YES Network streamlines Yankees broadcast booth for 2026, embracing less is more

Many Yankees fans are not happy that the team appears to be “running it back” with the same roster.

The same cannot be said for the YES Network, which has made a major alteration to its Yankees broadcast booth for the upcoming season.

Gone are the days when you might tune in to YES and weren’t sure who the analysts would be next to play-by-play man Michael Kay (or who would fill in for Kay when he took a day off).

In 2025, YES used four different play-by-play announcers and six different analysts.

In 2026, the network will have two play-by-play announcers in Kay and backup Ryan Ruocco and three rotating analysts in David Cone, Paul O’Neill and Joe Girardi. Meredith Marakovits will continue in her reporter role.

That’s it.

“I think that's what most of the audience wants,” YES executive producer and vice president of production Jared Boshnack told Newsday on Tuesday in a telephone interview. “I think that they know the excellence of our coverage. It's well documented. But at the end of the day, there is something to be said for the rhythm of baseball, that it's every single night, and you come home from work, or you make time, you carve it out of your schedule on the weekends . . . I think it's going to really be beneficial for the audience to know every single game, ‘Hey, this is who’s going to be covering it. ’ ”

Remember the scene in the 1998 movie “The Naked Gun” in which a seven-person booth for a baseball game included Curt Gowdy, Dick Enberg, Jim Palmer, Mel Allen, Tim McCarver, Dick Vitale and Dr. Joyce Brothers?

The YES booth never felt that crowded. But in this case, the network is hoping less is more. And that more of Kay, Cone, Girardi and O’Neill in either a two- or three-man configuration is better for viewers.

“I think we have always had, since YES launched, some of the best talent in the business across the board,” said Boshnack, a Long Island resident and former Newsday paper boy who took over the top job in production and programming at YES a year ago this month. “What we had an opportunity to do this offseason was to take a look at it, and really leaned more in on consistency, the opportunity to tighten some things up, and create continuity so that there's identity when people are tuning in that they know exactly who they're tuning in for. We carefully considered all of that and worked through it and I'm very happy with where the booth currently stands.”

Last year, John Flaherty, Todd Frazier and Jeff Nelson were used as game analysts. Flaherty also did play-by-play, as did Justin Shackil.

Flaherty and Nelson will not be back with YES this season. Shackil and Frazier are part of YES’ roster of pre- and postgame hosts and analysts.

Flaherty, a former Yankees catcher who had been at the network for 20 years, told Newsday it was “definitely not a surprise” when YES told him in October that it was not bringing him back.

Kay will be behind the mic for “85-90%” of the regular-season YES games in his 25th year at the network, Boshnack said. The network’s first spring training broadcast will be Saturday for the team’s home opener against Detroit. Kay and Cone will call the game.

With these changes, is YES trying to emulate the longevity of the well-regarded Mets booth on SNY? Gary Cohen, Keith Hernandez and Ron Darling are going into their 21st season together.

In a word: No.

“What SNY has done with their booth -- I'm aware of how those guys work together,” Boshnack said. “But in our world, we focus solely – solely -- on the YES Network. I'm locked in on our coverage. I'm locked in on what's best for YES. Nothing that we do is implied or as a result of what other networks might be up to.”

By Anthony Rieber

anthony.rieber@newsday.comAnthonyRieber

Anthony Rieber covers sports media and business and professional sports (you know, games and trades and things). He has worked at Newsday since Aug. 31, 1998, and has been in his current position since Jan. 1, 2026.