Dave Niehaus

It's a sad day for sports fans and really the entire city of Seattle today, as Dave Niehaus has passed away at the age of 75. Niehaus had been the voice of the Seattle Mariners since the first game of their existence, providing youthful exuberance and an almost comically complete knowledge of baseball to their TV broadcasts.

No man could answer a trivia question quite like Niehaus, who would ramble on for innings, going on ridiculous tangents just to tell us that Ken Griffey is 34th among active players in OBP. Even with those kind of crazy answers, Niehaus was a Seattle icon.

As a man who grew up listening to Niehaus' signature "My oh my!" homerun calls and had to endure his slow descent into not-being-able-to-tell-a-popup-from-a-homerun, hearing that he was passed away is especially impactful. Niehaus always knew how to keep the audience in a game and when to back off and just let the players do the talking. Even with some of his homerism, I find myself often longing for his gravely game calls over the hilariously inept Dave Sims.

No one will ever be able to match Dave Niehaus in Seattle. Niehaus was a Hall of Famer and an alltime great who refused to let anybody put him on a pedestal. Hopefully Seattle will put up a statue or a large mural or something honoring Niehaus, who will never be replaced but always remembered.

Update: Just about every person in the Seattle are has expressed their sadness over this horrible heart attack. Jay Buhner and Ken Griffey, Jr. have both likened it to losing a father, while Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn and Mariners CEO Howard Lincoln both struggled to put into words their feelings. Nothing would have been quite as amazing as getting to hear Dave Niehaus' absurdly energetic reaction to a Mariners World Series win. God willing, the city will win him one some day.