Yanks honor Sterling for 36 years as radio voice
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Jorge Castillo, ESPN Staff Writer
NEW YORK — John Sterling’s time as the play-by-play radio voice of the New York Yankees, a memorable 36-year run to conclude a 64-year career, officially ended Saturday at Yankee Stadium.
Sterling took the field for a pregame ceremony with his family to a roll call that spread from the right-field bleachers to the rest of the ballpark. He received video messages from former Yankees greats Derek Jeter, Bernie Williams and Paul O’Neill. He was presented with gifts, including an 83-inch television and a Yankees home jersey with the number 5631 — the total number of Yankees games he called on the radio.
Finally, Suzyn Waldman, his radio partner since 2005, introduced Sterling to the crowd. Sterling thanked the Steinbrenner family. He thanked Michael Kay and Waldman, his partners over the past three decades. Lastly, he thanked the fans.
“How lucky can you be,” Sterling said, “for people to celebrate what you do for a living?”
Sterling, 85, stepped into the Yankees’ radio booth in 1989 after nine years broadcasting Atlanta Braves and Atlanta Hawks games. He called 24 postseasons and seven World Series. He narrated the Yankees’ dynastic run in the 1990s, the final game at the old Yankee Stadium, Jeter’s 3,000th hit and Aaron Judge‘s 62nd home run. But he said Saturday’s celebration stood alone in his professional life.
“I never, ever dreamt that I’d be recognized,” Sterling said. “I told my boss earlier this might be the biggest day of my life — outside of marrying Jennifer, of course.”
Sterling spoke at a news conference Saturday before the Yankees’ 2-0, 10-inning loss to the Tampa Bay Rays in front of a sellout crowd. He was, per usual, quirky and unfiltered.
He took a playful jab at Yankees manager Aaron Boone — “Is this where Boonie says, ‘I think he’s getting close?'” — and recited stories off-the-cuff.
Sterling said his favorite season was 1996 when the Yankees won their first championship in 18 years because the team exceeded expectations. He explained he didn’t intend to invent a signature home run call for every player, that it just mushroomed after he came up with “Bern, Baby, Bern” for Williams.
He recalled falling in love with the craft “before puberty” and bluntly explained his reasoning for retiring so abruptly less than a month into the season.
Sterling knew it was time to retire while on the club’s road trip through Houston and Arizona to open the season. He called the Yankees’ first home series, but he had already made his decision.
“I did it all wrong,” Sterling said. “I should’ve quit on March 1 or March 15. But I decided I’d do one exhibition game, which was useless. As you well know. And then we went on that long trip. We went to Houston and Arizona. Boy, I knew that was it. I didn’t want to work every day. And I told you how long I’ve been working. If you work 64 years and on your next birthday you’re going to be 86, I think it’s time.”
A native of Manhattan’s Upper East side, Sterling called 5,420 Yankees regular-season games and 211 Yankees playoff games. His victory call — “Theeeee Yankees win” — became synonymous with the franchise’s run of success in the 1990s and 2000s.
He was in the booth for 5,060 straight games from September 1989 to July 2019 when he missed a series with an illness. He had taken on a reduced role in recent seasons and traveled less often because of health concerns. His final game on the call was the Yankees’ 8-3 win over the Toronto Blue Jays on April 7.
On Saturday, he joined both the YES Network television booth alongside Kay and the WFAN radio booth alongside Waldman. Now, he said, he will happily watch games from his home in New Jersey.
“I’m not going to miss coming to the ballpark,” Sterling said. “I don’t think so. I’m going to love watching and listening, I really am. I really know what I’m going to do. And I’m going to enjoy it.”
Spire Motorsports’ Michael McDowell captured pole position for the seventh time in his career during Saturday’s qualifying session for the Pennzoil 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
It’s the first pole for Spire, which has shown stark improvement with an infusion of cash brought by new majority owner Dan Towriss, who also controls Andretti Global in IndyCar and the Cadillac F1 team set to debut in 2026.
McDowell’s previous six poles all came during the 2024 season, his 17th in the Cup Series.
Christopher Bell qualified in 13th position but will start from the back of the field as he searches for a fourth consecutive win. NASCAR penalized the Joe Gibbs Racing driver Sunday for making changes to his Toyota.
He could become the first driver since Jimmie Johnson in 2007 to win four consecutive Cup Series races — an accomplishment that only eight drivers have achieved in the modern era of NASCAR that began in 1972.
Lackluster qualifying hasn’t been a deterrent for Bell thus far, as he started 19th before winning at Circuit of the Americas and 32nd before winning at Atlanta.
Joey Logano will start Sunday’s race alongside McDowell on the front of the grid, qualifying in the top two at Las Vegas for the third time in five races. Austin Cindric will start third, while Las Vegas native Kyle Busch starts in fourth.
Bell has received a congratulatory text message from Johnson after each win in this three-race streak, and he is hoping the seven-time NASCAR champion hits that send button again Sunday.
“It is still the coolest thing in the world to me that I have Jimmie Johnson in my phone,” Bell said. “He has talked to me, he has sent me a text message after every win so far. I’m still shocked every time I see his name pop up. I respect the heck out of him. It’s an honor to know that he thinks of me after the race to send a text message. That is so cool.”
Bell’s three straight wins is the Cup Series’ longest winning streak since Kyle Larson won three in a row twice in 2021, and Bell is the first to do it in NASCAR’s Next Gen car, which was introduced in 2022.
The three wins this year tie his season-high set in 2022 and matched in 2024, and setting a new mark isn’t out of the question at Las Vegas, where he has five career top-10 finishes in 10 starts and three poles. Bell, in his No. 20 Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing, was the runner-up in Vegas’ last two fall races.
He is not considering a fourth consecutive victory a lock, even as he has dominated the first month of the season.
“One thing is for sure: Nothing that has happened the last three weeks means anything for this week,” Bell said. “Everything is still ahead of me and nothing is set, and we have to go out there and perform. This has been a strong track for us in the past, but I’m just trying very hard to not get ahead of myself and understand it is a new week. It’s a different race, and everyone is going to be bringing their best stuff to try to beat me.”
Perhaps the greatest threat to end Bell’s hot streak is Larson, who has won at the “Diamond in the Desert” three times since joining Hendrick Motorsports. Larson’s first win with Hendrick came at Las Vegas in March 2021, and he has claimed two of the previous three races held at the track, winning the South Point 400 in October 2023 and the Pennzoil 400 in March 2024.
“I think since joining Hendrick Motorsports in 2021, it’s probably been our best racetrack,” Larson said. “Getting a few wins, I think two other second-place finishes in that time has also been really good. The track is great, but getting to come to the city and have fun on the Strip and all the stuff that it has to offer, it probably makes it one of my three favorite races to get to.”
Logano is the most recent winner at Las Vegas, as his victory at the South Point 400 in October propelled him to his third NASCAR title.
The Associated Press and Field Level Media contributed to this report.
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