Stuart Scott Quotes

Don't downgrade your dream just to fit your reality. Upgrade your conviction to match your destiny.

When you die, it does not mean that you lose to cancer. You beat cancer by how you live, why you live, and the manner in which you live.” His words were as raw, honest, and powerful as the man himself.

Hope is not defined by the absence of hardship. Rather, hope is found in God’s grace in the midst of hardship. Hope is found in his promise to give us a future.

Once you start questioning the bad stuff that comes your way, you have to start questioning the good—and I wouldn’t trade the good for anything.

You know what I’ve never done at a sporting event? Boo. I don’t get the whole idea of booing. You’re booing someone because they just failed at something? Seriously? Do you know how hard it is to do what they’re doing? That they’re among the best in the world at what they do?

We can agree with what the gospel says about our sinfulness without becoming overwhelmed by guilt and shame. Further, we do not have to prove that we are victims rather than victimizers out of a desperate effort to persuade ourselves that we are righteous. We have Christ’s righteousness already. We can rest in this.

Our priorities are misplaced when we are giving our greatest attention to temporary things of this world, rather than to Christ and pleasing Him.

In football, as in life, the hits you don’t see coming are the ones that do the most damage.

So often, growing up is about conforming to labels: There are the jocks, the nerds, the brainiacs. We never thought like that. That

You must determine the root cause of your problem, and just like running a car without the oil, you must ask yourself not what is happening, but what is missing.

Scott and Terry created a political theatre in which a Hanovarian English monarch could appear on the stage of Edinburgh to act the part of a Stuart king.

All that is true about our God, and made true for us through the Gospel of Christ needs to come to life when we are troubled, tempted, or we sin.

Prayer is an interesting thing. I’m not a loud God Squad guy; when guys imply in interviews that the Lord made them juke that defender and score that touchdown, it tends to rub me wrong. I pray, but I pray for His will to be done—not mine. I acknowledge in every prayer that what I want may not be what He wants.

Remember during the coverage of Hurricane Katrina, those images of people on their roofs while makeshift boats full of people sailed by? Well, this is my boat-people analogy. We’ve been flooded and I’m in a boat that’s gliding by everyone I know on top of those roofs. But my boat only holds fifteen people. I got my girls, my family, my closest friends. When your boat is full, it’s not like you’re saying to everyone else on those roofs, “I don’t care about you.” It’s just that these are my boat people and I’ve gotta save them. Because they’re in the fight with me. This is crucial: When you take on cancer, you’re not alone. Of course, that’s not how it feels when you first hear those words: “You have cancer.” At that moment, you feel more alone than you’ve ever been. You’re standing in place, numb, and the world is rushing by.

In fact, only six days later, with Chief Justice Marshall not participating, the Court avoided a possible constitutional confrontation. Voting 5–0 in Stuart v. Laird (1803), the justices upheld Congress’s repeal of the Judiciary Act of 1801, a move some historians see as reflecting the Court’s unwillingness to test the full dimensions of the power it had just claimed for itself. More than half a century would pass before the Supreme Court again declared an act of Congress unconstitutional. That was the Dred Scott decision of 1857 (Scott v. Sandford), invalidating the Missouri Compromise and holding that Congress lacked authority to abolish slavery in the territories. That notorious decision, a step on the road to the Civil War, was perhaps not the best advertisement for judicial review. But since then, the Court has lost its early reticence. It has declared acts of Congress unconstitutional more than 150 times.

By being with her and involving her. • Plan time to spend with her alone. • Develop common interests with her. • Let her know how she can help you/work along side you. • Call her from work. • Tell her about what you do. By seeking to understand her and help her. •Ask what she did today and then listen. • Inquire as to her well-being and then pay attention. • Plan a regular time to talk about her concerns and then pray/study/and help her find solutions. • Ask her how you can pray for her. • Pray with her. • Assist her when she needs it. By appreciating her. • Thank God for her. • Think and verbalize specific qualities or deeds that you are thankful for. • Speak well of her to others. • Leave her a note of appreciation. By treating her special compared to others. • Open doors for her. • Plan dates. • Put her “needs” and desires above others. • Show her non-sexual affection. • Be sexually intimate with her, focusing most on her enjoyment. By revealing yourself to her. • Communicate your thoughts, perspectives, and goals to her. • Let her know how she can pray for you.

