Top 45 Bruno Sammartino Quotes

If anybody can really beat me, fine. But that’s the only way I’ll go down.

Throughout the ’60s and ’70s, I saw many operas in New York and Philadelphia. When people found out about that, they were always shocked, because I was a professional wrestler. Why are athletes any different than any other profession? People have many other interests.

The last thing I want to do in Europe is drive.

Ivan Koloff was great. I had a lot of great matches with him.

They say it’s all fake, but there’s nothing fake when a guy picks you up and slams you down or throws you out of the ring onto a concrete floor. They say, ‘Yeah, but you know how to land.’ Well, you try landing on a concrete floor.

If I had only Inoki to meet, I could wrestle until I was 60 years old.

In my day, I, myself, in my prime, in the late-’50s-mid-’70s I was about 270-275. After I broke my neck and I was in the hospital for a month or so, I dropped the weight to about 250 and I kept that weight until I retired.

My father bought a house in Panther Hollow. We were the first Italians in the neighborhood.

In Europe, I was just a little guy… the winters in the mountains were very nasty.

I’m an old-school guy.

I held the title for almost eight years the first time and then I lost it at the Garden. But, then I came back and took it again for another four years.

Everything that I am, everything that I’ve done, everything that I hope to be is because of my mom.

Wrestling was my way of making a living. I did the very best I could.

I was born in Pizzoferrato, a little village of 1000, in the Abruzzi region of Italy.

The only thing I like about doing autograph shows is that the people who used to be fans are so wonderful. They’ll come over and give such wonderful compliments.

We didn’t have shoes until we came over to America.

I complained about the gimmicks. All the nonsense and garbage. After a while I just said I would not wrestle with the guys wearing masks, or guys that had some get-up on. It was demeaning. I refuse to go onto the mat against a Christmas tree.

They said Babe Ruth built Yankee Stadium and Bruno Sammartino built the Garden. It always was my favorite place.

I had a lot of my success due to appearing at the Garden. I wrestled there over 200 times, it’s where I won the title, and it’s where I picked up 630-plus pounds of Haystacks Calhoun.

When I broke my neck, I was told that I came within a millimeter of dying or being paralyzed from the neck down. When it happened, I was numb on one side. In spite of how serious they were telling me it was, I never took it seriously. I kept saying it’s going to be OK, I trained too hard to get hurt. Which is silly.

I’ve had 10 major operations. Four back surgeries. A hip replacement. A broken neck… But I consider myself lucky. I keep thinking after all these surgeries, my luck is going to run out.

Wrestling isn’t looked upon like the other sports of football, baseball, basketball and hockey.

A lotta stuff has been written about me that I never said. Stories that were lies. One guy wrote that young as I was during World War II, I actually got a rifle and fought off the Germans. Which is ridiculous, insane. I was just six.

I very seldom look at wrestling magazines. Whenever I do, I get angry.

I would be a fool to tell you that there was no fixing. You ask if wrestling is for real? Well, I think my own body answers that question.

I only survived because of my mother’s love and care.

When it came to the Hall of Fame, I’ve been very critical of the direction they’ve taken and I’d feel like a hypocrite if I just accepted this Hall of Fame while I’m so against what they’re doing.

We hid from the Nazis in the mountains. Sometimes there was nothing to eat but snow.

I’m not bragging, but my reputation among my peers was Bruno was a horse I never got tired.

Buddy Rogers and I never liked each other to be honest, however I take nothing away from him.

The things that Billy Graham says, I really have no idea why he says them. He talks about things without really knowing all the facts. I just think there’s something wrong with the man.

We lived in the mountains for 14 months without much food. People were dying from starvation.

Stan Hansen was a different ballgame. I broke my neck wrestling him in Madison Square Garden. I spent a month in the hospital and for a while it was touch and go because the doctors told me I came within a millimeter of being paralyzed from the neck down.

In Argentina, in Brazil, I remember going to Australia, all the trips I did in Japan, you know how they’d advertise me? ‘From Madison Square Garden, Bruno Sammartino.’

I wasn’t a 97-pound weakling. I was an 80-pound weakling.

I’m so grateful to America and my hometown of Pittsburgh. I love my city. I’m proud of being from here.

They call me ‘The Maniac’ as far as training goes. I’m a fanatic. I run 10 miles every day and I train three hours every other day with barbells. Nobody trains that hard. And that’s not bragging.

There were a lot of tough guys who were tremendous wrestlers.

I was never going to do anything that would have brought shame to my family. I owed too much, and I wanted them to be proud to say that they were Bruno Sammartino’s mother and father.

Anytime that people feel that you accomplished enough to enter into a Hall of Fame, of course this is a tremendous, tremendous thrill for me.

Besides wrestling, in my younger years, I also competed in Olympic lifting and power lifting.

We lived off the land in Italy.

I lost a brother and a sister, and I came down with rheumatic fever.

Inoki is nothing but a third rater in my estimation.

With Paul Levesque and the conversations we have had I’ve found him to be a straight shooter and everything he said with me he kept his word 100%.