R.I.P. Bob Uecker

He'll always be in the front row

Today was the final day of TikTok before the ban went into effect on January 19. It’s a sad time for me, because I was a content creator on the app since late 2019, and made literally thousands of short videos during that time. I’m now using my Substack account as one of the places where anyone who wants to can find me in a new location online. Life goes on, but it’s certainly not a change that I wanted to experience.

On a shopping trip earlier today, I came across a metallic container which was labelled as “Dad Jokes” and was sitting in the markdown bin of a TJ Maxx store. It offered 400 Dad Jokes for the small price of only $3.00, or less than a penny apiece! It seemed too good to pass up, and so I bought it.

As the hours final hours tikked away (no pun intended) toward the shutdown time, I wanted to do sometime to help mark the time, so I went live on TikTok (something I very rarely do) and started to read all the Dad Jokes. People came and went in the process, including my wife and two children, which made it something I’ll always remember doing, and I have no idea how many others there were along the way.

The idea was to create a calming moment amid the impending doom, similar to the scene from Titanic where a string quartet plays “Nearer My God to Thee” while the passengers were racing around on the decks, trying to find some way to avoid going down with the ship. It’s a popular meme on TikTok these days, and if I had any musical skill myself I’d try to insert myself into the scene somehow. But lacking that, I decided to try making people laugh, instead.

Dad Jokes, by their very nature, aren’t supposed to be more than mildly amusing. They can be corny, they can be cringey, but rarely are they intended to be funny. And after reading all 400 Dad Jokes over the couse of maybe 90 minutes this evening, perhaps five of them were really worthy of a good laugh.

All of this is to say that Bob Uecker’s gift for making us laugh—and in much more than a “Dad Jokes” kind of way—will be truly missed, now that he’s moved on to that great skybox that awaits us all. From his appearances on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, to his uproarious Lite Beer commercials, and his memorable turn as Harry Doyle in Major League, he always helped us to find the funny. And that’s nothing compared to his 2003 Hall of Fame induction speech. Yes Bob Uecker, a catcher of very modest playing ability, made it into the Baseball Hall of Fame. And nobody ever deserved it more than he did.

Baseball has always had its characters, and Bob Uecker may have been the best one of them all. Certainly he was one that won’t be seen again, and his passing will leave a particular hole in Milwaukee, where he was born and raised and worked in the radio booth until the end of last season, when he was 90 years old.

The thought of anyone else doing what he did for 54 years, and most of them with nothing more than a handshake deal, is mind-blowing. In fact, a radio station in Platteville, Wisconsin still lists Uecker as part of the Brewers announcing team, as if they can’t bring themselves to face a season without “Mr. Baseball” behind the microphone. And I know just how you feel, Platteville. Really, all of us do.