Oakland is home, and you always want to go home. Anytime you get the chance, you're happy to go home.

A good friend of mine took me out and had me hit off a tee. He made me understand what was my strike zone and - with my speed - the importance of making contact. So I give him a lot of credit for changing my game and making me the player I became. He showed me how to work on me and my game, and not worry about patterning myself after someone else and focusing on what they were capable of doing rather than what I was capable of doing.

Rickey got a big ranch. Rickey got a big bull. Rickey got horses. Rickey got chickens and everything. And Rickey got a 20-gallon hat.

Speeches and me don't get along sometimes. It is kind of like putting a tie too tight on my neck. I'm going to do whatever feels right.

I don't think I could have dreamt it up any better than how things went, of being at my peak at just the right time, and have everything go my way.

I like playing for Oakland, they have a very colorful uniform.

It gave me no chance. He (Nolan Ryan) just blew it (strikeout #5,000) by me. But its an honor. I'll have another paragraph in all the baseball books. I'm already in the books three or four times.