Branch Rickey famous quotes

It is not the honor that you take with you, but the heritage you leave behind.
-- Branch Rickey

#Character #Honor #Heritage

Man may penetrate the outer reaches of the universe, he may solve the very secret of eternity itself but for me, the ultimate human experience is to witness the flawless execution of the hit-and-run.
-- Branch Rickey

#Running #Baseball #Men

Some day I'm going to have to stand before God, and if He asks me why I didn't let that [Jackie] Robinson fellow play ball, I don't think saying 'because of the color of his skin' would be a good enough answer.
-- Branch Rickey

#Baseball #Thinking #Color

The man with the ball is responsible for what happens to the ball.
-- Branch Rickey

#Men #Balls #He Man

If things don't come easy, there is no premium on effort. There should be joy in the chase, zest in the pursuit.
-- Branch Rickey

#Zest #Effort #Joy

Trade a player a year too early rather than a year too late.
-- Branch Rickey

#Player #Years #Too Late

A great ballplayer is a player who will take a chance.
-- Branch Rickey

#Player #Chance #Take A Chance

A full mind is an empty bat.
-- Branch Rickey

#Baseball #Mind #Bats

Success is that place in the road where preparation meets opportunity.
-- Branch Rickey

#Sports #Opportunity #Psychology

Problems are the price you pay for progress.
-- Branch Rickey

#Adversity #Progress #Pay

Don't look at the hole in the doughnut. Look at the whole doughnut.
-- Branch Rickey

#Looks #Holes #Doughnut

How to use your leisure time is the biggest problem of a ballplayer.
-- Branch Rickey

#Use #Leisure #Problem

He (Leo Durocher) had the ability of taking a bad situation and making it immediately worse.
-- Branch Rickey

#Ability #Situation

Baseball people, and that includes myself, are slow to change and accept new ideas. I remember that it took years to persuade them to put numbers on uniforms.
-- Branch Rickey

#Baseball #Years #Ideas

I don't like the subtle infiltration of 'something for nothing' philosophies into the very hearthstone of the American family. I believe that 'Thou shalt earn the bread by the sweat of thy face' was a benediction and not a penalty. Work is the zest of life; there is joy in its pursuit.
-- Branch Rickey

#Philosophy #Believe #Zest

Don't worry about your individual numbers. Worry about the team. If the team is successful, each of you will be successful, too.
-- Branch Rickey

#Motivational #Baseball #Team

Never surrender opportunity to security.
-- Branch Rickey

#Running #Opportunity #Surrender

Luck is a residue of design.
-- Branch Rickey

#Design #Luck

I cannot face my God much longer knowing that his black creatures are held separate and distinct from his white creatures in the game that has given me all that I can call my own.
-- Branch Rickey

#Games #White #Knowing

Things worthwhile generally don’t just happen. Luck is a fact, but should not be a factor. Good luck is what is left over after intelligence and effort have combined at their best. Negligence or indifference are usually reviewed from an unlucky seat. The law of cause and effect and causality both work the same with inexorable exactitudes. Luck is the residue of design.
-- Branch Rickey

#Good Luck #Law #Design

The world’s not so simple anymore, I guess it never was. We ignored it, now we can’t.
-- Branch Rickey

#Simple #World #Ignored

He's the best prospect I've ever seen.
-- Branch Rickey

#Baseball

Branch Rickey made me a better man.
-- Branch Rickey

#Men #Branches #Made

The greatest untapped reservoir of raw material in the history of our game is the black race.
-- Branch Rickey

#Race #Games #Black

Baseball people are generally allergic to new ideas; it took years to persuade them to put numbers on uniforms, and it is the hardest thing in the world to get Major League Baseball to change anything—even spikes on a new pair of shoes—but they will eventually...they are bound to.
-- Branch Rickey

#Baseball #Years #Shoes

First of all, a man, whether seeking achievement on the athletic field or in business, must want to win. He must feel that the thing he is doing is worthwhile; so worthwhile that he is willing to pay the price of success to attain distinction.
-- Branch Rickey

#Winning #Men #Entrepreneur

Luck is the residue of opportunity and design.
-- Branch Rickey

#Opportunity #Design #Luck

Thou shalt not steal. I mean defensively. On offense, indeed thou shall steal and thou must.
-- Branch Rickey

#Mean #Stealing #Offense

Thinking about the devil is worse than seeing the devil.
-- Branch Rickey

#Thinking #Devil

A game of great charm in the adoption of mathematical measurements to the timing of human movements, the exactitudes and adjustments of physical ability to hazardous chance. The speed of the legs, the dexterity of the body, the grace of the swing, the elusiveness of the slide - these are the features that make Americans everywhere forget the last syllable of a man's last name or the pigmentation of his skin.
-- Branch Rickey

#Baseball #Men #Swings

Fill in any figure you want for that boy (Mickey Mantle). Whatever the figure, it's a deal.
-- Branch Rickey

#Baseball #Boys #Want

I'm a man of some intelligence. I've had some education, passed the bar, practiced law. I've been a teacher and I deal with men of substance, statesman, business leaders, the clergy... So why do I spend my time arguing with Dizzy Dean?
-- Branch Rickey

#Baseball #Teacher #Men

Leisure is the handmaiden of the devil.
-- Branch Rickey

#Devil #Leisure

I find fault with my children because I like them and I want them to go places - uprightness and strength and courage and civil respect and anything that affects the probabilities of failure on the part of those that are closest to me, that concerns me - I find fault.
-- Branch Rickey

#Courage #Children #Want

Ethnic prejudice has no place in sports, and baseball must recognize that truth if it is to maintain stature as a national game.
-- Branch Rickey

#Sports #Baseball #Games

I am alarmed at the subtle invasion of professional football, which is gaining preeminence over baseball. It's unthinkable.
-- Branch Rickey

#Baseball #Football #Invasion

I did not mind the public criticism. That sort of thing has not changed any program I thought was good.
-- Branch Rickey

#Mind #Criticism #Program

I don't care if I was a ditch-digger at a dollar a day, I'd want to do my job better than the fellow next to me. I'd want to be the best at whatever I do.
-- Branch Rickey

#Jobs #Dollars #Care

It (a baseball box score) doesn't tell how big you are, what church you attend, what color you are, or how your father voted in the last election. It just tells what kind of baseball player you were on that particular day.
-- Branch Rickey

#Baseball #Father #Player

Only in baseball can a team player be a pure individualist first and a team player second, within the rules and spirit of the game.
-- Branch Rickey

#Baseball #Team #Player

There was never a man in the game who could put mind and muscle together quicker and with better judgment than (Jackie) Robinson.
-- Branch Rickey

#Men #Games #Mind

Baseball is a game of inches.
-- Branch Rickey

#Baseball #Games #Inches