NEW YORK, March 27 (UPI) -- Longtime baseball announcer and former all-star catcher Tim McCarver said Wednesday he's retiring from the Fox Sports broadcast booth after this season.
McCarver told reporters on a conference call the upcoming 2013 season will be the last of 29 consecutive seasons of calling the biggest baseball games on either national television or radio.
He has announced a record 23 World Series in his broadcasting career.
"Although I am neither tired of broadcasting baseball nor have I in any way lost my interest in baseball, with which I have been associated as a player and broadcaster for 55 years, it's time to cut back," McCarver said.
McCarver, 71, has provided analysis for post-season and World Series coast-to-coast broadcasts every year since 1985, when he debuted on ABC's telecast of the championship series between the Kansas City Royals and his former team, the St. Louis Cardinals.
A 2012 Ford C. Frick Award recipient from the Baseball Hall of Fame, McCarver prior to joining Fox in 1996 had posted long stints with ABC (1985-89, 1994-95) and CBS (1990-93) and was the New York Mets' primary television analyst for 16 seasons from 1983-98.
