Zach Grienke quote compilation

[inari]

This guy is just about as good as Ichiro.

 

Two years ago, with Alex Gordon struggling, Greinke pulled him into the video room to show him a clip of Greinke hitting his home run. "In case you forgot," Greinke said, "this is what a home run looks like."

 

"Nice effort by the defense. They didn't get tired of running after balls to the wall. I was pretty impressed by that."

 

To Jeremy Affeldt after Affeldt gave up a homer on what he thought was a good pitch. "Really, I went back to the clubhouse and looked at the pitch on video. It was a really bad pitch. Right over the middle of the plate, and you got it up. I mean it was a bad pitch."

Affeldt: "Thanks, Zack."

Zack: "Right down the middle. I could have hit it out."

Affeldt: "Thanks, Zack."

Zack: "Yeah."

 

On making the Sports Illustrated cover: "There's a lot more interesting stuff going on right now. They should have something else on the cover. Playoff basketball or something else. So it's a mistake. They'll probably sell their least amount of magazines in a long time -- except when NASCAR was on the cover."

 

“You’re not allowed to write about me if you haven’t seen ‘The Shawshank Redemption,’ ” Greinke said. “See it, and then get back to me.”

 

"I just wanted to make this clear: I can't live without baseball...It's to the point where it caused problems with my girlfriend because she knows baseball is more important than her. I say, 'Hey, I'm sorry. I love the game that much. You're not even close to being No. 1 -- that's how much I love baseball. I couldn't live without it."

 

Greinke was, by most accounts, the best golfer on the Royals but soon after arriving at Spring Training 2008 when asked by a reporter about his golf game, that he’d given up the sport, “because there’s no point to it, I’m not going pro.”

 

“No sir, Mr. Baird. I’m not worried (about velocity). I’m worried that you might be worried. I can throw 94 and have a 2.50 ERA. Or I can throw 91 and have a 1.20 ERA. That’s up to you.”

 

"There definitely will be flying cars, but whether there'll be flying cars for most people to use, it'll probably take a long time to straighten everything out, all the rules and hassles. It'll take a while to figure out how to keep people from crashing into each other."

 

When more than 20 scouts hovered around Apopka High's baseball field for one of his games, Greinke was asked by a National League scout, "Should we draft you or Scott Kazmir?"

Greinke quipped: "Me. I'm a better hitter."

 

"If I hit a guy, I want him to be hurt, at least feel it.”

 

“Everybody was mad at me for only throwing fastballs and change-ups,” he said. “So I threw some first-pitch strikes with curveballs. It’s an easy way to get a strike. It’s not like it’s a real hard pitch to throw. You just throw it for a strike."

 

Zack marvels at Prince's Fielder:

 

"Seriously, that was the best pitch I've ever made that got hit over the fence. That was probably the only pitch today that I did exactly what I wanted to do. When I bunted and bunted it foul, I was like, 'How did you hit that?"' Greinke said. "That pitch was everything I wanted to do. It just shows you how good of a hitter he is."

 

 

Anything you can tell us about a teammate that would surprise us?

"Well, Davies thinks he's good at everything but he's not really good at anything."

Yeah? Like what?

"He thinks he's good at golf. He thinks he's good at ping-pong. He thinks he's good at basketball. He thinks he's good at tennis. And probably everything else he thinks he's good at. He thinks he's good at cards. But he really is very average at all of them."

Pretty mediocre, huh? You can beat him at all those things?

"Yeah. We haven't played basketball, but that's about it. And he thinks he can hit really good. So, that's pretty interesting I think."

 

Greinke on his 34 straight scoreless IP

 

Greinke: That's pretty exciting. I didn't know that. 34, that's pretty much impossible nowadays. I don't even know how that could be even possible, to tell you the truth. Uh, that's pretty...I don't even, that's an amazing stat.

 

"My fiance said I'm living her dream because she wants to be in the swimsuit calendar."

 

“But whenever guys bunt and give me an out — I don’t care what the situation is — it makes it a lot easier when you get a free out. Even if the guy moves up a base.”

When told the Wall Street Journal declared his slider to be the second most difficult pitch to hit in the major leagues behind the slider of the Oakland A's Michael Wuertz, Greinke barely moved his lips to answer.

"Who's Michael Wuertz?" he said.

 

So how would he do against his slider?

"That's a question that interests me," he said. "I could hit me if someone were on base. It wouldn't be easy, but I could do it. If no one were on base, I wouldn't care as much, so I could get me out."

 

 

And then, there was this exchange when Greinke was asked which NL All-Star he'd most like to face:

 

Zack: Maybe Chipper Jones. Is he here? I'm not even paying attention.

 

Reporter: No, he's not here.

 

Zack: He's not even here? Well, he would've been my favorite to face, if he was. Why isn't he, have you heard?

 

Reporter: Well, the National League third basemen are David Wright and Ryan Zimmerman.

 

Zack: Is Chipper doing good? Why isn't he here?

 

Reporter: He's having a good year, just maybe not as good as those other guys.

 

Zack: He should be here. That doesn't even make any sense. It's like, I'll vote Jeter in for the All-Star game the rest of his career, because you have to. He's Jeter. And I'll vote Chipper Jones in.

[javy knows my name]

Quotes like the last one make it sound like he's completely aloof. Other times he seems like he's poking fun at himself. Either way, it's really entertaining.

 

That Jeremy Affeldt quote is awesome.

 

I'm going with aloof.

[USSoccer]

Awesome

[The Logan]

Thank you for those. He's a funny dude. I'd like to see a tyeam with him, Z, and Ichiro on it. That would be fun

[champaignchris]

Thank you for those. He's a funny dude. I'd like to see a tyeam with him, Z, and Ichiro on it. That would be fun

With Ricky Henderson as 3rd base coach.

[TruffleShuffle]

the royals should be very glad they signed him before this season, because there's no way in hell he'd take that deal now.

[TruffleShuffle]

from ken tremendous' twitter:

 

If Zack Greinke goes 4 innings in his next start, gives up 30 earned runs, & records negative 43 Ks, he'll have the same stats as Sabathia.

[imb]

“You’re not allowed to write about me if you haven’t seen ‘The Shawshank Redemption,’ ” Greinke said. “See it, and then get back to me.”

 

agreed

[illiniguy]

the royals should be very glad they signed him before this season, because there's no way in hell he'd take that deal now.

I think more than anything the Royals are lucky he has the issues he does. He knows he wouldn't do as well in the pressure of a huge market. Plus he's loyal to the Royals because of how they stood by him during his issues.