January 21, 2025

By Bob Elliott

Canadian Baseball Network

The first time I realized what a sense of humor Bob Uecker had was in the spring of 1962.

Uecker, a back-up catcher on “my team” the Milwaukee Braves, was quoted in Sports Illustrated’s weekly “They Said It” feature read::

“My roommate and I have 400 home runs, Eddie Mathews has 399 and I have one.”

Three decades later in the press box at Milwaukee’s County Stadium I reminded him of that great line. Uecker explained that the new up-to-date total was 526 ... “Eddie finished with 512 and I had 14 ... pitchers always bore down on me.”

Nicknamed “Mr. Baseball,” by Johnny Carson of the Tonight Show, Uecker made his career as a self-deprecating analyst. He did not point out that day in the press box that he took Hall of Famers Sandy Koufax, Fergie Jenkins (Chatham, Ont.) and Gaylord Perry deep. He took former all-stars Ken Holtzman, Dick Ellsworth, Hal Woodeshick and Denny Lemaster deep. His other homers came against former 20-game winner Ray Sadecki (twice) and one each against Dave Eilers, Diomedes Olivo, Rob Gardner, Wade Blasingame and Ron Herbel.

Our George Farelli, who mined websites for Canadian in the minors for decades emailed his all time favourite Uecker joke when the career back up said “I didn’t get much respect when I played, ... I remember one game I hit a grand slam off Ron Herbel of the Giants. When his Manager Herman Franks came out to get him, he brought Herbel’s suitcase.” George said he still smiles when he think of that joke, saying “Bob Uecker will be missed by all ball fans, and in particular, by Brewers fans.”

* * *

“My cousin is a cop. Near American Family Field there is a police bar. Bob Uecker was in there one day with my aunt and uncle. The place is packed for lunch with police officers. ‘Ueck’ walked in, had his pictures taken with everyone and had his lunch. Then he left. After he leaves, the PA announcer said over the loudspeaker: ‘All of your meals have been paid for.’ Bob paid for everyone’s lunch. RIP Mr. Baseball.” _ Robin Adams, co-owner of the Sports Heroics Network and co-host of BrewFathers.

“The loss of Bob Uecker is a tough one for the world of baseball. Through all the ups and downs of the things that have gone on in the game, Ueck always brought us back to what it truly is. Fun. Thank you for bringing joy to the fans of baseball every day.” _ Former Philadelphia Phillies GM Ruben Amaro, MLB Network.

“Since Bob was so popular in Milwaukee and such a celebrity through his work on TV and in commercials, he was hounded no matter where we went. One time in Chicago a fan stopped him and asked for an autograph at our hotel. Bob said, ‘Sorry, I only sign at the ballpark.’ So, we get to Wrigley Field and there is the same fan. He asks Bob again for an autograph and Bob says, ‘No sir, I only sign at the hotel.’ He loved the players, he loved Milwaukee and he loved Wisconsin. He spent the season in Milwaukee and his winters in Phoenix.” _ Gord Ash, Brewers, vice president, baseball projects.

“We talked often. After working with him on our Krylon commercials, we talked about every month. He made me laugh to the point I had tears. Funniest and most admired man I have ever met. I asked him about his fishing years ago. He absolutely loved fishing. Sometimes he would joke that he put his wife in a wet suit with hooks, but trolling with her as bait didn’t pay off.” _ Hall of Famer Johnny Bench. who, over the decades that followed those TV spots, saw Uecker's humor evolve with the times.

“Many times during spring training, I would have dinner at one of the iconic baseball hangouts of the last 40 years - Don & Charlie’s in Scottsdale, Az. At least once a spring, I would sit with the owner Don Carson and Commissioner Bud Selig and ‘Mr. Baseball.’ It was like watching a comedy show in real time, and as ‘Ueck’ would say, from the front row: ‘two hours.’ It was unscripted. Unbelievable. Unforgettable.” _ Former Los Angeles Dodgers GM, Ned Colletti, now a San Jose Sharks scout.

“All I can add is he was one of the most friendly ‘stars’ you could come across. Always loved spending time with him in our radio booth when he would visit Herb Score. In the company of royalty, soaking in the stories and friendship they shared. We had a very friendly connection with his role in Major League as (broadcaster) Harry Doyle. I had script approval –- it sounds more important than the actual role –- and he would kid that I did a bad job, allowing him to be a part of the movie. Of course, I had no influence whatsoever. Such a nice, fun, happy man.” _ Bob DiBiasio, vice-president, Cleveland Guardians.

“Ueck was a teammate - a teammate to the Brewers organization, fans and city of Milwaukee. In a game built around failure, Ueck showed the rare quality of slicing through those failures with humor, reliability and support. We will all miss our good friend Ueck.” _ Jim Henderson (Calgary, Alta.), Brewers assistant coach, Brewers.

