Why Pat Sajak is the last great game show host

When Pat Sajak announced he’d be leaving “Wheel of Fortune” in 2024 after hosting the program since 1983, the news felt a lot bigger than a fancy game of hangman.

The 76-year-old has been a regular presence in American living rooms on most weeknights for four decades and he sadly represents a dying breed.

Sajak is the last of the golden age of game show hosts.

You know who I mean. Those suit-wearing, smooth-talking, jovial gents with an air of Las Vegas about them. They seem as if they were put on this earth solely to excitedly shake hands, ask trivia questions and dole out cash prizes. 

They’re icons.

Bob Barker of “The Price Is Right,” Richard Dawson of “Family Feud” and “Match Game,” Alex Trebek of “Jeopardy!,” John Charles Daly of “What’s My Line?” and Regis Philbin of “Who Wants To Be a Millionaire,” among other greats, were like fun uncles who came from a boozier, anything-goes era of show business.

Yet, at the same time, they also embodied a far more civilized one.

For example, on “What’s My Line?,” the well-spoken Daly would jokingly hint that he and panelist Bennett Cerf were hungover … while wearing a tux!

Of course, after Sajak revealed the sad news of his departure, speculation ran wild about who would replace him.

But you can’t swap in somebody for Pat Sajak willy-nilly.

Ryan Seacrest, Whoopi Goldberg, Stephen A. Smith and Sajak’s longtime co-host Vanna White have all been bandied about as possible candidates for the gig, and there will surely be another obsessed-over on-air audition process like the one that took place on “Jeopardy!” after Trebek died in 2020.

That answer-and-question show eventually landed on Ken Jennings, the “Jeopardy!” contestant with the longest-ever winning streak, and Mayim Bialik from “Blossom.” 

Meh. The duo is adequate at best. They’re more Geek Squad than Hollywood and there’s just no replacing Trebek’s easy, erudite demeanor and rich speaking voice.  

Game shows always lose their luster and razzle dazzle when a younger, less venerable and, frankly, not-as-interesting host takes the reins from a beloved legend.

Dawson kissing the ladies on “Family Feud” would never be allowed today, but he had an electric 1970s edge to him that nice-guy Steve Harvey can’t even approach.  

Barker — who’s 99 years old, by the way — had his fair share of behind-the-scenes drama on “The Price Is Right.”

However, his giddiness when he’d tell a contestant that they’d just won thousands of dollars felt genuine and grandfatherly.

Drew Carey, truth be told, was way better on “The Drew Carey Show” than he is on Bob Barker’s show.

To be a terrific host really is its own specific skill, and — as we learn at pathetic awards shows more with every passing year — it’s one that can’t quite be taught.

You have to be authoritative, but likable; deliver bad news, but make people happy; be both a comedian and a scholar. In short, you have to be an entertainer of the old school, and Sajak is one of the last.

It will be damn near impossible to reinvent the “Wheel.”