Quotes About The Players

#1. The players fire the coach, and as long as I'm on the same wavelength with them, I can coach as long as I want to.

Woody Hayes

#2. I think one of the most immoral things is college football and basketball, where everybody is making money except the players.

Frank Deford

#3. We don't condone it, but it happened. Is there a concern Yes, there is a concern. People are going to think what they think. But the reality is, I know the players we have, I know the character we have. We're recruiting the right people.

Larry Coker

#4. Baseball is not a conventional industry. It belongs neither to the players nor management, but to all of us. It is our national pastime, our national symbol, and our national treasure.

John Thorn

#5. The players who have reached out to me and told me about their sexual orientation, it just means a lot.

Michael Sam

#6. For a hundred years, the owners screwed the players. For 25 years, the players have screwed the owners-they've got 75 years to go.

Jim Bouton

#7. It is time for everyone to sit down - the NCAA, the NBA, the players union and the coaching fraternity - and come up with suitable solutions to these problems.

Dick Vitale

#8. No one ever sits you down at age eight and says, 'Aminatta, this is what's happened so far.' You have to work it out for yourself, and by the time you do, it's ancient history to many of the players. We're trying to make sense of the past, so we start to excavate our memories.

Aminatta Forna

#9. I feel that the All-Star game is more like a party because its made up of a lot of elements. However the core of All-Star is still the 48 minute-game and all the fans will pay all attention to the showcase of the players excellent skills. The result of the game is not much of a concern.

Yao Ming

#10. All the players looked absurdly inept, as though they were expressly drafted to be humiliated, entrepreneurs in the industry of losing.

Aleksandar Hemon

#11. But the citizens of Cincinnati loved their Reds because they won, no matter what their addresses had been the year before. They rooted for the Old-English 'C' on the players' shirts.

John Thorn

#12. I've always said the players don't build up rivalries themselves, people from the outside build up the rivalries. I just want to play good golf. I want to try and keep winning golf tournaments.

Rory McIlroy

#13. I regret the 1998 - 99 lockout. I regret that we didn't work harder to educate our players and our owners about what the damage would be. I never can quite come up with the answer on what else we should have done, but I always blame a part of the problem on us and some part on the players.

David Stern

#14. Ben [Peeler] and I have known each other for a decade. He trusts my crazy ideas and spontaneous combustion and he gets the players I want and knows the kind of personality players I like. He has taste that I trust and that to me is more important than any technical things.

Shelby Lynne

#15. It is hard to ignore that is reality. But, at the same time, it still comes down to sound baseball decisions, farm systems and then execution on the field by the players. There are a lot of components to that (other) than just saying it is the highest salary.

Alex Rodriguez

#16. You always study the players you go against. You try and stay ahead of it. Those guys are just too good to just show up on Sunday and think you're going to do well. Every week it seems like there's an all-star out there - to me, anyway. Every week is a rodeo. You just hope for the best.

Tom Ashworth

#17. I think the (brawl) made the league and the players more conscious of our responsibility to the public.

Joe Dumars

#18. But Rangers don't need to go there and win, they need to go there and get a point. I think the hardest thing about it is there will be no supporters. Playing in an empty ground will be a problem for the players.

Graham Roberts

#19. In my day, the players used to work their socks off. It's all changed now, obviously.

Gordon Smith

#20. Good things happen to a team when a player takes the place where he adds the most value. Great things happen when all the players on the team take the role that maximizes their strengths - their talent, skill, and experience.

John C. Maxwell

#21. Unfortunately, sometimes the fans forget who puts the money and passion into the club. It's funny, but when you win, it's the coach and the players who are responsible, but when you lose, it's the owner's fault; but that's football.

Andrea Della Valle

#22. Maybe I'm sort of like the players - there's still a lot of little boy in me.

Herb Brooks

#23. When the players think you are strong and that you trust them, it helps them to have a good attitude,

Jose Mourinho

#24. All the cameras shifted from the players to me.

Lesley Visser

#25. You don't have to be popular with the players to be a good manager or coach.

Francis Lee

#26. To this day, whenever I'm in Milwaukee, which is often, I'm reminded that the people there still haven't gotten over the Braves leaving ... If it helps, they should know the players haven't either.

