And I say to the father, ‘Did you see me walk across the court? Did you watch how I walk? Now, can you imagine how bad I feel right now because I stupidly and without thinking made a joke about how somebody else looked?’ ” “So I ask him where the father is, and he points him out, and I get up and I walk across the court to him, and he tells me he talked to his daughter at home who’s crying because I made fun of her brother’s goggles after all he’s been through. He is trying to get us to understand something: namely, why Jason Benetti is so hard on himself. He’s no longer killing time during a rain delay. Something has changed in Jason while he’s telling the story. He’s the father of the kid with the goggles, and he wants you to know his son lost an eye in an accident months ago, and it’s taken him this long to get his confidence back to get on the court, and that’s why he’s wearing those goggles.’ ” “Soon as that first game is over, my producer comes over to me and says, ‘There’s a parent here who wants to talk to you, but I told him I was going to talk to you myself about it. And yet his disability is a significant part of what drives him. I assumed Jason was deeply tired of being held up as an Inspirational Story. “This is years ago - maybe 2011, I think - and I’m doing a double-header of high school basketball games in East Syracuse.” (Jason triple majored in broadcasting, economics, and psychology at Syracuse University and got his start in sports broadcasting there.) “It’s toward the end of the first game, and a kid gets off the bench wearing big plastic protective goggles, like lab safety goggles, and me and my partner - he was actually the mayor of East Syracuse - we joke about it, saying things like, ‘Hey, looks like that kid knows his way around a Bunsen burner.’ We all feel Jason is being too hard on himself - come on, man, it was a momentary slip - but he disagrees, more and more vehemently, until he says, “Fine, you want to hear about a mistake?” and tells us another story, one he has never shared with anyone in that room before. This error, which seems rather minor to me, Steve, and broadcast stage manager Joe Grube, was a terrible sin to Jason, one for which he apologized profusely as soon as he realized his mistake, both on the air and then eventually in person to Bramblett’s survivors. But when the camera panned to a group of students who had painted R-O-D and a broken heart on their chests, Jason had a brain fart and turned to his broadcast partner - coincidentally and regrettably also named Rod - and said, “They’re spelling your name, Rod. He was broadcasting a football game at Auburn University two years ago, soon after the beloved Auburn radio announcer Rod Bramblett had died in a tragic car crash, as Jason well knew. Jason Benetti, who replaced Harrelson in the booth three years ago, and who at the age of 38 has already achieved the pinnacle of his chosen profession, decides to share a story of failure. Eventually, the subject of on-air mistakes comes up: mistakes in pronunciation or fact or attitude that, depending on the direction of the slip, can become either a funny viral video or a humiliating, even career-ending disaster. His career was highlighted by a Cy Young year in 1980 with the Orioles.Almost an hour into a rain delay on what should have been a warm and pleasant May night, the infield at Guaranteed Rate Field is covered with a tarp, the White Sox and the Orioles players are in their clubhouses playing cards or video games, and the broadcasters up in the TV booth are telling stories.Īnalyst Steve Stone has a lot of them, mostly about Harry Caray, with whom he broadcast Cubs games on TV for many years before coming over to the Sox to partner with the equally legendary play-by-play man Ken “Hawk” Harrelson. Before he was a broadcaster, Stone was a pitcher for both the Cubs and White Sox among other teams. ![]() Stone was the color commentator for the Cubs from 1983-2004, before moving to the South Side to call White Sox games on the radio in 2005. Stone started his broadcast career in 1982 on “Monday Night Baseball” alongside Al Michaels. Benetti became the full-time play-by-play man for the White Sox in 2019 when Harrelson retired. ![]() He initially joined the White Sox booth in 2016 as venerated announcer Hawk Harrelson’s career was winding down. The White Sox announced on Thursday that the team picked up a multiyear option for Benetti and signed Stone to a multiyear contract extension.īenetti is a rising star in the broadcast world and has started calling more games across several sports on a national stage in recent years. ![]() Jason Benetti and Steve Stone will be back in the broadcast booth calling White Sox games for 2023 and beyond.
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