If you’ve ever played the game of baseball, you can attest to how thrilling it is: stepping onto the home plate, your eyes on the pitcher and watching the ball zooming straight at you as your hands clinch the bat, ready to swipe. The adrenaline rush is amazing.
However, whether you’re a baseball fan or not or look forward to spring or not, I’m sure just viewing the strength that players put into the game gives a lot of vibes and inspiration on how to approach life sometimes.
Do you love the energy, passion, and spirit with which your favourite hitters play the game of baseball, and are you looking for powerful quotes and sayings that will place you in their shoes? Well, I’m about to blow your mind with the best selection of baseball hitting quotes and sayings you can ever find. Check them out.
Baseball Hitting Quotes and Sayings
Baseball hitting was always fun; I loved it very much. By the hours I practised, you’d have to say I was working a lot of hours, but it was pretty near tireless fun. It also taught me quotes and sayings that keep me fired on and off the pitch.
1. Life’s not about how hard of a hit you can give; it’s about how many you can take and keep moving forward.
2. Since baseball time is measured only in outs, all you have to do is succeed utterly; keep hitting, keep the rally alive, and defeat time. You remain forever young.
3. I swing big with everything I’ve got. I hit big, or I miss big. I like to live as big as I can.
4. Success is how high you bounce when you hit bottom.
5. I’d play for half my salary if I could always hit in this dump.
6. Man may penetrate the universe’s outer reaches, and he may solve the very secret of eternity itself. Still, for me, the ultimate human experience is to witness the flawless execution of the hit-and-run.
7. Talent hits a target no one else can hit. Genius hits a target no one else can see.
8. Don’t forget to swing hard if you hit the ball.
9. Remember, it’s a round ball and a round bat, and you got to hit the ball squarely.
10. The other sports are just sports. Baseball is a love.
11. Baseball, to me, is still the national pastime because it is a summer game.
12. My dad taught me to switch-hit. He and my grandfather, who was left-handed, pitched to me every day after school in the backyard. I batted lefty against my dad and righty against my granddad.
13. In life, you are going to make mistakes, you’re going to fall down, but it’s the getting up that counts. Like in baseball, you’ll get a few hits, but you’ll most likely strike out more than you’ll get on base. But don’t quit. Find your focus, relax, take a deep breath and give it a good swing
14. Every great batter works on the theory that the pitcher is more afraid of him than he is of the pitcher
15. You can’t think and hit the ball simultaneously. That’s the mystery of baseball playing.
16. One of the greatest lessons I have learnt from baseball is this: “a full mind is an empty bat.”
17. See the ball; hit the ball. It doesn’t get more difficult than this.
18. I decided to pick out the greatest hitter to watch and study, and Jackson was good enough for me.
19. Trying to get a fastball past Hank Aaron is like trying to get the sun past a rooster
20. Cardinal rule for all hitters with two strikes: Never trust the umpire.
21. The pitcher has got only a ball. I’ve got a bat. So the percentage in weapons is in my favour and I let the fellow with the ball do the fretting
22. Somebody once asked me if I ever went up to the plate trying to hit a home run. I said, ‘Sure, every time
23. But god-damn, to think you’re a .300 hitter and end up at .237 in your last season, then find yourself looking at a lifetime .298 average – it made me want to cry
24. There has always been a saying in baseball that you can’t make a hitter, but I think you can improve a hitter more than a fielder. More mistakes are made hitting than in any other part of the game.
25. During my 18 years, I came to bat almost 10,000 times. I struck out about 1,700 times and walked maybe 1,800 times. You figure a ballplayer will average about 500 at-bats a season. That means I played 7 years without ever hitting the ball.
26. They give you a round bat and throw a round ball. And they tell you to hit it square.
27. I think about baseball when I wake up in the morning. I think about it all day, and I dream about it at night. I don’t think about it, only when I’m playing it.
28. Hitting is fifty per cent above the shoulders. All you need to do is get your swing on
29. I became a good pitcher when I stopped trying to make them miss the ball and started trying to make them hit it.
30. Baseball is the only field of endeavour where a man can succeed three times out of ten and be considered a good performer.
31. The way a team plays as a whole determines its success. You may have the greatest number of individual stars in the world, but the club won’t be worth a dime if they don’t play together.
