A voice of the Minnesota Timberwolves since the franchise’s inception and an important broadcast fixture within the state for 50 years, Tom Hanneman, has died. He was 68.
Hanneman was born in La Crosse, Wis., went to college at the University of Minnesota, and then for years resided in living room televisions of houses across Minnesota — first as a sports reporter and anchor at WCCO-TV, then eventually as a sideline reporter, play-by-play broadcaster and studio host for the Timberwolves and Lynx.
“He was such a face of the Timberwolves organization, through his broadcast acumen,” said Jeff Munneke, the Timberwolves’ and Lynx’s vice president of fan experience and a friend of Hanneman’s. “I think he’s just one of those people that when you see Tom Hanneman on the air, you just feel like, ‘OK, I’m in a good spot now. I’m in front of my TV, I’m watching the Timberwolves, I’m going to have a great night.’ You’re going to hear the soothing sounds of Hanny, and he was going to incorporate some dry humor along the way, and you just knew that you were home.”
It was Hanneman’s genuineness and warmth that produced such emotions. It’s a rare skill for a broadcaster.
“His warmth that came through on the TV screen was the same warmth that just exudes from him all the time. It’s really incredible,” said Fox Sports North reporter and host Marney Gellner, who worked with Hanneman dating back to 2002. “He just has this delivery. I can’t even describe it. He just has this tone of voice and look in his eye, and it’s all genuine. I think it’s because when he was talking into a camera, he was talking to a friend.”
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Yes, the viewers were his friends — everyone was. That was true everywhere he went. Following the news of Hanneman’s passing, hundreds of people took to social media to share their interactions with Hanneman, from colleagues he worked with to interns he mentored to people with whom he merely crossed paths. He treated them all with love, compassion and genuine interest.
Munneke recalls Hanneman emceeing Timberwolves caravan road trip stops around the state, leaving those in attendance cracking up every time thanks to his dry humor.
Hanneman could walk into any room and instantly make you do two things: feel comfortable, and laugh.
Perhaps that’s what made him such a strong reporter at WCCO-TV. Hanneman first started with the station as a dispatcher earning $1.35 per hour. He spent 16 years with the company as he continued to climb the ranks.
While on the job, on a news assignment, Hanneman survived a hostage situation at Red Lake Reservation in 1979, when he and photographer Keith Brown were fired upon, and Hanneman was told, at gunpoint, that he was going to die.
On the sports beat, Hanneman covered an Olympics, two Vikings Super Bowl appearances, a Gophers men’s hockey national championship and a Twins World Series victory.
He served on the same sports desk as WCCO icon Mark Rosen, who has fond memories of covering state hockey tournaments with Hanneman, and spending ensuing late nights at Mancini’s with Lou Nanne and Herb Brooks. Not only were they colleagues, but Hanneman was Rosen’s roommate, and the best man in his wedding.
“It was unique to have myself, Tom and R.J. Fritz to share those years together in one same place, and we just complemented each other so well,” Rosen said. “More important, just to have him be great friends, that’s something that doesn’t happen in our business.”
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“That was so Hanny,” Gellner said. “He was a father figure in some ways, he was a best friend in some ways, he was just so many things, and he was such an easy person to talk to, to get along with and to be around. … There are not many people that you meet in this life who are ‘one of those people.’ Tom was one of those people.”
Rosen was thrilled when Hanneman parlayed his hard work at WCCO into a job with the Timberwolves when the franchise came to be in 1989. Hanneman also worked five seasons as the host of NBA Radio and hosted a weekly basketball program for the BBC in London.
Rosen certainly will cherish Hanneman’s unrivaled sense of humor, but what he’ll most miss is his curiosity about how everyone was doing. Hanneman — with his wife of more than four decades, Nancy, three children and five grandchildren — knew what was most important in life, with family atop the list.
It was during his time with the Wolves that Rosen thinks viewers really got to see who Hanneman was as a person, as the broadcaster shared his charisma and wit with his audience on a nightly basis.
“Tom just got to be Tom, and I think that’s what people appreciated and got to see in him,” Rosen said. “He was just kind of this Midwest, gentle-but-witty personality. He was just really good at what he did. He made it look easy.”
Gellner doesn’t know how you can think about the Timberwolves and not think about Tom Hanneman. The same can be said for Fox Sports North, or really Minnesota sports as a whole.
Hanneman was named a Silver Circle Honoree at the 2020 Upper Midwest Emmy awards last month for his television contributions. He spent much of his speech mentioning others. He spent the time afterward doing the same, thanking Gellner for her work on Hanneman’s presentation, and congratulating Twins’ communications guru Dustin Morse after a program he hosted won an Emmy of its own.
No moment was ever about Tom Hanneman.
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“That was so Hanny,” Gellner said. “He was a father figure in some ways, he was a best friend in some ways, he was just so many things, and he was such an easy person to talk to, to get along with and to be around. … There are not many people that you meet in this life who are ‘one of those people.’ Tom was one of those people.”
