Radio Brings Baseball to Life

Major League Baseball’s regular season has begun, but first, teams spent a month in Arizona or Florida for spring training—exhibition games that wrapped up recently. While these games don’t impact standings, they draw fans eager to see new and rising players.

For those unable to attend in person, like Texas Rangers fans in Surprise, Arizona, TV coverage is sparse—only eight of the Rangers’ 33 spring games were broadcast. But radio fills the gap, with broadcasters like Jared Sandler ensuring fans worldwide can experience every pitch.

“Baseball is paced in a way that you really can paint a picture that allow people to feel like they’re there,” Jared Sandler, a radio broadcaster for the Texas Rangers, tells Annenberg Media, which is a student-led multiplatform news media that’s overseen and funded by the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism.

Sandler, a lifelong Rangers fan, grew up falling asleep to broadcasts by Eric Nadel. That passion led him from listener to broadcaster, now filling fans’ homes with his calls.

In Chicago, Northwestern student Adam Beck chases the same dream. Though a basketball fan growing up, Beck finds baseball’s slow charm ideal for broadcasting. “You fill dead time with stories—it’s romantic, conversational,” he said. After calling games for the Arroyo Seco Saints last summer, he’ll intern with the Cape Cod League’s Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox next.

Yet both Sandler and Beck wonder about radio’s future amid changing technology. “Will radio stay distinct, or just simulcast?” Sandler mused. Beck remains optimistic: “People still listen in their cars. AI can’t replicate the human voice contextualizing a moment.”