J.I. Packer sees society’s decline in this way: “The truth is that because we have lost touch with God and his word we have lost the secret both of community (because sin kills neighbor-love) and of our own identity (because at the deepest level we do not know who or what we are, or what we exist for)” (J.I. Packer, Knowing Man. (Westchester, IL: Cornerstone Books, 1978) p. 43).

Tasha, my friend. You have become the one person I can count on to be honest with me here in the states. You support me without any hidden motives. You have made me laugh more than I thought I could. Will you do me the honor of being my wife—until Stuart do us part?

Kelly had decreed that Scott should go and so here he was, shaking and terrified as he prepared himself for what lay ahead, the rest of the section trying hard to avoid him, to not witness the fear that was clearly on display, that he could not hope to hide. He should by rights be a hundred miles from the nearest German soldier, yet, somehow, he had been sent to an infantry section, to the front line and it was here that he would stay, Jack thought grimly, until he was killed or injured. That was the only escape for any of them now.

I learned that what I thought was appendicitis was actually a rare form of cancer, was . . . fear.

Our cool factor went off the charts with Stu roaming the halls and performing “Rapper’s Delight” on karaoke nights. He brought a spirit and a style that had never been seen, never been felt before, at ESPN.

Blood would run in rivers and bodies would fall like raindrops.

When you die, it does not mean that you lose to cancer. You beat cancer by how you live, why you live, and the manner in which you live.

Men have labored diligently since the Fall to create a god of their own design, rather than submit themselves to their sovereign Creator.

Say what you will about Lance Armstrong—I think he did whatever everybody else in his sport was doing, and that it shouldn’t tarnish his accomplishments on a bike—but what is undeniable is that here was a world-class athlete who got cancer in his brain and in his nutsack. And he basically said, “Screw that. I’m getting off this table.” I dig that. I played sports all my life and I dig that attitude. Okay, you’re hurting? Get up anyway.

I also showed the engineers a framework for play devised by Scott Eberle, an intellectual historian of play and vice president for interpretation at the Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, New York. Eberle feels that most people go through a six-step process as they play. While neither he nor I believe that every player goes through exactly these steps in this order, I think it’s useful to think of play in this way. Eberle says that play involves: Anticipation, waiting with expectation, wondering what will happen, curiosity, a little anxiety, perhaps because there is a slight uncertainty or risk involved (can we hit the baseball and get safely on base?), although the risk cannot be so great that it overwhelms the fun. This leads to . . . Surprise, the unexpected, a discovery, a new sensation or idea, or shifting perspective. This produces . . . Pleasure, a good feeling, like the pleasure we feel at the unexpected twist in the punch line of a good joke. Next we have . . . Understanding, the acquisition of new knowledge, a synthesizing of distinct and separate concepts, an incorporation of ideas that were previously foreign, leading to . . . Strength, the mastery that comes from constructive experience and understanding, the empowerment of coming through a scary experience unscathed, of knowing more about how the world works. Ultimately, this results in . . . Poise, grace, contentment, composure, and a sense of balance in life. Eberle diagrams this as a wheel. Once we reach poise, we are ready to go to a new source of anticipation, starting the ride all over again.

God did not give us his gospel just so we could embrace it and be converted. Actually, he offers it to us every day as a gift that keeps on giving to us everything we need for life and godliness.

As James MacDonald wrote, “To really be gripped by your identity in God’s greatness you must wade out of the shallow waters of self-absorption into the deep waters of praising him at all times for all things.

