It wasn’t Bob Uecker’s six seasons playing catcher that earned him a spot in Major League Baseball’s Hall of Fame, the nickname “Mr. Baseball” or his frequent film and television roles. It was his sharp wit, smooth broadcast voice and great storytelling over decades of work in the sport he loved.

Before becoming a Baseball Hall of Famer, Uecker played the sport in high school and in the Army before landing a gig in the majors. He played baseball for four major-league teams between 1962 and 1967, and in 1971, he began a 54-year career calling the plays for the Brewers’ radio broadcast. He died on Jan. 16, 2025, after “a private battle with small cell lung cancer,” according to a statement from his family. He was 90 years old.

Bob Uecker was born and raised in his beloved Milwaukee, where he spent most of his life — when he wasn’t making commercials, television or movies. The son of Swiss immigrants, he just had a natural talent, even if he wasn’t destined to be a great baseball player.

“Actually, I was born in Illinois,” Uecker said in his 2003 Baseball Hall of Fame induction speech. “My mother and father were on an oleomargarine run to Chicago back in 1934, because we couldn’t get colored margarine in Wisconsin. On the way home, my mother was with child: me. And the pain started, and my dad pulled off into an exit area, and that’s where the event took place.

“I remember it was a nativity-type setting: the exit light shining down, there were three truck drivers there. One guy was carrying butter, one guy had frankfurters, and one guy was a retired baseball scout who told my folks that I probably had a chance to play somewhere down the line.”

The truck driver was right: Uecker did have a chance to play. He was a pitcher when he played baseball as a young man, but he didn’t finish high school. In 1954, he joined the Army at age 20, hoping to play with soldiers who had played in college or in the minor leagues. Since he hadn’t done either, he lied to the recruiter, telling him he played on Marquette’s baseball team.

“Marquette didn’t have a team, but they never checked,” he told USA Today in 1997.

It led Uecker to two years playing baseball for the Army, first at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, and then at Fort Belvoir in Virginia. At Fort Belvoir, he would play alongside his future St. Louis Cardinals teammate, Dick Groat. When he left the Army in 1956, he signed with the Milwaukee Braves. After six years in the minor leagues, he was called up to play catcher for the Braves in 1962.

Uecker’s six years in the majors were mostly unremarkable, with a batting average of .200, 74 RBIs and 14 home runs, although three of those home runs were hit off of future Hall of Fame pitchers Sandy Koufax, Fergie Jenkins and Gaylord Perry. He played for four teams and was part of the 1964 Cardinals World Series championship team. What he lacked on offense, he didn’t make up for on defense. In 1967, he led the National League with 27 passed balls and 11 errors by a catcher.

“I was the first player from Milwaukee to ever be signed by the Braves,” Uecker recalled in a 2024 interview on “CBS Sunday Morning.” “I was also the first Milwaukee native to be sent to the minor leagues by the Braves.”

After retiring as a player in 1967, Uecker began a broadcasting career. Bud Selig, a fellow Milwaukee native and then-owner of the Brewers, hired Uecker to be a baseball scout during an annual meeting of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America in New York. It was soon apparent that Uecker wasn’t meant to be a talent scout.

“The worst scout in baseball history,” Selig said of Uecker at a September 2021 event honoring the broadcaster’s 50 years with the Brewers. “My instinct told me he could be a hell of an announcer.”

Uecker’s trademark self-deprecating wit, along with his knowledge of the game and true Brewers fandom made him an instant hit with Brewers fans, and he soon became synonymous with the Milwaukee Brewers ball club, where he spent 54 years calling games. It wasn’t long before the entire country knew him, as he made more than 100 appearances on “The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson.” It was Carson who dubbed him “Mr. Baseball.”

Uecker’s performances on Carson’s show led to TV commercials (the most memorable ones for Milwaukee’s own Miller Lite beer), hosting “Saturday Night Live” and a starring role in the series “Mr. Belvedere.” His most enduring comedic role, however, came while playing an exaggerated version of himself, as Cleveland Indians radio announcer Harry Doyle in the 1989 comedy “Major League.” He would reprise the role in 1994’s “Major League II” and 1998’s “Major League: Back to the Minors.”

Ueker’s career led him to five Wisconsin Sportscaster of the Year awards and a National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association Hall of Fame induction in 2011. He was also inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in 2001, the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 2003 and the WWE Hall of Fame in 2010 (for his two WrestleMania appearances), and a statue of him is erected at the Brewers’ stadium, American Family Field, joining those of Hank Aaron, “Rockin'” Robin Yount and Bud Selig.

He also has a statue inside American Family Field, after making the worst seats in baseball famous during a Miller Lite commercial as “The Bob Uecker Seats.” He will forever sit in the last row of section 422 in the stadium’s upper deck.

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