Rich Lerner named 2025 DSA Recipient
ELMSFORD, N.Y. (December 2, 2025) – The Metropolitan Golf Association is pleased to announce Rich Lerner as its 2025 Distinguished Service Award recipient. The longtime Golf Channel host and essayist will be honored for his many on and off-air contributions to golf at the 2025 MGA Awards Celebration on Wednesday, December 3 at Westchester Country Club in Rye, N.Y.
Related: Past MGA DSA Recipients
Growing up on his father’s driving range in Pennsylvania, Lerner grew an appreciation for the game at an early age. He secured his first job as a live announcer at Temple University, covering basketball games for WRTI.
Lerner joined GOLF Channel in 1997 and has been a loyal contributor in many ways ever since. Through the years, he’s become one of the game’s most beloved hosts and storytellers, contributing as a play-by-play host for the network’s PGA Tour coverage and host of Golf Central and Golf Central Live From, for which he writes and narrates thoughtful essays that offer insight into some of the game’s biggest, most timely stories.
“Rich’s contribution to golf has been immense – helping golf fans everywhere to better understand the game, competition at a high level, and the wide range of personalities that make up the global golf stage,” says MGA President Ned Zachar, who co-chairs the DSA Committee.
Lerner’s storytelling skills extend well beyond live coverage programming, having produced in-depth specials such as Tiger Woods: Millennium Man and Se Ri Pak, A Champion’s Journey, which was honored with the Women’s Sports Foundation Journalism Award. He’s also been a valued writer and co-producer for GOLF Channel’s Emmy-nominated GOLF Films unit.
“It’s a special treat to honor Rich Lerner with the MGA’s Distinguished Service Award,” says DSA Committee co-chair and immediate past president Patrick Donnelly. “For almost 30 years, he has been a welcome guest in the family room of MGA members and golf fans around the world. We look forward to many more years of Rich bringing our game to life and telling the wonderful stories of the game we love so much.”
His on-air credits also stretch outside of golf with NBC Sports, having contributed to NBC Olympics’ on-air coverage for four Olympic Games. Most recently, Lerner won a Sports Emmy as part of NBCUniversal’s coverage of the 2024 Paris Olympics, which was honored as Outstanding Live Special – Championship Event. During those games, he covered play-by-play for men’s and women’s gymnastics.
Lerner’s impact has been felt well beyond his airtime, with he and his wife Robin’s Elijah Ross Foundation. For 20 years, they hosted the December Classic pro-am in Orlando, Fla., benefitting the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Winnie Palmer Hospital for Women and Babies.
Lerner has been a longtime supporter of the MGA and its causes as well. He’s offered his talents in a variety of ways, whether through helping with special video projects or moderating panels at special events.
“We all know Rich from his work on GOLF Channel as the consummate “Live From” host and brilliant essayist and storyteller, but he’s also been a steadfast supporter of the MGA,” says Lerner’s friend and MGA past president Andy Stock. “He always finds a way to say yes when asked to lend a hand.”
Lerner joins a long list of recipients for the award. Created in 1973, the MGA Distinguished Service Award is presented annually to a candidate who has contributed “distinguished service to golf and its related activities, consistent with the valued standards and honorable traditions of the game.” Some of its earliest winners include Joe Dey, Harry Cooper, Robert Trent Jones, Sr., and P.J. Boatwright, while names such as Jeff Holzschuh, Mike Davis and Suzy Whaley have received the honor in recent years.