Howie Rose will scale back on calling Mets games this season
Mets broadcaster Howie Rose Credit: Newsday/Neil Best
Howie Rose, the Mets’ longtime lead radio announcer, will cut back on his schedule this season in the wake of a health issue that cost him parts of the 2021 season.
Rose, 68, told Newsday on Thursday that he still plans to work most games but will skip long road trips such as ones to California, Arizona and Colorado.
The schedule change might have happened even if not for his health scare, Rose said, but he added "clearly, the physical situation and my surgery and recovery from that and my new normal dictates I have to cut back."
WCBS, which carries Mets games, has not said who will fill in for Rose alongside his partner, Wayne Randazzo.
Local baseball TV and radio teams are due to return to the road after doing away games off TV monitors last year.
Rose missed some games while being treated for his condition, then missed the entire last month upon having surgery.
"I was diagnosed with something last spring that we treated during the season with the hope of avoiding surgery, but we just weren’t able to get to that point," he said.
"I had to have the surgery that I did. I’ve been told that everything looked good after that and I should resume my life and so that’s where I’m at right now."
Even without that, Rose likely would have sought to cut back within the next two or three years to maintain peak on-air performance.
"I’m 68 and I’ve got a lot of miles on me from having done two sports [Mets and Islanders] full time for a lot of years," he said. "I’ve talked to some of the other radio guys around the league. I think we’re all in that boat when we get to this point in our careers.
"In order to maintain our ability to do the job to the highest level, we need to cut back along the way."
Rose has resumed his five-year-old recreational golf career – "I suck beyond suckage," he said – and that he has been told he is good to go on and off the golf course.
"The doctor said no restrictions; just live your life," he said. "So that’s what I’m doing. How I respond to the rigors and routines of travel is to be determined."
Neil Best first worked at Newsday in 1982, returned in 1985 after a detour to Alaska and has been here since, specializing in high schools, college basketball, the NFL and most recently sports media and business.