“Bob’s ability to make people laugh is well-known throughout not only the baseball world, but the wider world, due to his frequent movie, situation-comedy and talk-show appearances. For several years in the late ‘70s and early ‘80, Uecker was an announcer on ABC’s “Monday Night Baseball,” and a good one. (In those years, I was in charge of the statistics and graphics that would appear on the air, and also in position to watch Uke work his magic.) He was often paired with a young but already brilliant play-by-player Al Michaels and with pot-stirring Howard Cosell, who in that era, was one of the 10 best-known people not in TV, not in sports, but in the U.S. (and he would let you know, too). Howard, among other things, would love to display his extensive vocabulary, while Uecker was right on point with his sharp game analysis, but also quick with an impromptu one-liner when the occasion called. His most famous went something like this, during a game in Houston:

“Cosell (assertively) said: ‘I think this batter should bunt here.’

“Uecker (trying to nudge Cosell toward reality): ‘Not sure about that, Howard. Not in this game situation. And after all, he’s a power hitter.’

(In comes strike one, no sign of a bunt.)

“Cosell: ‘All right, Ukey, I get your drift, but you needn’t get truculent with me… You do know what truculent means, don’t you?’

“Uecker: ‘Sure, Howie … If you had a truck and I borrowed it, that’d be a truck-you-lent.”

“And that was the essence of Uecker’s humor: Unrehearsed, realizing different elements of a situation and coming out with comedic gold. Like this one:

“It’s a Monday night in 1977. The Twins, then playing in old Metropolitan Stadium in Bloomington, had just defeated the Red Sox in a game shown on ABC. Afterward, our TV crew returned to a small hotel close to the park, and went into a small lounge, where a small-town lounge singer was already performing in front of a handful of folks. (Think of Bill Murray’s lounge-singer character from his time on ‘Saturday Night Live.’) Again this was late on an August Monday night in Bloomington. Not exactly Caesar’s Palace in Vegas.

“But I walk in with Uecker and Cosell, both still wearing their canary-yellow official ABC Sports blazers. We take a table as far as we could from the stage, and after we order some food and drinks, Uke realizes that a spotlight on the singer is running right through our table. Within moments, he starts by putting up a finger or two, which are magnified and projected onto the guy’s tuxedo. While the singer is making his way through his love songs, oblivious to it, Uke goes on to do a little show of his own, his fingers walking along the guy’s chest, then running up and down his legs, then running, jumping, and finally swimming ... that is, until a shark (Uke’s other hand) arrived and submerged the swimmer, summarily ending the shadow show. We and the few others in the audience are roaring with laughter and the poor singer still doesn’t get what’s going on. Cosell slid off his chair with laughter. I never saw Howard laugh as hard, either before or after.

“But that was typical of Uecker. And Howard was more than once the unaccustomed butt of the joke.

“Such as a time during the 1981 World Series, televised by ABC, so long ago that weekend games were still played in daylight. Again, both Cosell and Uecker were part of the crew. The Yankees and the Dodgers had wrapped up Game 5 on a Sunday afternoon, and we had made our way to the airport for the overnight flight to New York, where the series was set to resume. Other than the players, managers and coaches themselves, it seemed that everybody who was anybody connected to the series had congregated around this particular departure gate at LAX, and there was a delay in boarding.

“This was fertile ground for Uecker. A few years before, there had been a movie called ‘Willard’ about a fellow whose only friends were his pet rats, and Bob used to kid the sometimes cantankerous Cosell about whether Howard also owned a pet rat himself. (One of the movie rats, named Ben, was the star of an eventual sequel to ‘Willard’ and the subject of a title song sung by a young Michael Jackson.) In fact, over that course of a season or two, Uke would often call Cosell ‘Willard,’ not on the air, but in our meetings or over dinners, and Cosell did not like it one bit.

“So at the airport gate, Uke slithers over to me, and conspiratorially whispers, ‘I’m gonna get him. Watch.’ Bob drifts away from our gate to another and earnestly speaks with the gate agent at her post. A moment or two later, he walks back toward me while, in this era before cell phones, an announcement booms over the airport loudspeaker, ‘Will Mr. Cosell, Mr. Willard Cosell, please pick up the white courtesy phone at Gate 48?’ The heads of everyone waiting – executives, scouts and managers of other teams, the commissioner and his staff, umpires, baseball writers, TV sports people and plain old fans, snap to attention and all eyes fall on Cosell – as always, wearing that canary blazer that could be spotted from space. Cosell walks toward Uecker, and says, ‘I’m not picking up that phone.’ Which means, of course, according to airport policy, that the announcement keeps repeating on schedule every 60 seconds. After four or five repeats, met by everything from snickers to now roars of laughter, Cosell finally had to troop down to the next gate to ask the agent to stop the announcement. Bob loved every moment of it.” _ Steve Hirdt, former ABC-TV director on info for Monday Night Baseball.

“I had half a year with him in Milwaukee before I got my concussion. Every time he came in the clubhouse before the game it seemed like he had a story to share. I absolutely loved it. You were drawn to him because it seemed like he was always smiling and encouraging you in some way.” _ Former Brewer and ex-Jay Corey Koskie (Anola, Man.).

“I was a board member of the PBSF (Professional Baseball Scouts Association) and we honoured Bob Uecker one year. He told this story and had the crowd rolling: the Braves scout came into their house to sign him ... the scout explained to Ueck’s father what the signing bonus was ... Ueck’s dad said, ‘well, that is a little more than we can afford, but we will pay.’” _ J.J. Lally, White Sox scout.

