Dewayne Staats (born August 8, 1952) is an American sports broadcaster who has been the television play-by-play commentator for the Tampa Bay Rays since their inception in 1998. He is currently teamed with color commentator Brian Anderson. Staats has been a broadcaster for several teams over his 40+ year career.

Biography

Staats regularly listened to the St. Louis Cardinals baseball broadcasts, featuring Harry Caray and Jack Buck. He graduated from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville (SIUE) in 1975 with a degree in Mass Communications. He began his broadcasting career reporting sports on WSIE, the SIUE radio station; as an announcer for high school sports on several of the nearby small town radio stations such as WOKZ in

Alton, Illinois Alton ( ) is a city on the Mississippi River in Madison County, Illinois, United States, about north of St. Louis, Missouri. The population was 25,676 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. It is a part of the River Bend (Illinois), Riv ...

; and as an intern at KMOX in St. Louis. Staats began announcing professional baseball with the Oklahoma City 89ers (1973–74) while still a student at SIUE. After graduation, he was sports director at KPLR-TV in St. Louis (1975–76), then he worked for the

Houston Astros The Houston Astros are an American professional baseball team based in Houston. The Astros compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) American League West, West Division. They are one of two major leag ...

(1977–84),

Chicago Cubs The Chicago Cubs are an American professional baseball team based in Chicago. The Cubs compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (baseball), National League (NL) National League Central, Central Division. Th ...

(1985–89),

New York Yankees The New York Yankees are an American professional baseball team based in the Boroughs of New York City, New York City borough of the Bronx. The Yankees compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) Am ...

(1990–94), and

ESPN ESPN (an initialism of their original name, which was the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by the Walt Disney Company (80% and operational control) and Hearst Commu ...

(1995–97) before joining the Rays in their 1998 inaugural season. Staats' first wife, Dee, died in 2005 after a long battle with cancer. He has since remarried to the former Carla Berry. He has two daughters, Stephanie (b. 1978) and Alexandra (b. 1984), from his first marriage. Stephanie is married to former MLB relief pitcher Dan Wheeler, who played with the Rays (the team Staats commentates for) from 1999-2001 and from 2007-2010. Staats has three grandchildren, Gabriel, Zachary, and Evie.

Highlights and honors

With the Cubs, Staats called the first MLB night game in Wrigley Field history with Steve Stone on August 8, 1988, although the game was canceled due to rain. Staats celebrated his 30th season as a

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball league composed of 30 teams, divided equally between the National League (baseball), National League (NL) and the American League (AL), with 29 in the United States and 1 in Canada. MLB i ...

announcer in 2006, and on June 22, 2010, he called his 5000th major league game. Among the several no-hitters Staats has announced were Nolan Ryan's fifth on September 26, 1981 for the

, one-handed pitcher Jim Abbott's on September 4, 1993 for the

, and Matt Garza on July 26, 2010 for the Tampa Bay Rays. Staats announced

college football College football is gridiron football that is played by teams of amateur Student athlete, student-athletes at universities and colleges. It was through collegiate competition that gridiron football American football in the United States, firs ...

and

college basketball College basketball is basketball that is played by teams of Student athlete, student-athletes at universities and colleges. In the Higher education in the United States, United States, colleges and universities are governed by collegiate athle ...

games during his tenure at ESPN. As a promotion in 2006, dual talking bobblehead dolls of Staats and Joe Magrane were given away at a home game against the

Seattle Mariners The Seattle Mariners are an American professional baseball team based in Seattle. The Mariners compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) American League West, West Division. The team joined the American ...

. The Dewayne Staats Award for Broadcast Journalism was established in 2008 by the Mass Communications Department at SIUE. This award "recognizes a student who exhibits Staats’s passion for sports, and who demonstrates the writing, announcing and analytical skills needed to excel in the field of Sports Journalism." He was named recipient of the SIUE Distinguished Alumnus of the Year Award in 1987. He became a member of the SIUE Alumni Hall of Fame in 2006 and of the SIUE Athletics Hall of Fame in 2012. Staats has been repeatedly nominated for the Ford C. Frick Award, the broadcasters' path to the Baseball Hall of Fame, since 2008. Staats and his broadcast team have won multiple local

Emmy awards The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the year, each with their own set of rules and award categor ...

from the Suncoast Chapter of the

National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences The National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS), also known as the National Television Academy until 2007, is an American professional service organization founded in 1955 for "the advancement of the arts and sciences of televisio ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Staats, Dewayne 1952 births Living people American radio sports announcers American television sports announcers Chicago Cubs announcers College basketball announcers in the United States College football announcers Houston Astros announcers Major League Baseball broadcasters Minor League Baseball broadcasters New York Yankees announcers People from Stoddard County, Missouri People from Wood River, Illinois Southern Illinois University Edwardsville alumni Tampa Bay Rays announcers