Babe Ruth Quotes

We've searched our database for all the quotes and captions related to Babe Ruth. Here they are! All 100 of them:

Every strike brings me closer to the next home run.
Babe Ruth
Never let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game
Babe Ruth
Heroes get remembered, but legends never die.
Babe Ruth
Never allow the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game!
Babe Ruth
You just can't beat the person who never gives up.
Babe Ruth
The way a team plays as a whole determines its success. You may have the greatest bunch of individual stars in the world, but if they don't play together, the club won't be worth a dime.
Babe Ruth
I have only one superstition. I touch all the bases when I hit a home run." -Babe Ruth
Babe Ruth
never let the fear of striking out get in your way.
Babe Ruth
Don't let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game.
Babe Ruth
You just can't beat the person who won't give up
Babe Ruth
It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up.
Babe Ruth
Even with the benefit of steroids most modern players still couldn't hit as many home runs as Babe Ruth hit on hotdogs.
Bill Bryson (One Summer: America, 1927)
In a whirlwind, Reagan quickly knocked off fifty more push-ups, flipped, and did thirty crunches, then turned and landed a kick that dented the metal door. "I'm feeling sick, too, and look at me. What if Babe Ruth had said 'Time to Rest'? Or Michael Phelps? Or Neil Armstrong? Come on, guys–what are we?" "Hungry," Natalie said. "Sleepy," Alistair added. "Grumpy," Fiske said. "Sneezy," Phoenix piped up. "Shot," Nellie said.
Peter Lerangis (The Dead of Night (The 39 Clues: Cahills vs. Vespers, #3))
It is hard to beat a person who never gives up.
Babe Ruth
Never let the fear of striking out, keep you from playing the game.
Babe Ruth (Babe Ruth's Own Book of Baseball)
Don't let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game
Babe Ruth
Over time, ink fades like a duck quack in the wind. I have a baseball signed by Babe Ruth, but his autograph has gone invisible. That’s why it’s now ON SALE for ONLY $19.95.
Jarod Kintz (Music is fluid, and my saxophone overflows when my ducks slosh in the sounds I make in elevators.)
Paris ain't much of a town.
Babe Ruth
Babe Ruth rose like a rocket.” Through discipline. He also loved to practice.
Carol S. Dweck (Mindset: How You Can Fulfil Your Potential)
In 1922 everything changed again. The Eskimo pie was invented; James Joyce's Ulysses was printed in Paris; snow fell on Mauna Loa, Hawaii; Babe Ruth signed a three-year contract with the New York Yankees; Eugene O'Neill was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Drama; Frederick Douglass's home was dedicated as a national shrine; former heavyweight champion of the world Jack Johnson invented the wrench...
Bernice L. McFadden (Glorious)
Yesterday's home runs don't win today's games.
Babe Ruth
Hey, manager... Some kid must have left his glove here... It has his name on it... See? Right here... Willie Mays... He wrote his name on his glove, see? Poor kid... He's probably been looking all over for it... We should have a lost and found. I don't know any kid around here named Willie Mays, do you? How are we gonna get it back to him? He was pretty smart putting his name on his glove this way, though... It's funny, I just don't remember any kid by that name..." "Look at your own glove." "What?" "Look at your own glove... There's a name on it..." "Babe Ruth... Well, I'll be! How in the world do you suppose I got her glove?!
Charles M. Schulz (The Complete Peanuts, Vol. 10: 1969–1970)
On September 7th, after the Cubs dropped Game Three, the two teams boarded the Michigan Central together to embark on the twenty-seven hour trip, and Babe Ruth got drunk and started stealing hats.
Dennis Lehane (The Given Day (Coughlin, #1))
Sometimes when I reflect on all the beer I drink, I feel ashamed. Then I look into the glass and think about the workers in the brewery and all of their hopes and dreams. If I didn't drink this beer, they might be out of work and their dreams would be shattered. I think, 'It is better to drink this beer and let their dreams come true than be selfish and worry about my liver.
Babe Ruth
Baseball was, is and always will be to me the best game in the world.
Babe Ruth
The Gotham boys have a first baseman, Louis Gehrig, who is called the ‘Babe Ruth’ of the high schools,” wrote the Chicago Tribune.
Jonathan Eig (Luckiest Man: The Life and Death of Lou Gehrig)
Baseball has traditionally possessed a wonderful lack of seriousness. The game's best player, Babe Ruth, was a Rabelaisian fat man, and its most loved manager, Casey Stengel, spoke gibberish. In this lazy sport, only the pitcher pours sweat. Then he takes three days off.
