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The end of Merchant is near?
I hope this is not true, I like Larry Merchant, and I can't stand Max Kellerman.
Boxing Confidential Exclusive:
HBO Boxing Voice Larry Merchant Out After 29 Years, Mad Max Promoted!!
Michael Marley
4/11/2007
I hope this www.boxingconfidential.com scoop turns out to be as wrong as The Chicago Tribune when it headlined that DEWEY BEATS TRUMANi in 1948. But I don't think my story is wrong. It's not what will happen that is in question...it's when it wil occur.
Having given almost 30 years of meritorious service to HBO Sports as its most critical commentator and having been, for most of that time the cable TV conscience of the sport, I don't think Larry Merchant was expecting a gold watch or anything else at the finish line.
And it looks like the HBO has decided that the Merchant of Venom is at the finsh line. What started as faint drumbeats the past few months has gone from a discernable whisper to a ear-spliting scream. Word around boxing is that HBO is negotiating out a buyout of Merchant's contract and that he will be replaced by young Mad Max Kellerman who will be promoted from the HBO "Boxing After Dark" series to full-time service on HBO Championship Boxing and on the network's PPV shows.
A source familiar with the negotiations told me that Merchant has accepted his professional fate like the consummate professional he is and that he is working out an amicable "divorce" from the broadcast giant.
"You will see Larry alongside Jim Lampley for the May 5 Las Vegas Super Fight between Mayweather and De La Hoya and the May 19 Jermain Taylor-Cory Spinks middleweight title bout in Memphis. Merchant may also work the Bernard Hopkins-Winkly Wright fight July 21 in Vegas. But HBO wants to return to the airwaves in September with Mad Max Kellerman sitting alongside Lampley in Merchant's 29-year role," the source said.
I've had my differences with Merchant over the years. Once, while scribbling for The New York Post, I wrote something about HBO bossman Seth Abraham not needing a family pet when he had an in-house parrot namded Merchant. But, despite disagreements, I've always respected Merchant for his sthyle, his candor and his courage to march to his own drummer on many boxing issues and stories. I believe that people generally talk the way they write and vice versa and Merchant was one helluva sportswriter back in the day.
Name another boxing broadcaster who shows more general respect for the fighters. Can you because I can't.
If it's over, Sir Larry, it's been one helluva run. I hope it's not, that HBO would carve out another role for you on their broadcasts, but if that is not the case then know this: you have given your employer more than you've got.
You may not be the HBO Number One boxing commentator much longer but you could always return to being the Write Man.
HBO had better give you a proper on the air sendoff. That's all I am saying right now. We can talk about demographics, ageism and all the rest later.
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Originally Posted by wacko3205
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