If, as former Speaker of the House of Representatives \u201cTip\u201d O\u2019Neill said, \u201call politics is local,\u201d the same can certainly be said for sports. Even today, in a world unbound by geographical limitations, few things can unite a city or a country more than a championship run by a sports team donning its letters.<\/p>\n
For\u00a0John J. Filippelli<\/strong>, those letters are an interlocking N and Y.<\/p>\n He\u2019s one of the more respected, influential, and accomplished leaders in the history of sports media, and his career is a rare one, spanning both the executive suite and the front bench. His current role as executive producer and president, production and programming, for New York-based YES Network, is an appropriate exclamation point on a career that has engrained memories in the minds of sports viewers and altered the careers of countless sports broadcasters for nearly five decades.<\/p>\n \u201cFlip is an innovator who thinks outside the box,\u201d says longtime New York Yankees play-by-play voice\u00a0Michael Kay<\/strong>. \u201cHe sees things that others don\u2019t see, through a prism of inventiveness and attention to detail. Most important, he\u2019s a Hall of Famer in the way he treats his people. He is your defender at all times, and he is the rare leader who constantly tells you how good a job you\u2019re doing. All workers in all walks of life should experience working with a leader like Flip.\u201d<\/p>\n Brooklyn-born Filippelli \u2018s story reads like one that was predestined. His father ran a bar across the street from Ebbets Field (one that many famous Dodger players would frequent after \u00a0games), and his first job was as a 16-year-old vendor at Yankee Stadium. Baseball is in his roots.<\/p>\n It was, however, during a run-of-the-mill tour of NBC in New York City \u2014 one that any tourist visiting the city would go on \u2014 that the magic of television gripped him. 1974 was the year Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer\u00a0Dick Ebersol<\/strong>\u00a0got his first job at NBC Sports, and\u00a0Saturday Night Live<\/em>\u00a0debuted. As young Flip walked through the halls of the tall building overlooking Rockefeller Plaza, it was, in his words, \u201clove at first sight.\u201d<\/p>\n Determined to break into the sports-television industry, Filippelli landed a job as a PA at NBC and eventually earned the opportunity to sit down with the first president of NBC Sports, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer\u00a0Chet Simmons<\/strong>, to make his case to join the team. According to Filippelli, Simmons, perhaps slightly skeptical of the overly enthusiastic youngster, challenged him to name the starting lineup of the 1961 New York Yankees. Fortunately, that World Series-winning, homerun-record\u2013breaking squad held a special place in his heart. He named not only the starting lineup but the club\u2019s entire roster.<\/p>\n Filippelli was in, and thus was birthed one of the most influential careers in the history of sports television. During his tenure at NBC Sports, he climbed the ranks to become a lead producer for numerous MLB Game of the Week telecasts, as well as for multiple League Championship Series, All-Star Games, and World Series telecasts. He was in the producer\u2019s chair for the famous 1988 World Series, including the night of one of the most iconic moments in baseball history, when Los Angeles Dodgers\u2019 Kirk Gibson slapped a game-winning home run over the right-field fence at Dodger Stadium in Game 1.<\/p>\n After more than two decades at NBC Sports, Filippelli moved over to the new Fox Sports, where his influence on the game of baseball grew even further. He served as coordinating producer of the broadcaster\u2019s first World Series, in 1996 (when his beloved Yankees win their first title in 18 years). He was also producer on the 1998 night when Mark McGwire hit his 62nd home run, breaking the record Roger Maris set in that \u201961 season that Filippelli\u2019s knowledge of got him in the sports-television door.<\/p>\n Fox gave him the room to flex his innovation muscles. He was a major part of key industry firsts, including the permanent baseball scorebug and, perhaps most notable, running regular-speed instant replays during a live broadcast. It changed how viewers perceived the speed and power of MLB players.<\/p>\n \u201cMany of the production enhancements commonplace on baseball telecasts today \u2014 such as full-speed replays, tight super-slo-mo shots of the bases, and even subtle elements such as the full-time display of the pitch count \u2013 are all things that Flip implemented,\u201d says former YES Network and Fox Sports executive\u00a0Ed Delaney<\/strong>. \u201cAlthough Flip\u2019s accomplishments are prodigious, they are eclipsed by his compassion, generosity, and wondrous spirit. At the end of the day, the sports-broadcasting industry is a better place because of Flip\u2019s remarkable contributions.