As the 2025 MLB season approaches, New York Yankees broadcasts on WFAN will have a new sound with Dave Sims becoming the play-by-play announcer alongside analyst Suzyn Waldman. John Sterling, the longtime voice of the Yankees, retired from the broadcast booth at the conclusion of the team’s postseason run after previously stepping away earlier in the season.
Sterling and Waldman worked together on the broadcasts for 20 years, resonating with baseball fans in the New York metropolitan area as they documented legendary careers and a World Series championship. The venerated broadcast duo received the William Slocum/Jack Lang award for “Long and Meritorious Service” from the New York chapter of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America and were on hand to accept the honor on Saturday night.
Sims introduced Sterling and Waldman, emphasizing that they were two people who he has known for a long time and considers to be dear friends. Being able to introduce them in front of the crowd coinciding with the centennial anniversary of the chapter meant a lot to him, and the duo was subsequently received with applause.
As Waldman accepted the award, she told a story about Lang removing her from a dais room 35 years ago, reminiscing that the term “radio girl” was used to describe her. Shortly thereafter, she remembered WFAN firing all of the women off the station, which resulted in Bill Madden of the New York Daily News imploring radio and television columnist Bob Raissman to help her.
“For weeks, every time he wrote a column, there was a little sentence in it about merit and knowledge and how that should count for something and not gender, and years later, it was Bill Madden and [John Sterling] who went to George Steinbrenner and said, ‘Go ahead – put a woman in the booth when nobody wants her. It’ll be great right in the middle of New York City,’ so thank you to Bill Madden and thank you to my partner of 20 years, the one and only John Sterling.”
As Sterling discussed the award, he considered himself undeserving of the honor and instead voiced that he should be giving baseball the merit instead. When he was about 7 years old, he recalled having an awareness of wanting to be on the air but never would have dreamed to land the job as the radio play-by-play voice of the Yankees. Even though he was doing well broadcasting in Atlanta, Ga. for WSB Radio and Turner Sports, he considers himself lucky to have landed the Yankees job and fortunate to have worked with Waldman.
“Here’s another date – Feb. 1, 1960,” Sterling added. “Woah. Were any of you born then? That was my first day on the air, and when February 1 comes up in a few days, it will be 65 years on the air, doing something that I’ve wanted to do all my life. How lucky am I? Thank you baseball for the award, thank you everyone for being here and God bless you all.”
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