The Best TV Announcer of All-Time

[dempseyfire]

Jack Drees would probably be near my tops. Good insightful commentary but little of the ra ra BS. Chuck Hodges also was good in that he didn't overdo the commentary but he showed enthusiasm for the sport.

Cossell is hit or miss. His theatrical style could really add excitement to a fight and make a great fight even better, but sometimes he just got in a cranky mood and hammered down on unimportant points in a fight. People remember his great Ali broadcasts but he had a lot of ones in which he seemed to be hating what he was doing.

Dunphy was good and dependable, but doesn't really add much flair to the broadcasts due to his radio background. Just compare his call of Foreman-Frazier to Cosell's. Dunphy was almost too cool at times.

Bernstein's analysis is always spot-on. Not the greatest voice to listen to but definitely the best TV analyst in the sport of the last two decades.

Percheco is definitely near the worst. He didn't know much about boxing and would spout on about stuff he knew nothing about. Him and Bobby C were an awful team; one reason why the Showtime broadcasts of the 90s always seemed a rung below its HBO counterparts.
Lampley started off solid but as we all know became too much of an HBO house fighter cheerleader.

Sheridan . . . ugh, can't stand him. For all of the fights he's watched, his scoring is usually horrible and he never shuts up. It's great he loves the sport, but not a fan of his broadcasts.

[witherspoon]

Here's one you may have overlooked...Jim Healy, best known for calling the Thursday night Olympic Auditorium fights from the early to mid-70s.
More glib than most announcers of that era, Healy was a veteran sports broadcast/ journalist who smoothly called the action nearly 52 weeks a year.


Always remember him for ducking under a ringside table during one of those unpopular decision riots and calling out in a shaky voice "Good Night (long pause) from the
Olympic!" as the sound of breaking bottles echoed
around him."
Also would practically sing out "It's alllllll oveeeeeer" when a referee stopped a fight.
Still remains a memorable character from my youth and
one of boxing's best, unsung announcers.

This guy was brilliant, discovered him a couple of years ago when I was watching Olivares-Chacon-Lopez fights on DVD, never caught his name or I would have mentioned him earlier.

Also who remembers Ruben Castillo calling an early MAB fight which ended with a brutal body punch KO?
His reaction to the slo-mo was a memorable 'ohhhh shiiiit!'.

[SenorPipino]

Ruben was a crackup. One of the all-time great unprofessional color man broadcasters.
I remember the night he was calling the Forum action with Chick Hearn (definitely not one of the best boxing TV announcers) and Chick remarked that one of the fighter's was "running out of gas."
Ruben quickly replied, "There's 2 places you don't want to run out of gas. In the ring or in Watts."
You could hear the sound of the broadcast microphones being turned off for the next 30 seconds or so. My guess is that either Hearn, the director or both were scolding Ruben about alienating viewers in the Watts community.
A few months later during the Forum fights, Castillo got a chance to make amends. This time when commenting on a fighter running low on energy, Ruben quipped "There's 2 places you don't want to run out of gas. In the ring or in my neighborhood."
Ruben usually seemed unprepared but was entertaining anyway. What's he doing these days?

[Rover]

Ruben was a crackup. One of the all-time great unprofessional color man broadcasters.
I remember the night he was calling the Forum action with Chick Hearn (definitely not one of the best boxing TV announcers) and Chick remarked that one of the fighter's was "running out of gas."
Ruben quickly replied, "There's 2 places you don't want to run out of gas. In the ring or in Watts."
You could hear the sound of the broadcast microphones being turned off for the next 30 seconds or so. My guess is that either Hearn, the director or both were scolding Ruben about alienating viewers in the Watts community.
A few months later during the Forum fights, Castillo got a chance to make amends. This time when commenting on a fighter running low on energy, Ruben quipped "There's 2 places you don't want to run out of gas. In the ring or in my neighborhood."
Ruben usually seemed unprepared but was entertaining anyway. What's he doing these days?

I liked him, too. He also did some interpreting for HBO.

[chucktaylor]

Col. Bob Sheridan = GOAT Announcer.
Yes; he is a blowhard, but that's why his "blow-by-blow" is easily the best. He makes boring fights seem like tear-ups.

[cavalo1]

teddy atlas---best ever

[actjac]

Mauro Ranallo and Barry Tompkins