Here are 23 of the best basketball quotes, perfect for motivation, inspiration, and capturing the essence of the sport:
- Michael Jordan: “I’ve missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times, I’ve been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.”
- Kobe Bryant: “The most important thing is to try and inspire people so that they can be great in whatever they want to do.”
- Larry Bird: “I’ve got a theory that if you give 100% all of the time, somehow things will work out in the end.”
- Magic Johnson: “Ask not what your teammates can do for you. Ask what you can do for your teammates.”
- LeBron James: “You can’t be afraid to fail. It’s the only way you succeed—you’re not gonna succeed all the time, and I know that.”
- Tim Duncan: “Good, better, best. Never let it rest. Until your good is better and your better is best.”
- Kevin Durant: “Hard work beats talent when talent fails to work hard.”
- Shaquille O’Neal: “Excellence is not a singular act, but a habit. You are what you repeatedly do.”
- Scottie Pippen: “Sometimes a player’s greatest challenge is coming to grips with his role on the team.”
- Charles Barkley: “The only difference between a good shot and a bad shot is if it goes in or not.”
- Phil Jackson: “The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team.”
- Pat Riley: “There can only be one winner, and the rest are losers, but winners know they are winners before the results are in.”
- Bill Russell: “Concentration and mental toughness are the margins of victory.”
- Dwyane Wade: “My belief is stronger than your doubt.”
- John Wooden: “Things turn out best for the people who make the best of the way things turn out.”
- Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: “One man can be a crucial ingredient on a team, but one man cannot make a team.”
- Wilt Chamberlain: “They say that nobody is perfect. Then they tell you practice makes perfect. I wish they’d make up their minds.”
- Derek Fisher: “Your biggest opponent isn’t the other guy. It’s human nature.”
- Jason Kidd: “A lot of people say they want to be great, but they’re not willing to make the sacrifices necessary to achieve greatness.”
- Carmelo Anthony: “Every morning you have two choices: continue to sleep with your dreams, or wake up and chase them.”
- Julius Erving: “Being a professional is doing the things you love to do, on the days you don’t feel like doing them.”
- Hakeem Olajuwon: “I always keep a ball in the car. You never know.”
- Doc Rivers: “You win by effort, by commitment, by ambition, by quality, by expressing yourself individually but in the team context.”
These quotes capture the determination, perseverance, and mindset needed both on and off the court.
