Every day is a new opportunity. You can build on yesterday’s success or put its failures behind and start over again. That’s the way life is, with a new game every day, and that’s the way baseball is.
I was only a gun captain on the battleship Alabama for 34 months. People have called me a hero for that, but I’ll tell you this – heroes don’t come home. Survivors come home.
I needed to join the Navy. If you ask the people in Europe who won World War II, they don’t say the Allies, they say the United States won the war and saved the world.
I would rather beat the Yankees regularly than pitch a no hit game.
Cooperstown is the greatest place on Earth.
If you believe your catcher is intelligent and you know that he has considerable experience, it is a good thing to leave the game almost entirely in his hands.
You figure they cheat at the ballpark, they’ll cheat on the golf course, they’ll cheat in business, and anything else in life. Players may laugh about it and say it’s funny, but right down in their heart, they don’t think it’s funny at all, and they have no respect for a person who cheats.
There was great leadership in this country at the time of World War II. There was also unrelenting resolve at home, in America’s factories and on the farms, in the cities and the country.
When I pick up the ball and it feels nice and light and small I know I’m going to have a good day. But if I picked it up and it’s big and heavy, I know I’m liable to get into a little trouble.