44

[Cruzan]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/44_(number)

[ThatsMyBarack]

1. Here's another:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WSNS-TV

[ThatsMyBarack]

2. Yikes! Double post.

Sah-ray. ;)

[klook]

3. I keep thinking of this #44

From http://espn.go.com/sportscentury/features/00006764.html --

"The thing I like about baseball is that it's one-on-one," Aaron said. "You stand up there alone, and if you make a mistake, it's your mistake. If you hit a home run, it's your home run."

Aaron's crowning moment was, of course, a home run. It came when he surpassed what had seemed like an unbreakable record only a decade earlier. That was the night in 1974 he walloped No. 715 and trotted around the bases past the Babe and into history.

While Aaron had the numbers, he didn't have much fan appeal. He was considered hard working, humble and shy, just as Joe DiMaggio was. But while those qualities made DiMaggio a hero, they made Aaron an enigma. Aaron was often overlooked as one of the game's greats until he took off on his chase of the Bambino. Racism had something to do with it, as well as his playing in the Atlanta and Milwaukee markets.

Of course, Aaron had many admirers and many who despised him for trying to break the record held so long by a white superstar.

The chase to beat the Babe heated up in the summer of 1973. So did the mail. Aaron needed a secretary to sort it as he received more than an estimated 3,000 letters a day, more than any American outside of politics. Unfortunately, racists did much of the writing. A sampling:

"Dear Nigger Henry,
You are (not) going to break this record established by the great Babe Ruth if I can help it. ... Whites are far more superior than jungle bunnies. . My gun is watching your every black move."

"Dear Henry Aaron,
How about some sickle cell anemia, Hank?"

The letters came from every state, but most were postmarked in northern cities. They were filled with hate. More hate than Aaron had ever imagined. "This," Aaron said later about the letters, "changed me."

The summer of '73 ended with Hammering Hank at 713 homers after hitting a remarkable 40 in just 392 at-bats. He was 39.

In his first at-bat in 1974, Aaron homered off Cincinnati's Jack Billingham, tying Ruth. His eyes got teary as he rounded third base. That night he called his mother. "I'm going to save the next one for you, Mom," he said.

On April 8, 1974, the largest crowd in Braves history (53,775) came out to witness history. Aaron didn't disappoint. In the fourth inning, he ripped an Al Downing pitch into the Braves bullpen, where it was caught by reliever Tom House. As Aaron rounded second base, two college students appeared and ran alongside him before security stepped in. The new home run king was mobbed at home by his teammates.

A quarter of a century later, Aaron still has the record -- and the hate mail. "I read the letters," he said, "because they remind me not to be surprised or hurt. They remind me what people are really like."

After retiring as a player, Aaron became one of the first blacks in Major League Baseball upper-level management as Atlanta's vice president of player development. Since Dec. 1989, he has served as senior vice president and assistant to the president, but he is more active for Turner Broadcasting as a corporate vice president of community relations and a member of TBS' board of directors. He also is vice president of business development for The Airport Network.

I'm a long-time Braves fan, and an admirer of the great Henry Aaron. This day is for him, too.