A left-handed batter, Kubek signed his first professional contract with the Yankees and rose rapidly through the team's farm system.

"[2] Kubek played 1,092 games, 882 of them at shortstop (although he also was an outfielder and utility infielder in his early career), compiling a lifetime batting average of .266 with 57 home runs.

The 38 doubles he totaled in 1961 remained the Yankee club record for shortstops until 2004, and his career fielding percentage and range factor were both above league average.

In Game 7 of the 1960 World Series, Kubek was shaken up by a bad-hop ground ball that struck him in the throat in the eighth inning.

[5] Just before the 1963 World Series, TV personality Phil Silvers, a Dodger fan, provided a reporter with a list of Yankee players to rattle.

He spent 24 years at NBC, teaming with such announcers as Simpson, Gowdy (whom Kubek later called his favorite partner), Joe Garagiola, and Bob Costas.

Angered by Kubek's comments, executives from Detroit's Chrysler Corporation, which sponsored NBC's telecasts, phoned then-Commissioner of Baseball Bowie Kuhn, who, in turn, called the network about the matter.

[7] On April 8, 1974, when Hank Aaron hit his record-breaking 715th career home run, Kubek, who was calling the game with Curt Gowdy and Joe Garagiola, criticized Bowie Kuhn on air for failing to be in attendance at Atlanta on that historic night.

Kubek, on the NBC telecast, immediately charged that Armbrister interfered (with the attempted forceout), though home plate umpire Larry Barnett did not agree.

After Joe Morgan drove in the game-winning run for the Reds in a 6–5 victory, Barnett blamed Kubek and Gowdy for inciting death threats against him.

The team of Kubek and Bob Costas (backing up[9] Vin Scully and Joe Garagiola and later, Tom Seaver) proved to be a formidable pair.

Sandberg then shocked the national audience by hitting a second home run, even farther into the left field bleachers, to tie the game again.

When the subject came up of NBC losing the rights to televising Major League Baseball for the first time since 1946, Kubek said, "I can't believe it!"

Kubek spent five years calling games for the Yankees (1990–1994) on the MSG Network with Dewayne Staats, where he earned fans and critics' respect for his honesty.

[14] Kubek lives in Appleton, Wisconsin, and is a supporter of the Fox Valley Lutheran High School and its baseball team.

On December 22, 2008, Tony Kubek was named the recipient of the 2009 Ford C. Frick Award, an honor bestowed on broadcasters by the Baseball Hall of Fame.

[17] He became the first Frick Award winner whose broadcast career was solely in television, and the first to have called games for a Canadian team, the Toronto Blue Jays, from 1977 to 1989.

In 1976, he declined to go to South Carolina to campaign for former teammate Bobby Richardson, a Republican, who lost a close race for the U.S. House of Representatives to incumbent Democrat Kenneth Holland by a 51% to 48% margin.