What We've Learned About Bob Saget Since His Tragic Death
America tragically lost one of its most popular on-screen dads in January 2022 when Bob Saget died suddenly just hours after a stand-up gig in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida. The "Full House" star had passed away in his sleep in his Ritz-Carlton Orlando hotel room having suffered blunt head trauma from what appeared to be an accidental fall.
Saget had been a fixture of the TV world for the best part of four decades, not only in his paternal role as Danny Tanner, but also as the voice of Ted Mosby in "How I Met Your Mother" and as the host of "America's Funniest Home Videos." And a whole host of tributes, from both fans and famous faces alike, poured in following the shocking news which revealed that he was just as much a good guy off camera, too.
But that's not all we've learned since Saget's untimely passing. From final messages to famous friends, and memories shared by loved ones, here's a look at how the funnyman's story has continued to unfold.
Bob Saget's death was likely caused by a fall to a carpeted floor
Two months after Bob Saget's mysterious death, a Florida coroner gave what he believed to be the most likely explanation for his blunt force trauma: a fall to a carpeted floor. Publicly released by the Orange County Sheriff's Office, the report stated that the comedian would initially have been left "stunned" and dizzy by the bleeding close to his brain and the eye socket fractures that occurred as a result. Other people would have potentially spotted the ways both his balance and speech patterns had been affected, if he hadn't been alone at the time (via the Independent).
The report also noted the lack of any blood on the bed of the Orlando Ritz-Carlton hotel room that Saget was found in; there weren't any "other indications of any type of trauma or injury." Saget was staying at the hotel having performed a stand-up gig nearby, but his lifeless body wasn't discovered until a wellness check the following afternoon.
But just when the mystery appeared to have been solved, TMZ reported that police are also looking into the theory that the blow to the head came from a headboard, while some experts believe that preceding health issues may have been to blame. One-time assistant U.S. Attorney Neama Rahmani, for example, told The Sun, "Healthy people do not normally fall backward, strike their head, and die."
Bob Saget's autopsy report will never be released
The mystery surrounding Bob Saget's death is likely to continue, as his family managed to block the full autopsy report from ever being publicly released. Just weeks after the "Full House" star's tragic passing, a judge assented to permanently seal the autopsy results, agreeing with the family's case that sharing any further information about the incident would cause "severe mental pain, anguish and emotional distress" to Saget's loved ones (via The Sun).
Brian Bieber, an attorney representing the Sagets, told Fox News in a statement, "We are pleased this issue has been resolved, and the healing process can continue to move forward. All of the prayers and well wishes continuously extended to the family are beyond appreciated."
Certain photos from the scene, however, were released by the Orange County Sheriff's Office in March 2022. These included the padded headboard that could have contributed to Saget's death as well as the hotel room's bathtub, walk-in shower, minibar and desk (via the Daily Mail).
His last screen credit was in a rap video
You wouldn't necessarily suggest Bob Saget, the comedian best known for playing wholesome family man Danny Tanner in "Full House," as an obvious choice to appear alongside an adult film star in a hip-hop video. But Desiigner obviously likes to think outside the box.
In the promo for 2022 single "BAKIN," the rapper is seen asking Snoop Dogg to recommend a chef. "Please believe me when I tell you this — get Bob on the job," the "Drop It Like It's Hot" hitmaker responds, which explains why just moments later Saget is shown sizzling some bacon, flashing wads of money, and busting some moves next to Desiigner and a scantily-clad Kendra Sunderland.
The video premiered just over a month after Saget's untimely passing, and proved to be the star's final on-screen credit. A tribute flashes after all the culinary action, as well as behind-the-scenes footage showing the funnyman declaring the song's title "the best dad joke ever."
Bob Saget was racked with insecurities
Bob Saget always presented himself as a confident man, particularly in his stand-up career. But according to a co-star who worked with him on two sitcoms, the comedian was racked with insecurities.
Speaking to The New York Times shortly after Saget's death, fellow "Full House" favorite John Stamos revealed that his longtime friend needed constant validation about his talents: "My job for many, many years was to help him to understand how good he was and how smart he was, how funny he was and how much people loved him. I guarantee you he went into that grave not knowing the love that this world has for him, and that saddens me so much because he wanted that so bad."
However, there were certain areas where Saget really didn't need any encouragement. Stamos explained, "He did this thing where he would inflate himself. Every girl that came onto 'Full House' — 'She loves me. She's got a crush on me.'" This even included the likes of supermodel Cindy Crawford, with Stamos adding, "I think he overcompensated sometimes."
