Highbridge - everybody rap in Highbridge; everyone grew up rappin' or playing basketball.
A Boogie wit da Hoodien
Really, I like the future. I appreciate my automatic alarm-call necklace in case I get lost and confused in a mall. I appreciate the watch that tells the hospital my blood pressure's gone ballistic. I like my computer, just as long as it doesn't get ideas above its workstation.
A. A. Gill
People who know there is a god and people who know there isn't live in exactly the same world. Same number of hours in the day, same weather, same football results. They both love their children and die of the same diseases.
For me, baseball is the most nourishing game outside of literature. They both are re-tellings of human experience.
A. Bartlett Giamatti
On matters of race, on matters of decency, baseball should lead the way.
There are a lot of people who know me who can't understand for the life of them why I would got to work on something as unserious as baseball. If they only knew.
There's nothing bad that accrues from baseball.
Baseball has undergone and absorbed a whole set of dislocations.
We have an obligation to spread amateur baseball both at home and abroad. Building up the game at all levels - Little League, Babe Ruth Leagues, the colleges - is in our own self-interest. That's where the pool of talent is - and also of fans.
The Negro was a political football between his former slave master and Northern political adventurers. The economic basis of this contest was the power to tax, to float bonds, to award franchise: in short, to gain control over the financial resources of the newly organized States.
A. Philip Randolph
I'm probably more obsessed with football that I am with music.
Aaron Dessner
I fell like I'm a well-rounded football player.
Aaron Donald
My main focus is playing football and giving it all I got. I'm trying to go out there and make plays and help my team win.
Any time you can get the ball back to the offense and they put points on the board, you can win games.
I'm a football player, you know? My film talks for me.
All I can do is do my part and keep trying to open up eyes with what I did on the football field, what I did in my career. Just go out there and try to compete and shock a couple more people.
I'm just going to go play football - fly around and make some plays. That's all that matters.
When I'm retired someday, when I'm done playing football, that's when I'll be relaxing and look back at some things.
I'm just a football player.
I love football, but being away from it is tough.
It's the same thing I have been doing since I was 5, playing the game of football. Going out there when my number is called and trying to make plays.
All I can do is play football, put it on film.
I feel like I've got a lot of football things I need to work on to have that success that I want to have in this league.
We just have to try to play ball. We go week-to-week trying to find ways to win games. That is what it comes down to.
There are a lot of good football players in the league. You just try to keep yourself grounded.
I grew up playing hockey and some football, and I always think about the first time you walk into the locker room on a new team. The cliques are looking at you funny, and you make one friend, but then they're trying to stab you in the back.
I think that is one thing I've picked up: follow a routine, be consistent, and everything is going to fall in place. If you are scrambling around, and you are late for stuff, that adds extra stress, and you have to go out there and hit a 97 mph fastball.
I talked to a few schools about playing football, but I had already pretty much made my mind up. I fell in love with baseball at a young age, and I knew that that's what I wanted to do.
The ups and downs, that's baseball life. That's what I live for, play for.
I've always had that mindset of, 'OK, I may be hot this month or doing really well this month, but don't get too high, don't get too low - just enjoy it.' Don't ride the rollercoaster, basically. I always thought about it like, I'm not going to an amusement park, I'm going to a baseball field.
Any time you play shortstop or center field, the majority of the baseballs are hit in the middle of the field.
You never hit a good slider or curveball; you just try to go after the mistakes.
In baseball, you have to remain calm, cool, and collected. In football, you can let out a little anger sometimes. It was a fun game, and I liked it, but I knew in my heart I was going to play baseball.
That's your dream, to play professional baseball. When you get the opportunity like that, getting drafted - especially by Oakland, a California team, pretty close to home - it was tempting. At the time, I just didn't think I was ready or mature enough mentally or physically to start pro ball.
If my barrel meets the ball, I think good things are going to happen.
I had a lot of fun playing football and basketball, but deep down, the chess match or cat-and-mouse game between the pitcher and batter in baseball really drew me in. It's a thinking man's game, and for me, nothing can compare to that.
Some guys, first pitch of the at-bat gets called a strike - maybe it's a ball off or below their knees, and it gets called a strike - and then the next two pitches, they swing at balls in the dirt, and all of a sudden, they're yelling at the umpire about that first pitch. You just swung at two balls in the dirt, buddy.
When I was younger, I'd always forget stuff. I think there was probably 4-5 times where we'd drive 30 minutes to a town for the baseball tournament, and all of a sudden, I'd get to the field and look in my bag, and I didn't have my cleats. So my dad had to race all the way home to get my cleats and get back before the game started so I could play.
For me, the strike zone has always been, If it's something I can drive, it's most likely a strike. I feel like if it's a ball I really can't do much with, it's most likely a ball. So that's just always been my approach.
When you go to college the first couple years, and you kind of get beat around, you kind of think about, 'Maybe if I went to pro ball, it would be a little bit better.' Now that I look back on it, I made the right choice.
My main focus is, 'What can I do today to help the team win the ballgame?' You have those blinders on. It helps you focus.
That's what it's all about - postseason baseball.
The big thing is, it's about learning which off-speed pitches to swing at. A lot of people say, 'Oh, this guy can't hit a curveball; this guy can't hit an off-speed pitch.' But it's about swinging at the right one. Swing at the hangers. Swing at the ones you can handle.
This is a crazy game we play. You're going to have those times you can't get out, and those times where you can do everything right, and the ball does not fall.
My dad told me, 'If you're going to go out there and play baseball, or you're going to play basketball or football, work hard at it no matter what. I want you to have fun with your buddies, but you have to put in the time because this is your craft.' He didn't just want me to be good. He pushed me to that next level.
My dad played junior college basketball, and he always showed me clips of Michael Jordan.
We used to play football on the levee, with no shirts on in the summer - August in New Orleans - and my skin would turn red. They'd call me Redskin, Red Apache, then it turned around to Apache Red.
A lot of my solo albums were produced by different people who had their idea of what songs I should do, and they had me doing a lot of ballads.
I used to always sing my way into the movies and the basketball games or whatever. I'd sing for whoever's on the door, and they'd let me in. I used to think I was Nat King Cole back in the day, you know. So I'd sing something like, 'Mona Lisa, Mona Lisa, men have named you,' and they'd let me in.
I've been spending quite a bit of time in Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and the U.K. as Mint is expanding globally, and I'm personally doing much of the research and business deals to make them happen.
