Why do Jim Lampley and Larry Merchant seem to dislike George Foreman -their previous partner- so much?

Question

Why do Jim Lampley and Larry Merchant seem to dislike George Foreman -their previous partner- so much?

Answer 1

Merchant is an A-hole to all boxer. If you ever watch boxing and they have boxer up there with him he acts they he knows more about the game of boxing than they do. Even when he gets into the ring after the fight he cuts them off when they are talking. He has done the same thing to Emanuel Stewart and Lenox Lewis, he treats them like he knows more than them. I really think it bothers him when they get someone that has been in the ring and know more about what it take to win a fight than he does. Someone told me back in the day he use to box, I can't see it.

Answer 2

Give us some examples. Foreman was way better than the semi-retarded Lennox Lewis.

Answer 3

Larry Merchant never boxed a day in his life

Answer 4

The majority of the time it was all in good fun.  Although I do remember a few times when George would argue with Larry Merchant, but then again, everyone has argued with Merchant at one time or another.  I remember in the last round of the Roy Jones, Jr.- John Ruiz fight, George got mad at them becuase he said they were discrediting what Roy had done that night by saying he wouldn't be recognized as a true champion because Lennox Lewis was the true champ at the time.  He said something like: "Don't try to discredit what Roy has done here tonight, you were a part of the build-up to the fight just like everybody else.  He's a heavyweight champion of the world after tonight."  There were also many other times when George would say to Larry something along the lines of "You would have to have been a fighter to understand, Larry."  Roy Jones used to say the same thing to him.  Plus, George used to humorously contradict himself a lot, which may have gotten on their nerves a bit.  All in all, though, I don't think that they hate him or he hates them- they just disagreed sometimes, and it never really got too nasty between them.  It seemed like the majority of the time he got along with them, but there were just a few occasions where they had good-natured arguments.

Answer 5

Because they were all doing something completely different all the time:

Foreman was talking because he thought he had to, usually saying ridiculously exaggerated or contradictory to what he had said moments before;

Merchant hates basically every fighter and every fight ever made, and after random 4 min of complete silence or so says something to that effect; and

Lampley spends entire fights kissing the *** of whichever fighter HBO is looking to push.

The tension would come in whenever they all actually listened to what the others were saying.

Answer 6

This tension can be traced back exactly to April 22 1994. On that night Evander Holyfield was defending his title against Michael Moorer. In the second round Holyfield leveled Michael Moorer with a brutal left hook. None of the 3 judges gave Evander a ten eight round despite the clean knockdown. Worst of all one of the judges Jerry Roth actually scored the round even! In the end Roth's horrible descision ultimately cost Evander his heavyweight championship! The argument was that Moorer was handily winning the round at the time of the knockdown. The argument was insane and everyone covering the fight was livid. Every single HBO commentator had something to say about how questionable this was. These people included Jim Lampley Larry Merchant Harold Ledderman James Brown and a furious George Foreman. In the post fight commentary Foreman stopped just short of saying that the Duva's fixed the fight. George said the following I HAVE SEEN ENOUGH! THE DUVA'S HAVE TOO MANY PIECES OF PAPER IN TOO MANY POCKETS! He went on to say that SOMEBODY IS GOING TO HAVE TO GET TOGETHER AND GET THIS JUNK OUT OF HERE! He then said half jokingly that he'd have to eat a lot of hamburgers to get over this one! HBO began promoting the rebroadcast as DID THE JUDGES GET IT WRONG? The Duva's went into attack mode and threatened to sue. They also moved to have Foreman fired for his allegations. Meanwhile Holyfield was being diagnosed with a heart condition. There would be no immediate rematch. Those two things combined caused HBO to completely do a 180. They feared a lawsuit and profusely apologized to Moorer and the Duva's. The postfight comments were edited in the rebroadcast. Lampley backed down completely and said he called the fight wrong. Merchant did a turnabout as well. NOT GEORGE THOUGH! He remained furious that the heavyweight championship had been reduced to a crooked game. He was also extremely hurt that his fellow commentators and friends left him hung out to dry! George himself dealt out the ultimate justice taking the titles back himself by knocking Moorer out 7 months later. The damage to the HBO team though was done. For the next nine years they remained a team but never without tension. Whenever George felt Jim or Larry were being YES MEN and calling a fight more favorably for an HBO contracted fighter he would boldly challenge them! Courageous commentators like George Foreman are one in a million!

Answer 7

Merchant was probably jealous since his most recent sports experience consisted of taking home his high school jockstrap  every so often for his mom to wash  & Lampley went to the Diego Corales school of wife-beating.

Answer 8

Realize that most of these "talking heads" are frustrated athletes who could never do anything and are jealous of those who can.

They probably think that any ex athlete is not qualified to announce, and it takes a professional speaker with a college education to do their job, so any ex athlete who works with them is not qualified to do their job, and only got there because of their professional athletics.