Not every ‘voice’ has same credibility

THE BIGGEST difference between Howie Rose Radio and John

Sterling Radio is that when Rose says this-and-this just occurred, you believe him.

Thursday, the Nationals’ Daniel Murphy — the guy baseball expert Mike

Francesa twice insisted never, ever will hit big league pitching — led off the second with a onehop liner toward Mets shortstop Jose Reyes, who failed to backhand the ball. Murphy was credited with a hit.

Rose immediately said Reyes failed to step in front of the ball. Thus a good shot to catch the ball, then throw Murphy out, as per fundamental baseball, was forsaken.

Not that I didn’t believe him, but as a second source, I checked my SNY recording of the game. Rose, again, fulfilled the radio play-by- play professional’s responsibility to serve as the listeners’ eyes as accurately as possible.

On the other hand, Sterling recently reported

Aaron Judge had just been hit by a pitch, something the home plate ump immediately would have indicated had it actually happened. It hadn’t.

As per his haughty yet counterproductive, every-game devices throughout his 28-year career as “The Voice of the New York Yankees,” Sterling then had to report he got it wrong.

In a recent interview, Sterling was asked to comment about his premature, highly stylized “It is high! ... It is far ...” home run calls, those allthe-same, self-promotional numbers that so often precede delayed, self-excused word that the home run actually went foul, was caught by an outfielder or went off the wall.

“Hey, listen,” he replied, “you can’t please everybody, and you shouldn’t try.”

In other words, he is entirely comfortable with getting many big moments wrong. And if you don’t like it, that’s your problem, not his.

Anyway, if Judge hits 55 homers this season, Sterling will have called all 90 of them.