Branch Rickey
Branch Rickey
Wesley Branch Rickeywas an innovative Major League Baseballexecutive elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1967. He was perhaps best known for breaking Major League Baseball's color barrier by signing African American player Jackie Robinson, for drafting the first Afro-Hispanic superstar, Roberto Clemente, for creating the framework for the modern minor league farm system, for encouraging the Major Leagues to add new teams through his involvement in the proposed Continental League, and for introducing the batting helmet...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionCoach
Date of Birth20 December 1881
CityPortsmouth, OH
CountryUnited States of America
Baseball is a game of inches.
Fill in any figure you want for that boy (Mickey Mantle). Whatever the figure, it's a deal.
Only in baseball can a team player be a pure individualist first and a team player second, within the rules and spirit of the game.
Baseball people, and that includes myself, are slow to change and accept new ideas. I remember that it took years to persuade them to put numbers on uniforms.
A game of great charm in the adoption of mathematical measurements to the timing of human movements, the exactitudes and adjustments of physical ability to hazardous chance. 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.
These are uncertain times. We cannot be content to rest on yesterday's laurels. These are times when we must strengthen rather than let down those standards which have stood in such good stead in crises that are past. Baseball cannot be selfish, or irresponsible, or lax. Neither can the men who operate it.
We win if the world is convinced of two things, that you are a fine gentleman, and a great baseball player.
He's the best prospect I've ever seen.
Don't worry about your individual numbers. Worry about the team. If the team is successful, each of you will be successful, too.
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.
I'm a man of some intelligence. I've had some education, passed the bar, practiced law. I've been a teacher and I deal with men of substance, statesman, business leaders, the clergy... So why do I spend my time arguing with Dizzy Dean?
A full mind is an empty bat.
Ethnic prejudice has no place in sports, and baseball must recognize that truth if it is to maintain stature as a national game.
I am alarmed at the subtle invasion of professional football, which is gaining preeminence over baseball. It's unthinkable.