Hank Aaron

#27. The players today reflect how much the game has evolved and changed both in style and culture. The game now has a wider appeal to a larger market.

Michael Jordan

#28. It's always good to have your players with you, it makes you feel great. That is just it. The coach and the players understand one another but people outside don't understand. But it's good to see him, it's good to see all the players.

Stephen Keshi

#29. Conspiracy theorists of the world, believers in the hidden hands of the Rothschilds and the Masons and the Illuminati, we skeptics owe you an apology. You were right. The players may be a little different, but your basic premise is correct: The world is a rigged game.

Matt Taibbi

#30. There's rule changes every year. I do wish, however, that the NFL did have a voice from the players' side, whether it's our players' union president, or team captains, or our executive committee on the players' side. Because we're the guys that realize the risk; we're the guys on the field.

Troy Polamalu

#31. When I was coaching with the Patriots, the players pulled a practical joke and I said, 'Do you think I'm Charlie the Tuna, like a sucker?' After that, they called me Tuna.

Bill Parcells

#32. We spend too much time recruiting and not enough time working with the players we have.

Alex Agase

#33. Tom Coughlin is great with the players and he is what you see with the media. He's a good guy and he's a fun guy, but at the same time he's a serious guy when it comes to winning and it comes to football.

Michael Strahan

#34. The fact that Slammin' Sammy couldn't win the Open made it all the more valuable for the players that did win. Gave it a special quality. I'd say a part of the sheen on that trophy comes from my sweat.

Sam Snead

#35. Do you know the nicest thing about looking at pictures of a 1950's baseball park? The only people wearing baseball caps are the players.

George Carlin

#36. Managers are never 100 percent in control. You're at the mercy of the players. When you're a player, you're driving. I'm the navigator. I hardly ever think about driving anymore, unless there's two out in the bottom of the ninth.

Dusty Baker

#37. I'm not buddy-buddy with the players. If they need a buddy, let them buy a dog.

Whitey Herzog

#38. The ball itself was for over a thousand people, about half of them game-players; the rest were mostly partners of the players, or officials, priests, officers and bureaucrats who

Iain M. Banks

#39. I just hope he doesn't frighten the players 'cos they're frigtened enough right now.

Roy Keane

#40. You need a lot of leaders, but a hockey team needs a voice, not only in the community, but more importantly between the coaching staff and the players. There are always ups and downs in a season; the captain is the guy players look to in those situations.

Joe Sakic

#41. When I arrived the players were talented, but did not obey the rules ... Once they understood what they needed to, they could express themselves.

Otto Rehhagel

#42. Many times the players get in there and it's just about as well as they could have done, and other times they get in there and they favorites and they don't win.

Ivan Lendl

#43. From the beginning, when something was wrong I've been saying: 'Dilly-ding, dilly-dong, wake up, wake up!' So on Christmas Day I bought for all the players and all the staff a little bell. It was just a joke.

Claudio Ranieri

#44. I feel that right from the start the players were prepared to experience catastrophic results with comments like: 'It's going to be tough and we are going to need time'.

Lilian Thuram

#45. There was nothing magical that the coaching staff did. This is about the players.

Bill Laimbeer

#46. Everyone talks about the forwards, the players when they are scoring goals. But sometimes I look for the complete player not just the players who score but those who can pass.

Pele

#47. My husband is so confident that when he watches sports on television, he thinks that if he concentrates he can help his team. If the team is in trouble, he coaches the players from our living room, and if they're really in trouble, I have to get off the phone in case they call him.

Rita Rudner

#48. It is good to be different, because difference is great; that's what this music is based on. But lose that energy between the audience and the players, and you have nothing.

Andrew Hill

#49. I dictate entirely how the team is prepared, and I am a hands-on coach; I love to be out there with the players taking the sessions.

Brendan Rodgers

#50. You and I are the players, God's our head coach, and we're all playing the biggest game of all.

Joe Gibbs

#51. The reports of racial episodes are disturbing. But the players' protest is exhilarating because it is the most high-profile example to date in a continuing revolution in which the athletes who drive the multibillion-dollar college sports machine have begun to use their visibility to demand change.