32. Hitting is timing. Pitching is upsetting timing. Bear this in mind always
33. The way a team plays as a whole determines its success.
34. He hits from both sides of the plate. He’s amphibious.
35. I only have one superstition: I make sure to touch all the bases when I hit a home run.
36. Slump? I ain’t in no slump. I just ain’t hitting.
37. I never blame myself when I’m not hitting. I just blame the bat, and if it keeps up, I change bats. After all, how can I get mad at myself if I know it isn’t my fault that I’m not hitting?
38. Baseball is a game, yes. It is also a business. But what is most truly is disguised combat. For all its gentility and almost leisurely pace, baseball is violence under wraps.
39. I’d walk through hell in a gasoline suit to play baseball.
40. I believe in the Church of Baseball. I’ve tried all the major religions and most of the minor ones. I’ve worshipped Buddha, Allah, Brahma, Vishnu, Siva, trees, mushrooms, and Isadora Duncan. I know things.
41. Baseball is like a poker game. Nobody wants to quit when he’s losing; nobody wants you to quit when you’re ahead.
42. People ask me what I do in winter when there’s no baseball. I’ll tell you what I do. I stare out the window and wait for spring.
43. You have to be a man to play baseball for a living, but you have to have a lot of little boys in you, too.
44. It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in spring when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone.
45. You must hit the fastball to play in the big leagues. All great hitters know this
46. I have observed that baseball is not unlike war, and when you get right down to it, we batters are the heavy artillery.
47. The pitcher has to find out if the hitter is timid. And if the hitter is timid, he has to remind the hitter he’s timid.
48. I have discovered in 20 years of moving around a ballpark that the knowledge of the game is usually in inverse proportion to the price of the seats.
49. Baseball, it is said, is only a game. True. And the Grand Canyon is only a hole in Arizona. Not all holes, or games, are created equal.
50. Every player should be accorded the privilege of at least one season with the Chicago Cubs. That’s baseball as it should be played – in God’s own sunshine. And that’s living.
51. After I hit a home run, I had a habit of running the bases with my head down. I figured the pitcher already felt bad enough without me showing him up rounding the bases.
52. Every hitter likes fastballs, just like everybody likes ice cream. But you don’t like it when someone’s stuffing it into you by the gallon. That’s what it feels like when you throw Nolan Ryan balls.
53. I’ve found that you don’t need to wear a necktie if you can hit.
54. Ability is the art of getting credit for all the home runs somebody else hits.
55. To a pitcher, a base hit is the perfect example of negative feedback.
56. Man may penetrate the universe’s outer reaches and solve the very secret of eternity itself. Still, for me, the ultimate human experience is to witness the flawless execution of the hit-and-run.
57. I played seven years without ever hitting the ball. It wasn’t a fun experience.
58. Don’t tell me about the world. Not today. It’s springtime, and they’re knocking baseball around fields where the grass is damp and green in the morning, and the kids are trying to hit the curve ball.
59. There’s only one way to become a hitter. Go up to the plate and get mad. Get mad at yourself and mad at the pitcher.
60. Guessing what the pitcher will throw is 80% of being a successful hitter. The other 20% is just execution.
61. It helps if the hitter thinks you’re a little crazy.
62. A man has to have goals – for a day, for a lifetime – and that was mine, to have people say, ‘There goes Ted Williams, the greatest hitter who ever lived.
63. I am an arm hitter. When you snap the bat with your wrists just as you meet the ball, you give it tremendous speed for a few inches of its course. The speed with which the bat meets the ball is the thing that counts.
64. I was such a dangerous hitter I even got intentional walks during batting practice.
65. I’m always amazed when a pitcher becomes angry at a hitter for hitting a home run off him. When I strike out, I don’t get angry at the pitcher; I get angry at myself. I would think that if a pitcher threw up a home run ball, he should be angry at himself.
66. Traditionally, baseball punishes preening. In a society increasingly tolerant of exhibitionism, it is splendid when a hitter is knocked down because in his last at-bat, he lingered at the plate to admire his home run.
67. The bigger the game, the better I liked it. Not that I was about to let anybody know I was excited. I approached every game the same way. One pitch, one hitter at a time.
68. You can struggle for a little while. It’s going to happen. If a guy hits .200 for a while, it doesn’t mean he’s a .200 hitter.
69. The leadoff-hitter thing, I think, it’s always nice to have an established leadoff hitter and to have someone who can get on base and set the tone.
70. I consider myself a line-drive hitter with power. I just try to put my best swing on the ball every time.
71. Going into Portland, I was trying not to step on anybody’s toes, stay quiet, and play my game. I was just trying to figure out the sequences I would see as a hitter and learn from that.