Thomas Boswell (Why Time Begins on Opening Day)
Not even much survives as memory. Many of the most notable names of the summer—Richard Byrd, Sacco and Vanzetti, Gene Tunney, even Charles Lindbergh—are rarely encountered now, and most of the others are never heard at all. So it is perhaps worth pausing for a moment to remember just some of the things that happened that summer: Babe Ruth hit sixty home runs. The Federal Reserve made the mistake that precipitated the stock market crash. Al Capone enjoyed his last summer of eminence. The Jazz Singer was filmed. Television was created. Radio came of age. Sacco and Vanzetti were executed. President Coolidge chose not to run. Work began on Mount Rushmore. The Mississippi flooded as it never had before. A madman in Michigan blew up a school and killed forty-four people in the worst slaughter of children in American history. Henry Ford stopped making the Model T and promised to stop insulting Jews. And a kid from Minnesota flew across an ocean and captivated the planet in a way it had never been captivated before. Whatever else it was, it was one hell of a summer.
Bill Bryson (One Summer: America, 1927)
Babe Ruth is remembered for his record 714 homers, not his 1330 strikeouts, which was also a record! When everything in life is over and done with, no one will remember your failures, just your successes. And neither will you.
Richard Fenton (Go for No! Yes is the Destination, No is How You Get There)
You never stop to think how the history of whiteness in America is one long scroll of affirmative action. You never stop to think that Babe Ruth never had to play the greatest players of his generation - just the greatest white players. You never stop to think that most of our presidents never rose to the top because they bested the competition - just the white competition. White privilege is a self-selecting tool that keeps you from having to compete with the best. The history of white folk gaining access to Harvard, Princeton, or Yale is the history of white folk deciding ahead of the game that you were superior. You argue that slots in school should be reserved for your kin, because, after all, they are smarter, more disciplined, better suited, and more deserving that inferior blacks.
Michael Eric Dyson (Tears We Cannot Stop: A Sermon to White America)
It’s hard to beat a person that never gives up.
Babe Ruth
Out popped Paul Duffy, in plain clothes except for a state police windbreaker and a badge clipped to his belt. He looked at me - I think by now I had dropped the bat to my side, at least, though I must have looked ridiculous anyway - and he raised his eyebrows. 'Get back in the house, Babe Ruth.
William Landay (Defending Jacob)
Don't let the fear of striking out hold you back
Babe Ruth
It is hard to beat someone who never gives up.
Babe Ruth
Its harder to beat a person that never gives up.
Babe Ruth
Even the legendary Babe Ruth batted “only” .342. You can’t hit every ball that comes your way, and neither can anyone else.
Valerie Young (The Secret Thoughts of Successful Women: And Men: Why Capable People Suffer from Impostor Syndrome and How to Thrive In Spite of It)
Never let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game” -Babe Ruth
Amy Terveer-Manwarren (The Fear of Striking Out)
Never let the fear of striking out get in your way. Babe Ruth
Michael W. Covel (Trend Following: How to Make a Fortune in Bull, Bear, and Black Swan Markets (Wiley Trading))
Yesterday’s home runs don’t win today’s games. —Babe Ruth
Kim Zoller (16 Communication Secrets)
Baseball is known for superstitious players and cursed teams—and at the root of every curse there’s a story. Boston’s curse was to trade Babe Ruth to the Yankees. Cubs fans claim a billy goat is responsible for their futility. And Cleveland’s curse? The club struggled after its Pennant-winning 1954 season, but it was rich with optimism just two years later as an onslaught of new talent promised to lift the club once more to the ranks of baseball’s elite—and by 1959 the club was contending for the Pennant again. And then GM Frank Lane traded Rocky Colavito to the Detroit Tigers and cursed everything.
Tucker Elliot
trade and wealth creation is not all upside. It is failure, too. Failure is a necessary component to growth and success. Babe Ruth struck out 1,330 times but also hit 714 home runs. We need to let failing entities fail. Only then will successful people turn these enterprises back into wealth-creating vehicles again. “Too big to fail” is a concept that perpetuates failure and saps vitality from the rest of the wealth creators to do so.
Ziad K. Abdelnour
Anyone who knows baseball knows Ted Williams. He played professionally from 1939 to 1960 and is one of the undisputed greatest hitters of all time, right up there with Babe Ruth. But whether you’re familiar with him or not, I have news for you: Ted Williams never played baseball. Nope, he never did. The problem there is the verb: Williams wasn’t playing. To him, hitting a baseball wasn’t a game. He always took it very, very seriously. In a 1988 interview he said as a child he literally wished on a falling star that he would become the greatest hitter to ever live. But he didn’t sit around and wait for the dream to come true. His obsessive, perfectionist work ethic would bring him more success than any descending celestial body would. Williams said, “I . . . insist that regardless of physical assets, I would never have gained a headline for hitting if I [had not] kept everlastingly at it and thought of nothing else the year round . . . I only lived for my next time at bat.” Ten thousand hours to achieve expertise? Williams probably did that a few times over. He was obsessed. After school, he’d go to a local field and practice hitting until nine P.M., only stopping because that’s when they turned the lights out. Then he’d go home and practice in the backyard until his parents made him go to bed. He’d get to school early so he could fit in more swings before classes started. He’d bring his bat to class. He picked courses that had less homework, not because he was lazy but so he’d have more time for hitting.