William C. Rhoden

#52. Yes, we've seen it all before. And yes, those who do not study history are condemned to repeat it. But no, the sky is not falling - baseball is such a great game that neither the owners nor the players can kill it. After some necessary carnage, market forces will prevail.

John Thorn

#53. On how to make the game more exciting - Eliminate the referees, raise the basket four feet, double the size of the basketball, limit the height of the players to 5 feet 9 inches, bring back the centre jump, allow taxi drivers in for free and allow the players to carry guns.

Al McGuire

#54. A leader may be the most knowledgeable person in the world, but if the players on his team cannot translate that knowledge into action, it means nothing.

Mike Krzyzewski

#55. Once I'm at the arena with the guys in the dressing room, and in the bus, and on the plane, I'm a player. And I sit in the back with the players and I play cards and try to take their money.

Mario Lemieux

#56. I like ice hockey, but it's a frustrating game to watch. It's hard to keep your eyes on both the puck and the players and too much time passes between scoring in hockey. There are usually more fights than there are points.

Andy Rooney

#57. For a lot of the players it was their first exposure to the Southern female - the most flagrant cheater in the mutual disarmament pact known as feminism. Lipstick! Hairdos! Submissiveness!

Michael Lewis

#58. If the players were armed with guns, there wouldn't be stadiums large enough to hold the crowds.

Irwin Shaw

#59. Everybody I talked to - from my friends to my family and some of the players - really gave me a lot of support from the start. And that certainly made me feel good about trying to come back and be one of the best again.

Mario Lemieux

#60. The best games are the ones that thrill the audience while the players thrill themselves.

Will Lawson

#61. Something goes wrong, I yell at them -'Fix it'- whether it's their fault or not. You can only really yell at the players you trust.

Bill Parcells

#62. As long as you don't criticise individual players in public, admonishing the team is fine, not a problem. We can all share in the blame: the manager, his staff, the players. Expressed properly, criticism can be an acceptance of collective responsibility. Under

Alex Ferguson

#63. People come to see the players. Nobody ever bought a ticket to see a manager.

Larry Goetz

#64. I don't like champagne, I don't smoke cigars, I haven't any real jewellery at all, apart from the 8 pieces of gold I picked up at Anfield, the most important relationship at a football club is not between the manager and the chairman, but the players and the fans.

John Toshack

#65. Our performance during this World Cup has not been enough to progress further and both myself and all the players regret that and are hurt by that more than people realise

David Beckham

#66. Award trophies, as opposed to letting the players define and claim their own. Ultimately, pay them to play so that their activity not only resembles work but is work.

John Thorn

#67. When I was younger, I had some close friends who always loved European football, and Real Madrid at that time were the dominant force. I remember family holidays when we used to go to Spain, and we'd bring back replica shirts of Real Madrid and pretend to be the players when we played in the park.

Gareth Bale

#68. If you work for Google or Apple, stock options give you a chance to share in the increasing value of the company. In the N.F.L., nothing like this happens; the players, though rich, are just working stiffs like the rest of us.

James Surowiecki

#69. The players are under so much duress, it's like duressic park out there!

Sid Waddell

#70. It's hard to be a clubhouse guy without being a great guy. I mean, the nature of the job is, you know, you're picking up dirty clothes and you're doing all the tasks that the players - that nobody else wants to do.

Terry Francona

#71. Why talk of the team when our Cricket Board is like an exclusive club with members being there for years on end? If they can stay on without performing, the players too feel they can stay in the team without too big a performance.

Sunil Gavaskar

#72. Keely's pulse quickened. A stab of apprehension. He was the same at any live performance, suddenly anxious for the players. So stupid; these people were professional muscicians. But the way his throat narrowed they could have all been kds at a school recital. His kids.

Tim Winton

#73. In 1981, when I went down to visit Georgia Tech, I watched Michael Jordan play and literally get ridiculed for taking a jump shot in the championship game that went off the backboard, and they won. People are forgetting that Michael was just one of the players when they went to the Dream Team.

John Salley

#74. Success in anything is about focus and concentration. When I coached, I'd say to the players, 'Yes, I know you played hard, but that's not good enough. You've got to stay focused on the task at hand the entire game.'