STUART SCOTT: I can’t be that concerned with how I’m perceived. I care about how my mother and father think about me and how my friends and how my loved ones think about me. I care about how my ex-wife thinks about me; she and I are still good friends and we do a good job raising our kids. It matters to me. But it doesn’t matter to me what people who are writing a blog on the Internet think. I can’t think about that. Being a father. That’s it. That’s the answer. That’s my answer. I’m convinced of that. I remember there was a day—my oldest daughter, who is fourteen now, but when she was about two or three, there was a show called Gullah Gullah Island, a Disney show, that was her favorite TV show. I was doing the late-night SportsCenter that aired all morning long. So there was one morning and I’d done the show the night before, and I got up and I said, “Taylor, do you want to watch Daddy on TV?” And she said—and it’s not just what she said but how she said it—“No, I want to watch Gullah Gullah Island.” And I remembered thinking that day, if it’s not a big deal to her, and she was my life, then it can’t be that big of a deal.

As Dr. Stuart McGill points out, “[back] strength may, or may not, help a particular individual as strength without control and endurance to repeatedly execute perfect form increases risk.

Ray Scott was a federal postal inspector—the dude carried a gun and cuffs; I’d grow muscles when the neighborhood kids would see him. He promised his four kids that he’d pay our college tuition if we maintained a 2.0 grade point average. After my sophomore year, I was skating along with a 2.7. Dad said he was restructuring our deal—he’d only pay if I kept a 3.0 or better. “That’s crap,” I said. That wasn’t the deal. It wasn’t fair—a common refrain from my teenagers today. But then something happened: In the fall of my junior year, I was heavily involved with my fraternity, I played club football, and I posted a 3.2 GPA. The next semester, I upped that to 3.6. The following one, 3.4. I remained pissed until years later, when it dawned on me: Dad knew I was better than a 2.7 student. And he knew I needed to be pushed. Funny, isn’t it, how much smarter our dads are when we get older?

When Taelor competed in dance and Sydni in soccer, I would tell them, “Nerves are good.” What are nerves, after all? They’re just energy.

little over a year ago, I got some heat for something I tweeted: “True racism is group w majority/economic/political power discriminating against others . . . Blacks/Hispanics can be ANGRY/RUDE but not ‘Racist.’” Man, you can guess how that went over. But I stand by it. Racism is the institutional manifestation of prejudice. Black people can be prejudiced and ignorant, yes, but since blacks by and large don’t control our institutions, they don’t have the power to act on those impulses, to subjugate others. This is something I learned forty years ago in Winston-Salem. I don’t care if someone—white or black—doesn’t like me because of what I look like. If they can act on that dislike in a way that harms me, then we’ve got a problem.

SOME YEARS AGO, I read the following quote from Spike Lee and thought instantly of my time at UNC: “It comes down to this,” he said. “Black people were stripped of our identities when we were brought here, and it’s been a quest since then to define who we are.

I’m not trying to “Kumbaya” you. My daughters are teenagers, man. Sydni is in perpetual eye-roll mode and Taelor is a typical college student; she’ll call for advice or to ask for money or to share a joke—only, of course, not as often as her needy Dad wishes she would. Teenage girls are a whole ’nother thing. They get angry with me, annoyed, embarrassed. Friends tell me they’ll come around. Teenage girls always come around to their dad eventually. But that well-meaning advice strikes to the heart of my fear. I don’t have “eventually.” The truth is, I’m not as afraid of dying as I am of not being here for my daughters’ aha moment. I’m on the clock and I want to be here when they get it—when they get what I got about my dad: that all the stuff he did that ticked me off? He did that for me.

Robin and I would talk about how those who weren’t in CancerWorld didn’t get it. “Yeah,” I remember Robin saying, “everyone wants to know how you’re doing, and they don’t get that you’ll reach out to the people you want to reach out to.

know people don’t know what to say, so they just talk to fill the awkward silence and stuff comes out. They don’t mean to say the wrong thing. But, listen, y’all: You don’t have to say anything at all. Just wrap your arms around me and squeeze. A hug speaks volumes. That’s what I do when I meet someone who is also in the fight. I grab on and don’t let go. Or just say, “I’m really sorry you’re going through this.” That’s all, man. It ain’t hard if you keep it simple and real.

