For those of us who grew up listening to—and watching—New York Yankees baseball in the 1970s and 1980s, the names Phil Rizzuto, Frank Messer, and Bill White will ring a bell. Long before John Sterling’s broadcast tenure from 1989 to 2024, that trio provided so many iconic broadcast moments for Yankees fans, both on radio and television.
The “Scooter”, Phil Rizzuto, is renowned for his Baseball Hall of Fame career as a Yankees shortstop. Having joined the Yankee broadcast booth in 1957 alongside Mel Allen and Red Barber, Rizzuto remained there for 40 years. His hilarious commentary inspired such books as O Holy Cow! The Selected Verse of Phil Rizzuto. Messer joined the booth in 1967 and remained there for 18 seasons. And by 1971, Rizzuto and Messer were joined by the former St. Louis Cardinals’ first baseman, Bill White, who was part of Yankee broadcasts until his departure in 1988. He was the first black regular play-by-play announcer for any major-league sports team. He’d later contribute to several CBS World Series radio broadcasts as well as Monday Night Baseball on ABC-TV.
White was well known for having appeared in six consecutive All-Star games (eight in total) and having won seven straight Gold Gloves at first base. He was a vital member of the 1964 World Series Champion Cardinals team, which beat the Yankees in 7 games. Beyond his baseball and broadcast days, he was elected unanimously as National League President in 1989 and served in that role till 1994. Along the way, the Yankees honored him with their “Pride of the Yankees Award” in 1990, and the Cardinals placed him in their Hall of Fame in 2020.
But the on-air chemistry between White and Rizzuto during Yankee broadcasts was undeniable.
For me, White’s most memorable moment was his call of Bucky Dent’s home run against the Boston Red Sox in a do-or-die one-game playoff on October 2, 1978. The Yanks had come back from a 14-game deficit to tie Boston on the last day of the regular 162-game season. The season was extended to Game #163 in a winner take-all Eastern Division playoff.
I can practically recite White’s call: “Deep to left! Yastrzemski will not get it. It’s a home run! A three-run home run for Bucky Dent! And the Yankees now lead it, 3 to 2. Bucky Dent has just hit his fifth home run of the year into the screen. And look at that Yankee bench!”
I thought I’d popped a vocal cord I was cheering so loudly! It’s the home run that left Dent with a ‘middle name’ forever, bestowed upon him by Red Sox Nation: Bucky F*&king Dent.
The Yanks defeated Boston, 5-4, and would go on to win the American League Pennant over the Kansas City Royals and the World Series, for a second straight year, over the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Alongside the 1996 World Championship team, that 1978 Yankees team remains my all-time favorite.
Yesterday, it was announced that Bill White, now 92 years old, would be the 2026 recipient of the “John Jordan ‘Buck’ O’Neil Lifetime Achievement Award, presented to an individual for extraordinary efforts to enhance baseball’s positive impact on society.” Previous recipients include Roland Hemond, Joe Garagiola, Rachel Robinson, David Montgomery and Carl Erskine. The honor will be given in Cooperstown on July 25 as part of Hall of Fame weekend!
Congratulations to Bill White!
Notablog 