Television Can Blow Me Read Online Free PDF Page A

be 140 years old. He may stink of vodka. He may have pissed off every boxer, trainer and promoter in the business. But Larry Merchant is a true original, a broadcasting giant and a fearless sayer of the unsaid in boxing.
    Merchant has always understood that boxing is a gigantic hype machine that spirals out of control if it is not checked and challenged. Fighters painting themselves as fearless warriors while avoiding every difficult opponent out there; alphabet soup title belts not worth the leather they’re made with; meaningless turd jousts presented as must-see pay-per-view extravaganzas. Nobody clears a path through the horseshit in boxing like Larry Merchant. As Vernon Forrest thanked God and his trainer after his gift decision over Ike Quartey, Merchant innocently asked him “Would you also like to thank the judges?”
    Determined never to be a cheerleader for boxing, Larry sees the fight game from a fan’s perspective and it’s often caused him trouble. After Don King and HBO fighter Mike Tyson shamelessly tried to overturn Buster Douglas’s legitimate knockout victory over Tyson, Merchant asked difficult questions and King and Tyson tried to get him the sack. To their eternal credit, HBO stood by their man and told the rapist and the murderer to go fuck themselves which they duly did. Merchant’s assessment of Tyson as “an emotionally-disturbed washed-up sociopath” is typically astute.
    With his unique pausing speech and bizarre analogies, his broadcasting style has authentic character - in sharp contrast to so many of the boilerplate presenter droids you see around today. Ever willing to criticise an HBO house fighter if necessary, his knowledge and love of the sport have nonetheless always shone through.
    The only time HBO should be taking his microphone is when they prise it out of his cold, dead hands.
    Larry Merchant - boxing legend and broadcasting pioneer. Respect is due.

606 with Danny Baker
    Like Aerial Telly, Danny Baker is a flawed genius. Aerial Telly has spoken about his own so-called alleged “flaws” and would like to talk about Danny Baker’s. He’s an arrogant and won’t heed counsel. His television work is horrible. Listening to his Radio 1 show was like watching a beautiful woman pull a razor blade across her face 1 and left us at the mercy of the Sendero Luminoso talent free 1FM house music junta for the next 10 years. Nevertheless, Aerial Telly does not come here to rag on Danny Baker, but to give him a pound and a bear hug. Because when this motherfucker is in the zone there’s no one who can touch him. 606 with Danny Baker has returned. The only 606. The original, accept no imitations, back-caught-you-looking-for-the-same-thing, distilled in Lynchburg, Tennessee 606 with Danny Baker. Motherfucker, what?
    The strange thing about Baker is that he knows nothing about football. It’s probably the only thing he knows nothing about. Ferociously intelligent, with an insatiable appetite for culture high, low or subterranean, he takes the theological stance that “football is chaos” and, rather like the Catholic Church telling cosmologists not to study the origin of the universe because it is the work of God and to study it is to blashpheme, he seems to think that an understanding of the mechanics of football - tactics, training, formation - will rob it of its magic.
    What he does know about is being a football fan. A Millwall fan no less. The parade of burlesque caricatures that pass through a club like Millwall - managers, players, fans - provide rich inspiration for talk-show topics. But to notice these things is an act of creation. The Chicken Judas, Keggy Keegle, Camp Lawrenson - these things already existed as Platonic Ideals but it took a particular mind to draw them in from the immaterial world and make them flesh. Danny Baker is that mind.
    He hits the ground running on his return. He wonders if Rory Delap achieves his throw-in prowess by means of a reptilian tale. This