Somebody once asked me if I ever went up to the plate trying to hit a home run. I said, 'Sure, every time.'

- Mickey Mantle

The biggest game I ever played in was probably Don Larsen's perfect game.

- Mickey Mantle

I always loved the game, but when my legs weren't hurting it was a lot easier to love.

- Mickey Mantle

To play 18 years in Yankee Stadium is the best thing that could ever happen to a ballplayer.

- Mickey Mantle

Roger Maris was as good a man and as good a ballplayer as there ever was.

- Mickey Mantle

I'll play baseball for the Army or fight for it, whatever they want me to do.

- Mickey Mantle

I don't care who you are, you hear those boos.

- Mickey Mantle

My views are just about the same as Casey's.

- Mickey Mantle

Sometimes I think if I had the same body and the same natural ability and someone else's brain, who knows how good a player I might have been.

- Mickey Mantle

I could never be a manager. All I have is natural ability.

- Mickey Mantle

You don't realize how easy this game is until you get up in that broadcasting booth.

- Mickey Mantle

If I knew I was going to live this long, I'd have taken better care of myself.

- Mickey Mantle

Heroes are people who are all good with no bad in them. That's the way I always saw Joe DiMaggio. He was beyond question one of the greatest players of the century.

- Mickey Mantle

I guess you could say I'm what this country is all about.

- Mickey Mantle

It was all I lived for, to play baseball.

- Mickey Mantle

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.

- Mickey Mantle

Well, baseball was my whole life. Nothing's ever been as fun as baseball.

- Mickey Mantle

As far as I'm concerned, Aaron is the best ball player of my era. He is to baseball of the last fifteen years what Joe DiMaggio was before him. He's never received the credit he's due.

- Mickey Mantle

Today's Little Leaguers, and there are millions of them each year, pick up how to hit and throw and field just by watching games on TV. By the time they're out of high school, the good ones are almost ready to play professional ball.

- Mickey Mantle

When I hit a home run I usually didn't care where it went. So long as it was a home run was all that mattered.

- Mickey Mantle