John Thorn

“Baseball is not a conventional industry. It belongs to the fans.”

“Myth is more important than history. History is arbitrary, a collection of facts. Myth we choose, we create, we perpetuate.”

“The past is a work of the imagination. It is not what happened, but how we agree to remember it.”

“The great thing about baseball is that there's a crisis every day.”

“Baseball is the story of all of us.”

“Stats are the lifeblood of baseball. They are the language that connects generations of fans.”

“The national pastime is not a business, it is a public trust.”

“Baseball is a game of failure. The best hitters fail seven out of ten times.”

“History is not a morality play. It's a tragedy.”

“Memory is a trickster. It selects, it embellishes, it creates.”

“The first rule of baseball is to get the first out.”

“We are all detectives in the house of the past.”