I had a marvelous baseball career and after my baseball career, there is an abundance of opportunity out there.

So many good things have happened to me in the game of baseball. When I do allow myself a chance to think about it, it's almost like a storybook career. You feel so blessed to have been able to compete this long.

Disadvantaged kids many times don't have the support network that we all have. I know how important my parents were in my life and many of these kids don't have that support network.

I always thought being a gamer and someone who had a sense of responsibility to the game and to my teammates was the honorable thing.

A lot of people think I had such a rosy career, but I wanted to identify that one of the things that helps you have a long career is learning how to deal with adversity, how to get past it. Once I learned how to get through that, others things didn't seem so hard.

Early in my career, I decided I never wanted to get out of shape.

When things happen to you in the worst way, you live with it, you go over it, you think, 'What else could I have done?