The only number I care about is Babe Ruth's. Because as a left-handed hitter, I wiped him out. That's it. And in the baseball world, Babe Ruth's everything, right? I got his slugging percentage and I'll take his home runs and that's it. Don't talk about him no more. |
The only person I can measure myself against is myself. It's all up to me to do my job and prove that I'm doing it at the ability that I feel that I should be doing it, contributing to the ball club. |
The record is Hank's until someone passes it. Whoever that person is, I wish them well. If it happens to be me, that's it. It's just having the opportunity. You hope you can inspire some little kid somewhere down the road to say, 'I want to break Hank's record, I want to break Barry Bonds' record.' That's all the record really means to me. |
The thing about leaving the game because of an injury, that's a whole different subject than playing 20 years and then going out, |
The timing is just not right. I have too many other responsibilities, too many things I have to take care of that are important to me. I owe it to the city (of San Francisco), my knee, my team, the fans and my family. I have to put my greatest effort right now into all of that. |
There are no greater fans. |
There are other issues a lot more serious, and you guys (the media) should direct your attention toward taking care of that, ... Ask yourselves how much you've donated to Katrina (relief). Everybody should be pointing the fingers at themselves. |
There's just no doubt in my mind that I can keep playing the game at a high level. |
there's more baseball in me. |
There's no doubt in my mind that I can still play the game at a high level. I have a short period of time to try to help as much as I can, and hopefully it doesn't hurt the team. |
There's no place like home, |
There's some things I got to prove to myself first. I take a lot of pride playing on the field. If I could still go out there and help the team, then that's what I'm going to do. If I can't do that anymore, then I'll say goodbye. |
They are the exact wristbands I wore in 2004 and 2005. They're exactly the same. They can't come after me now if they didn't come after me in 2004. |
They asked me how I felt and I said I felt fine. So they said we'll put you out there for three innings. |
They can say whatever they want to say, ... To me, anybody who has to go out of their way to say something negative about somebody else, they're in a lot more pain than I am. I'm not in that kind of pain. You've got to be miserable to go out of your way just to be negative about somebody all the time. |