Eric Barker (Barking Up the Wrong Tree: The Surprising Science Behind Why Everything You Know About Success Is (Mostly) Wrong)
pretty soon Lou Gehrig was poling them high, wide and handsome over the college fences. He hit seven home runs in one season, one of them the longest ever seen at South Field, and batted over .540. And he won himself a new name. They called him the “Babe Ruth of Columbia.
Paul Gallico (Lou Gehrig: Pride of the Yankees)
The ballpark is the star. In the age of Tris Speaker and Babe Ruth, the era of Jimmie Foxx and Ted Williams, through the empty-seats epoch of Don Buddin and Willie Tasby and unto the decades of Carl Yastrzemski and Jim Rice, the ballpark is the star. A crazy-quilt violation of city planning principles, an irregular pile of architecture, a menace to marketing consultants, Fenway Park works. It works as a symbol of New England's pride, as a repository of evergreen hopes, as a tabernacle of lost innocence. It works as a place to watch baseball
Martin F. Nolan
In the 1990s, many baseball players suddenly became immensely strong—some evolved whole new body shapes—and began to smack home runs in quantities that made a mockery of Ruth’s and Maris’s numbers. It turned out that a great many of this new generation of ballplayers—something in the region of 5 to 7 percent, according to random drug tests introduced, very belatedly, in 2003—were taking anabolic steroids. The use of drugs as an aid to hitting is far beyond the scope of this book, so let us just note in passing that even with the benefit of steroids most modern players still couldn’t hit as many home runs as Babe Ruth hit on hot dogs.
Bill Bryson (One Summer: America, 1927)
Never let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game...
Babe Ruth
It wasn’t until 1959 that the Red Sox finally joined the rest of the major leagues and brought up a black player from the minors to play in Boston. This tardiness on race and its lingering effects put the team at a competitive disadvantage for years and was far more responsible for the extended World Series drought in Boston than the 1919 sale of Babe Ruth to the Yankees—the so-called Curse of the Bambino. As
Ben Bradlee Jr. (The Kid: The Immortal Life of Ted Williams)
He turned on to the track and wondered why no birds were singing. The only sound he could hear was the buzz and rattle of a drill, which he assumed to be the farmer doing something to a fence. It was, in fact, a woodpecker whose presence would have thrilled him had he known what it was.
Ruth Rendell (The Babes In The Wood (Inspector Wexford #19))
But St. Mary's was still a prison. Those boys who entered with reasonably secure psyches might receive some valuable training and survive well enough. But for the others -- the neglected, sick, half-wild incorrigibles who had been thrown in as a last resort -- it represented nothing less than a death camp of the spirit. If you could meet them halfway, the brothers probably wouldn't hurt you, and conceivably might help. But if you were unable to meet them halfway -- if you didn't even know where halfway was or how to get there -- only a miracle could allow you to emerge a whole person.
Ken Sobol (Babe Ruth & the American dream)
Now, I have to tell you, this reminds me of a story. Actually, it’s an old baseball story. You see, one day, old Lucifer down there from his headquarters called St. Peter in Heaven, said they wanted to challenge him to a baseball game. And St. Peter said, “Sure, let’s play. But to be fair, I have to tell you all the great ones are up here. We’ve got Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Satchel Paige, Roberto Clemente. We’ve got all the best players, and our manager is the legendary Connie Mack. You won’t have a chance.” Well, old Lucifer says, “That doesn’t matter, we’ll win anyway.” And St. Peter says, “How do you expect to do that?” “Well,” he says, “simple, we’ve got all the umpires.” Luncheon for Representative Connie Mack Miami, Florida June 29, 1988
Malcolm Kushner (The Humor of Ronald Reagan: Quips, Jokes and Anecdotes From the Great Communicator)
Besides having baseball and success in common they also had Claire Merritt Hodgson, a Georgia native and a Ziegfeld Follies girl who was Ruth’s second wife. In her autobiography, The Babe and I, Mrs. Ruth said she had known Cobb “very well” as a teenager back in Athens, before he married Charlie, and for what it may be worth, Al Stump, in his second book on Cobb, suggests they were young lovers.
