Longtime New York Yankees radio play-by-play man John Sterling was hit with a foul ball during the ninth inning of Saturday’s game against the Boston Red Sox – but managed to finish calling the game anyway.
Sterling, 84, has been a fixture of Yankees broadcasts for 1989 and is well known around baseball for his signature home run calls and enthusiasm for Yankee victories.
Saturday’s broadcast, however, was an unusually painful one: with the Yankees trying to close out a 3-1 win over the rival Red Sox in the ninth inning, Boston’s Justin Turner fouled a ball backwards that went through the window of Sterling’s broadcast booth and hit him in the head.
“Swung on and a pop foul ... back here,” Sterling called, shortly before the ball hit him. “Ow! Ow! Ow! It really hit me! I didn’t know it was coming back that far!”
But despite being pinged in the had with a foul ball, Sterling stayed in the game — finishing the broadcast with one of his signature calls when Clay Holmes successfully closed the game.
“You know that foul ball actually hit me, it kind of glanced off my forehead,” Sterling said afterward. “So I took one for the team.”
The next night, Sterling was back in the booth. He was gifted the ball that hit him the night before as well as a band-aid from Turner. The Red Soxs outfield had also signed the ball with the message “To John, no matter where you sit at a ballgame, you're never safe! — Justin Turner.”
Sterling no longer calls a full 162-game schedule of Yankees games due to his age and health, and recently missed several weeks of the season due to illness and to attend the graduations of children. The Yankees, who haven’t won the World Series since 2009, are currently sitting in third place in the American League East.
