It was Friday May 23 and it was time for our regular monthly 'boxing' lunch. A chance for a few of us remaining boxing degenerates to talk about the sport and upcoming fights at our usual spot, the Water Grill in Santa Monica. The likes of manager, Gary Gittelsohn, producer, Alan Swyer and sometimes noted scribes Mark Kreigel and Doug Fischer get together. But the centerpiece of these summits is Larry Merchant.
At 94 years young, the guy still likes to talk boxing. He can't help himself. Boxing isn't just what he covered, it became something deeply ingrained in him.
"I guess it's just something built into me," he explained on this pleasant afternoon. "The first fight that I can recall is the rematch between Joe Louis and Max Schmeling, that my father allowed me to stay up late for. But Joe Louis took care of that so I didn't have to stay up too late, and I became a Joe Louis fan. He became an American hero.''
HBO Sports
So yeah, ol Lar' was there for 'the Brown Bomber' and now Jake Paul. He's seen it all as a fan, newspaper man, broadcaster, and now a still-interested observer.
Merchant continued, "Look, I've been involved with many sports as a sportswriter, and so on before I went into boxing at HBO. Being around boxing, boxing people, we're a dying breed. I'm probably close to that end game and so are a lot of people out there who were once upon a time boxing fans."
The lunches usually take place on a Friday when everyone is in town and available. The Water Grill is the go-to spot as it's down the block from Merchant, who prefers that we take a table on the outside dining area. Merchant enjoys the dialogue and really just reminiscing. We'll even debate and argue, but not quite like the way he and Floyd Mayweather did that one time.
But most of all, he still likes to stay updated on the current state of the fight game. For a younger guy like me, I still find him to be an invaluable source of knowledge. And fans on social media tell me that they still have an interest in what he has to say.
After all, how many people do you know that are still around that went to Ali-Frazier I? For a couple of generations of fans he was the sage voice of HBO's boxing franchise alongside the likes of Jim Lampley and Emanuel Steward. We are now in an era of housemen and hucksters who toe the party line. Merchant on the other hand pulled no punches and wasn't afraid to call out his own network when it was warranted. There will never be another like him -- it's just simply not allowed. Nowadays, they want the hard-sell, not the hard truth.
It's been awhile since he's been on a boxing broadcast, but he still watches the sport intently. Like the rest of us he was disappointed in how the first two cards on Cinco De Mayo weekend played out.
Riyadh Season
"The stunt, putting a fight in Times Square to help promote their brand, and the other fight the next and so on, was a fabulous idea. Unfortunately, it had the opposite result. If anybody was going to watch the fights the next two nights they were discouraged by those bad matches," said Merchant, who would've had a field day if he was on the telecast watching the likes of Ryan Garcia and Devin Haney on that evening.
Speaking of which, yeah, mark him down as someone who has no interest in seeing Garcia-Haney II at the moment.
''I'm not going to make it a point of my night. I'll find something else to do, probably," said Merchant, with a chuckle. "I don't think it deserves our loyalty," said Merchant, who also was rather nonplussed by the Saul Alvarez-William Scull fight that weekend in Saudi Arabia.
So what are his thoughts on Canelo-Terence Crawford in September?
Fatal Fury
"I don't think what we saw in Canelo on that Saturday night was the Canelo that we remember and have imprinted on us. I don't see how you can judge him because of the opponent, who was there to run the 800 meter at the Olympics," Merchant stated. "I still like Canelo in the fight with Crawford. But you can't dismiss Crawford, he's always found a way to win by changing styles and going left-handed, and doing stuff in there. I'll be curious to see what he does versus the bigger guy."
On May 4, the weekend was salvaged -- if not -- saved by the dynamic Naoya Inoue.
Merchant says, "I thought, 'this is a throwback.' There is almost no one like him. He's as good, as entertaining, as thrilling as anyone around. He saved that horrible weekend, he made it memorable for those of us who think about prizefighting, as I call it. I love him.
"I just wish we had 10 Inoue's around and then we could capture more asses in more seats."
Mikey Williams/Top Rank
Looking ahead, the boxing schedule is a bit tepid (to put it kindly) till the summer. What is Merchant looking forward to? "The third fight between the light heavyweights (Dmitry Bivol and Artur Beterbiev), I will have to watch," said Merchant, who also has a keen interest in heavyweight champion, Oleksandr Usyk, who faces Daniel Dubois in July.
We'll meet up again in a few weeks. In-between we'll all stay in touch on a group text, and I'll email Larry some pertinent stuff about boxing, which included fight links and clips. He'll even buzz me about the fights that take place. Merchant has seen every stage that boxing has been through in the hierarchy of American sports. While he still has a passion for the game, he's realistic about its standing.
Riyadh Season
"It's an occasional punch in the nose. It's an occasional good thing out of our memory but it's long gone as a favorite sport of the American public,'' he admits. "But it's still a big deal in the UK, a few other places, certainly Japan. And that's fine, I want to see Inoue, I want to see good fighters still
"This is a habit I can't get rid of."