The Josh Innes Show - Bob Uecker Died

Episode Date: January 16, 2025

We start with more bitching about the lack of snow shoveling in my St. Louis neighborhood. How hard would it have been for these dweebs to shovel the sidewalks? The legendary Bob Uecker died at 90. This leads me down the road of discussing classic baseball broadcasters and the relationship the audiences had with these guys. They are basically gone. It sucks. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Ah! Woo! Okay. All right. When a core's life is cold enough, the mountains on the can turn blue. So the next time you want a cold lager, cold filter, cold package, Coors Light. Just wait until those glorious mountains on the can turn blue. It's easy to say that fast when you're freezing cold.

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snow. It's not crunchy like snow. It looks like snow, but it's like shards of glass, basically, and it's terrible. One of our cars is still buried because I didn't shovel it out because we didn't need that car. We got our main car. I had the other car parked on the road. Problem is, whenever all the plows came through, it covered the car up to pretty high up the side of it, so you can't open the door, and I'm boxed in. I was thinking I'd have an opportunity to go shovel it know, I mean, pretty high up the side of it. So you can't open the door and I'm boxed in. I was thinking I'd have an opportunity to go shovel it, but I waited a couple of days and now it's gotten to the point that it's like, it's like rock. Like I cannot get through it.

So that car may be out of commission for a bit. I don't know how long it's going to be out of commission, but out of commission for a bit because there ain't no way in hell I'm getting out there. I went out there today with the shovel, like, let's see what we can do. I got through a little top layer of snow and then it seems like about eight inches, nine inches of solid like ice. So it still starts and that's good news. We haven't started the damn thing in two weeks. Haven't been in that car in two weeks. We've been snow covered in St. Louis for two weeks. This is where we are right now. Miserable. It's warmed up to the point that I could wear shorts

outside today because it's 35. In the next couple of days, it's going to get down into the teens for the highs. This damn snow ain't going anywhere. And here in Kirkwood, Missouri, I don't know where this message came from, but Jilly showed it to me. I don't know if it's on the Kirkwood website or the Kirkwood Facebook page, but the city of Kirkwood wants all the residents of this neighborhood and this little community to know that it is your responsibility to make sure that your sidewalk and your area is maintained and taken care of in terms of the snow. Now, your boy over here didn't take the time to get his own goddamn car out, but I did shovel the sidewalk like the second day of the snow.

You know who else has shoveled their sidewalk in Kirkwood? No one. It is common courtesy that when it snows, my eyes become large, and when it snows, you need to go outside with your little shovel and tend to the sidewalk. So what's happened now is my dog hasn't been able to take walks around the neighborhood

for two weeks because none of the sidewalks have been shoveled except one and it is mine. What does that say about me? Either I'm a really good guy that understands etiquette or i'm just an asshole that wasted my time shoveling the sidewalk while literally no one else maybe if i walked around the entire community here i'd find a handful of sidewalks shoveled you'd go to like downtown kirkwood a cute little downtown they probably have the sidewalk shoveled maybe some areas around some schools are shoveled but in front of these lazy fuckers houses oh they got their own cars out no they got their

driveway shoveled just like the dickhead next door the rich dickhead next door the one that built the nice backyard oasis that he's never in that guy got his snowblower out a week and a half ago made sure he got his driveway all good to go with his snowblower did not touch the sidewalk how do you not know the etiquette and I understand that it doesn't snow non-stop for four months here but like up in Philadelphia which is my main experience with being an adult in snow it is common courtesy and it's just common knowledge that you get your fat ass out there and you shovel your sidewalk. And if you shovel out your spot on the street, you put a chair or a garbage can or something in that spot

to let people know that I shoveled this motherfucker, and this is my spot. And if someone takes it, you shoot them. That's the way the world works. That's the Chicago way. That's what you do. It's just funny that you have to have a message sent out hey guys go shovel well you can't shovel now because it's literally unshovelable snow ice it cannot be moved so whatever is there is there until god blesses us with mother nature blesses us with hot sun beating down it hurt my feet just walking around 290s songs i've already

sung today i told you yesterday that the 90s music sucks here i am referencing 290s songs but until the sun melts this shit which could take months at this point ain't nobody gonna be walking the streets of kirkwood miss Missouri because the sidewalks won't melt because these monsters did not shovel them at all. You are monsters. Finally was able to take the dog to a park that was shoveled enough to go for a walk, but my God. Oh, anyway, how you doing? You guys feeling blessed today? Good. All right right so um also i decided i don't know if i mentioned this on one of the previous podcasts but i decided to pay for like the premium on uh i think i talked about this yesterday but i decided to pay for the premium like ten dollar

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Whatever your answer is, Toyota is here to bring you closer to the things that matter to you because they matter to us too. Toyota for what matters most. Craving an escape, Toyota. For what matters most. Yes, that sucks. 90 years old, Bob Euchre. But what's wild, and God, I love baseball broadcasters, man. You know how I feel. That was my dream growing up. My initial dream in life was to be a movie director. We talked about this yesterday. I wanted to be Alfred Hitchcock. So when I was a kid, I would film movie scenes. My dad got me a video camera, the same video camera that he filmed his own homemade erotica with. I found the tape.

