Harrelson, Stone receive multi-year extensions with White Sox

The Chicago White Sox have agreed on multi-year extensions with TV announcers Ken “The Hawk” Harrelson and Steve Stone, CSN Chicago’s Dan Hayes reported Wednesday morning.

Harrelson, 74, is taking some time off and working a reduced schedule in 2016. He will call all Sox road games, the home opener, as well as home games against the crosstown rival Chicago Cubs. The longtime play-by-play voice of the Sox lives in Granger, Indiana and opted to not make the lengthy 180-mile journey to U.S. Cellular Field on Chicago’s south side for every home game.

Stone, who has been the color commentator for White Sox games since 2009, will work the full 162-game schedule, 78 games of which will be done alongside the club’s newest voice, Jason Benetti.

The Sox announced Benetti as the team’s new play-by-play broadcaster for home games. Benetti, 32, most recently served as a baseball broadcaster with the Syracuse Chiefs, Triple-A affiliate of the Washington Nationals, for five seasons. Given his part-time schedule with the Sox, considered to be his “dream job,” Benetti will continue to call games in various capacities with ESPN.

Harrelson and Stone will kick off the season with the call for a four-game set in Oakland, beginning April 4, 2016.