Two this week.I feel like a hall of famer is dying every two weeks at this point. Ugh.
And Lasorda and Niekro shortly before that. Brutal.Two this week.
This hurts.
A small humblebrag but to your point...in the summer of 2005 I was an intern for the Mobile BayBears (who played at Hank Aaron Stadium) & we hosted the Southern League All-Star Game that year. Hank was a special guest and for reasons still unknown to me I was picked to drive him around on a couple of errands. He sat in the front seat of my Jetta and asked me tons of questions about who I was...pointed out spots in the city that meant a lot to him...and bought me a krispy kreme donut to boot. What could've been a nerve wracking 90 minutes he quickly made it seem like I was hanging out with my grandfather.Seemed like an incredibly classy and humble guy.
I'm not sure if it was in Ken Burns' Baseball or somewhere else, but hearing about the vile abuse he took (death threats, awful racist letters, etc.) when he was threatening Babe Ruth's record was heartbreaking. He had an absolutely incredible career and although he played on a lot of good-but-not-great teams when all that earned you was an early vacation, he did absolutely put it on the Yankees in the 1957 World Series.
Thanks for sharing that, I had never seen it. Very cool!Here's Hank homering off Bill Lee at Fenway in 1975:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgWBIfvDonI
This is sad and funny at the same timeThat's a tough one.
I bet Bonds stays on life support until he's 87.
Nice oneThat's a tough one.
I bet Bonds stays on life support until he's 87.
Yes, thanks for sharing that. A bygone era in baseball (not so long ago) when legends could go their entire careers and never play in the storied parks in the opposite league.Here's Hank homering off Bill Lee at Fenway in 1975:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgWBIfvDonI
I didn’t realize this until I saw he had passed and went to his bbref page. Obviously second in hr and third in hits as you said. Also first in rbi, second in runs, first in total bases, fourth in bbref war (position players only). And sounds like he was an incredible person to top it off. RIPRIP
Underrated career stat - retired with the 2nd-most hits ever, and is still 3rd, at 3771.
Nice story. Not a humblebrag. I like hearing about "celebrities" who don't think they are minigods.A small humblebrag but to your point...in the summer of 2005 I was an intern for the Mobile BayBears (who played at Hank Aaron Stadium) & we hosted the Southern League All-Star Game that year. Hank was a special guest and for reasons still unknown to me I was picked to drive him around on a couple of errands. He sat in the front seat of my Jetta and asked me tons of questions about who I was...pointed out spots in the city that meant a lot to him...and bought me a krispy kreme donut today. What could've been a nerve wracking 90 minutes he quickly made it seem like I was hanging out with my grandfather.
Watched it live in my basement. Still gives me chills.Vin Scully calls it, Buckner climbs the fence, House catches it
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjqYThEVoSQ
That's a great story, and confirmed the sense I had about Hank as well.A small humblebrag but to your point...in the summer of 2005 I was an intern for the Mobile BayBears (who played at Hank Aaron Stadium) & we hosted the Southern League All-Star Game that year. Hank was a special guest and for reasons still unknown to me I was picked to drive him around on a couple of errands. He sat in the front seat of my Jetta and asked me tons of questions about who I was...pointed out spots in the city that meant a lot to him...and bought me a krispy kreme donut today. What could've been a nerve wracking 90 minutes he quickly made it seem like I was hanging out with my grandfather.
Snipers on the roof of Fulton County Stadium that night to protect him ... amazing they didn't take those kids outHenry Aaron took on the racist world when he drew close to the Babe. He was playing in the most southern of franchises at the time. The threats were real and when those two White kids came charging after him on his 715th tour of the bases, who knew what they were up to? But they were just happy to be close to Henry Aaron.
I did not know that he preferred Henry to Hank. Maybe change the thread title?Loved Henry Aaron. Obviously I'm way too young to have ever watched him play; but he was probably my favorite retired athlete growing up. We had an old NES game called "Legends of the Game" and Aaron was in it and he had the most home runs (even more than Babe Ruth!) so therefore he was the best player ever in my 8 year old mind. Read some junior biographies on him as a kid, and then "The Last Hero" by Howard Bryant which is one of the best sports books you will ever read and everyone on SoSH should read it.
Aaron never really thought of himself as a power hitter; he always aimed to win the batting title and considered Stan Musial his greatest rival. The two batting titles he did win were almost as treasured as the all time home run record. He considered batting average to be the true measure of a hitter, and the home runs merely came as a symptom of making consistent contact. He had a unique cross-wrist grip on the bat, which probably would be hammered out of a player if he came up today; but Aaron was known as a professional for his remarkable wrist strength, which were attributed to giving him his incredible hitting power because he was a very average sized ballplayer.
He never liked to be called Hank, which was a name that was given to him by sportswriters. He always went by Henry among people who actually knew him.
Aaron, Willie McCovey and Billy Williams all came out of the same area of Mobile, Alabama right around the same time period. That is 1,702 home runs between the three of them.
According to this article,Does Ford or Kaline have a living HOF teammate?
Kaline missed by a few years having teammate Jim Bunning (passed in 2017) still around. Only other teammate (on the 1959 team) in the HOF was Larry Doby, who passed in 2003.Ford’s death leaves Bobby Brown, who won four Series titles with the Yankees in the 1940s and ’50s, as the last living link to prominent Yankees who played with both DiMaggio and Ford. Brown is 95.
https://www.foxsports.com/stories/mlb/hank-aaron-death-reactionMuhammad Ali famously called him "the only man I idolize more than myself."
Take away the 755 home runs, and he still has 3,016 other hitsRIP
Underrated career stat - retired with the 2nd-most hits ever, and is still 3rd, at 3771.
I won a portable AM radio from Magnavox for correctly guessing what inning he would hit the tie-breaking HR in.Vin Scully calls it, Buckner climbs the fence, House catches it
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjqYThEVoSQ
Yes. Baseball really is a microcosm of the American experience, the incredible highs and lows, and Hank Aaron experienced the entire range. A true icon.Seemed like an incredibly classy and humble guy.
I'm not sure if it was in Ken Burns' Baseball or somewhere else, but hearing about the vile abuse he took (death threats, awful racist letters, etc.) when he was threatening Babe Ruth's record was heartbreaking. He had an absolutely incredible career and although he played on a lot of good-but-not-great teams when all that earned you was an early vacation, he did absolutely put it on the Yankees in the 1957 World Series.
The second game I ever attended. I feel lucky to have seen him play and I am saddened by the news. Oof.Here's Hank homering off Bill Lee at Fenway in 1975:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgWBIfvDonI
He stopped hitting cross-handed in the minors.Did anyone else ever try to hit cross-handed as a kid, just to be like him?
I watched the 715 at home. But what I remember almost as vividly was a random NBC Saturday game of the week (Gowdy and Kubek, probably) when, at 41, he homered off prime Nolan Ryan in his return to Milwaukee year ('75).It's funny how certain events create such clear memories. You rarely saw an out of market baseball game on TV, but this was a Monday nighter special. We were in the high school auditorium, at a play rehearsal, and we went into a classroom, moved the TV onto the stage top stop and watch. It was something we just had to see.