Article:Players From the Past: Bob Uecker

= Baseball Notebook =

Players From the Past: Bob "Mr. Baseball" Uecker

Born January 26, 1935 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Major League Debut: April 13,1962 Final Game: September 29, 1967

Bob Uecker wasn't exaggerating when he says he was a terrible baseball player. He hit .200 in his five year career in the majors. It makes more sense to change the Mendoza line to the Uecker line since Mendoza hit .215 lifetime while Uecker hit an even .200 so batters hitting under .200 should be referred to as hitting below the Uecker line.

Uecker did hit 14 homers and drove in 74 runs in 731 major league at bats. Lance Berkman has hit 16 homers this season in less than 2 months while it took Uecker 6 years to hit 14 homers.

It is safe to say that Uecker will never darken the hallowed halls of the Baseball Hall of Fame as a player with his lifetime on base percentage of .293 and slugging percentage of .287. Uecker was not known for his speed either having no stolen bases during his career.

He grew up watching the minor league Milwaukee Brewers at Borchert Field. Many years later he would broadcast games for the major league version of the Milwaukee Brewers. Uecker has provided color commentary for national baseball telecasts and has done a lot of work in commercials over the years. Despite his inability to be inducted into the Hall of Fame as a baseball player he was inducted as a broadcaster in 2003.

At baseball-reference.com Uecker's stats are compared to those of such immortals as Buddy Biancalana, Tom Nieto and Al Glossop.

Uecker also acted in movies like Major League and Fatal Instinct. From 1985 to 1990 he was featured in the television series Mr. Belvedere.

Uecker played for both the Milwaukee and Atlanta versions of the Braves. He started his career with the Milwaukee Braves and ended it with the Atlanta Braves.

Al Hirt the famous New Orleans musician played a key role in Uecker's show business career when he had Uecker come up on stage in an Atlanta nightclub owned by Hirt was impressed enough to help Uecker be on the Tonight show which would be the first of many shows he was on with host Johnny Carson.

SSNN has this comment about Uecker's drinking escalating as the Brewers play more like the Brewers of old this season:

“It has been a long time since I’ve seen Bob this happy and this shit-faced. To be honest, I missed that Bob,” Brewers radio personality Jim Powell said of his broadcast partner, Bob Uecker. “For nearly thirty-five years, he made a name for himself as the slurring, incoherent voice of a Brewers baseball team that was the joke of the league. In my opinion, I think you would have to be drunk to endure twenty straight losing seasons, or whatever it is.”

Powell says Uecker’s legendary propensity for alcohol inexplicably stopped last season, when the Brewers – riding a rare and invigorating infusion of young talent – showed signs of life for the first time in decades, and narrowly missed qualifying for the playoffs for the first time in 25 years.

“I was worried there for a while, when the Brewers were winning last season and entered the hunt for the division title. The whole success thing threw Bob for a loop. He was caught off guard, and I think that’s why he stopped drinking,” explains Powell, who has been Uecker’s partner since 1996. “But it’s nice to see Bob return back to his former drunken self, now that the team is losing again. He’s back to being Harry Doyle.”

Following are some of the quotes attributed to Uecker:

http://www.geocities.com/Colosseum/Park/1138/quotes/quotesuecker.html

Baseball should be fun and Bob Uecker has made it fun for over 35 years. He may not be the greatest baseball player that ever lived but he has to be the funniest ex-baseball player living today.