1974 was a landmark year for baseball as Hank Aaron entered the season only one home run shy of Babe Ruth and his hallowed record of 714 career home runs. The Braves opened the season in Cincinnati with three games against the Reds. Wanting Aaron to break the record in Atlanta, the Braves were going to sit out Aaron for the entire series until commissioner Bowie Kuhn stepped in and required Aaron to play in at least three games. In fitting fashion, on his first swing of the season, Aaron hit a home run off Reds’ pitcher Jack Billingham to tie Ruth. Aaron went homerless for the remainder of the series and delivered his historic record-breaking home run in front the home Atlanta crowd at Fulton County Stadium on April 8th.

Game-used items from the late great Hank Aaron are always special to procure and collect, however, game-used items from his record-breaking season of 1974 – his final season with the Braves’ organization, are that much more special. That is what is offered here, one of the road jerseys worn by Aaron during the 1974 season that not only has been authenticated by MEARS with its highest possible grade of A10, but photo matched by Sports Investors Authentication and Elite Sports. Both Sports Investors and Elite Sports have photo matched this museum-worthy jersey to an undated 1974 image taken of Aaron with fellow Hall of Famer “Mr. Cub” Ernie Banks.

Aaron’s jersey was made by Wilson and is a size 42. The torso of this V-neck jersey is blue with “Braves” wordmark sewn on in an angle across the chest in white and red tackle twill with Aaron’s number “44” sewn on in the same material and pattern below. The back has Aaron’s number “44” sewn on in white and red tackle twill with white border stitching. The sleeves and shoulders are white with a blue, white and red layered twill ornate “feather” design stitch on with the sleeve ends having a stitched on red band. The Wilson size 42 tag, along with a blue team patch with “74 42” embroidered in white are sewn on the inside back collar indicating the year and size of the jersey. This jersey displays heavy game use with wash wear and the numbers on the front and back showing puckering from uneven fabric shrinking from hot water wash. All of the letters and numbers are original to the jersey with no alterations visible. One of, if not the finest Hank Aaron game-used jersey put up for sale. This comes with a LOA from MEARS (3217752) for the game use and has been given the highest possible grade of A10, plus LOAs from Sports Investors Authentication (210614M1) and Elite Sports Photo Photo Matching (0028), who have both photo matched this jersey to a photo of Aaron with Ernie Banks in 1974.