The New York Yankees today announced that they have reached a multi-year broadcast agreement with CBS Radio for Yankees games to be simulcast on WFAN-AM 660 and WFAN-FM 101.9 beginning in 2014.
Both radio stations will carry all Yankees regular season and postseason games, Yankees pregame and postgame shows, as well as broadcasts of select Yankees spring training games. CBS Radio has also acquired Spanish-language Yankees broadcasts rights on a multi-year basis.
“We are extremely excited to have reached an agreement with CBS Radio,” said Yankees Managing General Partner Hal Steinbrenner. “The paramount consideration was how our fans would best be able to hear our games. Having the Yankees on WFAN-AM/FM provides listeners in the New York metropolitan area and beyond with superior broadcast quality and vast territorial signal strength.”
“We are privileged to welcome the New York Yankees to WFAN,” said Dan Mason, CBS Radio President and CEO. “There is no bigger name in baseball than the Yankees, nor an organization so steeped in tradition. As the nation’s premier sports radio station we look forward to capturing all the excitement surrounding the team, and bringing it to millions of fans for many years to come.”
The new arrangement would bump the Mets off the radio station that has carried them since its launch in 1987. WFAN operates at both 660 AM and 101.9 FM.
It is not clear where the Mets would land, but among the options are Emmis/Disney’s ESPN New York (98.7) and Clear Channel’s WOR-AM, a serious bidder for the Yankees rights earlier in the process.
The Yankees signed one-year extensions to stay on WCBS-AM for the 2012 and ’13 seasons, aligning their availability with the expiration of the Mets’ contract on WFAN after the current season.
All indications are that John Sterling would remain the team’s play-by-play man. Less certain is the status of his partner, Suzyn Waldman, but if the Yankees give their blessing, they likely will continue an on-air partnership that began in 2005.
Regardless of where the Mets go, Howie Rose and Josh Lewin probably would remain on the broadcast team, reports Newsday.
The Yankees’ current one-year contract is believed to pay $13 million to $14 million. The new contract likely will boost that figure to well over $15 million per season.
The Mets are believed to earn about half what the Yankees do in rights fees but have been a money loser for WFAN, which inherited the team when it took over WHN’s 1050 AM signal in 1987. The Mets then moved down the dial with WFAN to 660 AM in 1988.