Charles Leerhsen (Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty)
Rewriting the baseball record book must be very fulfilling. Or maybe not. Yankees outfielder Roger Maris knew firsthand the fickle nature of success. After an MVP season in 1960—when he hit 39 homers and drove in a league-high 112 runs—Maris began a historic assault on one of baseball’s most imposing records: Babe Ruth’s single-season home run mark of 60. In the thirty-three seasons since the Bambino had set the standard, only a handful of players had come close when Jimmie Foxx in 1932 and Hank Greenberg in 1938 each hit 58. Hack Wilson, in 1930, slammed 56. But in 1961, Maris—playing in “The House That Ruth Built”—launched 61 home runs to surpass baseball’s most legendary slugger. Surprisingly, the achievement angered fans who seemed to feel Maris lacked the appropriate credentials to unseat Ruth. Some record books reminded readers that the native Minnesotan had accomplished his feat in a season eight games longer than Ruth’s. Major League Baseball, due to expansion, changed the traditional 154-game season to 162 games with the 1961 season. Of the new home run record, Maris said, “All it ever brought me was trouble.” Human achievements can be that way. Apart from God, the things we most desire can become empty and unfulfilling—even frustrating—as the writer of Ecclesiastes noted. “Whoever loves money never has enough; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with their income,” he wrote (5:10). “Everyone’s toil is for their mouth,” he added, “yet their appetite is never satisfied” (6:7). But the Bible also shows where real satisfaction is found, in what Ecclesiastes calls “the conclusion of the matter.” Fulfillment comes to those who “fear God and keep his commandments” (12:13).
Paul Kent (Playing with Purpose: Baseball Devotions: 180 Spiritual Truths Drawn from the Great Game of Baseball)
One had to be more discerning in recognizing other Yankees players. And a program would have been of little help. In 1923, the Yankee uniforms were blank on the back. The team did not introduce uniform numbers until 1929; Ruth was given No. 3 because he batted third in the lineup and Gehrig was given No. 4 because he batted fourth. In 1923, the Yankees did not even have their famous interlocking N and Y on the left breast of their uniforms. The only similarity of those Yankees home uniforms with those of later years were the pinstripes.
Tony Castro (Gehrig and the Babe: The Friendship and the Feud)
I that in heill was and gladnèss Am trublit now with great sickness And feblit with infirmitie:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. Our plesance here is all vain glory, This fals world is but transitory, The flesh is bruckle, the Feynd is slee:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. The state of man does change and vary, Now sound, now sick, now blyth, now sary, Now dansand mirry, now like to die:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. No state in Erd here standis sicker; As with the wynd wavis the wicker So wannis this world's vanitie:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. Unto the Death gois all Estatis, Princis, Prelatis, and Potestatis, Baith rich and poor of all degree:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. He takis the knichtis in to the field Enarmit under helm and scheild; Victor he is at all mellie:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. That strong unmerciful tyrand Takis, on the motheris breast sowkand, The babe full of benignitie:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. He takis the campion in the stour, The captain closit in the tour, The lady in bour full of bewtie:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. He spairis no lord for his piscence, Na clerk for his intelligence; His awful straik may no man flee:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. Art-magicianis and astrologgis, Rethoris, logicianis, and theologgis, Them helpis no conclusionis slee:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. In medecine the most practicianis, Leechis, surrigianis, and physicianis, Themself from Death may not supplee:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. I see that makaris amang the lave Playis here their padyanis, syne gois to grave; Sparit is nocht their facultie:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. He has done petuously devour The noble Chaucer, of makaris flour, The Monk of Bury, and Gower, all three:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. The good Sir Hew of Eglintoun, Ettrick, Heriot, and Wintoun, He has tane out of this cuntrie:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. That scorpion fell has done infeck Maister John Clerk, and James Afflek, Fra ballat-making and tragedie:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. Holland and Barbour he has berevit; Alas! that he not with us levit Sir Mungo Lockart of the Lee:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. Clerk of Tranent eke he has tane, That made the anteris of Gawaine; Sir Gilbert Hay endit has he:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. He has Blind Harry and Sandy Traill Slain with his schour of mortal hail, Quhilk Patrick Johnstoun might nought flee:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. He has reft Merseir his endite, That did in luve so lively write, So short, so quick, of sentence hie:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. He has tane Rowll of Aberdene, And gentill Rowll of Corstorphine; Two better fallowis did no man see:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. In Dunfermline he has tane Broun With Maister Robert Henrysoun; Sir John the Ross enbrast has he:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. And he has now tane, last of a, Good gentil Stobo and Quintin Shaw, Of quhom all wichtis hes pitie:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. Good Maister Walter Kennedy In point of Death lies verily; Great ruth it were that so suld be:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. Sen he has all my brether tane, He will naught let me live alane; Of force I man his next prey be:- Timor Mortis conturbat me. Since for the Death remeid is none, Best is that we for Death dispone, After our death that live may we:- Timor Mortis conturbat me
William Dunbar (Poems)
Ruth said, “It isn’t right to call me or any ballplayer an ingrate because we ask for more money. Sure I want more, all I’m entitled to. The time of a ballplayer is short. He must get his money in a few years or lose out. Listen, a man who works for another man is not going to be paid any more than he’s worth. You can bet on that. A man ought to get all he can earn. A man who knows he’s making money for other people ought to get some of the profit he brings in. Don’t make any difference if it’s baseball or a bank or a vaudeville show. It’s business, I tell you. There ain’t no sentiment to it. Forget that stuff.
