#basketball

I used to play basketball and I was pretty competitive, but I was never a bad loser. I never got angry. For me it was always about doing my best and devoting myself to a challenge. ↗

— Benicio Del Toro

#always #angry #bad #basketball #best

Sorry!' Dave's friend yelled when he saw me. 'That was my-' But i wasn't listening as,instead,i took every bit of the anger and stress of the last few minutes and days put it behind the ball, throwing it overhead at the basket as hard as i could. It went flying, hitting the backboard and banging through the netless hoop at full speed before shooting back out and nailing Dave Wade squarely on the forehead. And just like that, he was down. ↗

— Sarah Dessen

#dave-wade #anger

Now, granted, Howard doesn't fit the conventional psychological profile of a rebounder - that of the no-nonsense, utilitarian "dirty work" specialist. Rather, this is a guy who sings Beyoncé at the free throw line, who quotes not Scarface but Finding Nemo, whose idea of humor is ordering 10 pizzas to be delivered to another player's hotel room, or knocking on teammates' doors and sprinting off down the hall, giggling. He goofs around during practice, during press conferences and during team shootarounds, for which Magic coach Stan Van Gundy has had to institute a no-flatulence rule because, as teammate Rashard Lewis says, "Dwight really likes to cut the cheese. ↗

— Chris Ballard

#humor #nonfiction #art

Good thing in this business is that you just have to make one big shot and that’s enough to make you forget 9 other shots that you missed. ↗

— Guy Zucker

#sports-agent #business

We old athletes carry the disfigurements and markings of contests remembered only by us and no one else. Nothing is more lost than a forgotten game. ↗

— Pat Conroy

#basketball #game #sports #sports-inspirational #sportsmanship

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. ↗

— Hunter S. Thompson

#kentucky #life

OK, I'll put it like this: I doubt if we will see another All-American basketball athlete who is a Rhodes Scholar. ↗

— Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

#another #athlete #basketball #doubt #i

You ready to play?" Dave asked, bouncing it. "I don't know," I said. "Are you going to cheat?" "It's street ball!" He said checking it to me. "Show me that love." So chessy, i thought. But as i felt it, solid against my hands, i did feel something. I wasn't sure it was love. Maybe what remained of it, though, whatever that might be. "All right," I said. "Let's play. ↗

— Sarah Dessen

#love #love

They say that nobody is perfect. Then they tell you practice makes perfect. I wish they'd make up their minds. ↗

— Wilt Chamberlain

#sports #sports

[On writing:] "There's a great quote by Julius Irving that went, 'Being a professional is doing the things you love to do, on the days you don't feel like doing them.'" (One On 1, interview with Budd Mishkin; NY1, March 25, 2007.) ↗

— David Halberstam

#basketball #david-halberstam #julius-erving #professionalism #sports