The tape didn't work on the VCR. Like only could happen to me type of shit. The tape got eaten, whatever. Maybe it's a blessing I didn't see it. It might've ruined me. Maybe it would've made me a better man. I don't know. But anyway, I had the video camera. So I would do like the shower scene from Psycho. I would do a bunch of different shit i wanted to be a director i was like little dawson leary there on dawson's creek that was me that was my dream and then i decided i wanted to be a baseball play-by-play broadcaster that was my ambition that happened about the time i was about 12 or 13 years old and my grandpa my mom's dad tom mccoy one of the best humans to ever walk the face of the earth other than the fact that he kind of fucked around on my grandma.

But it was the 60s. Everybody did that. Whatever. But Grandpa McCoy is one of the nicest, most amazing humans to ever walk the face of the earth, right? I mean, until the time he was in his 80s, I think he was out shoveling parking lots for people, doing stuff for old ladies. Like, wonderful man but grandpa tom mccoy was a dumpster diver and he would go out and like find treasures and knickknacks in the garbage so like it was not uncommon for grandpa to come home and also a lot of cans he would just have

cars filled with cans you know aluminum cans sody pops and whatnot but anyway so grandpa would come home with treasures. And a lot of times those treasures were like McDonald's toys that had been discarded, you know, like the nuggets that could change outfits or like Flintstones glasses or whatever. But one day he came home with a talk boy from Home Alone 2, which if you didn't know was not a real thing, it was actually created for the movie. And then after the movie came out, they sold the Talkboy on its own, but there was no such thing as a Talkboy. Thing is, the Talkboy was literally just a handheld recorder that you could pitch up and pitch down, but it looked cool

because the microphone would pull up and it had a handle, right? The fucking Talkboy. Kevin McAllister. This is Peter McAllister, the the father and I'd like a hotel room please with an extra large bed tv and one of those refrigerators you have to open with a key credit card you got it and like that was badass so my grandpa came home one day and had a talk boy that he found in the garbage and And when I got that talk boy, I got a cassette from my other grandpa. He gave me a blank cassette and I would just start recording myself into this talk boy. And that's when I started trying to do play by play shit. And I was in Poplar Bluff, Missouri, like for the summer. So I would go watch Cardinals games

and call them into this talk boy. That is like my origin story for doing play by play. So I would sit there and watch like, Hey, the Cardinals are playing the expos tonight. I remember this season vividly because it was 1999 or 99 or 2000. One of those years, I guess might've been, I think it was 2000 when I really started doing that. So I was 13 or 14 and I would just call these games into these recorders and I fucking loved it. And that's when I decided that's what I wanted to do. And I would sit in my dad's car and you've heard all these stories before, but it applies today. I would sit in my dad's car before you could go to the internet and listen to any fucking game you ever wanted to, you know, like now, if I wanted to listen to the Astros, if the Astros had a game today, I could listen to it and it'd be easy

back then, man, like to find a stream of a baseball game or a sporting event was like I mean it might as well be the moon man like I remember I was listening to a Cardinals game once on a stream and like the real player pops up you know you're like holy shit this is revolutionary it'll never get any better than this that was like 2001 that was the last time I heard Jack Buck calling the game actually interestingly enough they were playing the Diamondbacks I want to say they were playing the Diamondbacks. This was 2001 and their season ended. And I just remember like it was a feed from the broadcast booth. So like you could hear their conversations off the, it was very fascinating. But anyway,

I digress, but I would listen to different radio stations. That's where I started learning about AM radio and about how, Hey, I can listen to KMOX and listen to the Cardinals at night in St. Louis. First, I didn't know it was just at night. I'd be amazed by the fact that at night, you could listen to almost any AM radio station in the country. But during the day, you'd have no chance. I didn't know why that was the case.

