Interesting story about Larry Merchant on racism.

[Floyd is TBE]

I remember when Max Kellerman asked Pac a few softball questions after Pac's fight with Floyd Mayweather. Can't remember the exact questions but they were pretty standard, just the generic routine **** commentators usually ask to fighters. Apparently that was too much for the some of the same folks praising Larry Merchant for always antagonizing and asking the fighters he hated the "tough questions".

[Eff Pandas]

I know what you mean and disregarding your nonsense comparison, I'm going to answer your question seriously:

The point of a commentator is to commentate on the fight, not to hype anything. The point of an interviewer is to ask questions, if that occurs after a fight, those questions will be based on the fight, the fighter himself, the opponent and the future.

This has nothing to do with making someone look bad and in all honesty, if a fighter has the ability to handle himself well, he can look great in post fight interviews. Consider the two fighters I mentioned: Naz and May.

Naz was a sharp guy who had a way with words and Larry asked him some important questions during that storied career (as did the likes of MacGuigan and co in England). Naz was able to handle it, answer, be entertaining and up his stock in the minds of many.

I guess your problem is Mayweather looking bad and yes, he did, simply because he could not compete on an intellectual level or ultimately, on a career level. Mayweather avoided too many guys at too many important points, Merchant asked him if he would fight them (same as he did with Naz and MAB/Morales). May could not respond adequately and that made him look bad. nOt Merchant.

Remember, Merchant is the same guy that provided May with a massive platform on HBO, gave him credit in the rumours of a potential Naz fight and made him seem a million dollars. No one likes to bring that up. Merchant was, as far as I could tell, a straight shooter. He saw a guy do good, fight who he should and beat them, he said so. If he saw the opposite, he said so too. That's the job of an impartial interviewer.

I can't stand modern day guys like Kellerman who are nothing but company weasels.

I think you want a "company weasel" as you call it. Who the f#ck thinks HBO should hire guys who attempts to sh^t on the fighters HBO hired too? These mfers are co-workers often times. Tyson & Merchant + Floyd & Merchant were co-workers ffs. These were work related mishaps one could argue.

Although I do say HBO largely knows what they are getting when they are getting Merchant to make Tyson & Floyd more bad guy-ish, but the thing is those guys were outliers & most cats aren't going for the bad guy angle & thus just get made to look ****** or ***** cuz of some of the questions these post fight interviewers ask. I've been saying for years idk why HBO hasn't fired these f#ckheads who 2 rounds into a fight start talking about it being a sh^t fight. You'll almost never see that in any other sport by its commentators cuz they are schooled into hyping the competitiveness of whatever level of competition is before them. Meanwhile in boxing you get a bunch of guys who'll massively sh^t on almost every fight that isn't Corrales vs Castillo.

That explains why boxing never gets above ground level on any regular basis I'd argue. The people talking about boxing the most & who boxing pays their rent & alimony don't even seem to appreciate the sport enough to see the upside or glass half full aspect of every fight they watch. Not to say there aren't garbage fights & that sometime they aren't apparent going in, but a network needs to have guys who love boxing not guys who love good fights. And thats what guys like Merchant & Lampley & Grey (although he has calmed down a bit in his older age it would seem) represent to me. Give me 100 Al Bernstein's & boxing is bigger than it is today just off of that one change.

[Eff Pandas]

I remember when Max Kellerman asked Pac a few softball questions after Pac's fight with Floyd Mayweather. Can't remember the exact questions but they were pretty standard, just the generic routine **** commentators usually ask to fighters. Apparently that was too much for the some of the same folks praising Larry Merchant for always antagonizing and asking the fighters he hated the "tough questions".

Idk about all that. One of the things boxing has that most sports don't is a huge % of hater fans. Idk that there is any sport that has so many fans who seem to derive their fulfillment of boxing from hating on a guy. And Manny just happens to be a guy some of those hater fans love to hate.

So yea you'll find a bunch of negativity about those big name guys by their hater fans for virtually anything they've done or have had done with them cuz thats just that sizeable hater fanbase being more vocal then anyone else about something the majority of fans don't see, don't agree with or hell most of the time probably don't even think is a thing worth talking about at all.

[soul_survivor]

I think you want a "company weasel" as you call it. Who the f#ck thinks HBO should hire guys who attempts to sh^t on the fighters

Just reading that clearly means you either did not read what I wrote or are unable to comprehend it.

[Eff Pandas]

Just reading that clearly means you either did not read what I wrote or are unable to comprehend it.

Well most of what you said was silly & has nothing to do with what I'm talking about. The goal is to sell not to "get to the truth" or whatever these guys are poorly attempting to do. And thats the thing too, they are hardly f#cking great interviewers with their "pressing" questions & ask follow up questions worse than a below average ****** so this is all hack sh^t either way. Its just counterproductive hack sh^t the way they work is what I'm saying.

You can't be a waiter at my restaurant & tell all my customers what sh^t food we got. And thats what a lot of these guys do & Larry was just the poster boy of that sh^t when he had a mainstream job. I guarantee you if Shaq started talking about how bs the NBA was as often as boxing commentators tell me how sh^t boxing is Shaq would be hosting some popular phone app turned game show quick like.

If boxing wasn't so old school with everything like 90% of these dipsh^ts would be getting laid off from some newspaper vs on TV in the first damn place. Give me some more boxing people who don't recall black & white drinking foundations ffs.

[alexguiness]

Using some of the libtard logic around lately Larry is racist simply because he is a white male over fifty.

Seriously, that's all it takes since Trump won.

[Team Reek]

Merchant was just a grumpy old man. He had his favorites and others he didn't care for. He loved Pernell Whitaker despite Whitaker being an abrasive personality and not too exciting a fighter.

[Team Reek]

Anyone who thinks Merchant didn't have issues with race, see his comments prior to the ODH/Sweet Pea fight and the reaction to those comments from the Latino community.

seemed like he just didn't like the way whitaker (one of his favorites) was treated and how oscar seemed to overdo it in trying to get the mexican fans behind him. He had been beating mexican and mexican-american fighters and all of a sudden fights whitaker, says "black fighters don't take body punches well", and comes out with a mariachi band when he never did that kind of entrance before.

Although I think Pernell maybe goaded him into the comment about body punches, I forgot what he said.