Robert W. Creamer (Babe: The Legend Comes to Life)
FORGIVENESS The political score from four scores ago doesn't matter to anyone anymore. So why are we still keeping a tally of all the scores? If we are not applying the lessons to be gained from yesterday's history to address the problems of today - then why does any of it matter? Does Babe Ruth's baseball score from 1917 matter to us today? No. Does it matter that Gandhi bickered with his wife, or that Lincoln got into a brawl over Sally at a bar? No. Then why do tribal matches that happened thousands of years ago still mean so much to us today? To keep us from moving forward? To remind us of our racial differences and indifference? To revive tribal bitterness? And what father or God would want his children to keep a record of every argument they have ever had with each other - if there is nothing positive - only harm - to be gained by constantly reminding them? Would a wise man steer his followers to hold onto past hurts - or to squeeze them for every drop of wisdom that could be gained from them - then release them? Isn't forgiveness a holy virtue? And if so, then why do we insist on keeping historical records of resentment? Is the Creator an advocate of love or hate? And if love, then why are we still pushing so much hatred? What is there ever to be gained from vocalizing hatred? Only MORE hatred. Who wants that? And why?
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
Yes, my friends, your hunger for history is still pretty segregated. Your knowledge of America often ends at the color line. You end up erasing the black story as the American story, black history as American history. You certainly have an insatiable thirst for history, but only if that history justifies whiteness. Most black folk can’t help but notice what many whites rarely wish, or are compelled, to see: you embrace history as your faithful flame when she kisses you, and yet you spurn her as a cheating mate when she nods or winks at others. You love history when it’s yet another book about, say, the Founding Fathers. No amount of minutia is too tedious. No new fact is too obscure to report. The curiosity about presidents is nearly inexhaustible. History is a friend to white America when it celebrates the glories of American exceptionalism, the beauty of American invention, the genius of the American soul. History is unrestrained bliss when it sings Walt Whitman’s body electric or touts the lyrical vision of the Transcendentalists. History that swings at the plate with Babe Ruth or slides into home with Joe DiMaggio is the American pastime at its best. History hovers low in solemn regard for the men who gave up the ghost at Appomattox and speaks with quiet reverence for the Confederate flags that gleefully waved to secession. Of course all of you don’t sing from the same hymnal. But American history, the collective force of white identity that picks up velocity across the centuries, mouths every note.
Michael Eric Dyson (Tears We Cannot Stop: A Sermon to White America)
I was a kid in Florida, in Sarasota, and the New York Giants trained in Sarasota. When teams would come, we’d stand outside the ballpark, and we would get the balls they hit over the fence during batting practice. We’d sell them to the tourists. And we made a stepladder so we could climb a pine tree out there. That way we could look into the ballpark. The Yanks were in town. I’m out there behind the fence, and I hear this sound. I’d never heard THAT sound off the bat before. Instead of me running to get the ball, I ran up the ladder to see who was hitting it. Well, it was a barrel-chested sucker, with skinny legs, with the best swing I’d ever seen. That was Babe Ruth hitting that ball. Yeah. I don’t hear that sound again until 1938, I’m with the Monarchs, we’re at Griffith Stadium in Washington D.C. We’re upstairs, changing clothes, and the Grays are taking batting practice. I’ve got nothing on but my jock. And I hear that sound. I ran down the runway, ran out on the field, and there’s a pretty black sucker with a big chest and about 34 in the waist, prettiest man I’d ever seen. That was Josh Gibson hitting that ball. And I don’t hear the sound again until I’m a scout with the Cubs. I’m scouting the Royals. When I opened the door to go downstairs, I heard that sound again. I rushed down on the field, and here’s another pretty black sucker hitting that ball. That was Bo Jackson. That’s three times I heard the sound. Three times. But I want to hear it a fourth. I go to the ballpark every day. I want to hear that sound again.