Rick Barry

#75. With the players Madden is definitely king and that's probably why it's been one of the top selling games all these years and will probably continue to be.

Michael Strahan

#76. I think the players win the championship, and the organization has something to do with it, don't get me wrong. But don't try to put the organization above the players.

Michael Jordan

#77. For the first time, we have the genetic sequences of all three of the players in the global malaria debacle: the parasite, the anopheles mosquito and the human. It's a very important milestone.

Anthony Fauci

#78. One of the main coaching points I've heard throughout my entire life is, 'How you respond to difficult situations defines your character,' and I think it's a good saying. I also think it applies to more than just the players.

Chris Kluwe

#79. I'll never forget that first night with the team. Going to the ballpark on the bus was the hardest 30 minutes of my life. I had to walk down that aisle between all the players. I really didn't know too much about the Detroit Tigers at that time.

Al Kaline

#80. I believe in the players and what I've put together and we'll make it work.

Isaiah Thomas

#81. In the theatre, because you're all looking at the same thing in the same space, consciousness is no longer individual. There is a unified consciousness. Until you look and project what is happening, it doesn't exist; the audience are the ones making the theatre, not the players.

Simon McBurney

#82. People will think there are no other great ballplayers. Look at Garnett. Look at Duncan, Shaq, Kobe. Look at the players with Sacramento. The have a really good basketball team.

Oscar Robertson

#83. I never really had a chance to know the players individually ... I thought when they were on the floor, they worked hard. But I never really got to know them.

Lenny Wilkens

#84. The speed will increase and the players will be better, but also the players around you will be a lot better. It all cancels itself out.

Robert Griffin III

#85. The players must be at the centre of their industry.

Rob Andrew

#86. Once the world sees this Synagogue of Satan as it really is and knows the players, they fear what will happen to them. The world will turn against them and that is happening now as we speak.

Louis Farrakhan

#87. Often it feels like we are at a home match when we have so many fans there. The singing, the cheering helps the players.
(on Chelsea playing on the road)

John Terry

#88. In some ways, I was a little bit surprised [by how dominant we were] but then I look at the players in our changing room and it doesn't surprise me because we've got quality in there. If we click and play well like we did in the first half, we can open up any team.

Rio Ferdinand

#89. Sometimes all the players get a bad hand. You just have to be determined enough to see the game through.

Dean F. Wilson

#90. But the equipment to protect the players hasn't developed along with that, so now you have more players out with worse injuries, for longer periods of time.

Leigh Steinberg

#91. The players in the promotion business today are, by and large, not in it for the art anymore. It's all about how many bucks can you make on a concert.

Sid Bernstein

#92. I will forgive if the players cannot get it right, but not if they do not try hard.

Pep Guardiola

#93. When I started to play football, when I was around 15, 16, I remember the players that played on the national team and noticed that it was only typically Swedish guys.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic

#94. It's going to be great. A lot of the players are coming. I wasn't here when they put (Jackson) up in the rafters. But to have him here as my number goes up, it brings back a lot of great memories.

Scottie Pippen

#95. The players are too serious. They don't have any fun any more. They come to camp with a financial adviser and they read the stock market page before the sports pages. They concern themselves with statistics rather than simply playing the game and enjoying it for what it is.

Rocky Bridges

#96. What is true of the NFL is that it has been well-managed over the years. And that has been beneficial to the fans, it's been beneficial to the game itself, it's been beneficial to the players, coaches and everyone involved.

Roger Goodell

#97. I'm not saying that they were Einsteins; they were marginal students. But every ballplayer whoever touched me has moved up his station in life. And the players moved up my station.

Al McGuire

#98. You learn from everybody. You learn from the players. You learn from great coaches. You learn from great teams

Tom Thibodeau

#99. Rugby is great. The players don't wear helmets or padding; they just beat the living daylights out of each other and then go for a beer. I love that.

Joe Theismann

#100. Rules do not determine outcomes - the players still have to make choices - but they make some outcomes more likely than others, by defining what it means to "win", and by creating incentives for and imposing constraints on the players.

Frances McCall Rosenbluth