Christy Mathewson

American pitcher and one of the first five Baseball Hall of Fame inductees, who won 373 games for the New York Giants and threw three shutouts in the 1905 World Series.

Born in Factoryville, Pennsylvania, on 12 August 1880, Christopher 'Christy' Mathewson was a rarity for his era: a college-educated pitcher, having attended Bucknell University where he played both football and baseball and served as class president. He signed his first professional contract in 1899 and made his major-league debut with the New York Giants in 1900. Mathewson became the National League's dominant pitcher of the century's first decade, mastering a pitch he called the 'fadeaway' — what would later be known as the screwball — with such precise control that a Giants catcher once said he could 'catch Matty in a rocking chair.' He won at least 30 games in three consecutive seasons from 1903 to 1905 and set a modern NL record with 37 wins in 1908. His signature moment came in the 1905 World Series, when he threw three complete-game shutouts in six days to lead the Giants to the championship, one of the most dominant individual World Series performances in history. Over his 17-year career, Mathewson won 373 games — tied for third all-time — with a 2.13 ERA, and won pitching's Triple Crown twice, in 1905 and 1908. Mathewson enlisted during World War I and was exposed to poison gas during a training exercise, which is believed to have contributed to the tuberculosis that ended his life. He served as president of the Boston Braves from 1923 until his death on 7 October 1925, at age 45. He was one of the inaugural five inductees into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1936.

Precise control and a signature 'fadeaway' pitch, an early screwball

Widely considered the greatest pitcher in National League history and baseball's first true gentleman-athlete