Benetti's first half with Sox a 'Once-in-a-lifetime experience'
About 20 years ago, Jason Benetti was just a kid with a dream. Today, Benetti is living out that exact dream to the fullest extent as he sits at the halfway mark of his first season as a play-by-play announcer for the Chicago White Sox.
Eighty-eight games through the season, the River North native still finds it hard to believe that he's become a TV announcer associated with the team he's cheered for his entire life.
"It's really weird," Benetti said with a smile. "I love that people watch, and I'm grateful that they do. Sox fans have been so warm and welcoming to me, and it's been awesome. But I don't think that I'll ever get used to the fact that people care that I'm walking around the concourse of the ballpark. Back when I was a kid, no one cared that I was walking around here, but now people seem to."
The 32-year old was given the opportunity to live out his childhood dream after Ken "Hawk" Harrelson decided to scale back his workload this season by going to a mostly road-game schedule. So now, Benetti works alongside Steve Stone, who Benetti says has given him an invaluable experience in the booth so far.
"Well, first of all, the best part of the job other than the team I work for is sitting next to Steve Stone," Benetti said. "He is clever, knowledgeable, analytical, fun and willing to go just about anywhere. To me, being able to do these games with him is an absolute joy. This amount of understanding between a pair is a once-in-a-lifetime experience."
The relationship Benetti has established with Stone has given him more confidence to do the job he had done so well before he even landed the job with the Sox. Over the course of his career, Benetti has called games for the University of Syracuse's lacrosse and women's basketball teams, the Syracuse Chiefs, a Triple-A team affiliated with the Washington Nationals, and ESPN. So it's safe to say Benetti knew a thing or two about how to do his job before arriving to Chicago.
"I'm a first-time team major league announcer, but I've done a thousand baseball games over the course of time or maybe more," Benetti said. "Maybe over 2,000 over my career. So, honestly, the best part of my job is that they've been letting me do my job, which is great. Steve has been so welcoming in terms of, you know, if we make an error we mess around with it. Things happen over the course of 162 games, and you just kind of deal with it as a group. They've been very supportive and both let me do my job, which is cool."
Benetti recalls a specific error that occurred before the All-Star break that highlights what he means when he said that making mistakes is part of his job.
"The other night, I was doing a read of the All-Star Game, and I said 'the balloting closes on July 8 at 4 Eastern,' and for some reason I remember saying 8 Eastern, so then I said at '7 Central,'" Benetti said. "Afterwards, I was like 'oh, boy, that's gonna be a tough time zone to crack.'"
Working with the team he used to watch every summer can be tough sometimes given that Benetti is still a passionate fan while in the booth, but he understands that his responsibilities as a play-by-play announcer trump whatever emotions he may have during a tough stretch or an amazing winning streak.
"I used to live and die with every pitch with the Sox growing up," Benetti said. "And at some point you understand - at least from my vantage point having done a bunch of games - that teams aren't going to go 162-0. We're not going to go 0-162. If I get too down after a loss, it's going to hurt my performance the next day ... For me, I want to have a great game every game. I do. Steve and I have to be great even if the team is getting shellacked. Or even if the team is up 900-4. So, you just have to have it every night."
So, now that the All-Star break is coming to a close, what does the rookie play-by-play announcer predict for the second half of the season?
"Based on my knowledge of every single season I've done with the Sox, I expect them to turn two triple plays of the second half of the season as well," Benetti said with a chuckle.
"I don't know what the probability of that is. We'll do it again though. 9-2-6-2-5. Yeah, give it a couple of weeks."