VOICE RAISED
Kay, YES agree on three years, multi-millions to continue on Yanks games
MICHAEL Kay will be the Yankees’ play-by-play man for the next three years and maybe longer, sources have told The Post.
Kay and YES Network are putting the finishing touches on a three-year contract with a network option for two more. The deal calls for a salary of more than $1 million per season.
Kay is believed to be the highestpaid local baseball announcer in the game. He took that mantle when fellow Fordham alumnus Vin Scully retired from the Dodgers after the 2016 season.
YES is currently owned by FOX Sports, which broadcasts 22 of the 30 MLB teams.
Kay, who will be 60 years old at the end of the three years, said he wants to call Yankees games for as long as possible.
“I don’t see any end in sight,” Kay told The Post. “I want to keep doing this as long as I want to and as long as they want me to.”
Kay will continue to do his afternoon drive-time show on 98.7 FM ESPN New York.
For these YES negotiations, Kay brought in heavyweight baseball agents Casey Close and Jim Murray as his representatives, and the discussions were tense at times, according to sources. This is not unusual, though there was a unique circumstance in this instance.
At the beginning of the talks, there was a disconnect between the two sides as Murray, who did most of the legwork on Kay’s side, entered it with a perspective of someone who handles baseball players, while the top YES executives, Jon Litner and John Filippelli, know how TV contracts work.
Close and Murray have had runins with Yankees management in the past. Close represented Derek Jeter when the captain was very disappointed in the Yankees’ approach to his penultimate contract in 2010. Yankees president Randy Levine criticized Murray’s approach to Dellin Betances’ arbitration during spring training in 2017.
“It was a typical, straightforward negotiation,” YES vice president of communications Eric Handler said.
Murray did not immediately return a call seeking comment.
Kay will be back doing his usual 125 or so games, but there remains a chance Ryan Ruocco could receive more time in the YES baseball booth. Ruocco, who is also one of ESPN’s top NBA and WNBA playby-players while backing up Ian Eagle on the Nets, could be in position to call more Yankees telecasts, as Ken Singleton is scheduled to retire at the conclusion of the season.
FOX will begin its World Cup coverage on Thursday. People love to kill ESPN, but that network set a high bar with the way it covered soccer’s most prestigious event, gearing the coverage to people who like soccer and not trying to somehow bring in more fringe fans with gimmicks.
The fans who are most passionate about a sport are the ones who are the most vocal about how it is covered. At one point, Gus John
son was supposed to be on play-byplay for this World Cup, which from the day it was announced seemed like an idea that would never make it to fruition. John
Strong, who is FOX’s lead announcer for MLS broadcasts, will be its top play-by-play man.
The voices FOX has hired have a much more American tinge than the English broadcasters ESPN favored. FOX has cut back its production costs and will have more games called from its Los Angeles studios. We plan on giving FOX a chance before making any final judgments. We will say this: Aly
Wagner, who will become the first female analyst for men’s World Cup games, is a rising star. It is too bad she will be calling games from a studio in L.A. instead of on-site. Still, in previous FOX Sports broadcasts, Wagner has stood out for her insights and for being opinionated without making it all about herself, like, say, Alexi Lalas. … Telemundo will have the Spanish-language broadcasts.
Clicker Consulting: ESPN should let the “Sunday Night Baseball” broadcast breathe more. Yes, it brought in Alex Rodriguez to be the star of the telecasts, but there is too much pre-produced stuff during the game, which annoys the most ardent viewers. While “SNB” is the only game on Sunday night, which gives it a little more shine, baseball is not like football or basketball, in which special matchups can be unique. The two Sunday night teams literally play on Friday and Saturday before the prime-time game. Less can be more on these broadcasts.