Like Father…
Where do folks get off criticising my grammar? I only went up to the second grade, and if I’d gone up to the third, I’d have passed my Old Man.
Dizzy Dean
Dizzy Diet
Sure, I eat what I advertise. Sure, I eat Wheaties for breakfast. A good bowl of Wheaties with bourbon can’t be beat.
Dizzy Dean
Dizzyspeak
During a TV commentary: He slud into second.
After his grammar was faulted: What should I have said – sludded?
Dizzy Dean
Muckspreader
You could plant two thousand rows of corn with the fertiliser [Tommy] LaSorda spreads around.
Joe Garagiola, TV commentator
Beyond The Grave
If Casey Stengel were alive today, he’d be spinning in his grave.
Ralph Kiner
Welcome to Magic’s world. The following compilation provides a graphic and entertaining tour of the mind of some of the sport’s greatest artists – even the famed ‘dream team’. It is a guide or travelogue around the weird ways in which people pursue sporting pleasure. Packed in equal measure with invaluable information are useless trivia and rude comments, containing wry observations about everything and anything.
Prize and Prejudice
The trouble with referees is that they just don’t care which side wins.
Tom Canterbury, NBA player
High Flyer
If I were given a change of life, I’d like to see how it would be to live as a mere six-footer.
Wilt ‘The Stilt’ Chamberlain, Golden State Warriors/LA Lakers
Happy Birthdays
I’m six foot eleven. My birthday covers three days.
Darryl Dawkins, Philadelphia 76ers
Regrets
Sometimes you wake up in the morning and wish your parents had never met.
Bill Fitch, unsuccessful coach, during a losing run
An Honest Crook
I thought I was an honest guy, and just doing what everyone else was doing – bending the rules.
Manny Goldstein, University of New Mexico recruiter
Survival of the Fittest
Quick guys get tired; big guys don’t shrink.
Coach Marv Harshman on recruiting players from college
Family Ties
I didn’t hire Scott as assistant coach because he’s my son. I hired him because I’m married to his mother.
Frank Layden
Keeping Both Options Open
The free throw shot is both easy – and difficult.
Peter Mintoft
Mistaken Identity
I guess I know very little about music. I’ve just discovered Yoko Ono is a singer. I thought it was Japanese for ‘one egg please’.
Anon basketball player
Player Power
We have total discipline in the Lakers’ locker room. It’s ‘yes sir’ and ‘no sir’. ‘Yes sir, Kareem’. ‘No sir, Magic’.
Pat Riley, Lakers’ coach
Equality of the Sexes
Of course there should be women basketball referees. Incompetence should not be confined to one sex.
Bill Russell, sportswriter
Good Company
It’s better to eat caviar with two players than hot dogs with five.
Marcel Souza, sportswriter
Black Magic
He [Magic Johnson] should change his name from Magic to Mystifying.
Mychal Thompson, LA Lakers
Zoo
Basketball, a game which won’t be fit for people until they set the basket umbilicus-high and return the giraffes to the zoo.
Ogden Nash, poet and humourist
Card and board games have generated a highly enjoyable and varied selection of interesting, informative, intriguing, infuriating and occasionally just witty remarks. For some reason they attract exponents of renowned surrealism, comic genius and savage wit, offering a quirky insight into the sporting psyche as well as some riotous good laughs. The vintage comments range from the classical to the colloquial, from ancient philosophers to today’s stars of stage and screen.
Is There A Doctor In The House?
Never play cards with a man named Doc.
Nelson Algren
Outdoor Pursuits
I’m afraid I play no outdoor games at all, except dominoes. I have sometimes played dominoes outside a French cafe.
Oscar Wilde
Small Is Not Beautiful
I failed to make the chess team, because of my height.
Woody Allen
Blood Is Thicker Than Water
She leads away from aces and neglects to keep my jump bids alive. But she is still my mother.
Heywood Brown
Suspicious Minds
Trust everybody – but cut the cards.
Finley Peter Dunne
Unfair Advantage
A Smith and Wesson beats four aces.
Michael Enright
Exhaustion
Bridge I regard as only one degree better than absolutely vacuous conversation, which is certainly the most fatiguing thing in the world.
Arthur C. Benson
Waste
As elaborate a waste of human intelligence [chess] as you can find outside an advertising agency.
Raymond Chandler
Time Management
Chess is a foolish expedient for making idle people think they are doing something clever, when they are only wasting their time.
George Bernard Shaw
Nothing Compares 2U
Trying to stop [Bobby] Fischer in full flight is like trying to stop a runaway train with a butterfly net.
Liam Fowler
Love