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michael kay, new york yankees

Player: Kay, Michael

Card: 2005 Topps All Time Fan Favorite #81

Position: Broadcaster

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Michael Kay (born February 2, 1961 in the Bronx, NY) is an American sports broadcaster who is the television play-by-play broadcaster of the New York Yankees and host of CenterStage on the YES Network, and the host of The Michael Kay Show.

Kay was born and raised in the Bronx, New York. As per ethnicelebs.com, While his father's side was Jewish, Michael’s maternal grandfather was Daniel Louis Aiello. Daniel was born in New York. Michael’s maternal grandmother was Frances Pietriacoca/Pietrocova. Frances was born in New York. His uncle is actor Danny Aiello.

Wanting to be the Yankees announcer when he grew up, he did all the school reports that he could about the Yankees, so he could know all about them. Kay began reporting as a youth at the Bronx High School of Science and then at Fordham University for WFUV. He earned a Bachelor of Arts in communications from Fordham.

Kay started his professional career with the New York Post in 1982 as a general assignment writer, with sports-specific assignments to college basketball, the National Basketball Association and the New Jersey Nets coming over time. He received the Yankees' beat writing assignment in 1987. In 1989, Kay left the Post for the Daily News, still primarily working on the Yankees. At this time, Kay also served as the Madison Square Garden Network Yankee reporter starting in 1989.

In 1992–99, he served as MSG's locker room reporter for the New York Knicks. He had previously worked for the network as a contributor on the news-format sports show MSG SportsDesk. Kay left the Daily News to host a sports talk show on WABC in 1992, briefly returning to write "Kay's Korner" for the Daily News in 1993, before taking the microphone job for radio broadcasts of New York Yankee games beside John Sterling. Kay also worked as a reporter for Fox Sports Net in the late 1990s.

Kay spent a decade partnered with Sterling as the radio announcers of the team on WABC from 1992 to 2001. Kay and Sterling also paired together in 1998 for Sports Talk with John Sterling and Michael Kay, a nightly radio show which aired on WABC.

During the baseball season, the duo hosted Yankee Talk, a weekend pre-game radio show. From 1992 to 1993 Kay hosted his own show on WABC. Kay continued during that time as a spot reporter on ABC Radio, doing off-season shows with Sterling and as a fill-in sports reporter on WABC-TV. When ESPN Radio began leasing (and later purchasing) WEVD radio in 2001, Kay was chosen to host a daily radio show on the newly rechristened "1050 ESPN Radio."

When WCBS acquired the radio rights to the Yankees broadcasts in 2002, Kay moved to the debuting YES Network on television and Sterling remained on the radio. Kay has been the Yankees' lead television play-by-play announcer ever since.

In 2008, Major League Baseball invited Michael to call the Home Run Derby at Yankee Stadium during that year's All Star festivities. On September 21, 2008, he joined Jon Miller and Joe Morgan to call the seventh inning of ESPN's broadcast of the final home game at Yankee Stadium against the Baltimore Orioles. According to Miller, Kay was brought in because ESPN felt that they should include the local aspects of broadcasting for the Yankees for this special game, as the YES Network was not allowed to cover the game.

Since the late 1990s, Kay and Sterling have co-emceed such events as the Yankees' annual Old-Timers' Day ceremony as well as players' number retirements, anniversary celebrations for the team's World Series victories, and the City Hall celebrations after Yankees' World Series victories.

Kay and Sterling also provided play-by-play commentary for Nintendo 64's All-Star Baseball video games from 1999 to 2001. In addition to his Yankees work, Michael has called play-by-play of several postseason games on ESPN Radio, including the 2008 NLDS between the Philadelphia Phillies and Milwaukee Brewers, the 2013 ALDS between the Detroit Tigers and Oakland Athletics, and Game 3 of the 2016 ALDS between the Texas Rangers and Toronto Blue Jays.

In January 2022, ESPN hired Kay and Alex Rodriguez to broadcast an alternate Sunday Night Baseball broadcast on ESPN2, similar to the critically acclaimed Manningcast for Monday Night Football.

In 2002, he began hosting a drive-time talk show on WEPN (the former WEVD). That same year, he also hosts the YES Network's CenterStage, a sports and entertainment interview-format show.

In 2003, he was added to the Bronx Walk of Fame. In 2007, Michael was nominated for a number of New York Emmy Awards for his work with the YES Network, both for Yankees broadcasts and for his highly rated interview program Centerstage. Michael won one New York Emmy for his work on the YES Network as part of the team of the NYY broadcast: New York Yankees Baseball "Manny vs. NY – Yankees/Red Sox- 5/24/06." (YES Network).

In 1998, he was on the MSG team that won an Emmy for Outstanding Live Sports Coverage—Series. In 1996 and 1997 he was a member of the MSG team that won Emmys for Outstanding Live Sports Coverage—Single Program for Dwight Gooden's no-hitter and The Battle for New York: Yankees vs. Mets, and he was awarded the Dick Young Award for Excellence in Sports Media by the New York Pro Baseball Scouts in 1995, and the award for Best Sports Reporter at the 2000 New York Metro Achievement in Radio Awards.

(excerpted from Wikipedia)

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michael kay
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tourstops


Michael is part of the New York Yankee Players Tour – Go To the Next Stop


Michael has also been an IABF Honoree – Go to the Next Stop


See Michael’s baseball cards at TCDB


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