Bob Sheppard will be missed

“Now batting for the Yankees … No. 2 … Derek … Jeter … No. 2.”

Before journalism… “Now batting for the Yankees … No. 2 … Derek … Jeter … No. 2.”

Before journalism removed all of my bias and purged my allegiances, I rooted for the Red Sox on occasion. This I will admit.

But even I will miss the voice of Bob Sheppard, the longtime Yankees public address announcer, who stated on Thursday that he will not return to his post with the New York ball club.

Sheppard, who turned 99 last month, logged 56 years in the booth for the Yankees before a bronchial infection sidelined him during the 2007 ALDS. He hasn’t announced in-stadium since, though a recording of his voice still plays for Derek Jeter’s at-bats.

He refused to call his announcement on Thursday an official retirement, but he told Newsday, “I don’t think a man, 99 years old, goes back to work after two years of separation.”

It doesn’t matter if you hate the Yankees. It doesn’t matter if you still think Mark Teixeira should have signed with your team instead of New York. It doesn’t matter if you can’t stand Jeter’s little jump-throw. Sheppard’s voice was a part of baseball for six decades.

Forget about me. Even my dad doesn’t remember a Yankee game without Sheppard’s trademark style. Like the Infield Fly Rule or Julio Franco, you don’t ask when exactly Sheppard became a part of the game. He was just always there.

He’s older than the old Yankee Stadium. His debut in the booth coincided with Mickey Mantle’s first game at home.

Lou Gehrig’s 2,130 consecutive games-played streak has nothing on Sheppard. In addition to his 4,500 games with the Yankees, he did the public address announcing for the New York Giants for 50 years.

Now that he’s stepping down, I just can’t help but feel like the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry — and baseball as a whole — won’t be the same.

Reggie Jackson called him “the Voice of God.” Mickey Mantle said he felt shivers up his spine every time he announced his name.

Probably every kid — whether they know the man’s name or not — envisions Sheppard’s voice in his head when he imagines stepping up to bat with the bases loaded, bottom of the ninth, down by three. You know the drill.

There’s nobody like Sheppard, and between his unofficial official retirement and the demolition of the original Yankee Stadium, it’s the end of an era.

Sheppard may be the last link to the most memorable moments in Yankee history, both joyous and melancholic. He sat in the booth for Roger Maris’ 61st home run — which I like to pretend is still the record — and read a poem the next game to commemorate the event. He also wrote and read a poem after Thurman Munson passed away in a plane crash in 1979.

Sheppard fought in the Pacific theater in World War II, played quarterback in college for St. John’s and earned a master’s degree from Columbia in 1933.

If you didn’t know about Sheppard, now you do. He’s been the one fixture in the Yankees franchise. And now he’s leaving.

To sound like a cantankerous purist, almost every team these days blasts Timbaland or Chacarron Macarron for walk-up music. Public address announcers will shout at fans to “get pumped, Pirates fans” for Ryan Doumit’s two-out at-bat. Don’t forget to get on your feet for the sixth-inning hot dog-flinging, T-shirt-slinging dance-off.

But there’s something majestic, something regal, about Sheppard’s slow, echoing voice. It gave fans chills. It’s the reason I didn’t mind when the Red Sox went on the road to play New York. That and the short porch in right for David Ortiz.

What’s next for baseball? Yankee Stadium — at least the real one — is gone. The Chicago Cubs are a progressive owner away from a high-definition electronic scoreboard, and Fenway Park can only be renovated for so long.

The Yankees honored Sheppard in 2000 with a plaque in Monument Park, and a dining room in the new Yankee Stadium is named for him. When asked if he’ll eat there in 2010, Sheppard said, “If the price is right.”

Nearly triple-digits in age, Sheppard’s health is failing him. He hasn’t visited the new stadium yet, and he said to Newsday that the trip to the Bronx might be too much for him.

Though he won’t be in the park any time soon, a recording of his voice will introduce Jeter until the shortstop retires.

Jeter, though, isn’t exactly young, either. He will turn 36 next June. As a suppressed Red Sox fan, I can’t wait for the day when I can stop worrying about Jeter in the on-deck circle, but now I have a reason for him to stick around.

“Now batting for the Yankees … No. 2 … Derek … Jeter … No. 2.”