The star didn't initially get along with John Stamos
It seems hard to believe, considering they were on-screen best buds and brothers-in-law for years, but Bob Saget and John Stamos weren't initially that close. In fact, according to his first wife Sherri Kramer, the former once despised the latter. In a 2022 interview with The New York Times, Stamos recalled the chat he had with Kramer at Saget's memorial: "She was crying. 'He loved you so much. He loved you so much. But in the beginning, he hated you ... He would come home and he was so jealous of you. He would just complain about you so much.'"
While doing press for "Fuller House" in 2017, Bob Saget was equally candid with People. He said of himself and Stamos, "For the first four years of the old show, we weren't as close, and then we became like brothers."
Stamos himself admitted that it was only when the family sitcom ended that his relationship with Saget improved. "I looked at this video of us of the last episode of 'Full House,' the final bows. We all gathered around, and Bob eventually walked over and he hugged me, kissed me. But I don't know how close I was to him at the end there. I didn't think I needed a Bob in my life." However, Stamos, who served as pallbearer at Saget's funeral, explained that they subsequently became so dependent on each other that they "were like a married couple."
Kelly Rizzo revealed her husband's last text
During an emotional interview with "TODAY" host Hoda Kotb, shortly after Bob Saget's memorial, widower Kelly Rizzo revealed to the world the last text message she received from the "Full House" star. And it included a simple four words: "I love you endlessly."
The travel blogger, who replied, "I can't wait to see you tomorrow," said that this was a typical message from Saget. In fact, he would repeatedly tell all of his nearest and dearest how much he cared for them: "If you knew Bob, and he loved you, you knew it. There was never ever a doubt in your mind. ... He always was just so kind and loving to everybody. He was just the best man I've ever known in my life."
Rizzo, who walked down the aisle with Saget in 2018, explained that she was bowled over by the sheer number of people the comedian forged a connection with: Referring to the memorial, she said, "...every single person was pretty much like, 'Oh, I talked to Bob last week.' I'm like, 'How did he have the time to talk to everybody and tell everybody that he loved them? All the time.' It was just amazing."
Bob Saget argued with a Full House star shortly before his death
Candace Cameron Bure struggled to hold back the tears during an appearance on "TODAY" as she recalled one of the last conversations she had with the late Bob Saget. The actor revealed that she was now terrified she would accidentally delete this final outpouring of love from the man who'd been in her life since the age of 11. She admitted that she and her on-screen father had a minor fallout just a couple of weeks before his untimely passing.
Bure, who played Danny Tanner's daughter DJ in hit sitcom "Full House," explained, "We were gonna have dinner. And we got into a little tiff. And his flight was delayed. We ended up not having dinner. But in Bob fashion, the next day he wrote me, like, what would be pages long of a text. He was apologizing, saying he was cranky and he was just so sorry."
Luckily, this apologetic text put Saget back in Bure's good books. The Hallmark Channel regular added, "I wrote back, 'I love you. I could never be mad at you. Roll my eyes at you? Yes. But never mad.'" She called Saget's friendship "unconditional" and noted his special dedication to loved ones. Bure also explained to Us Weekly that she and her castmates comforted one another with stories about their beloved TV dad.
The comedian helped Pete Davidson with his mental health
It seems that barely a day goes by without a story involving Pete Davidson. The beau of Kim Kardashian/enemy of Kanye West even managed to ingratiate himself in the tragic fate of Bob Saget, although at least on this occasion, it wasn't for ridiculous reasons.
Following Saget's untimely death, the "Saturday Night Live" regular asked comedian friend Dave Sirus to post an Instagram message — Davidson isn't on the photo-sharing platform himself — about how positively the "Full House" star impacted his life. Calling Saget "one of the nicest men on the planet" (via The Sun), the heavily-tattooed actor went on to reveal that Saget had helped him deal with some "rough mental health stuff."
Davidson recalled how Saget introduced him and mother Amy to various health professionals and continued to check up on how he was coping. He concluded, "I love you, Bob. It was an honor to know you. Thank you for your kindness and friendship."
Bob Saget was one of John Mayer's favorite people in the galaxy
Here's a super-strong friendship you might not necessarily have seen coming. In an interview with Andy Cohen to promote his Sirius XM and Pandora Small Stage Series show, lothario singer-songwriter John Mayer revealed that Bob Saget was one of his favorite people in the galaxy.
Speaking in the wake of the "Full House" star's death, the "Your Body Is A Wonderland" hitmaker revealed, "I loved that guy so much. That one was just no question. There are some times we lose someone and we ask ourselves, 'What's my appropriate level of being upset? Where do I stand here in my level of upset?' ... That one was right over me."
Mayer, who disclosed that he was in the process of collecting his thoughts about Saget in a new song, had made friends with the funnyman back in 2003 after being asked to contribute to Saget's Scleroderma benefit show. It was actually the Grammy Award winner who, alongside Jeff Ross, helped to return Saget's car home from LAX following his death. The two shared their recollections of Saget on Instagram during the drive. Kelly Rizzo then made one of her first public appearances as a widower when she attended a Mayer show in Los Angeles in March 2022.
