everybody's got at least a few supporters. atlas, kellerman, merchant, farhood - all these guys have about as many fans as detractors. who the **** is going to bat for Jim Gray? why does he even have a job?
The only reason Gray has a job is he creates dramma in his interviews by putting athleates ont he spot with blunt questions.
But it's not even entertaining. It's not like he asks the burning questions, and says what fight fans are thinking. He looks for any opportunity to create or exploit conflict, however petty. It's just embarassing to watch, tedious, and makes one feel very sorry for anyone who has to fight in a big fight on Showtime and go through this inconvenience.
Gray has been the much more successful broadcaster of the two. He has worked for a lot of networks. Basketball, football etc. Major events like NBA finals, superbowls, world series. Boxing has always been his side job. But in any case, I like Merchant a lot more. - Jason
While both can be jerks, at least Jim Gray understands how to ask questions and not inject himself into the interview. The problem I have with Merchant is that he's allowed his color commentary role to negatively affect his interview role. The 'journalist' and 'commentator' hats are vastly different. Rather than ask pertinent questions during post fight interviews, he instead uses that time to validate his own color commentary. The problem comes in when his color commentary is wrong, the post-fight interviews make him look foolish. See the PBF/Baldomir post fight interview, where in spite of PBF confirming he hurt his right hand and felt he was on his way to a KO, Merchant wants to press the notion that PBF's style is 'not entertaining'. These are grown @zz men you're talk to, and they, like most of us, will not stand there and allow you to 'editorialize' your way through an interview, when in fact they (the boxer) should be the one doing the talking.
Larry Merchant may be a windbag,and a drunk one at that,but at least he knows,loves and respects the sport.The idiot that that station needs to remove is Jim Lampley,who opens his mouth and says the complete opposite of what you and I just saw on the TV.Jim Gray asks impertinent questions for the sake of putting the fighter on the spot just to antagonize.He is a disgrace.I remember his interviewing an English-limited speaking Mexican fighter after a rough bout.When the fighter responded in Spanish through a translator,genius Gray said,"English,English".So the jackass got short and limited responses instead of an insight or 2 from a fighter who had just fought some tough rounds.