1974 Atlanta Braves season

But in his final game that year, playing against the Houston Astros (led by manager Leo Durocher, who had once roomed with Babe Ruth), he was unable to hit one out of the park.

Or will it be remembered as the season in which Aaron, the most dignified of athletes, was besieged with hate mail and trapped by the cobwebs and goblins that lurk in baseball's attic?

He played two out of three, tying Babe Ruth's record in his very first at bat off Reds pitcher Jack Billingham, but failed to hit another home run in the series.

While the crowning of Aaron as baseball's all-time home run king made 1974 an exceptional season for the Braves, the strong performance of the team on the field also marked the campaign.

But a mid-season slump cost manager Eddie Mathews—for years Aaron's fellow-superstar with the Milwaukee Braves of the 1950s—his job on July 21 during the All-Star break with the club at 50–49 (and 14 games out of first place).

Special assistant to the general manager Clyde King, 50, former skipper of the San Francisco Giants, assumed the managerial reins July 24.

King's hiring aroused some controversy when Aaron noted that he had been bypassed as a managerial candidate; he would have become baseball's first African-American manager had he been named to the post.

Aaron was traded to the American League Milwaukee Brewers on November 2, 1974; he finished his active career in the Junior Circuit with two years as a designated hitter before returning to the Braves as a front-office executive.