LAS VEGAS -- Keith Thurman and Robert Guerrero delivered a sensational battle Saturday in the main event of the heavily hyped debut of the Premier Boxing Champions series on NBC. It was a fight worthy of the first match on primetime in 30 years on the network, since the night in Reno in 1985 when Larry Holmes successfully defended the heavyweight title against Carl "The Truth" Williams.
Thurman, in particular, was outstanding as he successfully defended his WBA interim welterweight title with a one-sided decision over Guerrero.
But the quality of the NBC broadcast failed to live up to the quality of the action in the ring.
For starters, there were far, far, far too many voices, and it never allowed veteran play-by-play man Marv Albert to get into a groove. Albert had to share the microphone with host Al Michaels, analyst Sugar Ray Leonard and roving reporters Laila Ali, B.J. Flores and Kenny Rice.
Albert was solid and with a little more room could have been outstanding. But he was playing traffic cop much of the night, throwing it to Ali, Flores and Rice constantly, it seemed, and thus never getting into a rhythm. There was far too little news or information of consequence being delivered by the roving reporters and there thus wasn't nearly as much of a need to go to them as often as they did.
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