Bob Saget's last known photo was with a valet
Several pictures and videos have emerged of Bob Saget performing on stage just hours before he retired to the hotel room which would become his final resting place. But the last-known photo of the actor was actually taken by a valet driver in the Ritz-Carlton Orlando parking lot.
The snap shows Saget happily posing for a selfie with Orlando Nunez, the 21-year-old responsible for parking his rental vehicle. And the image became a crucial piece of evidence in determining when the "Full House" star picked up his facial blemishes. A final report released by the Orange County Sheriff's Office stated (via the Daily Mail), "The photo is a clear shot of Mr. Saget's face with his glasses on. There is no evidence of injury or of the bruising near his left eye that was evident post-mortem."
Nunez backed up this statement in a chat with the Daily Mail: "I didn't see any injuries, he didn't seem hurt, he wasn't slurring his words — he was exactly as I remembered while watching him on the TV as a child. I was in awe."
He inadvertently inspired a former co-star to get a check-up
According to a Florida coroner, Bob Saget passed away in his sleep after suffering blunt force trauma in a nasty hotel room fall. So when former co-star Dana Delany got a black eye after tumbling down a set of stairs just a week later, the actor decided she should get it checked out.
Delany, who starred in the 1996 TV movie "For Hope" that Saget directed, posted a picture of the damage on Twitter captioned, "You should see the other guy." But after making light of the accident, she then admitted that the death of her friend had made her take the fall much more seriously than she would have before.
The former "Desperate Housewives" star wrote, "Thank you all for your concern. I fell down some iron stairs head first (totally sober!) & all I could think of was poor Bob Saget. So I grabbed the handrail with my face. I was afraid it was fractured but thankfully, no. The folks at St John's emergency took great care of me."
Bob Saget believed in the healing power of laughter
In a final screen interview Bob Saget gave before his January 2022 death, the "Full House" star discussed how much he'd relied on humor throughout his life. And he revealed to "CBS This Morning" that making people laugh had helped him deal with one particular tragedy.
In 1994, Saget lost his sister Gay, aged just 47, to Scleroderma, a connective tissue disease she'd been battling for four years. He recalled, "When she was still coherent, I could still try to tell her stories and then put some humor in it. It just happened naturally in our conversation. ... It is so healthy to laugh. You know that. And I'm out there doing it and I know it's healing for people."
The "How I Met Your Mother" narrator shared that he developed an interest in comedy from a young age, only 4 years old: "I would dance in the living room and just start dancing, dancing stupid to make anybody laugh — just like silent film stars. I knew some jokes, but it wasn't really jokes. It was just like; 'I've got to perform. I've got to make people laugh.'" He certainly lived out his childhood dream.
He rediscovered a love of stand-up
While the majority of us were first introduced to Bob Saget's talents as Danny Tanner in "Full House," the star began his career on the stand-up circuit. And in his final episode of his podcast "Bob Saget's Here For You" that was released just a week after his untimely death, the funnyman revealed that he'd rediscovered a love of the art form.
Saget, who would perform in Ponte Vedra Beach the night before his body was found at the Ritz-Carlton Orlando, told fellow comedian Margaret Cho that his recent run of live shows had been a welcome surprise: "I didn't know that I was going to love stand-up as much as I love it. ... I haven't loved it this much since I started, I think."
The "America's Funniest Home Videos" host also acknowledged that his routines differed a lot from those back in the day. He added, "I'm doing long a** sets because I'm saying serious sh*t that I never said." Saget confirmed that he never looked back at material from previous tours, adding, "every seven, eight years I become a different version of myself."
Bob Saget's wife had a premonition about his death
During his interview with The New York Times shortly after Bob Saget's death, John Stamos revealed something particularly curious: the "Full House" star's widower Kelly Rizzo had apparently experienced a premonition that her husband was going to die.
The man best known as Uncle Jesse didn't disclose any further details about the vision, but he did add that Saget himself often talked about the subject of death. In fact, the late comedian was said to have predicted his own passing just months before his body was found at the Ritz-Carlton Orlando hotel in January 2022.
Yes, social media became awash with speculation thanks to a Saget quote which read, "I'm gonna be found dead in bed." The actor did, indeed, say these words on his "Bob Saget's Here For You" podcast in October 2021, but only in relation to a chat with Rizzo about what they considered to be the all-time best movies. The latter cited the likes of gangster flicks "Goodfellas," "The Godfather," and "Casino," prompting the host to quip in return, "So, I don't have long to live if these are your favorites. I'm gonna be found dead in bed."