An interviewer started to ask Yogi Berra about his two hits from the previous night when Berra corrected him and said he had three hits.

The interviewer apologized. "I checked the paper and the boxscore said you had two hits. The third must have been a typographical error."

"Hell, no," Berra replied. "It was clean single to left."

A reporter wanted to know where Alex Johnson's power surge came from. "Last year, you hit two homers and this year you have seven. What's the difference?"

"Five," Johnson replied.

A rookie sat next to his manager and watched Roger Maris gun down a runner trying to go from first to third.

"Kid, you won't see a throw like that again in a million years."

Three innings later, Maris duplicated the feat.

The rookie turned to the manager and said, "Time sure flies up here in the Majors."

Asked the age of his two elderly pinch-hitters - Vic Davalillo and Manny Mota - Los Angeles manager Tommy Lasorda shrugged.

"I don't know but somebody told me they were waiters at the last supper."

Before a series, St. Louis manager Frankie Frisch instructed his pitching staff to avoid throwing Brooklyn's Tony Cuccinello a fastball.

Dizzy Dean objected. "He can't hit my fastball."

He begged Frisch to let him throw Cuccinello a fastball. Frisch refused. Finally with the game in hand, he relented. Dean threw Cuccinello a fastball. Cuccinello hit it out of the park.

Dean turned to Frisch. "By gosh, Frankie. You were right for once."

Before the 1952 World Series, Brooklyn Dodgers' manager Charlie Dressen cornered pitcher Billy Loes.

"I see in the paper where you picked the Yankees to beat us in seven games. What's wrong with you," Dressen said.

"I was misquoted," Loes protested. "I picked them in six games."

Bob Gibson, known for his sarcastic wit, caught teammate Curt Flood off guard with a rare compliment as Gibson watched him take batting practice."Way to hit the ball, roomie. If I could hit the ball that way, I'd take off my toeplate and retire from pitching," Gibson said.

Flood smiled.

"In fact, roomie,'' Gibson continued, "If I hit the way you do, I think I'd also retire from baseball."

Del Ennis popped up with the bases loaded, sending manager Fred Hutchinson into a slow burn. After Ennis dropped his bat into the rack, Hutchinson fetched it.

He angrily took a swing at the concrete dugout steps. Nothing happened. Two more swings produced nothing more than dents in the bat.

Hutch calmly walked to where Ennis sat and dropped the bat at his feet.

"Keep it," he said. "It's got good wood."

Dick Allen launched a home run that cleared two-deck Connie Mack Stadium, impressing Pittsburgh's Willie Stargell.

"Now, I know why they boo Richie all the time. When he hits a home run, there's no souvenir."

Former manager Alvin Dark was asked to compare teams he managed over the years.

"With the A's we depended upon pitching and speed to win. With the Giants we depended upon pitching and power to win. With the Indians we depended upon an act of God."

Johnny Blanchard sat in the Yankees clubhouse crying after learning he had been traded to Kansas City. Concerned for his teammate, Mickey Mantle sat down and tried to console Blanchard.

"Don't take it so hard, John. Just think, in Kansas City you're going to get a chance to play."

"Hell, I can't play, Mick. That's why I'm crying."

Los Angeles third baseman Pedro Guerrero committed several hard-to-believe fielding errors during one game. This was during the same time that Dodgers' second baseman Steve Sax was undergoing his horrendous and well-publicized fielding slump in which he couldn't throw the most routine ball to first without trouble.

In the post-game meeting, Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda was at a loss with Guerrero. "What are you thinking out there," Lasorda asked.

"Two things," Guerrero said.

"What's the first thing?"

"God, don't let them hit the ball to me."

"And what's the other thing," Lasorda said.

"Don't let them hit the ball to (Steve) Sax."

On a windy day in San Francisco, third baseman Rocky Bridges called for a popup. He drifted past the shortstop, past the pitcher on the mound, past the second baseman. Finally, he was standing next to first baseman Vic Power as the ball fell four feet behind them.

The next day, the newspaper ran a string of song parodies, one targeting Bridges:

"A tisket, a tasket. I should have brought a basket."

Bridges awaited the writer in the clubhouse the following day. "Hey you, c'mon over here. I read what you wrote in the paper."

"And?"

"And it bothered me so much I couldn't sleep last night. I've got to ask you... How does the tune to that song go?"

On July 15, 1973, the Angels' Nolan Ryan pitches his second career no-hitter (and his second of the season), a 6-0 shutout versus the Tigers in Detroit, with a major league record seventeen strikeouts in a no-hitter.

The "Ryan Express" was so on that day, Norm Cash came to the plate with two
outs in the ninth inning and resorts to using a piano leg to get a hit. Home plate
umpire Ron Luciano, nearly falling down laughing at this ruse, makes him use
a real bat. Cash flied out to left-field, ending the game.

Pedro Guerrero, while playing with St. Louis, had no problems with management's desire to put his less-than-stellar glove in left field.

"Isn't that a mistake," a reporter asked Guerrero.

"It's already a mistake if the ball's hit my way," he replied.

Pitcher Bill Werle got Bill Nicholson to hit a high infield popup in front of the mound. As trained, he called for an infielder to make the play. "Eddie's got it! Eddie's got it!," he yelled.

Then, he watched the ball fall untouched as catcher Eddie Fitzgerald, first baseman Eddie Stevens and third baseman Eddie Bockman looked on.

Pitcher Don Sutton offered the best description to the Pirates' hitters of the 1970's, who were known as the Lumber Company.

"Some teams watch a pitcher and say, 'Oh boy, here comes a fastball.' Others say, 'Oh boy, here comes a curveball.' The Pirates say, 'Oh boy, here comes a baseball.'"

The Athletics pounded pitcher Bobo Newsom, taking an 8-0 lead in the fifth inning. Newsom entered his dugout and slammed his glove against the wall.

"What's eating you," a teammate asked.

"How the hell can a guy win when you don't give him any runs," Newsom answered.

Told to get a statement from the Giants' Dominican players after Generalissmo Trujillo was assassinated in the Dominican Republic, a reporter came back from the clubhouse and approached his editor.

"They said they didn't do it."