San Diego broadcasting legend Ted Leitner moves closer to finish line of stellar career

Ted Leitner jumped into his first broadcasting gig in 1966, earning $10 per game to cover high school football on Friday nights with a program, flashlight and recorder in tiny Cushing, Okla.

The "Sound of Music" dominated the Academy Awards. The final "Dick Van Dyke Show" aired. The Beatles played their final concert at Candlestick Park.

Across all the decades since, the New York kid with the unique voice and delivery — a mix of play-calling punch and fan angst — has guided viewers and listeners through sports of all stripes.

Now Leitner, 76, sees the conflicting finish line.

He left the Padres' booth in early 2021 after 41 seasons. He covered San Diego State football for 29 before stepping aside earlier this month . He will handle one more season of Aztecs basketball, soaking up every moment of his three decades in that role.

For someone who has filled San Diego's ears through his time at Channel 8, talk shows and a variety of larynx-stretching work, sensing the close of an career jammed to the gills for so long delivers a cocktail of gratitude with a tinge of sadness.

"I always tell people: I never worked hard, I worked often," Leitner said this week. "I've always been an every day kind of guy and I've loved it. It's that old proverb (by Confucius), 'You find something you love and you'll never work a day in your life.' I'm the poster child."

Life catches up to all of us at some point, dictating the terms and pretzeling our plans.

Leitner recalled covering an Aztecs football game when the team played in Carson, pushed onto the road as Snapdragon Stadium was being built.

Glaucoma and two other diseases were robbing Leitner of his right eye.

"I became a one-eyed guy," Leitner said. "Tracking the ball with binoculars was tough and the night lights in Carson weren't great. So I'm making more mistakes in one game than the previous 40-something years of my career.

"That's the only time I started to not love football play-by-play, dreading the possible mistake. Thankfully, I've never had a gigantic one.

"There's a small downside to loving your work so much. Eventually, you have to give it up."

Baseball proved a tough habit to break. Leitner adored the legendary Jerry Coleman, along with the other relationships that came with it.

Between balls and strikes, the flights, dinners and interactions away from the spotlight became a way of life.

"When you give it up, I don't care who you are, a janitor, a truck driver, and you've got decades and decades with people and the camaraderie and the schedule and the habits, it's an adjustment," Leitner said. "So I'm going through it."

Walking away, a step at a time, spurs reflection. Right now, those pinballing thoughts revolve around San Diego State football. The most memorable moment, Leitner said, was not a zig-zagging run, deep pass or last-second heroics.

It came in the form of a prediction.

"The Vegas Bowl against Houston (in 2016)," Leitner began. "They had the All-American nose guard (Ed Oliver). They'd beaten Oklahoma and another really great team (then-No. 3 Louisville). They were so good, so fast, so big.

"(Aztecs coach) Rocky Long told me at the hotel when we did the pregame show, 'These guys are amazing. We're going to have trouble in the first half. We're going to adjust to that, then we're going to beat the (crap) out of them in the second half.'

"And that's exactly what happened. It was amazing."

Houston led 10-6 at halftime. The Aztecs shut the Cougars out the rest of the way, cruising to a 34-10 win.

"(Broadcaster) Brent Musburger was doing the game and we we were riding down in an elevator," Leitner said. "He said, 'Tell Rocky he outplayed and outcoached one helluva team today.' So I told Rocky that on the plane. That stands out among all those games."

The conversation then drifted to Leitner's sense of his legacy in San Diego.

"I don't ever think about that," he said. "But I saw a Tweet one time when the games were on 1090 with that huge signal. A guy tweeted, we were up in Santa Barbara on a family vacation. We got in the car to come home and put on the radio. There was Uncle Teddy's voice on the Padres game. My wife said, 'It's Uncle Teddy. It's like we're already home.'

"Hearing things like that, that's special."

Leitner sensed the conversation feeling like an epilogue, so he tried to course correct a bit.

"I'm not looking at the finish line yet because I get to enjoy every single game of Aztecs hoops (next season)," he said.

About that finish line ...

"Trying to turn a negative into a positive, the finish line looks like more time with my grandchildren and children, and more time to exercise and read," he said. "That's how I look it, because I can't dwell on the fact that I'll miss it so much."

It will miss him right back.

This story originally appeared in San Diego Union-Tribune .