A 103-win season and an 11-2 October usually leave little room for anything beyond the celebration. Yet after the Milwaukee Brewers beat the Tampa Bay Rays 4-1 in Game 5 to clinch their first World Series title in franchise history, captain Christian Yelich spent his first moments as champion thinking about Hall of Fame broadcaster Bob Uecker, a bond that came through in his postgame remarks to ESPN.
Watch What’s Trending Now!
“He’s smiling, man. He’s smiling. I really wish he could have been here to see this. It would have meant everything to him,” Yelich said on ESPN’s X account after the Game 5 clincher on Oct. 28. “But like we said, he’s been with us a lot, and we keep him close to our hearts. This one’s still for Bob, and this is still for Uecker. Uecker, I love you, man, and we did it.”
Yelich spoke that way because Uecker never saw the franchise reach this stage. The Hall of Fame voice called Brewers games for 54 seasons through 2024, then died on Jan. 16, 2025, at 90 after a private fight with small cell lung cancer, leaving the club’s first title uncalled. That tribute had already surfaced a night earlier.
The Brewers honored Uecker one night earlier. At the end of the fifth inning in Game 4 at Tropicana Field, players, coaches and fans held placards reading “I stand up for” and wrote in the name of a loved one affected by cancer. Milwaukee’s dugout wrote “Ueck,” and cameras caught Yelich holding his sign.
Uecker’s connection to the game went well past the microphone. He worked as a reserve catcher for the 1964 St. Louis Cardinals, who beat the New York Yankees in seven games, and hit .200 with 14 home runs over six big-league seasons. The National Baseball Hall of Fame later gave him the 2003 Ford C. Frick Award for his broadcasting.
Uecker’s memory framed the night, but the roster that delivered the title also wrote a story worth telling. It did so from the smallest market in the majors.
Brewers End Franchise Title Drought With World Series Triumph
Nobody expected a bottom-half payroll club to run the table in October. The Brewers had the best winning percentage in the major leagues, winning 103 games in the regular season, posting an 11-2 record in the playoffs, and sweeping the Dodgers in the NLCS.
“It’s the best feeling ever. All of our fans are here. I know the city’s waited a long, long time for this,” Yelich said in postgame comments at Tropicana Field on Oct. 28. “We’re so happy to bring it home to them. I can’t wait to get back there and celebrate.”
“This is one of the greatest moments of my life. Oh my gosh. It doesn’t even feel real,” Pratt said after the clincher at Tropicana Field on Oct. 28. “This is surreal. It only took four months!”
That patience was earned. The Brewers’ lone earlier Fall Classic appearance, in 1982, slipped away when the St. Louis Cardinals rallied in Game 7 and erased a 3-1 edge after the sixth inning. The club started as the Seattle Pilots in 1969.
Pratt’s own timeline sounds wild because the infielder debuted in June and set a Series rookie record with six straight hits.