The people like the American Legion Post that gave us a chance to play. A place to play and a chance to play.

And I found out, the other part of it is that I found out and in my desire to life successfully, that baseball fit very well into my life. It's been a great teacher, trainer, mentor and you'll see what I mean in the next few minutes that I have to speak.

The Yankees won the pennant, we went on to the World Series, 41 years after that in the city of Toronto. The great city of Toronto, and all the provinces in Canada, everybody reached out and they were excited because we won the first World Series ever, across the border.

To the people out there, baseball is a simple sport. But it is complex. It is never easy.

All good balls to hit are strikes, though not all strikes are good balls to hit.

All though I didn't meet him. His legend and his saga and his story is just that. Jackie Robinson, we all have to tip our hat to him. Because he made the game available to guys like me.

There is no way, believe me, despite my name being Winfield, and loving the game dearly. It wasn't in the cards. I didn't know what it was going to take to get here.