"I still get such a bang out of it, playing ball. Same as I did when I first came up. You get out there, and the stands are full and everybody's cheerin'. It's like everybody in the world come to see you. And inside of that there's the players, they're yakkin' it up. The pitcher throws and you look for that pill... suddenly there's nothing else in the ballpark but you and it. Sometimes, when you feel right, there's a groove there, and the bat just eases into it and meets that ball. When the bat meets that ball and you feel that ball just give, you know it's going to go a long way. Damn, if you don't feel like you're going to live forever...I couldn't give all that up. Not for nothing."

"I always figured it was talent made a man big, you know, if I was the best at something. I mean, we're the guys they come to see. Without us, there ain't a ballgame. Yeah, but look at who's holding the money and look at who's facing a jail cell. Talent don't mean nothing. And where's Comiskey and Sullivan, Attell, Rothstein? Out in the back room cutting up profits, that's where. That's the damn conspiracy."

"Regardless of the verdict of juries... no player who throws a ball game... no player who undertakes, or promises to throw a game... no player who sits in conference with a bunch of crooked players and gamblers where the ways and means of throwing a ball game are discussed, and does not promptly tell his club about it... will ever play professional baseball again."

"The inside story of how one team, for a price, broke all the rules...along with the heart of every kid in the USA."

"Fellas, we’re in a hole full of coal gas here. The tiniest spark at the wrong time is going to be the end of us. So we got to pick away at this situation, slow and careful. We got to organize and build support. We got to work together. Together! Till they can’t get their coal out of the ground without us cause we’re a union! Cause we’re the workers damn it and we take care of each other!"

"I take care of my people. You bring 'em trouble, and you're a dead man. Sleep tight, Kenehan."

"I've met Mr. Felts. I wouldn't piss on him if his heart was on fire or ice was burned with paintings."

"Now you watch your mouth, peckerwood. I've been called nigger, and I can't help that's the way white folks is, but I ain't never been called no scab!"

"[Narrating] It were 19 and 20 in the southwest fields and things was tough. The miners was trying to bring the union to West Virginia and the coal operators and their gun thugs was set on keeping them out."

"We done it mama! We're gonna have the union!"

"[Narrating] All we got is our misery, Joe Kenehan used to say, and the least we could do is share it."

"'Round here, there's the Missionary folks. They's the hardshell Baptists. Then there's the Freewill folks, which is your softshell Baptists. Right now, I preach for both."

"I was putting up blackberries when Trammel Blankenship came shoutin' up the holler that the Number 5 had blown. I remember I took the pot off the stovetop and washed my hands before I went down. It took two days to dig through. And then when they brung 'em up, you couldn't tell which was which. They found blood on the walls from fellas trying to claw their way out. Mrs. Elkins, Mrs. Mounts, Bridey Mae, me ... we all lost our men in that fire. Danny were seven then. Now he's back in that same hole."

"It takes more than guns to kill a man."

"At the coal company they use you until you wear out."

"Chris Cooper — Joe Kenehan"

"James Earl Jones — "Few Clothes" Johnson"

"Mary McDonnell — Elma Radnor"

"Will Oldham — Danny Radnor"

"David Strathairn — Sid Hatfield"

"Ken Jenkins — Sephus Purcell"

"Gordon Clapp — Griggs"

"Kevin Tighe — Hickey"