February is always a bad month for TV sports. Football is gone, basketball is plodding along in the annual midseason doldrums, and baseball is not even mentioned.

The intensity of the football and how the people live football in Liverpool – it is not a usual.

I have short goals – to get better every day, to help my teammates every day – but my only ultimate goal is to win an NBA championship. It’s all that matters. I dream about it. I dream about it all the time, how it would look, how it would feel. It would be so amazing.

It’s a big compliment that so many people want to see me. For them, it’s all about football. That’s what they remember about me.

Sports are such a great teacher. I think of everything they’ve taught me: camaraderie, humility, how to resolve differences.

I’m committed to the fight game.

Baseball is like a poker game. Nobody wants to quit when he’s losing; nobody wants you to quit when you’re ahead.

No boxer in the history of boxing has had Parkinson’s. There’s no injury in my brain that suggests that the illness came from boxing.

To me, football is so much about mental toughness, it’s digging deep, it’s doing whatever you need to do to help a team win and that comes in a lot of shapes and forms.

Never put your money against Cassius Clay, for you will never have a lucky day.

You know, I’m just 6’9 and 260. And just so happen to be very good at playing the game of basketball.“

As Dortmund manager, I lived in a street, and my two neighbours were Schalke fans. They showed it every day, flying flags!

I had no future with the Dodgers, because I was too closely identified with Branch Rickey. After the club was taken over by Walter O’Malley, you couldn’t even mention Mr. Rickey’s name in front of him. I considered Mr. Rickey the greatest human being I had ever known.

Your touch and your feel for the game is pretty much gone if you don’t work on it – at least get some shots up or dribble the ball.

When I’m out on the football field, I have so much confidence in what I’m doing.

My uncle played rugby, and my dad played football, and they used to argue which game was the roughest – and everybody agreed rugby was. It’s a great team sport, and to be successful, every person has to play in the same level.

In my heart, I am always a Raider.

I’ve married somebody who I knew for 14 years. So, I’m just living with a friend. All through my ups and downs in football, from winning the I-League to losing the ISL final, she has been a source of great support.

I love football and the intensity of football in Liverpool, this is what is very good for me.

When I used to play sports, I’d be the one cheering the team on, ‚Come on, we can beat these guys!‘ That’s just in me.

Football is big business – you can’t get away from it. But you have to separate that side from the playing.

Whoever the coach is, my job is to talk to him, understand him and be a better player under him and give my best.

On the field, aggression can sometimes be a positive emotion. It boosts performance and can lift your game. But over the years, I have learnt that restrained aggression is a better animal. That way, you will conserve your energy and won’t spend yourself quickly.

Next to religion, baseball has had a greater impact on our American way of life than any other American institution.

Players today moan about the number of games, but when you’re young, you can’t play enough.

Playing basketball all my life, I’ve collected a lot of different basketball shoes. It’s pretty much all I wear.

We don’t want people to leave the stadium until the game finishes.

I like playing basketball and going to the gym. I don’t box, but I’ll ride my bike and go jogging or running in the park. Sometimes my lady and I go hiking.

They used to call me ‚Touchdown T.‘ I remember in high school, we had homecoming, and I got in front of the pep rally, and I told them, ‚I’m going to run for three touchdowns.‘ I ran for three touchdowns, kicked the extra point, and took myself out the game.

There are two bowlers who I think are very tough to play against – Dale Steyn and Morne Morkel.

My superhero has always been Tendulkar, and it will be Tendulkar for life. He is someone who has inspired me immensely. Just watching him play for India, I used to dream of winning games for India, because he used to do it single handedly.

There have been so many great players that I’ve played with, that I’ve played against over the years.

Michael Jordan changed so much in basketball, he took his power to make a difference. It’s so much going on in music right now and somebody has to make a difference.

I have long understood that losing always comes with the territory when you wander into the gambling business, just as getting crippled for life is an acceptable risk in the linebacker business. They both are extremely violent sports, and pain is part of the bargain. Buy the ticket, take the ride.

Fighting football, not serenity football – that is what I like.

I used to pray that God would make me a great athlete, and He never did.

I hope the fans have enjoyed listening as much as I’ve enjoyed doing the games. I don’t ever go to the park where I don’t have a good day. I don’t like losing. But I don’t think I ever go to the park where I have a bad day. I don’t think once.

When the NBA adopted their uniform that they had to wear, I thought that was very interesting. And you see the way NBA players dress: It’s very cool.

Some people think literature is high culture and that it should only have a small readership. I don’t think so… I have to compete with popular culture, including TV, magazines, movies and video games.

On the court, I want to try and get to the free-throw line a little more. And as a point guard, you can always get better at your decision-making and limiting your mistakes.

If you look at the history of Notre Dame, if you hire a coach who’s been successful at another college program, they’re going to be ultra successful at Notre Dame because the talent will always be there.

When you play sports like tennis, you’re alone, and that’s a good school for life, but it’s also a good school for life to bring your best and make those around you better, too – helping others in difficult moments.

Opera in English is, in the main, just about as sensible as baseball in Italian.

You know, I’m trying to chase rings, and that’s all I’m about. So that’s where the conversation stops for me.

But sports carried me away from being in a gang, or being associated with drugs. Sports was my way out.

I played a great horse yesterday! It took seven horses to beat him.

I am more than just a serious basketball fan. I am a life-long addict. I was addicted from birth, in fact, because I was born in Kentucky and I learned, early on, that Habitual Domination was a natural way of life.

I like to get out and get up the court, using my speed and aggressiveness toward the hoop.

We should play free football, defend lively with a passion, and have the best understanding in offence.

What a great day for football, all we need is some green grass and a ball.

Any teammate of mine that had a kid and a boy that was capable of playing baseball, I think I set a terrific example of ‚Don’t do this‘ and ‚Don’t do that.‘ And that’s one of the things that I’m most proud of.

In all my years of baseball, I have always expected to be traded. I never liked the idea.

You want me to own a team and deal with these rich, spoiled stubborn athletes, and try to get them to perform? No thank you.

My priority is cricket. Everything that I get apart from it is a result of the effort on the field. Everything else follows. I am pretty aware of my priorities, and I don’t really focus on things that are not as important to me as cricket.

I don’t think there is anything wrong in earning money from the sport you love. If you work hard and get benefits from it, there is no harm. The day you feel that you are not working hard and are only looking at the benefits, that’s where the problem is.

The more minutes you play and the more grind and physical play you endure through the course of a season, you have to re-charge and get your body right for the next season. Be in that weight room and conditioning and that kind of deal.

My grandfather was one of the very, very first, if not the first, Samoan wrestlers to become known on a worldwide basis.

Yes, it is one of my ultimate aims – it is the ultimate sense of football: to make the people happy, to let them live some emotions that you usually can’t get.

I am a professional sportswriter, among other things, and I take the games seriously. It is only one of my many powerful addictions, and I don’t mind admitting any of them.

Every season is a new challenge to me, and I always set out to improve in terms of games, goals, assists.

At the start of the season, there are 16 teams in the top division looking behind them, making sure they avoid relegation. The fear starts in the boardroom, comes down to managers and through to players. The fans sense it.