Buck O’Neil
The bartender put a couple of fistfuls of ice chunks into a big, thick mixing glass and then proceeded to make a Tom Collins that had so much gin in it that the other people at the bar started to laugh. He served the drink to the Babe just as it was made, right in the mixing glass. Ruth said something about how heavens to Betsy hot he was, and then he picked up the glass and opened his mouth, and there went everything. In one shot he swallowed the drink, the orange slice and the rest of the garbage, and the ice chunks too. He stopped for nothing. There is not a single man I have ever seen in a saloon who does not bring his teeth together a little bit and stop those ice chunks from going in. A man has to have a pipe the size of a trombone to take ice in one shot. But I saw Ruth do it, and whenever somebody tells me about how the Babe used to drink and eat when he was playing ball, I believe every word of it.
Jimmy Breslin (Can't Anybody Here Play This Game?: The Improbable Saga of the New York Mets' First Year)
Every Strike is one step closer to a Home Run
Babe Ruth
It took me seventeen years to get 3,000 hits in baseball. I did it in one afternoon on the golf course.” —George Herman “Babe” Ruth
Anonymous
America’s game. It has the snap, go, fling of the American atmosphere. It belongs as much to our institutions, fits into them as significantly as our Constitution’s laws, is just as important in the sum total of our historic life.” Baseball is, to be sure, an American cultural declaration of independence. It has come to express the nation’s character—perhaps never more so than during the years immediately after a scandal threatened to ruin the integrity of the game. That time ushered in a preoccupation with defining the national conscience, and particularly defining the national identity, which Babe Ruth came to symbolize.
Tony Castro (Gehrig and the Babe: The Friendship and the Feud)
All in all, a boy with more than the average share of problems, probably destined to end up no different than his father, or in jail, or in some other kind of trouble. The first time a cop crossed him, or a bookie demanded his money, or he was bounced from a job, would be the beginning of the end. There were kids like him in gutters and jail cells all around the country.
Ken Sobol
Ruth had three more games to outdo himself. Number fifty-seven was a grand slam off Lefty Grove in Philadelphia. Numbers fifty-eight and fifty-nine came at home against the Washington Senators. The record-tying home run—a grand slam!—came off a rookie pitcher, Paul Hopkins, making his major-league debut. His catcher told him to throw only curves, so that’s what he did. The one Ruth hit, Hopkins told Sports Illustrated in 1998, was “so slow Ruth started to swing and then hesitated, hitched on it and brought the bat back. And then he swung, breaking his wrists as he came through it. What a great eye he had! He hit it at the right second. Put everything behind it.
Jane Leavy (The Big Fella: Babe Ruth and the World He Created)
The Yankees handed out numbers based upon a player’s spot in the batting order, which is how Babe Ruth acquired the number 3. His teammate, Lou Gehrig, hit cleanup, and his number, 4, became the first ever retired by any team on July 4, 1939, the day he called himself “the luckiest man on the face of the earth.
Mike Greenberg (Got Your Number: The Greatest Sports Legends and the Numbers They Own)
He looked at her for a beat, then said, “Why do I need to introduce you? I don’t introduce you to anyone else.” She whined about him being rude. “All right, you want an introduction? You got it.” He smiled, then said, “Babe, this is one of my slides, Joy. Joy, this is my soon-to-be girl, and if I’m foreseeing the future correctly, she’s going to be my wife. Ruth, don’t worry about her because, by the time that you’re mine, she’ll be long gone.
Mel Dau (Mega Man)
He had a reasonable job as an actuary (whatever that was),
Ruth Rendell (The Babes In The Wood (Inspector Wexford #19))
He and Helen spent the rest of the winter there, seeing friends and promoting his cigars. He staged one stunt in which he smoked three cigars at one time.
Wilborn Hampton (Babe Ruth (Up Close))
that Ruth’s power as a player was gone. He was thirty-nine years old and his hard living had caught up with him.
Wilborn Hampton (Babe Ruth (Up Close))
The Baby Ruth candy bar debuted in 1921, and even today the origin of the name remains in dispute. The Chicago-based Curtiss Candy Co. insisted that it named the bar after President Grover Cleveland’s daughter Ruth. But some historians find it odd that a company would name a new candy after a girl who had died 17 years earlier. They also find it mighty suspicious that the candy’s name was similar to that of baseball star Babe Ruth, who never collected royalties and was prevented from selling his own Babe Ruth Home Run Bar because of a Curtiss lawsuit.
Mark Jacob (10 Things You Might Not Know About Nearly Everything)
In great deeds, something abides. On great fields, something stays. Forms change and pass; bodies disappear; but spirits linger, to consecrate ground for the vision-place of souls. And reverent men and women from afar, and generations that know us not and that we know not of, heart-drawn to see where and by whom great things were suffered and done for them, shall come to this deathless field, to ponder and dream; and lo! the shadow of a mighty presence shall wrap them in its bosom, and the power of the vision pass into their souls. —JOSHUA CHAMBERLAIN, “Dedication of the Maine Monuments,” Gettysburg, October 3, 1889.
