For Dodgers fans, a familiar voice is back on the radio airwaves in October.
Charley Steiner, the Dodgers’ longtime radio play-by-play man, is calling the team’s home playoff games this postseason on the Dodgers Radio Network, including Tuesday’s Game 3 of the National League Championship Series against the Milwaukee Brewers.
His return comes after a long fight with cancer, which Steiner detailed in a feature with FOX Sports’ Tom Rinaldi.
For Steiner, calling Dodgers games was always the goal growing up in New York City.
“When I was seven years old, I wanted to be the announcer for the Brooklyn Dodgers,” Steiner said. “Without any question, that’s what I wanted to be when I grew up.”
Getting there took decades, from radio in the Big Apple to 14 years at ESPN to the Yankees’ radio booth. Then the Dodgers called, and Steiner has spent the last 22 seasons as one of their voices.
“You think about Charley Steiner’s voice; it’s just perfect,” longtime Dodgers executive Lon Rosen said. “He wanted the job, so it was an easy negotiation.”
Los Angeles Dodgers radio broadcaster Charley Steiner, photographed in 2013, is calling the Dodgers’ home playoff games on radio this postseason after a fight with cancer. (Photo by Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images)
By 2024, Steiner had spent two decades in the Dodgers’ booth, living the dream he’d chased since childhood. Then, in his mid-70s, he received news that put all of it in doubt.
Steiner was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a blood cancer.
“That’s not the kind of news you want to hear from anybody,” Steiner said. “How am I going to get through this?”
He fought through fractures in his back and he lost 50 pounds after the diagnosis.
“To wonder if he’s going to get better, how long it’s going to take him to get better,” said Rick Monday, Steiner’s longtime broadcast partner. “He’s gone through hell.”
Steiner kept his illness private until Game 4 of the 2024 World Series. During that game’s Stand Up to Cancer moment, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts honored him by holding up a sign with Steiner’s name written on it.
“I just felt that it was an opportunity for me to tell him I loved him, I’m thinking about him, and I’m praying for him,” Roberts said.
During Game 4 of the 2024 World Series’ Stand Up to Cancer moment, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts honored him by holding up a sign with Steiner’s name written on it. (Photo by Daniel Shirey/MLB Photos via Getty Images)
Late in 2024, Steiner learned his cancer was in remission and from there, he slowly worked his way back into the booth.
“I started doing an inning here, inning there, and it wasn’t great,” Steiner said. “But I also knew if I get better, I can do this again.”
Earlier this season, on Aug. 15, against the Dodgers’ eventual NLCS opponent the Brewers, Steiner called all nine innings for the first time since his return.
“This game was the most meaningful event I had ever been associated with,” he said.
Monday felt it, too. “I turned to him right after it was over to give him a fist pump,” Monday said. “Neither one of us said a word. I knew my buddy was back.”
Steiner went on to call 10 full games over the final six weeks of the regular season. He then returned for Games 1 and 2 of the NLDS against the Atlanta Braves.
“I was seven years old when I wanted to be the Dodger announcer. Now I’m 77, and I’m a Dodger announcer, accomplishing a childhood dream.”
