I’m a former native French speaker who lost my mother tongue due to an illness, and I am trying to improve my English by talking about baseball on Youtube.
two filing cabinets in cooperstown hold every piece of hate mail hank aaron got while chasing babe ruth's home run record. 3,000 letters a day. the fbi assigned him federal protection for the entire 1973 season. he hit 715 anyway.
february 5 1934. mobile alabama. henry aaron grew up playing sandlot ball with bottle caps as baseballs. he signed with the indianapolis clowns of the negro leagues in 1952. one year later the boston braves bought his contract for 10,000 dollars.
1954. milwaukee braves rookie season. by 1957 he had a national league mvp, a batting title, and a world series ring. for the next 16 years he hit at a pace nobody on the planet matched. the home run total kept climbing.
september 1973. he ended the season at 713 home runs. one short of babe ruth. the offseason was the worst seven months of his life.
the mail arrived in trucks. the fbi opened a dedicated office in atlanta. his daughter gaile was given a federal security detail at fisk university because the threats included her by name. snipers watched the bleachers at every home game. hotel staff opened his mail in another room as a precaution.
april 8 1974. atlanta-fulton county stadium. fourth inning. al downing of the dodgers threw a fastball low and away. aaron pulled it over the left-field fence. teammate bill buckner climbed the wall trying to catch it. two college students ran onto the field beside him as he rounded second.
he kept every letter for the rest of his life. two filing cabinets full. when the hall of fame asked for them, he handed them over without comment. they sit in cooperstown today.
he retired in 1976 with 755 home runs. the record stood for 33 years.
january 22 2021. hank aaron died at his home in atlanta. he had spent the previous week getting publicly vaccinated against covid to encourage black americans to do the same.
every one of those 755 home runs was hit by a man reading death threats over breakfast.
The MLB 2K games had the jersey fabric wave back and forth when it was windy.
Two console generations and two decades later and that level of detail is non-existent in video games.
From Fresno State to The Show. You can now start your MLB The Show 26 Road To The Show journey just like Aaron and write your own history like never before. @thejudge44 😉
Learn more: https://t.co/UR8ALaXHJG