Top 120 Bear Bryant Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Expect the unexpected.”

— Bear Bryant

Featured in: Short Quotes, Expectations Quotes

2. “Don’t talk too much or too soon.”

— Bear Bryant

Featured in: Coaching Quotes

3. “It’s not the will to win that matters-everyone has that. It’s the will to prepare to win that matters.”

— Bear Bryant

Featured in: Preparation Quotes, Victory Quotes, Football Quotes

4. “When you make a mistake, there are only three things you should ever do about it: 1. Admit it. 2. Learn from it, and 3. Don’t repeat it.”

— Bear Bryant

Featured in: Experience Quotes, Accountability Quotes, Common Sense Quotes, Quotes for Better Decisions, Mistake Quotes

5. “Don’t tolerate lazy people. They are losers.”

— Bear Bryant

6. “Show class, have pride, and display character. If you do, winning takes care of itself.”

— Bear Bryant

Featured in: Coaching Quotes, Inspirational Quotes for Men, Football Quotes

7. “Have a plan. Follow the plan, and you’ll be surprised how successful you can be. Most people don’t have a plan. That’s why it’s easy to beat most folks.”

— Bear Bryant

8. “If you believe in yourself and have dedication and pride – and never quit, you’ll be a winner. The price of victory is high but so are the rewards.”

— Bear Bryant

9. “There’s a lot of blood, sweat, and guts between dreams and success.”

— Bear Bryant

10. “Offense sells tickets, but defense wins championships.”

— Bear Bryant

11. “Little things make the difference. Everyone is well prepared in the big things, but only the winners perfect the little things.”

— Bear Bryant

12. “I’m no miracle man. I guarantee nothing but hard work.”

— Bear Bryant

13. “The price of victory is high, but so are the rewards.”

— Bear Bryant

14. “Be aware of “yes” men. Generally, they are losers. Surround yourself with winners. Never forget – people win.”

— Bear Bryant

15. “In order to have a winner, the team must have a feeling of unity; every player must put the team first ahead of personal glory.”

— Bear Bryant

16. “I make my practices real hard because if a player is a quitter, I want him to quit in practice, not in a game.”

— Bear Bryant

Featured in: Real Quotes

17. “Don’t worry about making friends; don’t worry about making enemies. Worry about winning, because if you win, your enemies can’t hurt you, and if you lose, your friends can’t stand you.”

— Bear Bryant

18. “Winning isn’t imperative, but getting tougher in the fourth quarter is.”

— Bear Bryant

19. “Don’t give up at half time. Concentrate on winning the second half.”

— Bear Bryant

20. “In a crisis, don’t hide behind anything or anybody. They’re going to find you anyway.”

— Bear Bryant

21. “I ain’t never been nothin but a winner.”

— Bear Bryant

22. “You must learn how to hold a team together. You must lift some men up, calm others down, until finally they’ve got one heartbeat. Then you’ve got yourself a team.”

— Bear Bryant

23. “Never quit. It is the easiest cop-out in the world. Set a goal and don’t quit until you attain it. When you do attain it, set another goal, and don’t quit until you reach it. Never quit.”

— Bear Bryant

24. “Losing doesn’t make me want to quit. It makes me want to fight that much harder.”

— Bear Bryant

25. “There is a big difference in wanting to and willing to.”

— Bear Bryant

26. “People who are in it for their own good are individualists. They don’t share the same heartbeat that makes a team so great. A great unit, whether it be football or any organization, shares the same heartbeat.”

— Bear Bryant

27. “If anything goes bad, I did it. If anything goes semi-good, we did it. If anything goes real good, then you did it. That’s all it takes to get people to win football games for you.”

— Bear Bryant

28. “No coach has ever won a game by what he knows; it’s what his players know that counts.”

— Bear Bryant

29. “The first time you quit, it’s hard. The second time, it gets easier. The third time, you don’t even have to think about it.”

— Bear Bryant

Featured in: Firsts Quotes

30. “You never know how a horse will pull until you hook him to a heavy load.”

— Bear Bryant

31. “Set goals – high goals for you and your organization. When your organization has a goal to shoot for, you create teamwork, people working for a common good.”

— Bear Bryant

32. “In life, you’ll have your back up against the wall many times. You might as well get used to it.”

— Bear Bryant

33. “You win games with your strengths, not your weaknesses.”

— Bear Bryant

34. “Football changes and so do people.”

— Bear Bryant

35. “If you want to walk the heavenly streets of gold, you gotta know the password, “Roll, Tide, Roll!””

— Bear Bryant

36. “It’s awfully important to win with humility. It’s also important to lose. I hate to lose worse than anyone, but if you never lose you won’t know how to act. If you lose with humility, then you can come back.”

— Bear Bryant

37. “A good, quick, small team can beat a big, slow team any time.”

— Bear Bryant

38. “If a man is a quitter, I’d rather find out in practice than in a game. I ask for all a player has so I’ll know later what I can expect.”

— Bear Bryant

39. “Most coaches study the films when they lose. I study them when we win -to see if I can figure out what I did right.”

— Bear Bryant

40. “If you don’t have discipline, you can’t have a successful program.”

— Bear Bryant

41. “One man doesn’t make a team. It takes eleven.”

— Bear Bryant

42. “Hell, no! A tie is like kissing your sister!”

— Bear Bryant

43. “It’s kind of hard to rally around a math class.”

— Bear Bryant

44. “I’d like for people to remember me as a winner, because I ain’t never been nothin but a winner.”

— Bear Bryant

45. “A champion pays an extra price to be better than anyone else.”

— Bear Bryant

46. “Get the winners into the game.”

— Bear Bryant

47. “I’m known as a recruiter. Well you’ve got to have chicken to make chicken salad.”

— Bear Bryant

48. “Every time a player goes out there, at least 20 people have some amount of influence on him. His mother has more influence than anyone. I know because I played, and I loved my mama.”

— Bear Bryant

49. “Sure, I’d love to beat Notre Dame, don’t get me wrong. But nothing matters more than beating that cow college on the other side of the state!”

— Bear Bryant

50. “Here’s a twenty, bury two.”

— Bear Bryant