McCoy: Amid death threats, racial slurs, baseball legend Hank Aaron let his play do the talking

Bob Gibson, Lou Brock, Joe Morgan, Al Kaline, Whitey Ford, Tom Seaver, Phil Niekro, Tommy Lasorda, Don Sutton ... and now Hammerin’ Hank Aaron.

Aaron, 86, passed away Friday morning, leaving behind a legacy of stately character, supreme humbleness and a shy, quiet demeanor who permitted his accomplishments to do the talking.

As my friend Ray Snedegar asked me: “What the hell is going on in the baseball world? Another icon has passed away. Soon they will all be gone. This is terrible.”

It is more than terrible. We are fast losing our links back to the time when baseball was king, when baseball was relevant, when baseball was fun.

Aaron also is one of the last links to the Negro Leagues. He was 17 years old in Mobile, Ala., when he signed with the Indianapolis Clowns in 1952 for $200 a month. He mother wrapped him a sandwich, tucked it into his pocket and put him on a train.

He played shortstop just one year for the Clowns. He batted cross-handed and hit .467. In 1953, the Boston Braves signed him to a $10,000 contract.

And he became one of baseball’s legends, always mentioned in the same sentence with Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb and Willie Mays.

In 1974 he passed Babe Ruth in career home runs and finished with 755. He wasn’t just a slugger, he was a hitter, finishing with 3,771 hits and a .305 career average.

When the 1974 season began, Aaron had 713 home runs, one behind Babe Ruth. The Braves opened the season with a three-game series in Cincinnati’s Riverfront Stadium. The Braves wanted to hold Aaron out of the lineup so he could hit his 714th in Atlanta. But commissioner Bowie Kuhn stepped in and ordered the Braves to play Aaron in two of the three games in Cincinnati.

So Aaron was in Atlanta’s lineup on Opening Day, April 4, 1974, batting fourth. And the Reds had a new broadcaster describing his first game, Marty Brennaman.

In the top of the first, with two runners on base and 52,154 in-person witnesses, Aaron rocketed his 714th home run, a pitch from Jack Billingham. It was the only hit all day by the Braves with runner in scoring position (1 for 8).

The Reds won in 10 innings, 7-6, and Pete Rose banged three hits. But, of course, all the attention was on the one hit Aaron stroked that day.

Billingham, a star pitcher for the Big Red Machine, still takes a razzing about that day and says, “A lot of people tease me, ‘You gave up 714. I tell them ‘I was there. I had a better seat than everybody in the ballpark but Johnny Bench.’”

Billingham remembers every detail of the historic pitch. “First game, first swing. I was behind in the count 3-1 to him and had to throw him a strike because there was a man on first and second,” he said. “He knew me. He knew I was sinkerball pitcher. I tried to throw the ball low and away. It was a mistake and it was out of the ballpark. Boom! He’s a great hitter. One little mistake and boom. No shame in failing as long as you try your best.”

One of Aaron’s best friends was former Cincinnati Reds manager Dusty Baker. Baker was on deck in Atlanta when Aaron broke Ruth’s record by hitting his 715th home run off Al Downing of the Dodgers.

“Because Hank was a Black man in the Deep South, folks didn’t want him breaking The Babe’s record. It wasn’t as happy of a time for Hank as it should have been,” Baker once told me. “As he headed for the batter’s box, he told me, ‘I’m tired of all this and I’m just going to get it all over with. And damned if he didn’t.”

To break Ruth’s exalted record, a record many fans didn’t want broken, especially by an African-American, Aaron had to quietly endure not only the pressure of exceeding a hallowed record, but to absorb hatred aimed his way.

After his home run in Cincinnati, when the Reds visited Atlanta, Cincinnati Post baseball writer Earl Lawson and I stopped by Aaron’s locker.

Lawson, my mentor, had established a rapport with Aaron over the years. I was in my second year of covering the Reds and I was hanging on Lawson’s coat tails.

When we stopped at Aaron’s locker, he pulled out a large cardboard box from beneath his chair. It was stuffed with cards and letters.

“Just pull out a couple and read them,” he said. We each grabbed a handful and read. They were from before he broke Ruth’s record. They were filled with death threats and racial epithets.

He smiled as we shook our heads and said, “Not the silent majority. The loud minority.”

After his career ended, Aaron became a voice in the Civil Rights movement.

For what he endured and for what he accomplished, nobody was better prepared.