This is a sad, sad day, not just for us as Reds fans, but as a people.  I am sure like many in here, I grew up listening to Joe, would often watch the games by turning down the tv volume to hear Marty and Joe call the games, and I have many fond memories of listening to those games with my father throughout my childhood.  He will always be missed and remembered by those of us who love this game and appreciate what Joe brought to the Reds and the community.  May you rest in peace.

Very sad. The ESPN obit does a good job of retelling his debut game.

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=3113499

Growing up in the 80s one of my first memories of Joe was his clowning with Marty in Kroger TV commercials, joking back and forth as they bought Home City Ice and JTM.

Next season (and every season) won't be the same.

to get to hear him a little more this season.  He was never a great play-by-play man, but he always added something special to the game that more than made up for that.

The greatest thing about Joe was that he always represented the Reds and the city of Cincinnati with class.  Many hometown guys have come thru the Reds and ended departing on negative terms (Rose, Larkin, Oester), but Joe always stood out as a positive image.  He'll be greatly missed.

I loved his understated approach.  He never got too high or too low, but he always conveyed a great love of the game and the Reds.  RIP.

Joe was the best.  Even through this last season, I always made a special effort to listen to the games he broadcasted.  Cheers to one of the most loved sports figures this town's ever seen.

So long, Left-Hander.  We were lucky to have you for as long as we did, and we appreciated every minute of it.  Thanks for everything you did for Reds baseball, and for showing us what it means to never lose your excitement and passion for the game.  Here's hoping that you and Marty are reunited in Cooperstown soon.

When I think back to my teen years one of the first memories to come up is listening to Joe on the radio.  I loved the innings he worked alone.  Gentle and sparse.  Slowing the game down.  Really loved the guy.  He was the type of grandpa we all deserve.

He seemed like a happy man.  He knew he had a good life.  No anxiety and ticks.  He was just a gentle and content man.

The first spring training games from Florida each year. With Marty calling the game and Joe struggling to pronounce the names of the latest batch of hopefuls, always put me in mind of cut grass and sunshine while it was still cold outside.

I can think of few people in sports more unconditionally loved than the Old Left Hander, and he reciprocated every day of his life.

We'll miss him.
He leaves big shoes to fill.

I think you all have summed it up pretty well.  I have nothing more to add.  But I would feel remiss if I didnt.  My love for baseball would never have been so deep if it were not for Joe.  He always made me extra proud to be a lefty.

Wow...it is hard to believe that he is gone. Even though he was slowing down, you'd never think that he would finally reach home.

This is a sad day for the entire Reds family and I know the summers will not be the same without him. Hearing his voice meant summer was either here or just around the corner, and that made it easier to get through the long winters.

This is going to be a long winter. RIP Joe. You are missed.

We will miss your passionate home run calls and unbridled passion for the Reds. May God be with your family, friends and fans in this time of sadness. But let us all be reminded of the endless memories that Joe provided for us over the years. For me there will always be the summer nights as a kid staying up late to hear a west coast game, or sitting around with family in Eastern Kentucky on the front porch and the only artificial sound to be heard was the occasional train whistle and the Reds on radio. Joe guided us through the good times as well as the bad and was the voice of reason for Reds fans during some pretty lean years.

His contributions to baseball and also the community are legendary and he will be missed by many, including those who knew him only through his acts of kindness.

A hero of my youth has gone. A hero in my life has passed away and I will miss him.

All night long the Northern Streamers
shot across the trembling sky:
Fearful lights that never beckon
save when Kings or heroes die

Viya con Dios

Thanks for your post. I have similar childhood memories listening to Joe from southern West Virginia. Joe has truly created a lot of great memories for Reds fans over a large geographic region.

Sad Day for Reds fans.

We all must have expected it, but when it comes, it's always a bit of a shock. I cannot think of a person more omnipresent in my life than Joe. (My family et. al. are pretty screwed up). I know this is a bit sappy, but I could always count on Joe, he'd been there since before I had any memories, and I quite literally grew up with him. Man I'll miss those reflective silences coming out of the radio on a hot summer day. Go with God, Joe.

http://cincinnati.reds.mlb.com/cin/fan_forum/nuxhall_tribute.jsp

Time to come out of my self-imposed hiatus (I'll be back after this horrible semester) and pay my respects.

