PITTSBURGH — Lanny Frattare is retiring after 33 seasons as a Pittsburgh Pirates announcer, the longest tenure for a broadcaster in the club’s 122-year history.

The 60-year-old Frattare was under contract for the 2009 season, but decided during the Pirates’ season-ending road trip last week to quit.

“The decision to retire from the Pirates broadcast booth was something I have been thinking about and have discussed for some time,” Frattare said. “It was a difficult and an emotional decision but, in the end, I decided it was time.”

Greg Brown, the Pirates’ other play-by-play announcer, and analysts Bob Walk, Steve Blass and John Wehner will return next season. The announcers split time between TV and radio, although Blass, a former Pirates pitcher, no longer makes road trips.

Frattare, originally from Rochester, N.Y. and an Ithaca College graduate, was an announcer for the Pirates’ Charleston Charlies Triple-A farm club when he was hired by the parent club following the surprise 1975 dismissals of Bob Prince and Nellie King.

Prince, a Hall of Famer, was the Pirates’ primary voice for 28 years and was one of baseball’s most colorful and well-known broadcasters when he was let go — a move the club later acknowledged was a major mistake.

Former Atlanta Braves announcer Milo Hamilton succeeded Prince as the Pirates’ main play-by-play voice but — blamed by many Prince fans for supplanting him — never caught on in Pittsburgh and left following the 1979 season for the Cubs’ booth. Hamilton has been a Houston Astros announcer since 1985.

Frattare succeeded Hamilton as the Pirates’ lead play-by-play announcer and kept that job through this season, though he was briefly moved off TV games during the mid-1990s by the sports channel that held the team’s television rights.

Frattare had two signature calls — “Go ball, get outta here” for a home run and “There was no doubt about it” when the Pirates won, an increasingly infrequent occurrence during his tenure.

The Pirates won the World Series in 1979 and division titles that season and in 1990-92 with Frattare in the booth, but he also called nearly every game during their ongoing streak of 16 consecutive losing seasons.

Few major league announcers have had the misfortune of calling as many losing games as Frattare did — the Pirates had losing records in 22 of Frattare’s 33 seasons, including 21 of his final 25 seasons.

Frattare will be honored during an on-field ceremony at a 2009 home game, according to club president Frank Coonelly.

“For 33 seasons his voice has been, and always will be, synonymous with Pirates baseball. ... The entire Pirates organization will sorely miss the sound of Lanny’s voice calling Pirate baseball games,” Coonelly said in a statement.

The Pirates will begin looking for Frattare’s replacement, but do not have a timetable for the hiring.