I do now, but I didn't know back then. So I would just sit there and listen like, hey, here's 720 WGN in Chicago. And here's 1200 WOAI in San Antonio. And here's six, you know, dude, you can pick up even like not even 50,000 waters. If you're in the right spot, you can pick up 5 and 10,000 watt AM stations across the country. It's wild. But you'd listen. Like, here's 660 WFAN. And

like, you would just listen to all these stations, WTAM in Cleveland. And it was really cool. And that's where I wanted to be a play by play guy and baseball broadcasters were my heroes, particularly Jack Buck and Mike Shannon, the voices of the Cardinals. But I would listen to the Astros because the Astros games were on 1300 WIBR Baton Rouge, the sports animal. So I would listen to what I thought was a fantastic broadcast, which was Milo Hamilton and Alan Ashby. I thought that was a great broadcast. It was prime Milo because he wasn't like young. He was old, but he was at that old where his voice was still strong.

And, oh, he got the tailgate down on that one. Like, I mean, just cool. Sent it up the elevator shaft. Like, I fucking loved it. Milo, old school baseball broadcasters. And I would read books about these guys. The Art of Sportscasting, which coincidentally, I still have. I found it when I was digging through my shit. art of sports casting and Jack Buck's autobiography like this is what I wanted to be so guys like Bob Euchre and Jack Buck and Ernie Harwell and Milo Hamilton like these old school gravelly voiced sound like they've been smoking since they were eight and some of them had been war veteran type guys that had seen

some shit, probably out on the road slaying ass on the road because they're on the road nonstop. Like, my God. And usually their broadcast partner was a former player, and that former player was probably out getting all sorts of ass on the road too. Like, these dudes were my heroes. And they were amazing. And gradually over time, those guys start dying off.

Like a couple of years ago, when I moved to St. Louis, one of my heroes died within a month of me moving here. Mike Shannon, who at the time was the voice of the Cardinals. He had really lost a lot because he had had the COVIDs and he got old. He just didn't sound good anymore, but he died. And over the last handful of years, you start to lose these iconic voices right and one of the last remaining dudes one of the last remaining icons Bob Uecker and he died 90 years old today I know he had a heart transplant I think or a heart surgery uh maybe a decade or so ago apparently had cancer that he didn't tell a lot of people about and that's's kind of what got him. Dude was calling playoff baseball games a couple of months ago.

Like, he was on the call for that Mets game that the Mets rallied to beat the Brewers. The Brewers had them beaten in Milwaukee. I think it was 2-0 going into the ninth. I know this because I bet on Milwaukee to win because I'm a degenerate. And I think they scored four in the ninth inning and won 4-2. I think it was a score three to two Pete Alonso hit a homer but all that said god like we just lose these great voices like if you're listening in Houston that iconic voice to you is is Milo Hamilton even though Milo

Hamilton is kind of a was kind of a vagabond and he you know I think he started with the Cardinals and dude you want to I know I mentioned this all the time but you're never going to see something like this again the Cardinals broadcast team in I believe 1953 Milo Hamilton Jack Buck Harry Carey get the fuck out of Dodge there will never be anything like that again that's no knock on the young dudes that do it now those dudes are never going to have the opportunities to become icons because most people don't even care about the broadcasters anymore. There's not going to be that era where people had to listen to the radio and felt a connection with the radio play-by-play guy.

I don't believe that anybody in Houston feels some sort of connection to Robert Ford. No offense to Robert Ford, but Robert Ford is just kind of a bland, generic, play-by-play guy that they hired, and he's fine, and he's gotten to call some of the great moments in Astro's history, but I don't think anybody listens to Robert Ford and goes, man, in like 30 years, I'm gonna go back and listen to this

and be like, whoa, Robert Ford. But everybody remembers the Milo Hamilton calls. Everybody remembers the iconic stuff from those old school broadcasters. People remember when Bum Phillips was doing Oilers games on the radio. People remember Jack Buck and they remember Harry Carey. And maybe time will change that,

but in 30 years, we probably won't even have radio broadcasts anyway, they'll be dead. So you don't get that. Like Bob Uecker, the fact that this dude spent 50 some odd years doing what he was doing with Milwaukee, the fact that Mike Shannon as a player and broadcaster and a citizen, you want to hear something you're never going to hear in the history of anything ever again, is Mike Shannon, born and raised in St. Louis, went to high school in St. Louis, went to the University of Missouri, played only raised in St. Louis, went to high school in St. Louis, went to the University

of Missouri, played only for the St. Louis Cardinals, due to an illness, had to retire early, became a broadcaster for the St. Louis Cardinals, was associated with the Cardinals organization for 60 some odd years. His entire life, I think he died at 83 or 85, maybe I forgot how old Mike was but Mike spent his entire life in St. Louis from birth to death St. Louis and is an icon that will never happen again like as much as I love Milo Hamilton Milo Hamilton worked for the Cardinals and I believe he worked for the A's and he worked for the Pirates and he worked for the Cubs and he worked for the Astros and the Braves. Milo was on to the next one.

