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Editor's Note: The following excerpt is from the newly published book, "Sixty Feet, Six Inches," by Bob Gibson and Reggie Jackson. Copyright (c) 2009 by Robert Gibson and Reginald Martinez Jackson. Published by arrangement with Doubleday, an imprint of the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc.

Bob Gibson
It's hard for me to explain how I was able to thrive under pressure. It was just in my makeup. It just happened.

It wasn't only in baseball; it was in basketball or anything I played or did. The bigger the game or moment, the more I was on top of it. When there was a pressure situation, I just always seemed to excel. It's like it was expected of me. At least, I expected it of me.

Reggie Jackson
When there's pressure, usually, there's also an unusual amount of attention from the outside. Everybody in the park -- and sometimes, everybody in the country -- is watching. That was a good scenario for me. I liked that. I needed that. It helped me focus.

I called those Reggie Moments.

Bob Gibson
We're both known for what we did in the World Series, and you'd think, because of that, that there must be something similar in our makeup. I'm sure there is, in terms of concentration and confidence and all that. But I don't think my feeling about those situations was much like Reggie's.

He thrived when all eyes were on him. I've heard people say that he's the best hitter there ever was when everybody was watching. That worked for him. I had success in the same types of situations, but for me that part of it was only incidental. It wasn't where I was coming from.

For me, the World Series was all on the field, and in the dugout with my teammates. It was us against them, for everything. It was the height of competition. That's what brought out the best in me.

Reggie Jackson
The World Series put you on a stage, and that was where I liked to be. I wanted to bring the crowd to its feet. I wanted to bring the country to its feet. Sometimes I did, sometimes I didn't. But I never ran from it. I ran to it.

There were moments like that during the regular season, too, when the game would heighten, grow to a crescendo, would come get me, but … I'm not proud to say it, but during the season I got bored sometimes. In the postseason, I understood what it meant to win the game. I always yearned to somehow, some way, be a part of the victory. The postseason was do or die. I died sometimes, but I did a lot, too, because everything around me -- all the trappings, all the intensity -- forced me to focus and get my faculties gathered up for the moment.

Bob Gibson
Everybody reacts differently to pressure. I saw plenty of players who absolutely couldn't perform under it.

The Cardinals had an outfielder who, when he found out he was going to start Game Five of the 1968 World Series, went and sat in his locker facing the inside, scared to death. Everybody saw it. We all thought, what the hell is wrong with this guy? He had the chance of a lifetime to start in a World Series game. The World Series is the time to show what you can do, the greatest opportunity a ballplayer can have, it's where we've always hoped to be someday -- our Carnegie Hall -- and his ship comes in and he's scared. I couldn't understand that. To me, it just didn't compute.

I was nervous, too, in situations like that, but never scared. Hell no. And as soon as the game started, the nervousness left me. I might have played with more adrenaline than usual, but that's different than being nervous. A lot different.

Reggie Jackson
I didn't get nervous. I got intense. My sensitivities were enhanced. I had the ability to take the adrenaline, the focus, the intensity, and let it drive me.

All those feelings and emotions can hurt you if you don't get them in check. That's why I sometimes felt that I survived pressure situations more than I thrived in them. Once you acknowledge the pressure, it's something you have to deal with. I thrived in the spotlight, but I survived the pressure.

Bob Gibson
Pressure sort of felt right to me. I got accustomed to it by playing for Josh when I was a kid. I grew up under it. It wasn't World Series pressure, but I'm not sure it was any easier, either.

Josh absolutely wouldn't accept any kind of failure on my part, or anything less than mental toughness. He imposed that toughness. He demanded it; and when my big brother demanded something of me, I did everything in my power to come through. It wasn't that he would beat me or criticize me if I didn't. He was just somebody I wanted badly to please, and when he told me to get the job done, I made damn sure I got the job done.

And the main job was being better than everyone else. Winning, in other words.