When I was a kid, Marty and Joe were summer. Growing up in Upstate NY before internet/satellite radio, before extra innings packages, hell even before there was more than one game per week, my chances to see the Reds were few and far between. But on clear summer nights, you could still hear Marty and Joe riding those radio waves, emerging from the static to deliver my baseball education.

The biggest treat of all would be the week we'd spend with my aunt near Washington CH every summer. No problems getting the Big One there, obviously. My aunt lives out in the woods, and every evening after dinner I'd take a little radio out to the hammock and let Marty and Joe blend with the crickets and katydids. I believe the cliched term for this would be a reverie.

Joe was part of the rhythm of my summer and my youth. He was a legendary Reds pitcher. 15 seasons and 135 wins. He was an extraordinary broadcaster--slip ups be damned, he conveyed his love for the game better than any announcer. Didn't matter which team did it, if there was a great play, he'd let you know about it. And he was the best kind of homer. He didn't need to be over the top about it, because everyone listening knew that he was a life-long Red. He didn't inflate or exaggerate, which meant that the joy he felt when the Reds came up with a clutch hit or a big strikeout was genuine. This was Joe's genius--he exuded joy, and everyone with a radio couldn't help but feel the same way, win or lose.

Sometimes baseball is all we have. No matter if you had a rough day; there's always a game on. Used to be, there was always Joe Nuxhall. Now that he's gone, I'm not sure what to make of things.

Rest in peace, Joe.

Very sad day to be a Baseball fan not just a Reds fan. Joe brings back memories of my Grandfather who passed. We would listen to Marty and Joe every chance I got to get to his house. Joe's voice will never be forgotten. Rest in peace and Thank you, Joe Nuxhall

From the New York Times obituary:

...On the afternoon of Saturday, June 10, 1944, four days after the D-Day invasion, the Reds and the St. Louis Cardinals were playing at Cincinnati's Crosley Field as World War II baseball carried on with players rejected for military service or too young or too old for the draft. The Cardinals, en route to a third straight pennant, were leading the Reds, 13-0, in the eighth inning when the Cincinnati manager, Bill McKechnie, beckoned to a young man seated in the dugout. He was 6 feet 3 inches and weighed about 190 pounds, a left-handed pitcher who threw a fastball 85 miles an hour. He had spent the spring in junior high school.

A year earlier, the Reds had scouted a right-handed pitcher named Orville Nuxhall, who was playing in a Hamilton, Ohio, Sunday baseball league. They also noticed his son, Joe, barely in his teens, who was also pitching in that league.

Joe Nuxhall signed with Cincinnati in February 1944, and when his ninth-grade classes in Hamilton let out, he got into uniform on occasion at the Reds' home games.

Then came the moment in the debacle against the Cardinals when his manager told him to grab his glove and head to the bullpen. Wearing cleats borrowed from a friend, Nuxhall made it as far as the top step of the dugout.

"I was scared to death," he told The Associated Press 50 years later. "I got all shook up and tripped over the top step and fell flat on my face in the dirt."

Nuxhall did make it to the bullpen, then entered the game at the start of the ninth inning, arriving in the major leagues at the age of 15 years, 10 months, 11 days. He got the first Cardinal batter, George Fallon, to ground out, then walked the St. Louis pitcher, Mort Cooper. He induced the next hitter, Augie Bergamo, to fly out. While facing Debs Garms, the 1940 league batting champion, when he was with the Pittsburgh Pirates, Nuxhall glanced at the on-deck circle.

Waiting to hit, if Nuxhall couldn't get Garms out, was Stan Musial, the 1943 batting champion.

An unnerved Nuxhall walked Garms. Musial followed with a line single to right, and then Nuxhall walked three batters, made a wild pitch and gave up another hit. With five runs in, McKechnie took Nuxhall back to the dugout.

"Those people that were at Crosley Field that afternoon probably said, `Well, that's the last we'll see of that kid,' " Nuxhall recalled long afterward...

Not a chance.  That was nothing but the Ol' Left-Hander grabbing a bat and heading for the on-deck circle.

Thanks for the memories, Joe.

The New York Times does some fabulous obits. The one on Norman Mailer earlier this week was good, as was the one on Kurt Vonnegut earlier this year. Joe joins (and adds to) the good company of those who moved along in 2007.