I don't know if he just pissed people off or what, but Milo had a lot of gigs. So did Harry Carey. People don't realize Harry Carey is most associated as the 80s and 90s caricature, Cub fan, Budman Harry Carey, the one that you see the impressions of, the, you know, well, jeet the moon if it were made of cheese, like that shit. Dude, Harry Carey spent like 30 years damn near as the broadcaster for the Cardinals, like from the 50s into the early 70s. It might have even been, no, the 40s, I believe, into the early 70s or late 60s. And then he went on to, I think, the White Sox.

I think he did the A's for a little bit and then became that kind of caricature that you see now in the WGN and the seventh inning stretch and all that shit. I think the seventh inning stretch thing happened when he was in Chicago with the White Sox, which would make sense because Bill Veck was the owner. I understand that I spill a lot of useless knowledge

on you guys, but every now and then I like to flex to show that I know something and I'm not a total dunce. But then you think of Bob Bucher and you think of Mr. Belvedere, streaks on the china, never mattered before, who cared? When you drop kicked your jacket, when you came through the door, no one glared. Hey, according to our new arrival, life is more than mere survival,

and we just might live the good life yet. Bloodle-doodle-do, bloodle-doodle-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do. And then, of course, Major League, which is really kind of one of the ways that many of us got into baseball of a certain generation is watching baseball movies. Like, everybody played baseball as a kid, and you watched your team if you could when you were a kid. Not every game was on TV when you were a kid, so kind of a different world. But, like, Major League was one of those movies.

Everybody can quote Harry Doyle. Harry Doyle welcoming all you friends of the feather to another season of Indians baseball, like all that shit, just a bit outside. Ball four, ball eight, ball 12, and the Indians have looked like fly ball caught. That was Monty, of course, but take over, Monty. I'm in the back. And there were some great quotes in Major League Two. Major League One was more realistic.

He became a little bit more of a cartoon in the second one and is constantly hammered in the booth. But there were some good lines in that. So here's Hiroshi Kamikaze Tanaka, recently of the Tokyo Giants, has knocked himself cold for the third time this week. Perhaps in Japan that's actually better than catching the ball. Like, there's funny shit.

He was also in Major League Back to the Minors. And you you would have to if you put a gun to my head and said josh give me one line from bob euchre in major league back to the minors i'd be like shoot me i know scott bacula was in it i know corbin burnson was in it i know that uncle baby billy's bible bonkers played like the star player downtown in it. The dude, the big Hispanic dude was called Carlos Liston. And I remember lines from the stupid movie, but none of them from Bob Uecker. If you throw again at Carlos Liston, do or no do? Like, I remember that shit. Couldn't tell you any Bob Uecker lines from that. But it's sad when you start to see these people. And do yourselves a favor, right? And if one of you does this, I'll feel like I did my job, okay? And that I

accomplished something. I need to hear from you on this. Go to YouTube. First of all, I'm going to guess that MLB TV tonight is probably going to air Major League and Major League 2 and probably air the Bob Uecker documentary, Mr. Baseball, which is a great documentary. If it airs tonight, you should watch it if you haven't seen it. But go to YouTube, look up Mike Shannon and Bob Uecker. Of course, they played together with the Cardinals in the 60s. Shannon used to do a Friday night baseball show after the Cardinals would play home games. I'd go over to Shannon's restaurant and he would talk with his buddies. That's where I bumped in the one time when I bumped into Bob fucking Gibson. You talk icons, man. I'm hammered, went to the ball game, go over to Mike Shannon's Steaks and Seafood. The broadcast is happening across the street where they're doing live at Shannon's.

And he's, I guess, talking to Bob Gibson. I get up to take a leak and I just kind of gray shoulders with this imposing guy. And I look over and I'm like, you talking to Bob Gibson. I get up to take a leak and I just kind of graze shoulders with this imposing guy. And I look over and I'm like, you're fucking Bob Gibson. Holy shit. You know, but look up Bob Gibson and Mike Shannon. And there is a conversation they had in 2017. It's about 25 minutes. Just listen to two dudes talking baseball, old school baseball.

Nobody has better stories than old school baseball guys. And Mike Shannon had so many with so many icons and the conversations were spectacular. But Shannon and Euchre would have these incredible back and forths. And I think this was from 2017. So just go to YouTube, look up Mike Shannon, Bob Euchre, and the conversation is great. If one of you listens and sends me a message and says, hey, I listened and it was outstanding, I'll feel like I accomplished something today. Anyway, Bob Euchre, it sucks he's dead. The fact that he was calling games until he was 90, and not only calling games until he was 90, but sounded good.

So many guys hang around too long and they sound old and shitty. He never sounded old and shitty he was just remarkable what a run man all right more to come