Remembering Bob Uecker, and Experiencing Him, From a Distance

I never really got to hear Uecker call games until the mid-2000s, when MLB GameDay audio became available. I’d heard him in some commercials, and knew he’d been acting some, but he seemed cool. Once I was able to listen to GameDay audio, it was a revelation. I’d heard local play-by-play–but for the announcers, like Jon Miller, even for the home team, it was like a job.

For Uecker, though, it was different. He was all-in for his team–and make no mistake, the Brewers were his team. When I finally was able to listen to him call games, you could tell his love for the Brewers was real. Uecker was the one person with Brewers fans during the highs of winning a pennant, multiple division titles, and hitting a new high in terms of regular playoff appearances.

He was also there for the team’s hard times, too, between the early struggles before the team made its first rise to the top; the mid-1990s through 2002, when the franchise hit its lowest point; and even when it hit a rough patch in the mid-2010s. Those seasons test the mettle of announcers more than the glory days, and Uecker was as good at bracing the audience during each.

Uecker also clearly brought joy to a play-by-play call. When Carlos Lee hit a home run, Uecker would do his best impression of a horse neighing, playing off Lee’s nickname of "El Caballo". He’d describe Derrick Turnbow coming in to close out a game with “D-Bow” to get “D-Save.”

It was a glimpse of how he must have called the biggest Brewers’ moments of my early fandom: the Juan Nieves no-hitter, Paul Molitor’s hitting streak, and the time they dropped 18 runs on the Red Sox among them. Some of these were games I heard through local announcers. Others, I just followed in the box scores or brief blurbs in the local paper.

Through all of it, Uecker provided Brewers fans hope after the losses, someone who shared in our joy after the wins. No matter what the predictions for the season, Uecker was the person whom we all looked forward to hearing from on Opening Day, no matter whether the heartbreak was losing a game, seeing a season end without the playoffs, exiting the playoffs way too soon, or a beloved player being traded or departing via free agency.

Uecker had been scaling back his work for the Brewers, we know now, due to a battle with lung cancer, but this coming Mar. 31 will be the first home opener without Uecker. This will be the first season without Uecker calling Brewers games since 1970. I missed many of those, and so did many fans younger than me. But for all the Bob Uecker calls I missed, and the Bob Uecker calls we won’t get to hear in the future, I’m grateful for the ones I did get to hear.