The story of Hammerin’ Hank is coming to the big screen.  Variety reports that producers Mike Tollin and Glenn Rigberg have acquired the rights to baseball great Hank Aaron’s life story.  Furthermore, they’ve set The Natural director Barry Levinson to helm from a script by Adam Mazer (Empire State).  The story will be based on Howard Bryant’s book The Last Hero: The Life Story of Henry Aaron and “will follow the right fielder’s chase of Babe Ruth’s home run record from 1972 to 1974.  Spoiler alert: Aaron finally eclipsed Ruth’s record with his 715th home run in April of 1974. Hit the jump for more.

Recently, ESPN has been getting into bed with some pretty talented filmmakers.  Spike Lee, Peter Berg, and Barry Levinson have all directed documentaries that aired on the channel over the last year.  Now, Variety is reporting that New Line is joining ESPN in the production of the feature film Mulkey.  The film will tell the story of Louis Mulkey, a firefighter and assistant coach for a South Carolina high school basketball team.  Mulkey and eight others died in a fire in 2007, and the team he coached was inspired to win the state championship for the first time ever.  Mulkey is scripted by Christopher Wilkinson and Stephen Rivele, who partnered on Michael Mann’s Ali, and Mike Tollin is signed to direct.  Tollin assembled a documentary on the USFL for ESPN earlier this year, and has been involved with such recent inspirational sports pictures as Coach Carter, Radio, and Hardball.  More on the film’s creative and box office potential after the jump.