TORONTO — A few days ago, John Sterling told Suzanne Waldman that he had called his last game for the New York Yankees.
“I can’t,” he told her over the phone. “I’m done.”
But it became real on Monday when the 85-year-old announced via press release that he was ending his storied career as the Yankees’ primary play-by-play spokesman.
“As a little boy growing up in New York as a Yankees fan,” he said, “I was able to broadcast the Yankees for 36 years. Everything is in my favor and I leave very, very happy.”
The Yankees plan to honor Sterling at Yankee Stadium on Saturday.
“There is no shortage of adjectives to describe John and what he means to this organization and our millions of fans around the world,” the team said in a release, adding that he is “a Goliath in the world of sports broadcasting.”
The finality of Sterling’s decision hit Waldman hard. She has been his broadcast partner since 2004. They have been friends since 1987, when Waldman was doing news for WFAN.
“Nothing can be the same,” she said. “Life goes on. We all do. But nothing will ever be the same.”
Waldman called Monday’s game against the Toronto Blue Jays to Justin Shaquille, one of several people who filled in for Sterling while he dealt with health issues in recent years.
Sterling called six games for the Yankees to start the season in Houston and Arizona and then their first two home games before having to take time off. The last game he pitched was the Yankees’ 8-3 win over the Blue Jays at home on Sunday, April 7.
Here’s the final call of John Sterling’s career – Dennis Santana knocks out Cavan Bijou.
Sterling’s last game was on April 7, 2024. The Yankees beat the Blue Jays 8-3 pic.twitter.com/RZaMbkaTxU
— Yankees Videos (@snyyankees) April 15, 2024
A sample of his resume includes calling five Yankees World Series titles and two perfect games. He called 5,420 regular season games for the Yankees, including 5,060 consecutive games from September 1989 to July 2019. He also called 211 postseason games. And that’s just the Yankees. Sterling spent 64 years in broadcasting, including stints calling games for the Atlanta Hawks and Atlanta Braves.
Sterling has four children, including three who recently graduated from college.
“Think about it,” Waldman said, “you get to a certain age and he deserves to enjoy the rest of his life. He has a daughter who will walk down the aisle in a year.
She was thrilled that Sterling had to go out on his own terms.
“That’s the worst thing that can happen to you, I think, is for someone to tell you, ‘That’s enough,'” Waldman said. “You can’t do it anymore.” I think that’s the best way you can go out is to make the decision yourself and be really clear and happy about it. He knows what he has done in this industry.
YES The Network’s play-by-play man Michael Kay calls a decade of games with Sterling as his partner. On his ESPN Radio show Monday, Kay said Sterling broke the news to him about his retirement on Saturday. Kay described the phone call as “emotional”.
“His voice doesn’t sound like an 85-year-old man’s,” Kay said. “It sounds like it did when I started working with him when he was 50.”
Kay said Sterling told him he wasn’t retiring for health reasons, but because “I just don’t like doing it anymore.”
Aaron Judge is among Sterling’s many admirers. He beamed about Sterling hitting his first career home run in his first major league game on August 13, 2016 at Yankee Stadium. Judge said his parents, Wayne and Patti, like to listen to Sterling on the radio. They attended his first home run, but tonight, Wayne played Sterling’s song “over and over” on YouTube.
“It’s hard to put into words what John means to Yankees baseball across the country and to broadcasting,” Judge said.
Aaron Boone served as an ESPN analyst from 2010 to 2017. He became the Yankees manager in 2018. He said Sterling has “an amazing, classic voice with so many calls.”
“One of the things I like to do now is every time we have a game or big moments in a game or big plays in a game, I’ll go back and watch just to hear John and Michael and Suzyn’s call things,” said Bun. “His voice is legendary. His calls are legendary.
Boone said he was “down” and “sad” Sterling had decided to retire, but added he just wanted him “to be in a good place and healthy.” He said his favorite Sterling moment came when a foul ball hit Sterling in the head while he was broadcasting a game against the Boston Red Sox last year. Sterling went on to call the game even though the ball bloodied his eyebrow.
“This is John,” Boone said. “There’s a youthful exuberance to the way he goes about things that is uniquely John and unapologetically John, and I appreciate that in him.”
Meredith Marakovitz of the YES Network has worked in a booth next to Sterling’s at Yankee Stadium since 2012. She said games at the stadium don’t feel official until Sterling walks into the YES booth and greets each person, cracking jokes here and there . After the call ended, Sterling walked into the WFAN booth and announced the play.
“As soon as the lights come on, I’ve never seen anybody call like that,” Marakovitz said. “As soon as the first pitch is thrown, he’s in it. He lives and dies with every punch.”
Waldman said he hopes Yankees fans will fully express their appreciation for Sterling when the team honors him.
“I hope on Saturday everyone shows it,” Waldman said. “There are three generations that know nothing but Yankee baseball with John Sterling.”
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(Photo of John Sterling and Michael Kay at the 75th Yankees Veterans Day on Sept. 9, 2023: Rich Graessle/Icon Sportswire via Associated Press)
