Joe Castiglione Calls His Final Play as Red Sox Radio Broadcaster

 

A short time ago, I listened to Joe Castiglione call the final play of his career as the radio broadcaster for the Boston Red Sox. 

As his former broadcast partner Sean McDonough and current broadcaster partner and successor Will Flemming struggled to keep their composure, Castiglione went about his business as he has for the past 42 years and kept his focus on Sox reliever Justin Slaten facing Tampa Bay Rays second baseman Richie Palacios until Palacios lined out to Sox centerfielder Ceddanne Rafaela to end the ballgame and end the 2024 regular season with a 3-1 win and a .500 record. 

Whatever sadness Castiglione might have felt in the moment he kept to himself. Castiglione did what he has done every season since 1989 after his colleague Ken Coleman retired. He read the words of the late MLB Commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti from his essay "From a Great and Glorius Game":

It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone. You count on it, rely on it to buffer the passage of time, to keep the memory of sunshine and high skies alive, and then just when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it stops.....and summer was gone.

Joe Castiglione ended his career on a high note. In July, he received the Ford C. Frick Award at the Baseball Hall of Fame ceremonies before announcing his retirement two weeks ago. 

Here is what I wrote about Castiglione when he was named this year's Ford C. Frick recipient last December:

I began listening to the Red Sox on the radio shortly after moving to Boston in 2000. Usually I would listen to the games on a Sunday afternoon while walking from Boston to Cambridge via Mass Ave or Memorial Drive. Sometimes I would be content to listen to the game walking around Jamaica Plain. 

The common denominator was Castiglione with his low-key demeanor and leisurely delivery. While Castiglione roots for the Red Sox he does so quietly and isn't a homer. Nor does he overwhelm you with statistics. He knows how to let the game breathe while knowing how to pace the drama with pauses. 

Now 76, Castiglione began working a reduced schedule this past season calling 81 games - half of the team's schedule.

He is part of that dying breed of baseball broadcasters who focuses his attention on the game rather than the bread and circuses surrounding it. Even with a reduced schedule, I hope Castiglione will be part of the Red Sox radio broadcast team for many more years to come. 

Well, as Castiglione said while calling his final at bat, "Nothing is forever." 

Perhaps, but I am glad Castiglione was one of the voices who helped mark my passage of time here in Boston. I know I am far from alone in that sentiment.