Theo Epstein Quotes

I think a lot of personnel decisions come down to who's the best player today, like if we had to throw 'em in a game today versus what could their upside be 18 months from now. A lot of times, those are two different answers. That's the difficulty of player personnel.

You pick guys in the first round - whenever you pick guys - you pick them for a reason.

In real football, I wouldn't want Terrell Owens anywhere near my team. But you're nuts if you don't take him in fantasy.

It's hard to change a roster around. You've got to hit your draft picks right, you've gotta hit free agency right, and a team's got to fit together.

When the draft comes and goes, there's a certain set of players you acquire and there's a whole bunch of others you had interest in acquiring. That doesn't die.

Whether it's drafting or player development, the ultimate is putting a team together.

A personnel guy always wants to get his pick right. We live that every year. We want to make sure the pick is right.

If I have written too polemically, it is only because of the passionate concern that we consider because it is too late whether we truly know what we are doing.

If we kept all the players I liked personally, we'd be a lot worse team over the years.

What else does a manager do but push buttons? He doesn't hit, he doesn't run, he doesn't throw, and he doesn't catch the ball. A manager has twenty-five players, or twenty-five buttons, and he selects which one he'll use, or push, that day. The manager who presses the right buttons most often is the one who wins the most games.

My role in Palin is something that there's not a day that has gone by that I don't have regret about.

Every team in the league is always looking to upgrade its talent.

My signing of Derrick Rose was like anything in life, I think it was just luck. I played in Chicago. Derrick is from Chicago.

Managers can make themselves look strong by selling or dropping players, but if the move doesn't work, the choice looks flawed.

We as a club should be aspiring to have the best players playing for us. We've had that in the past. We're in for players if the manager wants to be.

When you're a general manager, you don't get to see every single player, so you have to rely on your scouts.

Men should know that no job is more important than their family. I had that all screwed up for a long time. I regret it.

If I was to become a manager, I would not want someone else to be signing the players for the team that my job depended on.

I don't think football management is easy.

When a scout recommends a brilliant right back or a coach recommends one from our academy, we want the manager to weigh up what is right for the team.

Some players are bought by other clubs with an eye to them developing into something special in a few years' time. Whereas there's a bit more pressure on some of the other clubs to bring in players who are going to be hitting the ground running and top players verging on world class almost immediately.

For a club to come and get you, they are going to use you at some stage.

The decisions related to recruitment are all taken by football experts. My involvement is signing off the money.

With the coaches, you don't want to hear everybody saying, 'Move over! Back up! Do this!' Let's find out what the players know.

I don't think it's right to think ahead to free agency.