Defense is something I take pride in. I feel it's just as important as offense. They should have RBIs for defensive plays.

Sometimes it's more fun to compete with your friends, because you can talk a little trash with them.

It's not like I'm an introvert. You get to know me, I can have a conversation with you. But in front of the media, I'm probably more of a quiet guy.

I want to be on that team that wins the world championship here in Chicago and sees the city go crazy.

If they watch me play, people will say I'm not into it or whatever. That's okay. I kind of like it. People don't know how much work I'm putting into it. They don't need to know.

As a first baseman, hitting home runs is what's expected of me. But I don't really try to hit home runs.

I miss basketball every now and then.

I felt I was good in basketball but I wasn't a blue-chip prospect.

You just get better with age. You learn yourself and the league. I'm starting to understand more about hitting every year.

If you write in the paper 'Lee stinks,' that's not going to affect me. I'll just laugh. And if you write 'Derrek Lee is the best player in the league,' that won't affect me either. I'll laugh.

The chance to go to the postseason, it's hard to pass up.

[W]e are not merely tempered and schooled by failure but compelled, in however subtle a fashion, to become something other than we were.

Be disciplined enough to choose your network and be willing to sacrifice the circles that reduce your effectiveness and make you unproductive.

Everybody may have gone through the sufferings and pains of falling and failing in love earlier, may be many times.

Well, any effort to maximize your potential and ability is a good thing.

It is a good thing to be rich and strong, but it is a better thing to be loved.

I'm not a big fan of doing what my mother wants me to do, like any daughter.

My father had a country store and then later, when I was 10 or 12, sold it and bought a farm equipment dealership in nearby Camden.

The evolution of the capitalist style of life could be easily - and perhaps most tellingly - described in terms of the genesis of the modern Lounge Suit.

But every error is due to extraneous factors (such as emotion and education); reason itself does not err.

It's no go the merry-go-round, it's no go the rickshaw All we want is a limousine and a ticket for the peepshow.