"I don't have to hear that criticism, that idotic criticism anymore."
Basketball quotes
Basketball
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Basketball quotes (page 18 of 170)
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"The party's just getting started. This is where the fun starts."
"When people ask me what I miss most about the game, it's being in the locker room and getting to know the guys. Back in those days, we had roommates. We had to talk basketball and that was a great way to understand the game itself and form those lasting relationships."
"I just stopped liking basketball. And then you dribbling down the court and having the owner like cuss at you and call you an idiot. I didn't even look forward to coming to the games, and if the owner [Donald Sterling] came to the game, I definitely was not gonna have a good game because it was just like, how do you play when the main heckler in the gym is the owner of the team, and he's telling you how much he hates you and calling out your name?"
"Creativity can be learned like basketball, which does not mean we will all be NBA stars."
"I played baseball, and thats pretty much it. Basketball came late, this was, basketball was the sport that I tried to master, I kind of mastered baseball, so basketball was one of those things where I wanted to master this game, so thats why I probably play it the way I do."
"The function of football, soccer, basketball and other passion-sports in modern industrial society is the transference of boredom, frustration, anger and rage into socially acceptable forms of combat. A temporary substitute for war; for nationalism; identification with something bigger than the self."
"I'm no miracle man. I guarantee nothing but hard work."
"The biggest mistake coaches make is taking borderline cases and trying to save them. I'm not talking about grades now, I'm talking about character. I want to know before a boy enrolls about his home life, and what his parents want him to be."
"But it's still a coach's game. Make no mistake. You start at the top. If you don't have a good one at the top, you don't have a cut dog's chance."
"Don't talk too much. Don't pop off. Don't talk after the game until you cool off."
"Get the winners into the game."
"Don't overwork your squad. If you're going to make a mistake, under-work them."
"If we can take young people who excel at the highest levels, put them on the same kind of pedestal as the all-state basketball player and the all-state football player, and begin to get the same kind of recognition, it will have a profound effect, and we are finding that it does."
"I submit that tennis is the most beautiful sport there is, and also the most demanding....Basketball comes close, but it's a team sport and lacks tennis's primal mano a mano intensity. Boxing might come close- at least at the lighter weight divisions- but the actual physical damage the fighters inflict on each other makes it too concretely brutal to be really beautiful- a level of abstraction and formality (i.e., play) is necessary for a sport to possess true metaphysical beauty (in my opinion)."
"Any old coach will say the game was meant for finesse. It's a beautiful game, especially on television."
"The best way to build team chemistry is the way Rupp used to substitute, when they fouled out."
"People say it was the greatest individual rivalry they've ever seen. I agree with that. Let me assure you that if either Wilt's or Russ' coach had ever told one of them he couldn't guard the other guy, he would have lost that player forever."
"Teams want me to do something stupid. You want to get to the point where nothing affects you, where you control them."
"I'm going to be working on my shot. Working on extending my range. Keep working on everything, and really studying the game."