Jason Benetti Stuns Everyone, Leaves White Sox for Division Rival
Holy shit, who saw this coming? Chicago White Sox play-by-play man Jason Benetti has left the south side and is now the new announcer for the Detroit Tigers.
The news of this stunning move came out on Thursday morning. The White Sox said they are now looking for a replacement in their TV booth, as Len Kasper is committed to his radio role.
This seemingly came out of left field, as Benetti signed a multi-year contract with the White Sox back in January. Yet, despite getting a new deal with his hometown team, Benetti did admit the negotiations were annoying with the White Sox.
Via the Chicago Sun-Times.
“The really good news is we got somewhere good,” Benetti said. “It was kind of a pain, really. There were some things that we had to get through that I thought were silly, and I’m sure they thought some of the stuff that I was talking about might’ve been silly. But we got there in the end.”
Now, after the White Sox lost 101 games in 2023, Benetti is off to Detroit, where he will call at least 127 Tigers games each season according to the team’s press release. Benetti will also continue to fulfill his other broadcasting duties that include national MLB games, college football and college basketball games.
Benetti’s first regular season game with the Tigers will be against the White Sox on Opening Day in 2024 in Detroit.
The Tigers have announced a multi-year deal with Benetti.
It does seem like the White Sox were unhappy that Benetti was not committed to their team for all 162 regular season games.
The following is from Jon Greenberg’s story on Benetti from March.
Via The Athletic.
The big issue between the Sox and Benetti was his schedule.
During the season, some people with the White Sox weren’t so keen on Benetti being gone so much for his other jobs — though they have radio guy Len Kasper as perhaps the most overqualified fill-in in sports — and they let him know about it. This is the first year he’ll do weekly Saturday national baseball games for Fox.
After some negotiation, his new contract spells out how many Sox games he can miss — he said it’ll be 35, max — and that should go a long way to smoothing any rough patches with the team, at least for the next two years.
So, after eight years, Benetti, who is a lifelong White Sox fan, is leaving the team he’s loved for the Tigers.