Pain is temporary. It may last a minute, or an hour, or a day, or a year, but eventually it will subside and something else will take its place. If I quit, however, it lasts forever.
 
When cerebral processes enter into sports, you start screwing up.  It’s like the Constitution, which says separate church and state.  You have to separate mind and body.  ~Bill Lee
 
Don’t accept that others know you better than yourself. Work joyfully and peacefully, knowing that right thoughts and right efforts will inevitably bring about right results.
 
In order to hit a good golf shot at that moment in time when you’re standing over the ball, you must believe that golf short is the most important things in your life.
 
All a manager has to do is keep eleven players happy – the eleven in the reserves.  The first team are happy because they are in the first team.  ~Rodney Marsh, 1979
 
You’re still going to win with preparation and dedication and plain old desire. If you don’t have genuine desire, you won’t be dedicated enough to prepare properly.
 
I’m fanatical about sport:  there seems to me something almost religious about the fact that human beings can organise play, the spirit of play.  ~Simon Gray, 1995
 
Sport strips away personality, letting the white bone of character shine through.  Sport gives players an opportunity to know and test themselves.  ~Rita Mae Brown
 
You have to be able to center yourself, to let all of your emotions go.  Don’t ever forget that you play with your soul as well as your body.  ~Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
 
If you’ll not settle for anything less than your best, you will be amazed at what you can accomplish in your lives. Vince Lombardi (Hall of Fame Football Coach)
 
He has turned defensive boxing into a poetic art.  Trouble is, nobody ever knocked anybody out with a poem.  ~Eddie Shaw, referring to Herol “Bomber” Graham
 
It is all very well to say that a man should play for the pure love of the game.  Perhaps he ought, but to the working man it is impossible.  ~J.J. Bentley
 
I always turn to the sports section first.  The sports page records people’s accomplishments; the front page has nothing but man’s failures.  ~Earl Warren
 
Competition in its best form is a test of self. It has nothing to do with medals. The winner is the person who gets the most out of themselves. Al Oerter
 
Men forget everything; women remember everything.  That’s why men need instant replays in sports.  They’ve already forgotten what happened.  ~Rita Rudner
 
Cricket – a game which the English, not being a spiritual people, have invented in order to give themselves some conception of eternity.  ~Lord Mancroft
 
If only Hitler and Mussolini could have a good game of bowls once a week at Geneva, I feel that Europe would not be as troubled as it is.  ~R.G. Briscow
 
You’ve got to have the guts not be afraid to screw up. The guys who win are the ones who are not afraid to mess up. And that comes right from the heart.
 
The Russians have a weapon that can wipe out two hundred eighty thousand Americans.  That puts them exactly ten years behind Howard Cosell.  ~Red Smith
 
I know we’re meant to be these hard-headed, money-obsessed professionals but we’re still little boys at heart.  Just ask our wives.  ~Rob Lee, 1998
 
It’s like going into a nuclear war with bows and arrows.  ~Joe Kinnear, comparing finances and resources in high-dollar and low-dollar sports teams
 
Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear. Except a creature be part coward, it is not a compliment to say it is brave.
 
To dope the racer is as criminal, as sacrilegious, as trying to imitate God; it is stealing from God the privilege of the spark.  ~Roland Barthes
 
You are never really playing an opponent. You are playing yourself, your own highest standards, and when you reach your limits, that is real joy.
 
In the closing seconds of every game, I want the ball in my hands for the last shot – not in anybody else’s, not in anybody else’s in the world.
 
The pitcher has got only a ball. I’ve got a bat. So the percentage of weapons is in my favor and I let the fellow with the ball do the fretting.
 
You can motivate by fear, and you can motivate by reward. But both those methods are only temporary. The only lasting thing is self motivation.
 
October is not only a beautiful month but marks the precious yet fleeting overlap of hockey, baseball, basketball, and football.  ~Jason Love
 
I think you enjoy the game more if you don’t know the rules.  Anyway you’re on the same wavelength as the referees.  ~Jonathan Davies, 1995