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What distinguishes a great player is his presence. When he goes on to the court, his presence dominates the atmosphere.

Bill Russell

What’s more important than who’s going to be the first black manager is who’s going to be the first black sports editor of the New York Times.
BILL RUSSELL

Black Important Manager
We couldn’t sustain it. And they got a lot of kids that can shoot. We just couldn’t close out well enough.
BILL RUSSELL

Children Close Enough Sustainable
We overreached our decision power. Sometimes our decisions have to fit the reality of the outside world.
BILL RUSSELL

Decision Power Reality World
My father once told me that anyone who worked for three dollars an hour owed it to himself to put in four dollars’ worth of work.
BILL RUSSELL

Father Myself Work Worth
Don’t knock the ball in the stands, keep it in your hands!
BILL RUSSELL

Hands Stand Yourself
You got to have the killer instinct. If you do not have it, forget about basketball and go into social psychology or something. If you sometimes wonder if you’ve got it, you ain’t got it. No pussycats, please.
BILL RUSSELL

Instinct Kill Social Wonder Yourself
To me, the most important part of winning is joy. You can win without joy, but winning that’s joyless is like eating in a four-star restaurant when you’re not hungry. Joy is a current of energy in your body, like chlorophyll or sunlight, that fills you up and makes you naturally want to do your best.
BILL RUSSELL

Happiness Hungry Light Natural Restaurant Sun Win Yourself
The idea is not to block every shot. The idea is to make your opponent believe that you might block every shot.
BILL RUSSELL

Believe Block Ideas Opponent Yourself
Create unselfishness as the most important team attribute.
BILL RUSSELL

Attribute Creation Important Selfish Team
The only important statistic is the final score.
BILL RUSSELL

Final Importance Score Statistics
The most important thing to me is the friends that I’ve made.
BILL RUSSELL

Friendship Important Myself
I’ve been fortunate to meet and work with a lot of really smart people. The thing that strikes me most about them is how they continue to explore and learn every day. I have tried to apply that approach in my modest career as well.
BILL RUSSELL

Career Fortunate Learning Myself People Smart Work
Remember that basketball is a game of habits. If you make the other guy deviate from his habits, you’ve got him.
BILL RUSSELL

Game Habit Himself Remember Yourself
Friendship is a full-time job.
BILL RUSSELL

Friendship Job One Liner Time
The magic to a great meeting is all of the work that’s done beforehand.
BILL RUSSELL

Greatness Hands Magic Work
The most important measure of how good a game I played was how much better I’d made my teammates play.
BILL RUSSELL

Important Measurement Myself Play Team
If a guy pays you five dollars, you give him seven dollars worth of work.
BILL RUSSELL

Man Pay Work Worth Yourself
I think that David Stern is probably the greatest commissioner that any sport has ever had in the history of this country.
BILL RUSSELL

Commission Country Greatness Thinking
Concentration and mental toughness are the margins of victory.
BILL RUSSELL

Focus Mental Tough Victory
Heart in champions has to do with the depth of our motivation and how well your mind and body react to pressure – that is, being able to do what you do best under maximum pain and stress.
BILL RUSSELL

Champion Heart Motivational Pain Stress
What distinguishes a great player is his presence. When he goes on to the court, his presence dominates the atmosphere.
BILL RUSSELL

Atmosphere Dominate Greatness Player Presence
The last five or six days, I’ve been running. The last two days, I’ve been running pretty hard. Everybody’s got to be someplace.
BILL RUSSELL

Hard Myself Pretty Run
My most prized possession was my library card from the Oakland Public Library.
BILL RUSSELL

Library Myself Possession Prize
Durability is part of what makes a great athlete.
BILL RUSSELL

Athlete Durability Endurance Greatness Inspirational One Liner
Most people have a harder time letting themselves love than finding someone to love them.
BILL RUSSELL

Finding Hard Time Love People
On females officiating in the NBA -Incompetence should not be confined to one sex.
BILL RUSSELL

Female Oneself Sex
Commitment separates those who live their dreams from those who live their lives regretting the opportunities they have squandered.
BILL RUSSELL

Commitment Live Opportunity Regret Separate

What distinguishes a great player is his presence. When he goes on to the court, his presence dominates the atmosphere.

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What distinguishes a great player is his presence. When he goes on to the court, his presence dominates the atmosphere.

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