I’ve learned that Curt Menefee and Joel Klatt will be Fox Sports’ top USFL announcing team this season. Menefee and Klatt will be in the booth 12 days from now when the league kicks off with an opening game that will simulcast on both Fox and NBC.

Fox Sports is expected to make an announcement on Menefee and Klatt within the next two weeks, along with the other play-by-play, analyst and sideline reporter teams for the new league. The league officially starts April 16 at 7:30pm ET when the Generals and Stallions play each other from Birmingham.

Two years ago, Fox Sports paired Menefee and Klatt on its XFL telecasts. Menefee is best known as the host of Fox’s NFL pregame show, “Fox NFL Sunday.” Klatt has been Fox Sports’ top college football analyst for the past eight seasons.

Sinclair and Charter worked out another short-term extension on their negotiations for the Bally Sports RSNs, with multiple sources expressing optimism that the two sides will agree to a deal within the next few weeks.

Charter, which operates the Spectrum cable systems, and Sinclair first worked out a negotiating extension on March 31. Sources described that extension as a short-term one, with both sides prepared to agree to a series of short extensions to get this deal past the finish line.

If the two sides can agree on a deal, which also would include Sinclair’s local broadcast stations, it would give Sinclair a measure of stability in the volatile RSN marketplace, which is facing a double whammy of rising costs combined with a falling subscriber base.

Sinclair has announced plans to launch a local sports direct-to-consumer app around its RSNs by this summer and needs to work out a deal with Charter to make sure it has the rights to stream live pro games in the markets where Charter carries Sinclair’s RSNs. In the summer of 2020, Comcast agreed to a deal with Sinclair that included the Bally Sports RSNs. Last year, Sinclair was unable to convince Dish Network to agree to carry its RSNs.

The next big negotiation on Sinclair’s calendar comes toward the end of next year, when it has to renew its deal with DirecTV.

Longtime industry vet Eric Conrad is leaving Univision later this month after 11 years with the network. The former ESPN and NBA exec most recently was exec VP/sports programming and acquisitions at Univision.

Conrad, who says he is pursuing other opportunities in the sports industry, helped lead the launch of Univision Deportes Network (now TUDN) and was the lead negotiator on dozens of sports media rights deals, including the UEFA Champions League, CONCACAF Gold Cup, Copa America, MLS and various Liga MX club rights.