I thought Joe sounded good on the radio this year, in limited action. His voice was sharper, his wit more intact, his give-and-take with Marty like I remember it from 1986, when I first listened to them both. My father liked how excited Joe would get when a Reds player hit a home run, and I came to enjoy the same rush of excitement that came when Joe called a home run. I don't even live in America these days, but I caught games on the internet whenever possible, mostly to hear Marty and Joe.

So long.

capturing so much of what I feel.

My childhood was spent listening to Joe and whomever the partner, mostly Marty of course, was in the booth. We listened from southeastern Ohio on the now-defunct WGNT out of Huntington, W.Va.

Having been a member of the media, I saw Joe numerous times in person. The first time we met, though, wasn't like the first time you usually meet someone, even someone well known. It was as if I was meeting an old friend. Kind of a sit a spell on the porch and talk a while type of feeling.

The baseball broadcast in Heaven sure must be something today.

Reds baseball and summertime will never be the same again.  Thanks for the memories, Joe.

He's home.

I'll miss the ridiculous mispronunciations of Latin players' names.

I'll miss saying aloud "Joe's had a few too many cocktails tonight" after a "left-right-centerfield" or "You do not test Pedro Guerrero's arm in right."

I'll miss the "GET OUT OF HERE,  GET OUT OF HERE," in the background during Marty's home run calls.

But mostly, I'll miss knowing that Reds' Baseball is being brought to me through the eyes of the biggest, most unabashed Reds' fan this world will ever know.

It seems simple.  It seems insignificant.  But I don't think I need to explain myself to this community when I tell you that I'm getting a little misty writing about a guy I never met, and only knew for a couple hours on a summer night while he told me about baseball.  Opening Day 2008 just won't be the same.

show were always great. It didn't matter to Joe if the player was young, old, black, white, Hispanic - it just did not matter. I could feel especially  Joe's love for the game and desire that every player get to be 'a star' of the game during those shows. One of his best interview was in 1975 during a rain delay when he 'interviewed' the legendary old timer pitcher "Whip Willis" (aka Jonathan Winters)..between Winter's antics and Joe's malapropisms I laughed 'til I cried.right now I wish I could hear that interview again...I grew up in the '50 with Waite Hoyt and Joe as a pitcher but like everyone else here grew fonder and more comfortable with Joe over the years as he broadcasted for his team. Although it is obvious - I'll reiterate it anyway - Too bad he never made it to the MLB HOF. I can write no more....

You hit the nail on the head.  Sitting in my house as a 11-year old, listening to Marty and Joe on the radio when I was supposed to be asleep is what built a love of the game of baseball in me.  Their love of the game--its drama, its pace, its humor, its frustrations--transmitted to me and has given me something I will love for as long as I am living.  Joe Nuxhall was loyal to this franchise, and a man who loved this game and the fans who love it, too.  I am terribly sad today, but on opening day next year as another season unfolds before me, I will feel part of him is living on.

While I don't know that I have the same love for Joe as everyone else here because by the time I really got into the Reds he was on the way out, this still blows. Joe Nuxhall is the definition of "baseball fan", and more specifically, "Reds fan". Joe may not have been the most dynamic or effective announcer ever, but he sure as hell was the one who loved his job the most. As a fellow Hamiltonian and Reds fan, I'm sad to see him go. RIP Nuxy.

I came late to baseball and even later to Reds fandom, so I don't have the childhood memories you all have.  But I'm amazed and touched at how loved he obviously was.  

Rest in peace.

Joe Nuxhall is my favorite Announcer and Cincinnati Red of all time.  He is quite possibly my favorite person in sports history.  This has been a very sad day for me.  I tried to read some of the wonderful stuff that was written about him, but I couldn't get past first paragraphs before I would start to tear up.

Growing up, I didn't have access to the Reds on Television.  However, I could listen to Marty and Joe call the games on the radio every night.  I love Marty as an announcer, but he doesn't compare in my mind to Joe.  Even as he got older and less coherent doing play by play, just hearing his voice made me feel happy.  There's no real way to explain it, but there was just something magic about hearing Joe Nuxhall call a game.  To me, Joe was baseball.

I feel very fortunate that I tuned in to listen to his last broadcast.  Clearly, he was in poor health, but it was just like listening to him always was.  

