NYT: Goldstein: Billy Loes, Quirky Pitcher for Dodgers, Dies at 80

When the Dodgers faced the Yankees in the 1952 World Series, Loes became a modern-day incarnation of the Dodgers’ Daffiness Boys of the 1920s, when they once had three men on third base at the same time.

On the eve of the 1952 Series, Loes was asked how the Dodgers would fare. He picked the Yankees to win in six games.

Then came Loes’s misadventures in Game 6, at Ebbets Field.

Pitching in the seventh inning with a 1-0 lead, Loes gave up a home run by Yogi Berra and a single by Gene Woodling. Then he balked by letting the baseball slip from his hand while he was on the pitching rubber, sending Woodling to second base. With two out, Vic Raschi, the Yankees’ starting pitcher, hit a ball off Loes’s leg, and it caromed into right field for a single, scoring Woodling. The Yankees went on to a 3-2 victory, tying the Series at three games apiece.

Afterward, Loes had an explanation for failing to snare Raschi’s comebacker: he said he had lost the ground ball in the sun.

Anyone who can come up with an excuse like that belongs in the Brooklyn Hall of Fame.