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The man with the ball is responsible for what happens to the ball.

Branch Rickey

It (a baseball box score) doesn’t tell how big you are, what church you attend, what color you are, or how your father voted in the last election. It just tells what kind of baseball player you were on that particular day.
BRANCH RICKEY

Baseball Father Player
If things don’t come easy, there is no premium on effort. There should be joy in the chase, zest in the pursuit.
BRANCH RICKEY

Effort Joy Zest
The only thing Abner Doubleday ever started was the Civil War.
BRANCH RICKEY

Civil War War
Fill in any figure you want for that boy (Mickey Mantle). Whatever the figure, it’s a deal.
BRANCH RICKEY

Baseball Boys Want
Baseball people are generally allergic to new ideas; it took years to persuade them to put numbers on uniforms, and it is the hardest thing in the world to get Major League Baseball to change anything—even spikes on a new pair of shoes—but they will eventually…they are bound to.
BRANCH RICKEY

Baseball Ideas Shoes
Man may penetrate the outer reaches of the universe, he may solve the very secret of eternity itself but for me, the ultimate human experience is to witness the flawless execution of the hit-and-run.
BRANCH RICKEY

Baseball Men Running
He (Leo Durocher) had the ability of taking a bad situation and making it immediately worse.
BRANCH RICKEY

Ability Bad Situation Taking
The man with the ball is responsible for what happens to the ball.
BRANCH RICKEY

Anymore Balls Men Simple
Thinking about the devil is worse than seeing the devil.
BRANCH RICKEY

Devil Thinking Vision
Luck is a residue of design.
BRANCH RICKEY

Design Luck Residue
Don’t look at the hole in the doughnut. Look at the whole doughnut.
BRANCH RICKEY

Doughnut Holes Looks
Problems are the price you pay for progress.
BRANCH RICKEY

Adversity Progress Survival
First of all, a man, whether seeking achievement on the athletic field or in business, must want to win. He must feel that the thing he is doing is worthwhile; so worthwhile that he is willing to pay the price of success to attain distinction.
BRANCH RICKEY

Men Pay Price Winning
I don’t care if I was a ditch-digger at a dollar a day, I’d want to do my job better than the fellow next to me. I’d want to be the best at whatever I do.
BRANCH RICKEY

Care Dollars Jobs
Baseball is a game of inches.
BRANCH RICKEY

Baseball Games Inches
A full mind is an empty bat.
BRANCH RICKEY

Baseball Bats Mind
A great ballplayer is a player who will take a chance.
BRANCH RICKEY

Chance Great Player Take
Good luck is what is left over after intelligence and effort have combined at their best. Luck is the residue of design.
BRANCH RICKEY

Design Effort Good Luck
The speed of the legs, the dexterity of the body, the grace of the swing, the elusiveness of the slide – these are the features that make Americans everywhere forget the last syllable of a man’s last name or the pigmentation of his skin.
BRANCH RICKEY

Country Elusiveness Features Last Man Name Yesterday
The world’s not so simple anymore, I guess it never was. We ignored it, now we can’t.
BRANCH RICKEY

Ignore Simple World
Negligence or indifference are usually reviewed from an unlucky seat. The law of cause and effect and causality both work the same with inexorable exactitudes. Luck is the residue of design.
BRANCH RICKEY

Design Indifference Negligence Review Usually
We win if the world is convinced of two things, that you are a fine gentleman, and a great baseball player.
BRANCH RICKEY

Baseball Player Winning
Don’t worry about your individual numbers. Worry about the team. If the team is successful, each of you will be successful, too.
BRANCH RICKEY

Baseball Motivational Team
I cannot face my God much longer knowing that his black creatures are held separate and distinct from his white creatures in the game that has given me all that I can call my own.
BRANCH RICKEY

Games Knowing White
I find fault with my children because I like them and I want them to go places – uprightness and strength and courage and civil respect and anything that affects the probabilities of failure on the part of those that are closest to me, that concerns me – I find fault.
BRANCH RICKEY

Children Courage Fault Probability
Leisure is the handmaiden of the devil.
BRANCH RICKEY

Devil Handmaiden Leisure

The man with the ball is responsible for what happens to the ball.

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The man with the ball is responsible for what happens to the ball.

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