Luis (Lou) Gomez

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Luis "Lou" Gomez (Luis Gomez Sanchez) is a former professional baseball player who played during the 1970s and 1980s. Born in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico in 1951 and raised in the Echo Park neighborhood of Los Angeles, CA, he attended and graduated from Nightingale Jr High then, attended Belmont High School and UCLA.

The 5'9" Gomez played freshman basketball at UCLA with Bill Walton and played on the baseball team for three years ('71-'73) at shortstop. He is listed as having a batting average of .272, 2 HR, and 34 RBI in college. During his senior year, his batting average was .301 in 52 games and 186 at bats.

He started his major league baseball career with the Minnesota Twins in 1974, playing with them until 1977, when he moved to the Toronto Blue Jays, for which he played two seasons before being traded to the Atlanta Braves, playing his two remaining seasons there and retiring in 1982. He set an Atlanta record in 1980 with a .968 fielding percentage at shortstop and strung together 42 consecutive errorless games. He played at the shortstop, second base and third base positions in 609 major league games. In his eight years, he had a .210 batting average with 1251 at bats.

Gomez joined the LDS Church as a result of his association with Dale Murphy and Alan Ashby.^[1]