Tom Swyers (Saving Babe Ruth (Lawyer David Thompson #.5))
I developed an interest in major league baseball and the 1960s were, as far as I’m concerned (with a nod to the Babe Ruth era of the 1920s), the Golden Age of Baseball. Like most people in the valley, I was a diehard Yankees fan and, in a pinch, a Mets fan. They were New York teams, and most New Englanders rooted for the Boston Red Sox, but our end of Connecticut was geographically and culturally closer to New York than Boston, and that’s where our loyalties went. And what was not to love? The Yankees ruled the earth in those days. The great Roger Maris set one Major League record after another and even he was almost always one hit shy of Mickey Mantle, God on High of the Green Diamond.
John William Tuohy (No Time to Say Goodbye: A Memoir of a Life in Foster Care)
Why did an entire country fall in love, go gaga over him?
Leigh Montville (The Big Bam: The Life and Times of Babe Ruth)
America had become an ice cream society in the last years of the twenties, thanks in large part to Prohibition. Bars and fine lounges in hotels sold ice cream, because they could no longer sell liquor, and dairy bars began to crop up all over the country. It was an incredible era. The straitlaced Cal Coolidge, who assured the nation that his fiscal probity had brought prosperity here to stay, moved the White House to the Black Hills of South Dakota for the summer and celebrated the Fourth of July by parading around in a cowboy costume. Babe Ruth signed a three-year contract with the Yankees for the stupefying figure of $70,000 a year. Lindbergh flew nonstop from New York to Paris. Al Jolson sang in the first talking pictures. And—wonder of wonders—in 1929 the Chicago Cubs won the National League pennant! Big
Ray Kroc (Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald's)
Principle #7: Embrace Adversity and Struggle: Strengthen Your Achievement Muscles Who ever came up with the expression, “Get it right the first time?” Who ever gets it right the first time? In fact, we’re not supposed to get it right the first time. Thomas Edison failed nearly 10,000 times trying to invent the lightbulb. Walt Disney was turned down hundreds of times in his attempts to finance Disneyland. Babe Ruth struck out twice as many times as he hit home runs. Babies don’t walk the first time they try.
Jay A. Block (101 Best Ways to Land a Job in Troubled Times)
Babe Ruth said, “Every strike out gets me closer to the home run.
Mark A. Sephton (Inside Job)
home. Recognizing him, she said this before he
Ruth Rendell (The Babes In The Wood (Inspector Wexford #19))
Babe-Ruth raised her family with everything but money
Orzie Henderson Jr.
    5.  Unfair to Animals                    6.  Unfair to Muledom THE HALF-PENNANT PORCH Finley was obsessed with the Yankees and attributed their success to the short distance to the right field fence in Yankee Stadium. He believed sluggers who batted left-handed, like Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, and Roger Maris, had an unfair advantage. The fence was the sole reason the Yankees were winners. Before the 1964 season, Finley sought to create his own advantage. He moved his right field fence so that it was 296 feet from home plate and called it his “Pennant Porch.” The commissioner forced Finley to change it to 325 feet.
Josh Ostergaard (The Devil's Snake Curve: A Fan's Notes from Left Field)
Baseball,” he said. “Babe Ruth.” Dixie Clay saw now that the boy wore a satchel honeycombed with rolled newspapers. The world was still going on, was it.
Tom Franklin (The Tilted World)
If we are not applying the lessons to be gained from yesterday's history to address the problems of today - then why does any of it matter? Does Babe Ruth's baseball score from 1917 matter to us today? No. Does it matter that Gandhi bickered with his wife, or that Lincoln got into a brawl over Sally at a bar? No. Then why do tribal matches that happened thousands of years ago still mean so much to us today? To keep us from moving forward? To remind us of our racial differences and indifference? To revive tribal bitterness? And what father or God would want his children to keep a record of every argument they have ever had with each other - if there is nothing positive - only harm - to be gained by constantly reminding them? Would a wise man steer his followers to hold onto past hurts - or to squeeze them for every drop of wisdom that could be gained from them - then release them? Isn't forgiveness a holy virtue? And if so, then why do we insist on keeping historical records of resentment? Is the Creator an advocate of love or hate? And if love, then why are we still pushing so much hatred? What is there ever to be gained from vocalizing hatred? Only more hatred. Who wants that? And why?
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
Never let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game.
Babe Ruth
You just can’t beat the person who never gives up.
Babe Ruth
Yankees.
David A. Kelly (Babe Ruth and the Baseball Curse)
THANK YOU!
