Ford used his wedding ring to cut the ball, or had catcher
Elston Howard put a nice slice in it with a buckle on his
shin guard. Ford also planted mud pies around the mound and
used them to load the ball. He confessed that when pitching
against the Dodgers in the 1963 World Series, "I used
enough mud to build a dam." He also threw a "gunk
ball," which combined a mixture of baby oil,
turpentine, and resin. He kept the "gunk" in a
roll-on dispenser, which, the story goes, Yogi Berra once
mistook for deodorant, gluing his arms to his sides in the
process.