After 5,060 straight Yankees games, a day off for Sterling
‘I’m just run down. There’s nothing wrong with me’
ST. PETERSBURG, FLA. — For the first day off from his job in 30 years, the man who broadcast every pitch thrown by Mariano Rivera and every inning played by Derek Jeter planned to enjoy waking up whenever he wanted.
He also had a project to tackle at home: Sorting through a pile of mail he has ignored for a while.
“I’m getting my act together for the second half,” John Sterling, the longtime voice of the New York Yankees on the radio, said Wednesday, the day before his break started.
Until Thursday — his 81st birthday coincidentally — Sterling had worked 5,060 straight Yankees games since 1989, according to the Yankees.
The baseball season is an eightmonth marathon — two for spring training and six for the 162-game regular season — and that does not include the playoffs, which can add another month for a team that reaches the World Series. It all caught up to Sterling. And so, for the first time since Don Mattingly was the team’s first baseman and Dallas Green was the manager, the Yankees will play a game without Sterling behind a microphone.
In fact, he will miss the entire four-game series against the Tampa Bay Rays that will close out the first half of the season.
Coupled with the upcoming All-Star break, that will give Sterling eight straight days to rest.
The reason for the time off: His health.
In interviews this week, Sterling has said he feels a bit under the weather. But before Wednesday’s game against the New York Mets, Sterling insisted he wasn’t sick.
“I’m just run down,” he said. “There’s nothing wrong with me.”
He later said his doctor had set three goals for the respite: “Eat to put back on the weight I’ve lost, drink a gallon of water a day, and sleep.”
Sterling, a father of four, also heard from several worried friends telling him they were glad he was finally taking a day off. Some had noticed Sterling was coming to work tired — the Yankees’ recent trip to London didn’t help — and struggling to walk up stairs.
“I just want John to be healthy, and we’ve got a long way to go before, hopefully, a World Series,” said Suzyn Waldman, Sterling’s radio broadcast partner of the past 15 years. “And the streak is wonderful, but that’s the past.”
Waldman recalled being in Baltimore when infielder Cal Ripken Jr. took himself out of the Orioles’ lineup against the Yankees on Sept. 20, 1998, ending his record streak of consecutive games played at 2,632. Like Sterling this week, Ripken finally relented and admitted a day off was for the best.
“I don’t think anyone will ever do it again,” Waldman said of Sterling’s streak.