“I really didn’t say everything I said.”

Yogi Berra, one of America’s most famous baseball players, died yesterday. He will go down in history not just for his famous catches, but also for his catchy phrases, which came to be known as “Yogiisms”. His nonsensical witticisms took the form of obvious tautologies* or paradoxical contradictions.

Some famous Yogiisms:

“You can observe a lot by watching.”

“If you can’t imitate him, don’t copy him.”

About baseball: “90% of the game is half-mental.”

“If you come to a fork in the road, take it.”

“Nobody goes there any more. It’s too crowded.”

“It’s déjà vu all over again.”

“Even Napoleon had his Watergate.”

“You’ve got to be very careful if you don’t know where you are going, because you might not get there.”

“You wouldn’t have won if we’d beaten you.”

“A nickel ain’t worth a dime anymore.”

“In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is.”

“Always go to other people’s funerals, otherwise they won’t go to yours.”

“It ain’t over till it’s over.”

— Yogi Berra, May 12, 1925 – 22 September, 2015

*  tautology: the saying of the same thing twice in different words, generally considered to be a fault of style. But not in the case of Yogi Berra.