Yogi & Casey

NEW YORK, New York

"You can observe a lot by watching," Yogi Berra once said.

After his seventieth birthday, Casey Stengel remarked that "most people my age are dead at the present time."

We're not here to discuss Yogi and Casey's baseball exploits. We're not here to talk about how Stengel managed the New York Yankees when they became the only franchise to win five world championships in a row, and how he won a record 10 pennants with them. Or how he also managed the worst team in modern baseball history, the 1962 New York Mets, and finished his career with three last place finishes. We're not here to discuss how Yogi enjoyed one of the game's greatest playing careers, as catcher for the Yankees during one of their many heydays, and how he holds some of the most enviable of World Series records, including most games played, at-bats, hits and doubles. We're not here to talk about how Casey and Yogi are in the Hall of Fame, or how they're both New York baseball legends.

That's not why we're here.

No. We're here to recount some of the more intriguing things that Casey and Yogi have said over the years because, even more than their prowess on the field, these two engaging men are known for their commentary off it.

About baseball, Yogi Berra once said, "Ninety percent of this game is half-mental." Similarly, he once said, "Ninety percent of the putts that fall short don't go in."

Casey once went to the mound to pull his pitcher. "I'm not tired," the pitcher said.

"Well, I'm tired of you," Casey replied.

Yogi once tried to calm a writer who was incensed over the price of a diner breakfast he'd just eaten.

"That's because they have to import those English muffins," Yogi explained.

Casey once told a writer, "I won't trade my left fielder."

"Who's your left fielder?" asked the writer.

"I don't know," Casey said, "but if it isn't him, I'll keep him anyway."

After arguing long and loud with an umpire about where a ball had hit and thus whether it was a home run or still in play, Yogi said afterward, "Anybody who can't tell the difference between the sound of a ball hitting wood and a ball hitting concrete must be blind."

Yogi once showed up for an appointment just fifteen minutes after he was supposed to. "That's the earliest I've ever been late," he said.

When the expansion Mets made Hobie Landrith, a journeyman catcher, their first choice in the draft, Stengel explained his logic. "You have to have a catcher or you'll have a lot of passed balls."

On a hot day in Florida, Yogi was dressed snazzily. "Good afternoon, Mr. Berra," a woman said. "My, you look mighty cool today."

"Thank you, ma'am," Yogi replied. "You don't look so hot yourself."

Casey once got on the Mets for their inept play during an exhibition trip to mile-high Mexico City. When asked if the altitude bothered his players, Casey said, "The altitude bothered my players at the Polo Grounds, and that's below sea level."

Asked for the time, Yogi once said, "Do you mean now?"

Once Casey got into a cab with several writers. "Are you fellows players?" the cabbie asked. "No," Casey answered, "and neither are my players players."

Probably Yogi's most famous line is the Zen-like "It's not over 'til it's over."

Probably Casey's most famous line is an elegant cry for something -- anything -- good. "Can't anybody play this here game?" he said.

Finally, Yogi disputed that he had uttered all the malapropisms that had been attributed to him.

"I really didn't say everything I said," Yogi said.