2. HANK AARON AND THE BROWNS. The man who broke Babe Ruth’s career home-run record, once thought unbreakable (more about him later in the column), died Friday in Atlanta. Aaron was a huge Cleveland Browns fan. So huge that he used to buy single tickets in the Dawg Pound (the end zone with the crazy fans), fly from his Atlanta home to Cleveland on three or four Sunday mornings every autumn, bundle up, sit anonymously and alone in the stands, and fly back to Atlanta Sunday evening. Who knew? Ernie Accorsi, the GM of the Browns in the eighties, did. One summer day in 1986, at Browns training camp in Kirtland, Ohio, Accorsi thought he spied Aaron behind the ropes, watching practice with fans. Accorsi, a huge baseball fan, sidled up near Aaron and introduced himself. “I know you!” Aaron said. “It’s an honor to meet you.” That started a relationship that Accorsi, of course, was thrilled to have. “He told me he sat in the Dawg Pound, alone, for games, and I told him, ‘Hank, we can get you better seats than that.’ He said, ‘I don’t want ‘em. I love sitting there.’ “
Accorsi said Aaron became a Browns fan early in life because they were the first team, under Paul Brown, to sign and feature black stars—Bill Willis, Marion Motley, Len Ford, all of whom earned busts in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Aaron subscribed to the Cleveland Plain Dealer by mail to follow the team during the season. And once every week or 10 days, Accorsi’s phone would ring, and Aaron would want some scoop on his team. “He’s everything everybody has said about him,” Accorsi said. “A gentleman. Completely humble. And he loved his Browns.”