Baseball to me has lost something very magical, and there will never be another person like Joe Nuxhall...

Thought you guys might like to see these

Thanks for all the memories.

You will be missed.

I'm with those who mentioned their fondest memories of Joe being when he'd yell at the baseball to get out of the park. I always loved that, and will never forget it.

Thank you, sir, for the memories.

Red Hot Mama has a posted a tribute to Joe Nuxhall by the Screaming Mimes, called We'll Miss You, Joe.

And here are some photos from the wire services:

The chair inside the radio booth that Cincinnati Reds former pitcher and broadcaster sat in looks over the field and scoreboard at Great American Park Friday, Nov. 16, 2007.

Cincinnati Reds' general manager Wayne Krivsky takes a moment in front of a jersey and photos of Reds' former pitcher and broadcaster Joe Nuxhall after a news conference at Great American Park Friday, Nov. 16, 2007 in Cincinnati.

All lights are off at Great American Ball Park except for the traditional signoff of former Cincinnati Reds baseball player and broadcaster Joe Nuxhall, '...rounding third and heading for home,' Friday, Nov. 16, 2007, in Cincinnati.

An unidentified man places flowers on a statue of former Cincinnati Reds pitcher and broadcaster Joe Nuxhall at Great American Park Friday, Nov. 16, 2007.

Flowers and other memoirs lie at the base of a statue of former Cincinnati Reds pitcher and broadcaster Joe Nuxhall at Great American Park Friday, Nov. 16, 2007.

I think I've told this story before, but I'll say it again to sum up my feelings on Mr. Nuxhall passing.

I've been fortunate enough to meet many "luminaries" if you will, so it's extremely rare that I'm ever in awe. Last year, I was in complete awe as Nuxie and Trumpy cut a radio segment as I fixed something in the broadcast booth. I was there to work and so were they so I initially paid little attention to what they were saying, but as I caught snippets of their conversation, I found myself listening more and more. The on-air stuff was good, but the conversations off-air were OUTSTANDING. It was like listening to two elder statesmen in your family tell stories from years long gone. The pure joy with which they swapped stories fascinated me, and I stuck around for more than an hour later than I needed to just to hear them talk. It was amazing.

  I agree with everything said here about how genuine a person Mr. Nuxhall was as well. I'll never forget the first time I met him and how he called me "young man" with a big smile on his face.

 Man this sucks. RIP, Mr. Nuxhall, godspeed.

I liked this quote:

Brennaman says you cannot overestimate Nuxhall's place in the local sports echelon.

"With all due respect to all great sports figures in this area, no one is as widely loved as Joe," Brennaman said. "People talk about Pete Rose. He isn't even in Joe's class."

Here's the link.  http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071116/SPT04/311160054/1062/SPT

A Good Red

(Hat tip: Red Hot Mama)

I called my dad to tell him about this yesterday. I was pretty sure he didn't know about it, as he doesn't follow national sports anymore really. He was devastated. Through my grandfather's dealings with the team, my dad had gotten to meet lots of Reds in the '50s and '60s. Joe and Klu were by far his favorites.

When he came to visit me this summer, my dad and I went to a Bulls game and returned to my apartment to listen to the Reds play.  Joe was in the booth. We were both pumped. That was a good day.

I don't know why, but there wasn't a "comment box".     One of the first pieces of news I received since I returned from China(3 hours ago), was that Joe had died.  I remember being worried last week when I read he was going to have surgery to receive a pace maker, he seemed too weak for that.  Joe Nuxhall is all that is good about baseball.  I remember in 2004 thinking it was time for him to retire, but after he left, especially this year with the "brillancy" that replaced him, I gained a special appreciation for him.  I missed his balance.  While Marty is explaining the failures of the organization, and Jeff is telling you how a slider works, and tHom is telling you how to equate rocket science, biology and baseball, Joe just told you about the game.  He was very much a Cincinnati kinda guy.  He was simple and polite.  I am a recent Hamilton High graduate.  He came to my high school twice while I was there.  The first time was at a basketball game, he had his high school basketball number retired.  The other time he "coached" a cops V teachers game for deaf charity.  The sign language teacher called him, and the only thing they needed to know was the date and time, in case he had a prior engagement.  There were no appearance fee's, no riders, nothing, just Joe.  Cincinnati lost it's most popular man.