“During my years as general manager of the Brewers if our team had a few tough losses or a losing streak Bob Uecker was the perfect guy to sit with because he could make you laugh and put things into perspective. He would say, ‘If you think losing four in a row is bad, how about hitting .197 for an entire year.” _ Doug Melvin, former Brewers GM, now special assistant to the GM.

“I ran into him several times in the dining room or the press area in Milwaukee when I was scouting the Brewers from around 2008 to 2016. I was there quite a bit during those years, since it was only a couple hours from my home by car. We chit chatted on occasion. He was great. Back then the Brewers had the scouts park in this employee lot at Miller Park. It was beneath the overpass and you would walk back beneath the overpass through the loading dock into the tunnel of the stadium. It was meant for both walking and utility vehicles. So as you are walking in the bowels of the stadium toward the clubhouses on your left was one of the main elevators. There was a good amount of room in front of that elevator. And every single Brewers home game there was always one vehicle there. It wasn’t designated for parking, but there was plenty of room. Usually it was new convertible Corvette, but on occasion it was a really nice new SUV. Year to year the vehicles would change, but it was always a new convertible Corvette or a new SUV. One day I ask the security guy about this ‘custom’ parking spot of such great convenience. One day he starts laughing and tells me ‘that’s Ueck’s spot.’ So basically Ueck literally drives right through the loading dock into the tunnel, parks in front of the elevator and takes that up to the press box to go to work. Without a doubt the greatest parking spot in all of the majors. Next time I run into him in the dining room I ask about the Corvette. He tells me he gets a new SUV loaned to him every year from a local dealership. By this time he’s gotta be in his late 70s, so I’m a bit surprised he would request a new ragtop Vette as a daily drive. I ask him how much he likes it? In a very typical, animated Bob Uecker-like style he replies, ‘Oh shit, it goes like hell, even better in the summer with the top down.’ Talk about a life well lived. R.I.P. Bob Uecker.” _ Billy Milos, scout, former Minnesota Twins, now with Colorado Rockies.

“Bob used to tell people that he’s ‘known Zack since he was a fetus.’” _ Zack Minasian, vice-president San Francisco Giants, former Brewers executive.

“We used to have a transistor radio in the bullpen to listen to the WTMJ broadcast with Ueck and Pat Hughes ... Ueck used to say … ‘Now coming in for The Crew is lefty Tony Fossas … The Mechanic ... our version of Mr. Fixit … this guy can fix any potential inning and get out of a mess.’ So one day I ask Ueck about the nickname he gave Fossas ... ‘the Mechanic … ‘How’d you come up with that one?’ He replies … ‘He looks like an auto mechanic from Jiffy Lube that changes your oil.’” _ Dan Plesac, former Brewers and Blue Jays reliever.

“We are on a charter from Milwaukee to Seattle … Ueck gets in the cockpit and announces a four-hour flight from Milwaukee to Seattle on the intercom … “Welcome aboard gents .. this is Ueck from the cockpit … Fasten your seat belts and make sure your seat backs are upright …. on this flight we have a Rocky Marciano, Marylin Monroe, John Wayne triple feature for your viewing pleasure.’” _ Plesac.

“As a visiting manager I can only remember three broadcasters for the home team that requested to spend some time ... 1-on-1 time to ask questions about our club in order to have a better broadcast and be accurate about our team. Vin Scully ... Ken (Hawk) Harrelson ... and ... Bob Uecker. He took a lot of pride in his broadcasts and was so proud of being a part of Major League Baseball and wanted to uphold his end. The game will miss him. Like the George Jones song I worry ‘Who’s Gonna Fill Their Shoes’” _ Three-time manager of the year Buck Showalter, MLB Network.

“I was more struck by how unremarkable he was in his position … he always seemed to be all business before the first pitch, focused on the game, not being a personality. Many media types carry themselves like they’re something special and an important part of the game, when they’re not. I never saw Uecker like that.” _ Ben Walker, former Associated Press ball scribe.

* * *

The late Tim McCarver told me his favorite Uecker story at a reception at Cooperstown in 2012. The mighty New York Yankees came to Busch Stadium for Game 1 of the 1964 World Series. McCarver was the starting catcher and Uecker was his back up. As the Cards batting practice was ending a DixieLand band was playing in the outfield.

Uecker borrowed the tuba from a member of the player and then wandered around catching fly balls off the hitters’ bats during batting practice.

“Here are the Yankees, with all their championships and all their great players like Mickey Mantle, Roger Maris, Whitey Ford, Elston Howard, Mel Stottlemyre and Ralph Terry looking over at our team ... and we got a guy catching fly balls with a tuba.”

The Cardinals, behind MVP Bob Gibson, who won three games, and 4 2/3 scoreless innings and a save from reliever Ron Taylor (Leaside, Ont.), certainly were not intimidated by the Yankees winning in Game 7 of the Series.

“Best part of the story?” McCarver said with a laugh, “our general manager Bob Howsam sent Uecker a bill for damaging the band’s tuba. It cut into Ueck’s World Series share.”