“The thing that most people hear about that one is that a priest [Father Herbert Redmond of St. Francis Roman Catholic Church] stood in a Brooklyn pulpit that Sunday and said, “It’s too hot for a sermon. Just go home and say a prayer for Gil Hodges.” Well, I know that I’ll never forget that, but also I won’t forget the hundreds of people who sent me letters, telegrams, and postcards during that World Series. There wasn’t a single nasty message. Everybody tried to say something nice. It had a tremendous effect on my morale, if not my batting average. Remember that in 1952, the Dodgers had never won a World Series. A couple of base hits by me in the right spot might have changed all that.”
— Gil Hodges, on his 1952 season slump from his book, The Game of Baseball
