Top 100 Mickey Mantle Quotes
#1. If you want to know who was better, me or Willie Mays, you have to look at our career stats. And Willie's bottom line was better.
Mickey Mantle
#2. Roger Maris was as good a man and as good a ballplayer as there ever was.
Mickey Mantle
#3. Not after all the time my dad spent teaching me to switch-hit.
Mickey Mantle
#4. When I first came to Yankee Stadium I used to feel like the ghosts of Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig were walking around in there.
Mickey Mantle
#5. Bravery is a complicated thing to describe. You can't say it's three feet long and two feet wide and that it weighs four hundred pounds or that it's colored bright blue or that it sounds like a piano or that it smells like roses. It's a quality, not a thing.
Mickey Mantle
#6. In 1960 when Pittsburgh beat us in the World Series, we outscored them 55-27. It was the only time I think the better team lost. I was so disappointed I cried on the plane ride home.
Mickey Mantle
#7. The biggest game I ever played in was probably Don Larsen's perfect game.
Mickey Mantle
#8. I've often wondered how a man who knew he was going to die could stand here and say he was the luckiest man on the face of the earth, but now I guess I know how he felt.
Mickey Mantle
#9. My biggest regret was letting my lifetime average drop below .300. I always felt I was a .300 hitter, and if I could change one thing that would be it.
Mickey Mantle
#10. If the World Series was on the line and I could pick one pitcher to pitch the game, I'd choose Whitey Ford every time.
Mickey Mantle
#11. You don't have to talk to me about pensions. I won't be around long enough to collect one.
Mickey Mantle
#13. The strain on Roger (Maris) was unbelievable. After I dropped out the reporters only had one guy to go to. They surrounded him everywhere he went. He had big clumps of hair falling out. That he went ahead and did it was unbelievable.
Mickey Mantle
#14. You hit .350 you're a leader. You hit .250 and you're not.
Mickey Mantle
#17. The best team I ever saw, and I really mean this, was the '61 Yankees.
Mickey Mantle
#18. I never got to see the '27 Yankees. Everyone says that was the greatest team ever. But I think it would've been a great series if we'd have had the chance to play them.
Mickey Mantle
#19. If I were playing today I'd do what Joe DiMaggio said. I'd go knock on the door at Yankee Stadium and when George Steinbrenner answered I'd say, 'Howdy, pardner.'
Mickey Mantle
#22. There were things that would irritate Casey, but trying too hard or getting mad at sitting on the bench weren't among them.
Mickey Mantle
#23. Sometimes I think if I had the same body and the same natural ability and someone else's brain, who knows how good a player I might have been.
Mickey Mantle
#24. You never have to wait long, or look far, to be reminded of how thin the line is between being a hero or a goat.
Mickey Mantle
#25. To play 18 years in Yankee Stadium is the best thing that could ever happen to a ballplayer.
Mickey Mantle
#26. After a play in the field Casey would turn (to the players on the bench) and say 'What did he do wrong?' or 'You're better than that guy.' Either way, he'd keep them from getting stale.
Mickey Mantle
#27. I leaned on him for support when I got out of the cab, and he just crumpled to the ground. That's how we found out.
Mickey Mantle
#29. Because the players knew that if Billy asked them to jump off a roof, he'd jump off with them.
Mickey Mantle
#30. I don't care what the situation was, how high the stakes were - the bases could be loaded and the pennant riding on every pitch, it never bothered Whitey. He pitched his game. Cool. Craft. Nerves of steel.
Mickey Mantle
#31. Those people don't know how tough that really was.
Mickey Mantle
#32. After I hit a home run I had a habit of running the bases with my head down. I figured the pitcher already felt bad enough without me showing him up rounding the bases.
Mickey Mantle
#33. Billy (Martin) was a great one for jokes. He liked to play a joke more than anyone I ever knew.
Mickey Mantle
#34. Heroes are people who are all good with no bad in them. That's the way I always saw Joe DiMaggio. He was beyond question one of the greatest players of the century.
Mickey Mantle
#35. I don't know why Roger (Maris) isn't in the hall of fame. To me, he was as good as there ever was.
Mickey Mantle
#36. The thing I really liked about Mickey was the way he treated everyone the same.
Mickey Mantle
#37. Somebody once asked me if I ever went up to the plate trying to hit a home run. I said "sure, every time".
Mickey Mantle
#39. Casey wanted us to stay loose. That didn't mean clowning around. He just meant we should be confident and relaxed. We shouldn't feel that one strikeout was going to end the season for us.
Mickey Mantle
#40. My dad taught me to switch-hit. He and my grandfather, who was left-handed, pitched to me every day after school in the back yard. I batted lefty against my dad and righty against my granddad.
Mickey Mantle
#41. Ralph (Houk) brought out the best in everybody, and that included me. I consider myself lucky to have played for him.
Mickey Mantle
#42. Today's Little Leaguers, and there are millions of them each year, pick up how to hit and throw and field just by watching games on TV. By the time they're out of high school, the good ones are almost ready to play professional ball.
Mickey Mantle
#43. He foresaw the platooning that managers like Casey Stengel used years before it happened. He told me I had to be a switch-hitter if I was going to play.
Mickey Mantle
#44. Don't do as I did. I'm living proof of how not to live.
Mickey Mantle
#45. Well, I beat my man. Now it's up to you to beat yours.
