William "Big Bill" Gatewood (born August 22, 1881) was a Negro Leagues

Negro league baseball

The Negro leagues were United States professional baseball leagues comprising teams predominantly made up of African Americans. The term may be used broadly to include professional black teams outside the leagues and it may be used narrowly for the seven relatively successful leagues beginning in...

 pitcher

Pitcher

In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throwsthe baseball from the pitcher's mound toward the catcher to begin each play, with the goal of retiring a batter, who attempts to either make contact with the pitched ball or draw a walk. In the numbering system used to record defensive plays, the...

 and manager

Manager (baseball)

In baseball, the field manager is an individual who is responsible for matters of team strategy on the field and team leadership. Managers are typically assisted by between one and six assistant coaches, whose responsibilities are specialized...

 for several years before the founding of the first Negro National League, and in its first few seasons. He pitched for the Leland Giants

Leland Giants

The Chicago Union Giants, the top black baseball team in the Midwest or West in the first decade of the 20th century, changed its name in 1905 to the Leland Giants, after manager and owner Frank Leland....

, Chicago Giants

Chicago Giants

The Chicago Giants were a professional baseball team based in Chicago, Illinois which played in the Negro Leagues. The team was founded by Frank Leland after he and his partner, Rube Foster, split up the Leland Giants in 1910. The new club was sometimes also known as the Leland Giants...

, Chicago American Giants

Chicago American Giants

Chicago American Giants were a Chicago-based Negro league baseball team, owned and managed from 1911 to 1926 by player-manager Andrew "Rube" Foster. From 1910 until the mid-1930s, the American Giants were the most dominant team in black baseball...

, New York Lincoln Giants

Lincoln Giants

The Lincoln Giants were a Negro League baseball team based in New York City from 1911 through 1930.- Founding :Jess McMahon, a white promoter, hired Sol White, former manager of the Philadelphia Giants, to put together a club...

, Cuban X-Giants

Cuban X-Giants

The Cuban X-Giants were an African-American professional baseball team for about ten seasons around 1900. Originally most of the players were former Cuban Giants, or ex-Giants....

, Philadelphia Giants

Philadelphia Giants

The Philadelphia Giants were a Negro league baseball team that played from 1902 to 1916. From 1904 to 1909 they were one of the strongest teams in black baseball, winning five eastern championships in six years. The team was organized by Sol White, H. Walter Schlichter, and Harry Smith.- Founding...

, Brooklyn Royal Giants

Brooklyn Royal Giants

The Brooklyn Royal Giants were a professional baseball team based in Brooklyn, New York which played in the Negro Leagues. They were one of the premier professional teams before World War I, winning multiple championships in the East.- League play :...

, St. Louis Giants

St. Louis Giants

The St. Louis Giants were a Negro League baseball team that competed independently from as early as 1906 to 1919, and joined the Negro National League for the 1920 and 1921 seasons. After the 1921 season, the franchise was sold to another group of investors, who built a new park and renamed the...

, Indianapolis ABCs

Indianapolis ABCs

The Indianapolis ABCs were a Negro League baseball team that played both as an independent club and as a charter member of the first Negro National League . They claimed the western championship of black baseball in 1915 and 1916, and finished second in the 1922 NNL...

, Detroit Stars

Detroit Stars

The Detroit Stars were a United States baseball team in the Negro leagues and played at historic Mack Park.- Founding :Founded in 1919 by Tenny Blount with the help of Rube Foster, owner and manager of the Chicago American Giants, the Detroit Stars immediately established themselves as one of the...

, St. Louis Stars

St. Louis Stars (baseball)

The St. Louis Stars were a Negro League baseball team that competed in the Negro National League from 1922 to 1931. Founded when Dick Kent and Dr. Sam Sheppard took over the St...

, Toledo Tigers

Toledo Tigers

The Toledo Tigers were a Negro National League team that operated during the season, its only season in the league, representing Toledo, Ohio. It played its home games at Toledo's Swayne Field, home of the minor league Mud Hens....

, Milwaukee Bears

Milwaukee Bears

The Milwaukee Bears were a Negro National League team that operated during the 1923 season, its only season in the league, representing Milwaukee, Wisconsin....

, Memphis Red Sox

Memphis Red Sox

The Memphis Red Sox were a professional Negro League baseball team based in Memphis, Tennessee from the 1920s until the end of segregated baseball....

, Atlantic City

Atlantic City, New Jersey

Atlantic City is a city in Atlantic County, New Jersey, United States, and a nationally renowned resort city for gambling, shopping and fine dining. The city also served as the inspiration for the American version of the board game Monopoly. Atlantic City is located on Absecon Island on the coast...

 Bacharach Giants

Bacharach Giants

The Bacharach Giants were a Negro league baseball team that played in Atlantic City, New Jersey.- Founding :The club was founded when two African-American politicians moved the Duval Giants of Jacksonville, Florida, to Atlantic City in 1916 and renamed them after Harry Bacharach, the city's mayor...

, and Birmingham Black Barons

Birmingham Black Barons

The Birmingham Black Barons played professional baseball for Birmingham, Alabama, in the Negro Leagues from 1920 to 1960 when the Major Leagues successfully integrated...

.

A 6'7" tall spitball

Spitball

A spitball is an illegal baseball pitch in which the ball has been altered by the application of saliva, petroleum jelly, or some other foreign substance....

 pitcher, Gatewood was a first line pitcher in Blackball's pre-league days, and pitched the first no-hitter

No-hitter

A no-hitter is a baseball game in which one team has no hits. In Major League Baseball, the team must be without hits during the entire game, and the game must be at least nine innings. A pitcher who prevents the opposing team from achieving a hit is said to have "thrown a no-hitter"...

 in NNL league play, beating the Cincinnati Cuban Stars

Cuban Stars (West)

The Cuban Stars were a team of Cuban professional baseball players that competed in the United States Negro leagues from 1907 to 1932. The team was also sometimes known as the Stars of Cuba, the Cuban All-Stars, the Havana Reds, the Almendares Blues, or simply as the Cubans. For one season, 1921,...

 on June 6, 1921. As his pitching skills deteriorated, he remained in the game as a manager.

He managed the St. Louis Stars

St. Louis Stars (baseball)

The St. Louis Stars were a Negro League baseball team that competed in the Negro National League from 1922 to 1931. Founded when Dick Kent and Dr. Sam Sheppard took over the St...

 and Birmingham Black Barons

Birmingham Black Barons

The Birmingham Black Barons played professional baseball for Birmingham, Alabama, in the Negro Leagues from 1920 to 1960 when the Major Leagues successfully integrated...

. He is credited with giving Negro Leagues great James Cool Papa Bell his famous nickname, and for convincing him to learn to switch hit in order to take advantage of his speed. He is also credited with teaching Satchel Paige

Satchel Paige

Leroy Robert "Satchel" Paige was an American baseball player whose pitching in the Negro leagues and in Major League Baseball made him a legend in his own lifetime...

his "hesitation pitch" while managing him in Birmingham.