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Friday January 17, 2025
Bob Uecker (1934-2025)
The journeyman who became Mr. Baseball
My father said his delivery reminded him of W.C. Fields—particularly in that great Miller Lite ad where he gets comps to a game and obliviously bothers everyone getting to his seat—only to be told, no, buddy, you're in the wrong seat. To which Bob Uecker says “Oh, I must be in the front roooow!” Dad could totally hear the W.C. Fields there. The final moments of the commercial are Uecker in the deepest section of the bleachers, far away from the action, enthusiasm undimmed.
Major League Baseball has had its share of clown princes, it's a tag you hear a lot, but I wouldn't tag Uecker with it. Neither clown nor prince seems right. He was just the funniest everyman to ever play the game.
I read his memoir, “Catcher in the Wry,” nearly 30 years ago now, and every so often I'll think of one of the cutlines in the photo section: Uecker, grimacing, as he slides into homeplate. “Here I am trying to score from second on a three-base hit; out on a close play.” He was master of self-effacement. He was famously a not-great player—six seasons, .200/.293/.287 in six seasons—and played for three teams in four cities: Braves (Milwaukee), Cardinals, Philllies, Braves (Atlanta). This is from his memoir:
When a player gets cut, well, the news is traumatic. He is face to face with that moment of final truth, that he will never put on a big league uniform again. Nor is it easy on the manager who has to break the news. ... I'll never forget how it happened to me. I went to spring training with Atlanta in 1968. The manager was Luman Harris. I opened the door to the clubhouse and Luman looked up and said calmly, “No visitors allowed.”
This story is via Joe Posnanski. Ueck was on the '64 Cardinals who came from 11 games back to win the pennant, but he didn't play in the World Series.
“I was on the disabled list,” he told Bob Costas and Joe Morgan in the booth during Game 6 of the 1995 World Series.
Costas: Fouled to the screen. Why were you on the disabled list?
Uecker: I got hepatitis.
Costas: Swing and a miss. How did you get hepatitis?
Uecker: The trainer injected me with it.
Pos says Uecker was everyone's favorite teammate: Dick Allen, Phil Niekro, Bob Gibson. He and Gibson were fined $100 each by the St. Louis Cardinals for necessitating a reshoot of the team photo. In the first version they were holding hands. In '65, Lou Brock set a then Cardinals record by stealing 60 bases and was given a plaque in a ceremony in the team clubhouse, during which Uecker turned to Tim McCarver and whispered: “If I had been in the lineup every day, that could be me out there.”
After his career he became a regular on “The Tonight Show,” beloved by Johnny, who gave him the nickname “Mr. Baseball.” He became the Milwaukee Brewers announcer in 1972 and never stopped. He did the Lite beer commercials and got his own sitcom in the '80s. He became one of the most famous fictional announcers of the game when he played Harry Doyle in the “Major League” movies: “Juuust a bit outside!”
I like this from Bob Costas: “Baseball kept him alive. Even in his last year, when he was so ill, when he got to the ballpark and stepped on the elevator up to the press box, he would come to life. He was just happier and healthier at the ballpark.”
Touch 'em all, Ueck.
“I must be in the front roooow.”