Bob Gibson

"Robert, the scales must be balanced no matter how long it takes."

"When a hitter like Pete LaCock hits a grand slam off you, it’s time to hang them up."

"I’m proud of that fact that whatever I did, I did it my way."

"In a world filled with hate, prejudice and protest, I find that I too am filled with hate, prejudice and protest. I hate phonies. I am prejudiced against all those who have contempt for me because my face is black and all those who accept me only because of my ability to throw a baseball. I am not proud of that ability. It is not something I earned or acquired or bought. It is a gift."

"People make it sound like it was easy, like all I had to do was stare at a hitter or throw inside and they’d wilt. It wasn’t like that. It wasn’t easy. There wasn’t anything easy about it."

"Ive played a couple of hundred games of tic-tac-toe with my little daughter and she hasnt beaten me yet. Ive always had to win. Ive got to win."

"Is that all I did?...Hit batters? Is that really all they remember?...I wasn’t trying to intimidate anybody — are you kidding me? I was just trying to survive, man."

"I wasn’t mean. I don’t buy into any of it. You hear people talk about this glare that I had. You know, I’ve been wearing glasses for almost 60 years. I wasn’t glaring...I just couldn’t see the catcher’s signals. I was just trying to see. That’s all. But people turn everything into something else."

"People don’t know what it was like to be a young black pitcher in those days."

"Hank Aaron could hit God’s fastball."

"Gibson was so mean, he’d knock you down and then meet you at home plate to see if you wanted to make something of it."

"I remember one time going out to the mound to talk with Bob Gibson. He told me to get back behind the plate where I belonged and that the only thing I knew about pitching was that I couldn’t hit it."