Mickey Mantle
#46. If I hadn't met those two guys (Billy Martin and Whitey Ford) at the start of my career, I would have lasted another five years.
Mickey Mantle
#47. A team is where a boy can prove his courage on his own. A gang is where a coward goes to hide.
Mickey Mantle
#48. He who has the fastest golf cart never has a bad lie.
Mickey Mantle
#49. Before you go, would you sign that case of balls for me?
Mickey Mantle
#50. I never understood how someone who was dying could say he was the luckiest man in the world, but now I understand.
Mickey Mantle
#51. As far as I'm concerned, Aaron is the best ball player of my era. He is to baseball of the last fifteen years what Joe DiMaggio was before him. He's never received the credit he's due.
Mickey Mantle
#52. A body came flying out and landed at my feet. At first I thought it was Billy so I picked him up. But when I saw it wasn't I dropped him back down.
Mickey Mantle
#53. The biggest thrill I ever had was in 1969, when they held day at Yankee Stadium.
Mickey Mantle
#54. The greatest thing I ever saw was Roger Maris breaking Babe Ruth's record.
Mickey Mantle
#56. We know you can bunt, Mick. You're not down here to bunt. You're here to get some hits and get your swing back.
Mickey Mantle
#57. You don't realize how easy this game is until you get up in that broadcasting booth.
Mickey Mantle
#59. He who have the fastest cart never have to play a bad lie.
Mickey Mantle
#60. You might as well go in and start getting dressed. I'm going to hit his first pitch for a home run.
Mickey Mantle
#61. I always loved the game, but when my legs weren't hurting it was a lot easier to love.
Mickey Mantle
#63. Hitting the ball was easy. Running around the bases was the tough part.
Mickey Mantle
#65. It gave me a second chance. I'd like everybody to have a second chance if they need it, so I'm trying to let people know how important it is to become an organ donor.
Mickey Mantle
#66. Every time I see his name (Dean Chance) on a lineup card, I feel like throwing up.
Mickey Mantle
#67. If I send the ball home, I know what will happen to it. My twin brothers will take it out on the lot, like any 20-cent rocket.
Mickey Mantle
#68. I hated to bat against Drysdale. After he hit you he'd come around, look at the bruise on your arm and say, 'Do you want me to sign it?'
Mickey Mantle
#69. If I had played my career hitting singles like Pete (Rose), I'd wear a dress.
Mickey Mantle
#70. All the ballparks and the big crowds have a certain mystique. You feel attached, permanently wedded to the sounds that ring out, to the fans chanting your name, even when there are only four or five thousand in the stands on a Wednesday afternoon.
Mickey Mantle
#72. They should have come out of the dugout on tippy-toes, holding hands and singing.
Mickey Mantle
#73. I expected him to say, 'Hang in there' or something like that. It took me an hour to talk him into giving me another chance!
Mickey Mantle
#75. It looked like Roy Rogers rode through on Trigger, and Trigger kicked the guy in the face.
Mickey Mantle
#76. People say Yogi (Berra) is a strange guy, and I've heard Yogi say some funny things. But he has a beautiful wife, he's rich, and he's famous. I don't see anything strange about that.
Mickey Mantle
#77. Of course, I didn't tell you about all the times I said I was going to hit one and it didn't happen.
Mickey Mantle
#78. Well, baseball was my whole life. Nothing's ever been as fun as baseball.
Mickey Mantle
#80. The only thing I can do is play baseball. I have to play ball. It's the only thing I know.
Mickey Mantle
#81. I'll play baseball for the Army or fight for it, whatever they want me to do.
Mickey Mantle
#82. I guess you could say I'm what this country is all about.
Mickey Mantle
#83. No man in the history of baseball had as much power as . No man.
Mickey Mantle
#84. After they remodeled Yankee Stadium I didn't feel that the ghosts were there anymore. It just wasn't the same.
Mickey Mantle
#85. Casey didn't easily forgive a guy who got doubled up on a hit-and-run play. He didn't see any reason why the runner couldn't take a quick glance back toward the plate to make sure the ball was hit safely.
Mickey Mantle
#86. I don't care who you are, you hear those boos.
Mickey Mantle
#87. I've heard about you. I've heard about you, too.
Mickey Mantle
#88. I could never be a manager. All I have is natural ability.
Mickey Mantle
#89. It's unbelievable how much you don't know about the game you've been playing all your life.
Mickey Mantle
#90. The hardest thing to do in sports, I think, is to hit a home run.
Mickey Mantle
#91. To get a better piece of chicken, you'd have to be a rooster.
Mickey Mantle
#92. I never saw him fight. I never saw Billy fight.
Mickey Mantle
#94. When I'm hitting, I'd play for nothing. When I'm not, any kind of money I receive makes me feel as if I'm stealing.
Mickey Mantle
#95. Stay away from drugs and alcohol. Listen to your moms and dads. In this great country of ours you do whatever you set your mind to. Make us proud of you.
Mickey Mantle
#96. This year I'd rather lead the league in home runs, runs batted in and hitting.
Mickey Mantle
#98. I thought I raised a ballplayer. You're nothing but a coward and a quitter.
Mickey Mantle
#99. His fielding leaves you wondering. Then he steps up to hit and all doubts start to fade.
Mickey Mantle
#100. He can run, steal bases, throw, hit for average, and hit with power like I've never seen. Just don't put him at shortstop.
Mickey Mantle
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