@ you guys thinking the commentators are talking to YOU. No! They have to commentate in a way for the Joe Blow who tuned in, but has never watched a fight, to be able to follow the fight. Also, they have to make it exciting. They need repeat viewers.
Merchant was too much of a hater for my tastes -- if the fighters weren't standing toe to toe, he would criticize them non-stop and sour the mood -- so would amend that to Lampley/Kellerman/Steward as my favorite team. But Jones was great, too. Not a fan of Foreman's commentary. I agree with others that this is a sports problem generally. The classic old school style has been replaced by people being too loud and focusing on catch phrases.
I agree with some of what you're saying here. Merchant could definitely be a hater at times, and you could tell when he didn't like a fighter. He always despised Floyd for example. But he did have something of a gift for verbally painting the action in the ring in a very illustrative way. I liked how the HBO team was never afraid to disagree with each other, either. Despite some of their individual biases, you felt that they were largely calling it like they saw it. I wish MMA had commentators like that, but Daniel Cormier is the closest they've ever had. Manny Stewart was great, too, as the third guest. He always had great technical knowledge, and he was usually right about the way the fight was transpiring. I never liked Kellerman at all. Big George and Roy both had great personalities that translated well to commentry. There's a lot of fighters who don't have media savvy, and can barely string a sentence together. Lennox Lewis was clearly a much better technical boxer than Roy or George could ever dream of being, but he definitely wasn't blessed with a silver tongue like they were. I never liked his commentary much for that reason.
The guy for the Canelo fight made Adam Smith look like Howard Cosell. I don't know what his name was mumbled throughout the fight. What happened to Ward and Bradley. They were good , especially Ward
I prefer one guy doing all the commentary, like Don Dunphy (my favorite), or Sam Taub on the older stuff, etc. Although A good team is cool too, the HBO guys as mentioned, Marv Albert/Ferdie Pacheco, etc. Also have to mention Gil Clancy, one of the best color commentators ever. An excellent trainer and all-around awesome human being, from all that I've heard of him.
Its an American problem as well. The extremely loud, fake screaming way of commentating. Its tge same with football as well. Some guy scores a tap in and they act like its a world cup winner. I guess they commentate on sports how pipo inzaghi used to celebrate to his goals.
Commentators like Andre Ward, Max Kellerman, Mark Kriegel, and Timothy Bradley are awful. Thank goodness Kellerman is gone from ESPN, but Kriegel is just as bad and Bradley is nearly as bad as Ward. Teddy Atlas was horrible. Joe Tessitore is okay. Chris Mannix and Maya Jama of DAZN are awful. Sugar Ray Leonard is terribly biased. But they now have Darren Barker, Mike Costello and Brian Kenny who are all very good. Lampley and Merchant of HBO were the best commentary team. Roy Jones was generally fair. Al Bernstein is very good, but Steve Farhood is horrible. Some very good commentators include former boxers like Antonio Tarver, Bernard Hopkins, Chris Algeri, and Paulie Malignaggi. Sergio Mora is okay too, he's generally fair and objective. John Scully has been excellent. UK commentator Rawling is awful, but some of the others like Adam Smith are very good. Matthew Macklin, Carl Froch and Tony Bellew are okay, while Johnny Nelson is terrible.
Mauro is awful, his loud obnoxious yelling is like finger nails on a chalkboard. Bernstein is okay and I don't mind Tim Bradley either.
they’re propagandists, not commentators all of these guys could call a fight straight and low key, if they were instructed to…but they aren’t
This content is protected Commentary teams will normally consist of a pundit who knows about as much on boxing as a bloke with min iq in an insane asylum and a technical expert typically former boxers or coaches who sometimes give awful technical insight and talk nonsense or are horribly biased they themselves getting into disputes with the pundits, "any excuses tonight Roy?"