I debated if it should go here or in CS, but I figured he was more a sports guy. Bob Uecker has died at the age of 90.
I’ll bet there’s a seat reserved just for him. Way out on the outskirts of the Afterlife.
RIP.
Nah, he’s in the front row.
Uecker was just one of those people who knew how to be funny, but he was also a FANTASTIC announcer.
Uecker was on the Tonight Show more than one hundred times. He was never promoting anything, they just kept having him on because he was reliably hilarious. I think my favourite joke was that when he hit his only major league grand slam, off Ron Herbel, “when his manager came out to relieve him, he was carrying Herbel’s suitcase.”
Also his quip “In '62 I was named Minor League Player of the Year. It was my second season in the majors.”
Or “I had a great shoe contract, and a glove contract, with a company that paid me not to use their equipment.”
Of Uecker’s 14 career home runs, 3 were off Hall of Famers; he lit up Fergie Jenkies, Sandy Koufax, and Gaylord Perry.
He was funny and he loved baseball.
Uecker only batted .200 but honestly, he was probably a more talented player than that. He tore it up in the minors, but he never really got a chance to play regularly, and I think he was a guy who didn’t do well off the bench. Just one of those things. He got a World Series ring tho!
I’ll have to watch Major League tonight.
Bob Uecker is the name that pops to mind when I hear the term funnyman. Lots of people qualify but he’s the model.
My memories of Bob go back to my childhood, in Wisconsin in the mid '70s, building models in my room while listening to him and Merle Harmon doing Brewers radio broadcasts.
He was an excellent broadcaster, an exceptionally funny (and self-effacing) man, and, from everything I have ever been able to tell, a nice guy.
He didn’t have an official contract with the Brewers to do their broadcasts until the past few years, and that was so that he could be covered under the team’s health insurance plan. In recent years, he didn’t do many broadcasts, but the Brewers always told him, “when you want to work a game, the booth is always yours.”
Rest in peace, Bob. The state of Wisconsin, and this Brewers fan, mourn your passing.
As a wrestling fan, when I think of Bob Uecker, I always think of when Andre the Giant choked him at WrestleMania IV.
Apologies if you have Xitter blocked.
As mentioned in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article which is in the OP, there are actually two statues of Uecker at the Brewers’ ballpark, American Family Field. One is outside, and is shown in the Tweet in @Railer13 's post above mine. The other is inside, in the very last row of the stadium, and is a nod to Uecker’s “must be in the front row!” ad for Miller Lite.
As a non-American and a non-Sports fan, I only know him from Mr Belvedere.
Class moves by the Brewers. Really class moves.
Hang on a second, I think I have some dust in my eye or something…
“How can you not be romantic about baseball?”
Billy Beane - Moneyball
This sucks. He was one of the greatest play by play guys ever. I’d put him at 2, behind only Vin Scully. And this is coming from a Red Sox fan who just said goodbye to Joe Castiglione.
I knew him from Mr. Belvedere and Major League mostly. I used to sometimes confuse him with Richard Mulligan.
Well, damn. He was very beloved here in Wisconsin.
I remember some celebrity (Google is failing me as to who) talk about his unparalleled use of the cough button on the microphone to drop jokes and comments only the others in the broadcast booth could hear. He was apparently a grand master at it.
There are a bunch of clips going around with Norm Macdonald describing how hilariously foul mouthed Uecker was off mic.
On Sirius radio this year I caught a Milwaukee game that Uecker was working. He had obviously lost a step but he was still great.
For me, Dave Niehaus is up there, but I’m a life-long M’s fan. A long-suffering M’s fan.
I did love Mr. Baseball. Top-notch guy and I’m not sure you’ll find someone that knows baseball that didn’t like him.
The memorial grows.
Would have been funnier if they had placed the tributes about 3 feet to the right.
Letterman’s YouTube channel puts up clips of guests who have recently died. Here’s the one for Uecker. He is even funnier than I remember. The prologue where Norm MacDonald tells some Uecker anecdotes pales by comparison. 