David A. Kelly (Babe Ruth and the Baseball Curse)
ALL IS FORGIVEN.
David A. Kelly (Babe Ruth and the Baseball Curse)
Most people who bought from bucket shop operators lost money, but that didn’t stop them, and it certainly didn’t stop the bucket shops. Human beings inevitably overestimated the probability of success. Too many young men thought they could become the next Babe Ruth; too many young women sought to become Mary Pickford. Four of five people believed they were of above average skill when driving a car. A majority of people said they could outsmart the stock market, or win money gambling.
Frank Partnoy (The Match King: Ivar Kreuger and the Financial Scandal of the Century)
were one of the worst teams in the league. They lost game after game. They didn’t come close to winning a World Series. But Babe Ruth turned their luck around. After he became a New York Yankee, things would never be the same. Within a few years of buying Babe Ruth, the Yankees won the first of dozens of World Series. On the Yankees, Ruth hit even more home runs. In 1920, Ruth was one of the most famous people in America. He hit an amazing fifty-four home runs that year. That’s twenty-five more than he had hit the year before. Fifty-four home runs was more than most teams had!
David A. Kelly (Babe Ruth and the Baseball Curse)
They were playing the St. Louis Cardinals. Each team had won three games. The seventh game would decide the winner. With half an inning left to play, the score was tied, 3-3. Then the Cardinals batter hit a double. Their man on first ran around the bases toward home plate. Boston’s shortstop fired a relay throw home to get him out. It should have been
David A. Kelly (Babe Ruth and the Baseball Curse)
chance and traded him. In return they
David A. Kelly (Babe Ruth and the Baseball Curse)
Curt Schilling pitched game two at Fenway Park the following night. Again, blood soaked through his white
David A. Kelly (Babe Ruth and the Baseball Curse)
Platinum bars, loose gemstones, and one original Babe Ruth baseball card in a lucite case, because fuck it, that’s cool and I want it.
Sophie Lark (Savage Lover (Brutal Birthright, #3))
Bruce, on the other hand, was sometimes too clever for his own good. He was a tremendous influence on me, teaching me all about sports, Mickey Mantle, Babe Ruth, Johnny Unitas and Gordie Howe.
Bret Hart (Hitman: My Real Life in the Cartoon World of Wrestling)
The stock passed the $700 billion market value milestone that Musk had thrown down years earlier like Babe Ruth calling his shot. It soared from a value of $100 billion to more than $800 billion in 244 days, accomplishing something it took Apple almost a decade to do. With the stock he already owned, his wealth was surging from an estimated $30 billion at the start of 2020 to around $200 billion at the start of 2021, overtaking Amazon founder Jeff
Tim Higgins (Power Play: Tesla, Elon Musk, and the Bet of the Century)
To block the Klansman auto wrecker, Kent Parrot turned to an auto dealer whose only other high-profile supporter was, oddly, New York Yankees slugger Babe Ruth. Reformers backed the “absolutely incorruptible” city council president William Bonelli (who would later flee to Mexico to avoid an indictment on corruption charges).
John Buntin (L.A. Noir: The Struggle for the Soul of America's Most Seductive City)
Remember the batting secret of the great home-run-hitter Sadaharu Oh, “The Japanese Babe Ruth.” Oh said that he looked upon the opposing pitcher as his ‘partner,’ who with every pitch was serving up an opportunity for him to hit a home run. Similarly, you should see your opponent as a ‘partner,’ who with his every position and tactic, is offering you an opportunity to talk about the problem. In other words, Reframe.
William Ury (Getting Past No: Negotiating in Difficult Situations)
In each case, the key trick is to verbally collectivize wealth produced by individuals and then depict those individuals who produced more of it, and received payment for doing so, as having deprived others of their fair share. With such word games, one might say that Babe Ruth took an unfair share of the home runs hit by the New York Yankees.
Thomas Sowell (Discrimination and Disparities)
don’t actually say any of these things; I’m way too mature for that. “How come, Rick?” is what I actually say. “It’s not so much fun.” My heart is heavy. It’s just not fair; Babe Ruth’s father never had to go through anything like this. “You want to try it a while longer? Maybe you’ll change your mind. You’re really good at it.” “Nah. I want to play soccer instead.” Soccer? That is the unkindest cut of all. Can my only son be a communist? “Et tu, Pelé?” I say, unfortunately out loud.
David Rosenfelt (Who Let the Dog Out? (Andy Carpenter #13))
I smacked a homer that would have made Babe Ruth smile.
Veda Boyd Jones (American Progress: Battling Fear, Discrimination, and the Great Depression (Sisters in Time))
Remember kid, heros get remembered, but legends never die; follow your heart kid, and you'll never go wrong.
Babe Ruth (the sandlot)