Coleman was named the lead play-by-play announcer for the Boston Red Sox on both radio and television, succeeding Curt Gowdy, who resigned after 15 years of calling Red Sox games to become the top play-by-play voice for NBC's Major League Baseball Game of the Week. Coleman joined a broadcast team that also included Ned Martin and color man Mel Parnell, and signed a three-year contract that paid him $40,000 per year. Coleman broadcast the 1967 World Series (which the Red Sox lost to the St. Louis Cardinals) for NBC television, working alongside Gowdy, and radio. Coleman was the "Voice of the Red Sox" on both WHDH-AM 850 and the original WHDH-TV for six seasons, through 1971. When the FCC revoked WHDH's television license during the winter of 1971–1972, the Red Sox split their radio and TV announcing crews and signed a three-year contract with WBZ-TV. Coleman and color man Johnny Pesky worked exclusively on television through the 1974 season. In 1975, the Red Sox awarded their television rights to WSBK-TV and increased their telecast schedule from 65 to over 100 games, and the new flagship station opted for a new broadcasting team, Dick Stockton and Ken Harrelson. Coleman then returned to Ohio. From 1975 to 1978, he was the play-by-play man for WLWT and the Cincinnati Reds' television network, calling regular-season games for the Big Red Machine's back-to-back 1975–1976 World Series champions. After the Red Sox' legendary radio combination of Ned Martin and Jim Woods were fired for failing to follow the dictates of sponsors following the 1978 season, Coleman came back to Boston in 1979 and spent 11 years as the Red Sox' top radio voice. He broadcast the Red Sox' 1986 World Series loss to the New York Mets and two Red Sox ALCS (1986 and 1988). Coleman remained in the Red Sox booth until his retirement in 1989. He worked with #2 announcers Rico Petrocelli, Jon Miller and Joe Castiglione during this "second term" with the Red Sox. In 1972, Coleman returned briefly to the NFL, rotating play-by-play duties with Stockton for New England Patriots' preseason games on WBZ-TV with no color commentators. Additionally, he wrote books on sportscasting, was one of the founding fathers of the Red Sox Booster Club and the BoSox Club, and was intimately involved with the Jimmy Fund, which raises money for cancer research. Personal life and death Coleman followed the routine