“When you intercept the ball with your stomach, that is great defense”

There are no guarantees in life. The simple twists of fate and the breaks of the game are the two maxims that define so much of the success and failure in life.

I might be the most injured athlete in the history of sports. I’ve had 31 operations. An endless string of stress fractures.

Health is the most critical thing in our life. With your health anything is possible, without it you can’t do anything.

What a pathetic play from a pathetic human being.

Tim Duncan’s foot issue, I think, is a major factor in this year’s playoffs. That’s not the kind of injury that gets better over time playing NBA basketball.

Basketball is one of those rare opportunities where you can make a difference, not only for yourself, but for other people as well.

The passions I have in my life are my family, music, books, I’m an avid plant collector, and I love to ride my bike.

I can think. I can sleep. I can move. I can ride my bike. I can dream.

It’s the most pleasurable experience in the world! When you’re on a great team and you get hot, your teammates milk you dry – they wear you out and there’s nothing like being on a great team.

I learned early on the value and the power of music to inspire and to drive me.

That’s what makes it so fun to be on a team. You’re sitting at your house, thinking up this wild, crazy stuff as to how it’s going to go, and the other guys are sitting at their houses doing the same thing.

I’m mainstream. Always have been.

I grew up in an non-athletic family, where my parents were interested in music, in literature, in education and art.

Anytime you bring Michael Olowokandi on to your team, disaster is soon to follow.

Yao Ming is the best thing to happen to the NBA in a long time. He is just a beautiful person inside and out. The vision, the creativity, the gentleness of spirit … he has it all.

I love live music. I love going to the event. And to know them as people and to have seen the Grateful Dead grow up and become who they are is so incredibly special.

As I see it, the thing that hurt my putting most when it was bad, was thinking too much about how I was making the stroke and not enough about getting the ball in the hole.

Oh aye…my Father would thrash me every now and then. He’d talk while he did it too! He’d hit me and shout, ‘Have ye had enough?’ Had enough? Whit kind of question is that? ‘Why, Father, would another kick in the balls be out of the question???’

Golf is assuredly a mystifying game. It would seem that if a person has hit a golf ball correctly a thousand times, he should be able to duplicate the performance at will. But such is certainly not the case.

He hits the ball 130 yards and his jewelry goes 150.

By doing that and being very competitive, the grown-ups started telling me even back before I started playing organized ball that I was too physical and too advanced for the kids my own age.

It’s just a matter of hitting the ball where I want to hit it and hopefully making some putts.

I had no knowledge of the various steps involved in the game balls and the process that happened between when they were prepared and went to the officials and went to the game. So, I’ve learned a lot about that.

Most people don’t deserve to be spoken of in the same breath as Chaplin or Lucille Ball.