Willie "Bill" Jefferson (January 27, 1904 – May 31, 1972)was an American

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...

pitcher In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throws ("pitches") the 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 ...

in the

Negro leagues The Negro leagues were United States professional baseball leagues comprising teams of African Americans and, to a lesser extent, Latin Americans. The term may be used broadly to include professional black teams outside the leagues and it may be ...

. A native of

Clearview, Oklahoma Clearview is a town in Okfuskee County, Oklahoma, United States. The population was 56 at the 2000 census. It was historically an all-black freedmen's town and was platted by the Lincoln Townsite Company and designated as Lincoln.O'Dell, Larry,Cle ...

, Jefferson was the brother of

Jeff Jefferson George Leo "Jeff" Jefferson (August 8, 1922 – September 21, 1985) was an American baseball pitcher in the Negro leagues. He played with the Jacksonville Red Caps in 1942 and 1943 and the Cleveland Buckeyes from 1944 to 1950. His brother, Bill Je ...

, also played in the Negro leagues. Jefferson played with several teams from 1937 to 1948, spending the majority of his career with the

Cleveland Buckeyes The Cleveland Buckeyes were a Negro league baseball team that played from 1942 to 1950 in the Negro American League. The Buckeyes played in two Negro World Series, defeating the Washington Homestead Grays in 1945, and losing to the New York Cuba ...

. He was the starting pitcher for the Buckeyes when they made it to the 1945 Negro World Series, starting Game 1 against the two-time defending champion

Homestead Grays The Homestead Grays (also known as Washington Grays or Washington Homestead Grays) were a professional baseball team that played in the Negro league baseball, Negro leagues in the United States. The team was formed in 1912 in sports, 1912 by Cumb ...

. He threw a complete game while allowing just six hits and one earned run while striking out four and walking two batters in a 2–1 win, and the Buckeyes would ultimately sweep the Grays in four games. He served in the

US Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, and died in

Houston, Texas Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 in ...

in 1976 at age 71 or 72.

References

External links

an
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1904 births 1976 deaths Cincinnati Crescents players Cleveland Buckeyes players Louisville Buckeyes players Memphis Red Sox players Baseball players from Oklahoma United States Army personnel of World War II 20th-century African-American sportspeople Baseball pitchers {{Negro-league-baseball-pitcher-stub