Coatesy:

Some of my favorite Coatesy moments:

Coatesy did television for a long time, and then shifted over to the radio side a few years ago.

From the article on the Flyers’ site:

Coates spent the last 43 seasons with the Flyers broadcast team, both on television and radio networks, most recently serving as the team’s color analyst for Flyers radio broadcasts on 97.5 the Fanatic and 93.3 WMMR for the last nine seasons.

Coates has filled several roles with the Flyers since retiring as a player in 1980, when he joined Gene Hart in the Flyers radio booth. Coates served as studio host on Flyers telecasts on both WTAF-TV (Channel 29, 1984 through 1986) and WGBS-TV (Channel 57, 1987 through 1991), and then spent six seasons as the color analyst on WIP-AM.

He joined the Comcast SportsNet telecast in 1999 and spent 16 seasons as a member of its broadcast team. In 2006-07, he moved to a new rinkside position that is now widely used in the hockey world.

They’re gonna “recognize and honor” Coatesy in a pregame ceremony on April 1st. He’ll stick around and do some ambassador kind of stuff, so it’s not a full retirement here, just from broadcasting. It’s also noted in the press release that they’ll start looking for a new color analyst to do radio. My recommendation is Russell Joy of the “Snow the Goalie” podcast.