I don't regret one minute of the last twelve years, but I do believe I would regret one minute too many. … I don't know if cortisone is good for you or not. But to take a shot every other ball game is more than I wanted to do and to walk around with a constant upset stomach because of the pills and to be high half the time during a ball game because you're taking painkillers … I don't want to have to do that.

A 1966 press conference explaining why he chose to retire from baseball following the 1966 season, as quoted in Baseball: An Illustrated History (1996) by Ken Burns, Geoffrey C. Ward, p. 390