\u201d<\/p>\n Filippelli\u2019s career hasn\u2019t touched only America\u2019s Pastime. During his days producing in the 1980s and \u201990s, he left his mark on productions of a global scale \u2013 the Olympic Games, multiple Super Bowls,\u00a0Monday Night Football<\/em>, the Indianapolis 500, Wimbledon, the NHL, golf, college football \u2014 and was even involved in the iconic\u00a0ABC\u2019s Wide World of Sports<\/em>. He also spent time with World Wrestling Entertainment.<\/p>\n But when it comes to second chapters in life, they don\u2019t come more prolific than Filippelli\u2019s. After a brief stint at ABC Sports, he got the call that the Yankees were starting their own television network and that Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer and team owner\u00a0George Steinbrenner<\/strong>\u00a0wanted him to help run it. He was the network\u2019s first hire, brought on in September 2001. Over the next few months, as his beloved city healed from the great tragedy at the World Trade Center, a small team laid the groundwork for what has become the gold standard for the regional sports network.<\/p>\n YES Network, which will celebrate its 20th anniversary in 2022, has set the bar for both financial and creative success in the RSN industry. Since its launch, YES, under Filippelli\u2019s leadership, has collected a staggering 134 Emmy Awards (as of 2021).<\/p>\n \u201cFlip was already a Hall of Famer for the many ways he revolutionized baseball coverage as a producer,\u201d says YES Network VP, Broadcast Operations,\u00a0Mike Webb<\/strong>, who was one of the startup network\u2019s first hires. \u201cHe cemented his place in this distinguished class by reinventing the definition of [the] regional sports network. He built a culture of excellence at YES with his singular leadership style that encourages creativity and innovation in every department at every level of the network.\u201d<\/p>\n Under his watch, YES became the first television network to produce 3D and interactive MLB telecasts and was also the first to display continuous on-screen pitch counts during a game. YES Network was the first RSN to produce and televise an MLB game outside North America when the Yankees opened the 2004 season vs. the Tampa Bay Devil Rays in Tokyo. Filippelli also challenged the status quo when it came to around-the-clock content, making YES Network the first RSN to simulcast a sports radio talk show when it picked up the legendary\u00a0Mike and the Mad Dog<\/em>\u00a0program in March 2002.<\/p>\n It was out in front of the HD trend as well, launching its standalone 24\/7 HD channel in 2007, and, as it continues to push the envelope in image quality, its \u201cSuper Slo Mo\u201d and \u201cYES MO\u201d cameras have set a new standard for replays in sports telecasts.<\/p>\n Filippelli\u2019s induction into the Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame is just the latest honor of his decorated career. In 2017, he was inducted into the Silver Circle by the Board of Governors of The National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, New York Chapter. In 2013, he was named Executive of the Year by New York University\u2019s Sports Business Society.<\/p>\n From the technological to the personal, few people have had a greater influence on what fans see and on broadcast careers than Filippelli has had over the past half century.<\/p>\n \u201cFlip has had an immeasurable impact on countless on-air talent and production personnel who have had the good fortune to work alongside him over his storied career,\u201d says YES Network CEO\u00a0Jon Litner<\/strong>. \u201cI count myself one of those lucky ones. He has always been a Hall of Famer to me.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":1509,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"tags":[55],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsbroadcastinghalloffame.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/inductees\/1508"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsbroadcastinghalloffame.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/inductees"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsbroadcastinghalloffame.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/inductees"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsbroadcastinghalloffame.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1509"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsbroadcastinghalloffame.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1508"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsbroadcastinghalloffame.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1508"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}