John Sterling (né Sloss;[1] born July 4, 1938)[2][3] is an American retired sportscaster, best known as the radio play-by-play announcer of the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball from 1989 to 2024.

[4] Sterling was born John Sloss in New York City[4] and grew up on Manhattan's Upper East Side,[5] the son of advertising executive Carl H. T.

[8] He changed his name to Sterling and began his broadcasting career in Baltimore, where he served as the play-by-play announcer for the then-Baltimore Bullets for the 1970–71 NBA season.

Sterling also did a stretch with the Yankees as pre-game host on WMCA and WINS radio, as well as co-host on cable segments with Mel Allen.

[11] His announcing partners were Jay Johnstone (1989–1990), Joe Angel (1991), Michael Kay (1992–2001), Charley Steiner (2002–2004), and Suzyn Waldman (2002–2024).

[15] On June 6, 2022, Sterling announced that he would start working on a reduced schedule in the second half of the MLB season, primarily taking time off from traveling to road games outside of the northeastern United States.

[16] On September 20, 2018, as part of a promotion called "Rivalry in the Booth", Sterling and Red Sox radio broadcaster Joe Castiglione switched places in the fourth inning.

[22][23] Sterling has emceed several Yankees pre-game ceremonies including the number retirements of Jorge Posada, Andy Pettitte, Bernie Williams, Joe Torre, Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera's number retirement in 2013 and Monument Park induction (2016), and the 20th anniversary of the Yankees' 1996 World Series victory in 2016.

His long association with the Yankees earned him the nickname "Pa Pinstripe" from New York Daily News writer Bob Raissman.

Sterling made his final broadcast on October 30, 2024, in Game 5 of the World Series when the Yankees lost to the Dodgers.

[35] The phrase evolved from Sterling's call of Mel Hall's game-winning three-run homer in the ninth inning on May 27, 1991, to give the Yankees a dramatic Memorial Day win over the Boston Red Sox.

[citation needed] In all cases when Sterling emphasizes the word "the", as is one of his signatures, he uses not the long ē ("thee") but the schwa ə ("thuh").

[44] In 2024, following his retirement, he was nominated as a finalist for the Ford C. Frick Award from the National Baseball Hall of Fame.

Spanish-language Yankees broadcaster Rickie Ricardo, also an Edgewater resident, was driving his Jeep Cherokee home and rescued Sterling.

[51] On June 10, 2023, while broadcasting a game against the Boston Red Sox at Yankee Stadium, Sterling was hit in the head by a foul ball off the bat of Justin Turner.