Ernie Harwell

Baseball is a ballet without music. Drama without words.

The best thing anyone can do is be himself. Everyone was made different by God, and that's the way it should be. And if I were a writer or an announcer starting out, I don't think I'd imitate anybody. I'd try to be whatever I am.

Baseball is a tongue-tied kid from Georgia growing up to be an announcer and praising the Lord for showing him the way to Cooperstown. This is a game for America. Still a game for America, this baseball!

Baseball is just a game, as simple as a ball and bat, yet as complex as the American spirit it symbolizes. A sport, a business and sometimes almost even a religion.

Why the fairy tale of Willie Mays making a brilliant World Series catch, and then dashing off to play stickball in the street with his teenage pals. That’s baseball. So is the husky voice of a doomed Lou Gehrig saying, ‘I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of this earth.’

Everybody in the minor leagues - if you're a player, an announcer, whatever - wants to be in the big leagues.

Baseball is a lot like life. It's a day-to-day existence, full of ups and downs. You make the most of your opportunities in baseball as you do in life.

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