When Bob Uecker died in January 2025, his daughter Sue Ann Uecker lost more than a father. She lost the last parent connecting her to a childhood in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin, where baseball broadcasts filled the house and family dinners meant listening to her dad’s stories about his years catching for the Milwaukee Braves.
Now 65 years old, Sue Ann is one of two surviving children from the Hall of Fame broadcaster’s first marriage. She’s watched her family shrink from six to three over 13 years.
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The Family Left Behind
Bob Uecker died at home on January 16, 2025, ten days before his 91st birthday. Small-cell lung cancer took him after a private two-year fight that few outside his family knew about.
Sue Ann and her brother Bob Uecker Jr. held a private memorial and burial for their father on January 24, 2025. The family statement, released through the Milwaukee Brewers, thanked fans for the memorial they built at his statue outside American Family Field.
“Bob brought us a lifetime of joy in both his public and private life,” the family wrote. “We loved him deeply.”
The statement listed Sue Ann’s two daughters among Bob’s surviving grandchildren: Victoria Bennett, married to Austin Bennett, and Nichole Uecker, married to Brandon Peters. Bob Jr.’s daughters, Emily Uecker and Kelsey Ziemer, rounded out the four grandchildren. Three great-grandchildren also survive him.
Growing Up Uecker
Sue Ann was born in April 1960 to Bob and Joyce Uecker. Her father had just started his Major League Baseball career as a backup catcher, bouncing between the Braves, Cardinals, Phillies, and Atlanta Braves.
She was 11 when Bob retired from playing and took the Milwaukee Brewers radio job in 1971. That year changed everything for the family. Bob found his calling behind the microphone, and his kids grew up listening to him call games for 54 seasons.
Her parents divorced in 1975 when Sue Ann was 15. Her mother Joyce, who worked as a travel agent for AAA and later managed Wisconsin Craftsman, raised the four children through the split while Bob’s broadcasting career took off.
Sue Ann stayed in Wisconsin as an adult. She works as a manager at TMP Directional Marketing, keeping close to the Milwaukee area where she grew up.
Two Siblings Gone
Steve Uecker, Sue Ann’s younger brother, worked as a cowboy in California. He died on April 5, 2012, from complications of San Joaquin Valley Fever. He was 53.
The timing made it worse. Steve died on opening day of the baseball season. Bob went to the hospital, then drove to Chicago to broadcast that night’s game for the Brewers.
Ten years later, Sue Ann lost her older sister. Leeann Uecker Ziemer died on March 11, 2022, at 65, after fighting ALS. The disease took her ability to speak, then took everything else.
Bob moved Leeann from Cedarburg to be near his condo in Menomonee Falls during her final months. He told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel how she texted him about dying as the disease progressed.
“The really sad part of that whole thing as it got closer was she kept talking about dying,” Bob said in 2022. “She’d send me texts about dying. Which, how do you answer those? You don’t.”
Leeann left behind a daughter, Kelsey Ziemer.
Joyce’s Death
Sue Ann’s mother Joyce died on July 16, 2015, at 81. Born in Milwaukee, Joyce loved travel. She took trips across Europe, went hot air ballooning through the Midwest, and visited Steve in California before his death.
Joyce’s obituary described her as someone known for dancing all night, her sense of humor, and loyalty to friends. She died surrounded by family at home in Menomonee Falls.
The obituary listed Sue Ann, Leeann, and Bob Jr. as her surviving children. Steve had died three years earlier.
Bob’s Final Years
Bob Uecker learned he had small-cell lung cancer in early 2023. He kept broadcasting Brewers games through the 2023 and 2024 seasons, staying behind the microphone until weeks before his death.
His longtime partner Judy Uecker, his second wife from whom he divorced in 2001, stayed close to him. She was with him during his final days and attended Brewers events with him in 2024.
Bob died at his Menomonee Falls home with family nearby.
The family asked those wanting to honor his memory to donate to three causes: Froedtert Hospital and the Medical College of Wisconsin for cancer research, the Wounded Warrior Project, and the ALS Association.
Carrying the Name Forward
Sue Ann and Bob Jr. are working with the Brewers on a public celebration of life for their father, planned for summer 2025. The details haven’t been released.
The family statement thanked Brewers fans for supporting Bob through five decades of broadcasting. “The affection and connection he had with you gave Bob the strength to continue announcing games until the very end,” they wrote.
Sue Ann Uecker lives quietly in Wisconsin, away from the spotlight that followed her father for 50 years. She raised two daughters, worked her career in marketing, and stayed close to her brother and his family.
She buried her mother in 2015, her brother Steve in 2012, her sister Leeann in 2022, and her father in 2025. She’s one of two children left from a family of six.
The Uecker name in Milwaukee means baseball, broadcasting, and the voice of summer. For Sue Ann, it means something different. It means the people she loved and lost, the family that kept shrinking, and the quiet life she built while her father entertained millions on the radio.
Bob Uecker’s voice is gone from the broadcast booth. But his children carry what he left behind: memories of a father who made people laugh, grandchildren who knew him as something more than Mr. Baseball, and a family that held together through loss after loss.
