As local sports broadcasts bring familiar faces into the homes of countless viewers, some personalities become as integral to the experience as the teams they cover. For John Keating, whose voice and presence have shaped Detroit sports coverage for over two decades, all of that’s true.
Keating is set to retire after the Detroit Red Wings’ 2024-25 season.
Keating started his career working in radio in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He then worked for Grand Rapids ABC TV affiliate WZZM as a weekend sports anchor from 1980 until 1985, when he left for Denver, Colorado, covering sports there for 12 years (including the launch of the Colorado Rockies and the Colorado Avalanche’s inaugural season in 1995-96 and first Stanley Cup in 1996).
Keating then returned to Michigan to host “Game Night” for the Pro-Am Sports System (PASS) regional cable network in the fall of 1996, but then shifted to Fox Sports Detroit after their 1997 launch, starting as a fill-in host but quickly becoming a regular.
He’s been the main pregame, postgame, and studio host for that network (now FanDuel Sports Network Detroit)’s Red Wings and Tigers coverage since and has been so prominent that Red Wings’ studio analyst Chris Osgood (who Keating first covered as a goalie for the Red Wings during a 1992-2011 playing career) often wears his face on a tie.
Keating has covered four Red Wings’ Stanley Cups, the Pistons’ NBA title in 2004 and two Tigers’ World Series appearances (2006, 2012).
Quite a run.
He announced on X Friday he’ll wrap it up with this Red Wings’ season, saying he made that decision this summer, and he’s privileged to get to go out on his terms:
Hey, gang. A bit of personal news here. I’ve decided to retire from TV at the end of this Red Wings season. pic.twitter.com/naqq0FIzvC
— John Keating (@JohnKeatingTV) December 20, 2024
As Keating told Tony Paul of The Detroit News, part of this is about spending more time with his family. He lives just outside Detroit in Canton, MI, but his wife of 40 years, Linda, has recently been living in Grand Haven, MI (about two and a half hours away) to take care of her parents. Ending his broadcast career will make it easier for him to spend time with her and their adult children. And Keating told Paul he has no regrets about his career.
“I’ve had a terrific run. I don’t know that I’m the face of anything. We have a great team of people, and the fact that I’ve been a part of it and seen the things I’ve seen, I wouldn’t trade it for anything.
…”Everybody talks about, ‘I wish I were younger.’ I don’t have that. I wouldn’t trade what I’ve been able to experience.”
Jeff Byle, the vice president and executive producer for FanDuel Sports Network Detroit who’s worked with Keating for two decades (and who Keating noted was the one who told him years ago he’d earned the right to go out on his own terms when he wanted to), had quite the tribute to the departing host in comments to Paul.
“It was a really interesting time for everybody, and it worked out for him. He’s been the guy that’s been our face and the staple of who we’ve been for, now, well over 25 years. Whenever it came to storytelling for anything, anything special, some special ceremony, special teams, documentaries, memorializing our fallen sports heroes, he’s been the guy. …He’s been the guy that would write and, really, give us our compass to what that looked like.”
Keating will certainly be missed by many of those who have watched him as a regular presence on coverage of those teams over the decades.
We send him all the best in this final season and in his retirement after that.
[The Detroit News; image via WXYZ on YouTube]
About Andrew Bucholtz
Andrew Bucholtz has been covering sports media for Awful Announcing since 2012. He is also a staff writer for The Comeback. His previous work includes time at Yahoo! Sports Canada and Black Press.