Bob Uecker’s death Thursday at age 90 led the sports world to share many fond memories and colorful anecdotes about the longtime Milwaukee Brewers radio announcer.
It’s possible no one had a better story to share than Brewers TV broadcaster Brian Anderson. He appeared on MLB Network’s Hot Stove Thursday to talk about his colleague.
Anderson first thanked Uecker for helping him land the Brewers’ TV role in 2007. FanDuel Sports Network Wisconsin carries Brewers broadcasts.
“I’ve never told this story … because he didn’t want me to, but he can’t yell at me now,” Anderson said, “but he’s responsible for me getting the Brewers’ job. We had a mutual friend. I didn’t know Bob, but he had made a phone call … he said, ‘I don’t know anything about this kid, but a friend of mine likes him, and just give him a look.
“Because of that … they pulled my demo materials off the floor of the ‘No’ category.”
Yet after Anderson accepted his new job, he said Uecker didn’t really talk to him for weeks.
“I was the new guy, the TV guy,” Anderson said.
That all changed when the Brewers went on a road trip to Miami.
“I was just almost ignoring him on some level ’cause he wasn’t interacting with me at all,” Anderson said. “But he grabbed me on the pant leg as I walked by … he grabbed my pants and said, ‘Hey, I hear you’re a golfer.’”
“I go, ‘Yeah.’
“He goes, “Let’s play tomorrow — you set it up.’”
Anderson said the next day was Monday, and all the courses were closed. In an incredible bit of good fortune, Anderson had a friend who worked as the head pro at a Miami golf course.
“The course was closed, but he opened it because I said, ‘I need a win here. I need to bring Bob Uecker out. And I need a victory,’” Anderson recalled. “He brought the chef in, and one of the kids to do the clubs and the cart.
“The whole way around Bob Uecker’s like, ‘I can’t believe there’s nobody out here today, it’s a beautiful day.”
It’s easy to imagine Uecker casually saying that line in his iconic “I must be sitting in the front row” tone.
“That was the day we spent five hours together,” Anderson said. “The first nine holes, it was the full download. How to be a Brewer broadcaster. Who not to piss off, who to avoid, who to talk to, the whole thing.”
Things got interesting on the back nine, however. Uecker and Anderson were playing with the club pro and the club champion. Uecker wanted to bet them.
Anderson said he and Uecker won the back nine, but not without some nervous moments.
“I was scared to death of Bob Uecker,” Anderson said. “I was scared to death to even be in his presence because he was just an incredible force of nature. … What a brilliant man. I don’t want to get all sad right now, because he’d be so pissed at all of us for even talking this way about him.”
Anderson joked that Uecker always used to joke to fellow broadcasters that he couldn’t wait for his fellow broadcasters to have to carry him out of the booth one day.
It’s a good bet Anderson has plenty of other Uecker tales to share. Everyone has Uecker stories. The former MLB player worked more than 50 years as an announcer and lived life in the spotlight, from late-night TV and Miller Lite commercial appearances to his iconic role in the Major League film franchise. The sports world paid tribute to him following news of his death.
“It’s been written before, but on our tombstones, we’re going to have the year we were born, the year we died, but that dash in the middle … has there ever been a greater dash in our world than Bob Uecker?” Anderson asked. “That life that he lived. Damn man, that’s as special as it gets.”
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