I’ve been criticized for being too chummy with and soft on athletes. That critique is born of a very particular type of journalism: one in which predominantly white, middle-aged writers and broadcasters paternalistically judge young, often black, athletes. I’ll ask tough questions, if need be. But they’ll be in service of explaining rather than judging. The viewer can then judge for him- or herself.

I look at each shadow, no two are the same. On each happy face there’s no trace of shame. Each different and special and fully unique, no color’s stronger, and no color’s weaker.

I nod to Stuart, who is already moving in the direction of the mic, eager, as they say in the states, to rip the bandaid. We have a saying a little like this, to seize the nettle. Either

So live. Live. Fight like hell. And when you get too tired to fight, lay down and rest and let somebody else fight for you.

Today there exist two Republican parties that are linked mostly in name only: the Republican Party of Washington elected officials and the infrastructures that support them, and the Republican governors. The dichotomy is striking. Some of these governors seem to understand their role is to govern and solve problems, not just raise money, attack Democrats, and go on Fox News. In the Northeast in deeply Democratic states, three Republican governors—Phil Scott of Vermont, Charlie Baker of Massachusetts, and Larry Hogan of Maryland—are among the most popular governors in America. They are the last outposts of a dying civilization, the socially moderate, fiscally conservative Republican Party. I’ve worked for all three. I’d like to say that their breed will continue, but it’s difficult to understand how what they represent can coexist with the empowerment of the Trump elements within their state parties. Their greatest electoral difficulties lie not with the larger electorate but within their own party.

you.

A husband who lords it over his wife does not really care for her as he should, but instead cares most about his own agenda. This kind of husband might also look down on others and have difficulty believing that they are capable (by God’s grace) of doing what they need to do and becoming what they need to become. He may be tempted to see himself as the only one who must make everything happen, instead of giving others a chance and trusting God to work. He also is usually lacking in personal and relational skills and the ability to recognize his own sin and shortcomings.

Every man who hopes to honor God and know true contentment in this life must be thoroughly convinced that God’s ways are perfect.

We are also taught from Scripture that while some events in our lives may indeed be tragic, God is in absolute control (Romans 8:28). While this fact may be hard to reconcile in our own minds, God is the one who knows the end from the beginning. Therefore, only He knows how a circumstance can serve to: • Humble a person (Job 42:1-6) • Draw a person to Himself (John 6:44) • Show Himself to be a greater-than-anything God (Jeremiah 32:17; Genesis 50:20) • Reveal Himself to a believing sufferer as Refuge, Strength and Helper (Psalm 46:1; Isaiah 57:15; John 9:1-3).

France has a magnificent history, filled with great men, great wars, and—” “Great Scott,” said Greg’s mother,

Something had been instilled in me that wasn’t going to let the irrational anger of strangers make me doubt my own identity.

Being on a plane . . . and hearing a baby crying. That’s the sound of life, man. Moms: Stop apologizing for your kid crying—he or she has a right to be there. I love to revel in the beauty of a baby’s cry.

Utilitarianism has its roots in the philosophies of Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832) and John Stuart Mill (1806–73). Bentham held to a hedonistic utilitarianism, which maintains that the most moral acts are those that maximize pleasure and minimize pain. Mill developed his approach away from hedonism and toward a more general concept of maximizing the general happiness or the greatest good for the greatest number. When it was proposed, utilitarianism was a radical theory, since it divorced morality from divine revelation and from any view of nature. According to utilitarianism, moral behavior no longer required faithfulness to divine ordinances and rigid moral rules. Utilitarian modes of moral reasoning are widely applied to many of the currently debated moral issues. Most of the public policy in the United States and Western Europe is still decided on overwhelmingly utilitarian grounds.