72. You must work with different angles as a hitter. Figuring out with my body what helps me get into those angles is a constant discovery.
73. When you hit a player in the head, you’re more apt to get some fisticuffs or, you know, bring both teams out on the field, but it was more accepted that – in the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s. I think it’s a little over-policed nowadays because I will always believe that sometimes knocking a hitter down or even hitting a hitter is part of baseball.
74. You would be amazed how many important outs you can get by working the countdown to where the hitter is sure you’re going to throw to his weakness and then throw to his power instead.
75. If there was ever a man born to be a hitter, it was me.
76. One game and one pitch can change everything for a hitter. I like to approach it because every at-bat has its own unique opportunity to go out there and do something really good.
77. I was a lousy hitter in May, doing the same things that made me a great hitter in June.
78. To be a good hitter, you’ve got to do one thing – get a good ball to hit.
79. There are different kinds of laughs. It’s like a baseball lineup: this guy’s your power hitter, gets on base, works out, and walks. If everybody does their job, we’re gonna win.
80. I consider Billy Keeler, Mike Tiernan, Ed Delhanty and Larrie La Joie the toughest hitters I had to pitch to, but I did not dread them. Remember, Hughie Duffy was a member of our team, so I did not face him. In my opinion, Duffy was the greatest hitter.
81. For me, it’s about finding ways. I’m not a great hitter, but I will try and beat you any way I can. I think about that in every aspect of the game. Running? I’m not the fastest runner, but I can steal a base. For me, it’s about taking advantage of what I can.
82. I was the worst hitter ever. I never broke a bat until backing out of the garage last year.
83. What is life, after all, but a challenge? There’s no better challenge that can be there than the one between the pitcher and the hitter.
84. A pitcher has to look at the hitter as his mortal enemy.
85. I study pitchers. I visualize pitches. That gives me a better chance every time I step into the box. That doesn’t mean I’m going to get a hit every game, but that’s one of the reasons I’ve come a long way as a hitter.
86. I don’t like the designated hitter. A guy who plays should be able to catch and hit.
87. Actually, punching is a mistake; a heavy hitter will cut you with one shot.
88. I wonder why there is a designated hitter in baseball after all these years? As an experiment, it seemed like a swell enough idea, but you would think the novelty would have worn off by now, and everyone would get back to playing baseball.
89. If I was crazy, I’d throw the ball into the stands with the bases loaded. Now, that’s crazy. If I was stupid, I’d throw the ball into centre field with the bases loaded and a 3-2 count on the hitter. Now, that’s stupid.
90. There’s so much attached to playing shortstop that you lose your concentration on hitting unless you’re a natural hitter. There’s so much to think about in the field; you don’t have time to think about what you did at the plate last time.
91. Playing shortstop is 75 to 80 per cent anticipation, knowing the hitter and the pitch being thrown.
92. It tickles me still when you see Roger Clemens, as great as he is, throws a split finger and the hitter just swings and misses. They don’t see that ball that well. Jack Morris threw a good one, and Mike Scott did. There have been a lot of great pitchers over the years, and I think that pitch helped their careers.
93. That’s one of the great oddities of baseball: Success is relative. A hitter who fails 70 per cent of the time at the plate is a potential National Baseball Hall of Fame member, and many World Championship teams lose more than 70 games during their title-winning seasons.
94. Balls and strikes are the basic tenets of everything in baseball. From the perspective of hitting, pitching, offence and defence, it’s all about the strike zone and the battle between the pitcher and hitter.
95. I threw my best to every hitter I faced, and I found I had the strength to go all the way.
96. There is no doubt that because I am a switch hitter, I have one of the best offensive advantages that a hitter can have.
97. When I wake up in the morning, I don’t think of myself as being better than anybody else. I think of myself as a good hitter.
98. I was a contact hitter my whole career but learned to handle the ball inside. And Ted Williams played a big part in that. He gave me advice on how to handle inside pitches.
99. Ted Williams, an extraordinary hitter in his day, has said the swing starts in the hips, and Sosa arrived with one of the strongest lower bodies in the game.
100. There have been times when I’ve come out of the bullpen thinking I was going to throw a no-hitter, and I’ve lasted two or three innings. So I try not to use my pre-game warm-ups as a barometer of how I pitch.
I hope these collection of 100 baseball hitting quotes and sayings effectively showcased the beauty of baseball. Do well to grab your favourite quotes ASAP! Also, share your thoughts on each one in the comment section. Thanks.