Bowie Kuhn Quotes

I came up in 1941 and I played against men who played in the 1930s. I stayed until 1963 playing against men who will be playing in the 1970s. So I think I can feel qualified to say that baseball really was a great game, and baseball is really a great game, and baseball will always be a great game.

I love Boston. I love Fenway Park. I love Red Sox history. But in no way am I a Red Sox fan.

Continuity is one of the things I like about New England.

My dad was part of the Oriole way. I think he was there 14 years in the minor leagues; I think seven of those years, they had the same people in place. So it was about continuity. It was about stability.

If I walked back into the booth in the year 2025, I don't think it would have changed much. I think baseball would be played and managed pretty much the same as it is today. It's a great survivor.

I just go out there and throw. That's what I've done my whole life.

You have to remember that baseball really was the American pastime in the Forties, not football, basketball or any other sport.

I managed the Dodgers for 20 years. It's hard to believe that there are only four guys in the history of baseball who managed the same team for 20 years or more. One was owner of the team, Connie Mack. Another was part owner of the team, John McGraw. Then there was my predecessor, Walter Alston, and me. It's amazing. In the 20 years I managed the Dodgers, 210 managers were fired.

I can't believe that Babe Ruth was a better player than Willie Mays. (Babe) Ruth is to baseball what Arnold Palmer is to golf. He got the game moving. But I can't believe he could run as well as (Willie) Mays, and I can't believe he was any better an outfielder.

The one constant through all the years has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It's been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt, and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game, is a part of our past. It reminds us of all that once was good, and what could be again.

Baseball is America's pastime, and that record is absolutely huge in the States.

Baseball is the only thing beside the paper clip that hasn't changed

If the Cincinnati Reds were really the first major league baseball team, who did they play?

Baseball has so much history and tradition. You can respect it, or you can exploit it for profit, but it's still being made all over the place, all the time.

Baseball is continuity. Pitch to pitch. Inning to inning. Season to season.

I believe when you say you're going to start a race at 2 p.m. then you should stick to that and start the race at 2 p.m. There's no maybe, could be or should be. You start the race on time. It's very simple.

One always goes on as one begins.

Baseball has always been slow to accept change. Only through dire pressure can any radical change be accomplished. The move of the Giants and Dodgers from New York to California brought that pressure in abundance.

My principles and core beliefs haven't changed in many years. You know, I don't change what I think with the wind just in order to perhaps attract more people. I am what I am, believe what I believe, and I say so.

By nature, I am an experimentalist. I don't believe much in accomplishment.

Finding myself to exist in the world, I believe I shall, in some shape or other, always exist.

Don't feel like you have to do and be everything.

What is seen now so much more clearly is that although the names keep changing and the bodies keep changing, the larger pattern that holds us all together goes on and on.

Great men are sometimes so even in small things.