Hank Aaron: More Than a Ballplayer

A lot has been written about Hank Aaron the past week. Initially, I thought I would add my voice to those honoring Aaron by digging into some of his incredible stats. The thing is, there are certain players, Aaron is definitely one of them, where the stat line doesn't matter. Sure, Aaron had an amazing career in a statistical sense, but what he accomplished in hitting a baseball tells very little of the type of man he was. That's what we need to focus more on, who Aaron was on and off the field.

Legends live forever.pic.twitter.com/X5zfZuWLuV-- Atlanta Braves (@Braves)January 23, 2021

Legends live forever.pic.twitter.com/X5zfZuWLuV

The man who came to be known as Hammerin' Hank was of a class of ballplayer that the game of baseball will never see again. He began his career in the Negro Leagues before migrating to the Major League Baseball ranks. There's no question that his Negro Leagues roots helped to inform the player he was and the person he became as the years went by.

Being a pioneer comes with its costs and the more Aaron talked, the clearer it became that his transition to MLB and dealing with integration changed how he was and how he viewed the world as compared to when his only input was that of the Negro Leagues.

The above is true but it's also easily sussed out and not really at the heart of what I ended up loving about the longtime Milwaukee and Atlanta slugger. I can recall many years ago reading a team encyclopedia for the Atlanta National League Ballclub. These encyclopedias, for lack of a better term, used to be published somewhat regularly.

Usually, they weren't much of an encyclopedia but rather a glance at the very recent history of the team in question. Occasionally they would pump in some history by way of comments from old-timers from the team being covered. That's where I read Aaron give some advice to a very young Milt Thompson.

Aaron's advice stood out because it was simple and seemed like it could have been about more than baseball. "Keep working and don't let up." What comes across as an innocuous statement takes on a different sort of life when thinking about the racism, hatred, death threats, and various forms of violence and bigotry that Aaron had to deal with throughout his career and life.

He dealt with those things quietly, at least that's what people who only skimmed the surface of Aaron thought. Underneath the overt actions, there was anger and a drive to keep at it; to push back against those who sought to ruin his life. He never stopped working and he never let up, his greatness on the field can be attributed to a mindset that wouldn't allow what others had to say about him to be given the light of day.

Based on everything I have read and seen about Hank Aaron, he was a genuinely nice guy. Nice doesn't mean pushover though. There wasn't any part of Aaron's personality that was going to let racists and fear mongers run roughshod over his life. He was graceful, he wasn't always loud, but there was always a bite and fire behind his eyes.

He used baseball as a vehicle to fight back against those who would oppress for no reason other than skin color. Aaron helped teach an entire generation that it was okay to be a person of color and powerful at the same time. That's not something you'll find in a stat line, but it was found all throughout Aaron's being.