By then, Gearon Sr. had been associated with the Hawks – as general manager, president, board chairman or part-owner – for almost 40 years. He was surrounded by his children and grandchildren when he died. “Our father spent his last few days on earth in his home pain free, sleeping peacefully,” Michael Gearon Jr. wrote. “As the tears rolled from everyone’s eyes, I could not stop thinking about what a gift God had given us. Dad spent the majority of his 87 years worrying and caring about everyone else and was the most unselfish, giving, caring person I knew.
Tag: Michael Gearon Sr
As the Hawks’ general manager, Gearon …
As the Hawks’ general manager, Gearon completed trades for Tom McMillen and Terry Furlow and signed Dan Roundfield as a free agent. The Hawks made the playoffs in both of Gearon’s two seasons as GM. He was team president in the 1980s when the Hawks fired Hubie Brown as coach and when they hired first Kevin Loughery and then Mike Fratello as coach. Gearon was followed, first as the Hawks’ general manager and later as team president, by Stan Kasten. When Kasten became president, Gearon became chairman of the Hawks’ board of directors, an advisory and ceremonial position that he held until 2004, at which point his long association with the team entered a new chapter.