I recently read “When Pride Still Mattered: A life of Vince Lombardi” by David Maraniss. Below are the quotes I found most interesting. If you enjoy them, consider buying the book.
“In 1935, Robert Maynard Hutchins, president of the University of Chicago, said “if we look at the modern American university we have some difficulty seeing that it is uniformly either one. It sometimes seems to approximate kindergarten at one end and a clutter of specialists at the other.”” (43)
“The fall from grace of American universities, declared ralph C. Hutchinson, president of Washington and Jefferson College, was “evidenced by the shocking number of graduates who have been discovered in… corrupt professional practices, in the concealment of corporation assets or liabilities, in the watering of stock, the peddling of questionable securities, the evasion of income and other taxes, the distribution and acceptance of bribes, and the predatory exploitation of public resources.” (43)
“As an ace public relations man, Cohane understood that his mission was to make people remember his team and its players, and that the most effective way to accomplish this was through the imagery of metaphor and nickname, the semiotics of myth.” (58)
“There was no master plan, just a call from Handy Andy, the Luteran quarterback, looking for someone ot help him out at a little Catholic school in New Jersey – that is how Vince Lombardi became a football coach.” (69)
Ignatius Loyola said, “there is the perception of ‘an intolerable disparity between the hugeness of their desire and the smallness of reality.’” (69)
“Lombardi said, “there were limitations to the game due to mentality and physical ability and that the amount that can be consumed and executed is controlled by the weakest man on your team.” (79)
“Blaik made a distinction between losing and sportsmanship. “There never was a champion, who, to himself, was a good loser.” In Blaik’s opinion the “purpose of the game is to win. To dilute the will to win is to destroy the purpose of the game.”” (102)
“History has a way of mocking attempts to render it retroactively pure.” (120)
“Unfortunately, too much experience in losing [gracefully] often lowers the resistance to defeat.” Blaik wrote.” (144)
“Vincent (son of Vince) had conflicting feelings baout his father’s long work hours. His friends were envious of him for having a dad who worked for the Giants. Vincent would rather have had a father who was around every day.” (178)
“The Packers compiled the worst record in team history, 1-10-1, a mark that New York sportswriter Red Smith later immortalized with the phrase: “The Packers underwhelmed ten opponents, overwhelmed one, and whelmed one.” (191)
“Yes, he had freedom, but that meant freedom to fail.” (212)
“Controlled violence is what Lombardi called football, and he did not consider the phrase an oxymoron. The violence was as importnat to him as the control. He distinguished controlled violence from brutality, which is said “ultimately defeats itself,” but he did not try to minimize the role of violence. To approach football any other way, he said, “would be idotic.”” (219)
“It was a variation of the Jesuit concept of freedom within discipline.” (224)
“Lombardi waited until the precise moment when it would mean the most, when Wood was doubting himself, and then assured him that what had happened to him was no big deal, that there would be hundreds of other days of redemption, and that the coach believed in him.” (248)
“Style rather than substance, Blaik said, allowed coaches of inferior character and talent to rise more quickly than Lombardi.” (261)
“Character is the will in action, his Fordham tutors used to say, and here it is, embodied, magnetism of the will, asserting that life is not merely fleeting luck or chance, that discipline and persistence can prevail, even if it takes twenty years, and as he presses forward the crowd seems certain that he knows the way, the right way, that even if he has not won everything, he will.” (271)
“Myth becomes myth not in the living but in the retelling.” (295)
“The thing that hit me with Lombardi and that we agreed on right away is that if you are gifted you hav ea moral responsibility to fulfill that gift as best you can,” Heinz reflected later.” (318)
“Dick Schaap had once written of him: “Jimmy Taylor, the great fullback of the Green Bay Packers, spent four years in college and emerged unscarred by education.”” (331)
“Lombardi said, “Success is like a habit-forming drug that in victory saps your elation and in defeat deepens your despair. Once you have sampled it, you are hooked.” When you are successful, he thought, everyone else is jealous and every game becomes a grudge match.” (348)
“What’s charisma?” Lombardi once asked W.C. Heinz.
“What?”
“You’re the writer. I keep reading that I have charisma. What the hell is that?”
“Relax,” Heinz said. “It’s not a disease.” (373)
“Lombardi once began a speech to us by asking ‘What is the meaning of love?’ recalled Bob Skoronski. “And this is what he said. He said, ‘Anybody can love something that is beautiful or smart or agile. You will never know love until you can love something that isn’t beautiful, isn’t bright, isn’t glamorous. It takes a special person to love something unattractive, someone unknown. That is the test of love. Everybody can love someone’s strengths and somebody’s good looks. But can you accept someone for his inabilities?”” (374)
“His concern was that the nature of his job had changed. Once, it was hard for him to distinguish between work and play; thye fit together like the tattoos etched into his father’s knuckles. Now it was WORK on one hand and more WORK on the other.” (390)
“Lombardi characterized it as “a violent game and to play it any other way but violently would be imbecilic.” (401)
“Lombardi’s son, Vincent said, “Anybody who motivates and gets people going sooner or later runs out of things to say. You’ve got to take your act to a new venue.” (435)
