Sam Rosen recovering from health issue and will not be on Rangers radio
Sam Rosen Credit: Getty Images/Bruce Bennett
Don La Greca will handle the Rangers’ radio play-by-play for at least the next three games of the Eastern Conference final against the Florida Panthers.
Sam Rosen had been in line to fill in for Kenny Albert while Albert calls the Western Conference final for TNT Sports, but he was sidelined by a recent health scare.
La Greca said on ESPN New York radio’s “The Michael Kay Show” before Game 1 on Wednesday that Rosen was hospitalized recently after experiencing dizziness but that he now is doing well.
Albert had hoped to call Game 1 but left for Dallas early because of weather-related travel concerns there in advance of Game 1 of that series on Thursday night. So La Greca called the Rangers’ 3-0 loss to the Panthers. Game 2 is Friday.
“Sam is OK, but I know there’s a lot of people wondering what’s going on with Sam,” La Greca said on the Kay show. “He was suffering some dizziness. He had to go to the hospital. He got a clean bill of health. He’s OK. All is fine, but he did have a little bit of an issue.”
La Greca will travel to Florida for Games 3 and 4 with Rosen unable to fly.
With the Western final being played in Dallas and Edmonton, the logistics do not allow Albert to call both series, as he has done in the past in these situations.
The radio play-by-play assignment for Games 5, 6 and 7, if necessary, of the Rangers-Panthers series, is not yet 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.
