FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Saturday, April 11th, 2015

BOB COSTAS, AL MICHAELS & MARV ALBERT WORK TOGETHER FOR FIRST TIME TONIGHT ON PREMIER BOXING CHAMPIONS ON NBC

Highlights of Costas-Michaels-Albert Show Open

First On-Set Photo of the Trio Below

Brooklyn, NY – April 11, 2015 – Sports broadcasting legends Bob Costas, Al Michaels and Marv Albert worked together for the first time ever on tonight’s PBC on NBC telecast from Barclays Center in Brooklyn.

Returning to their native New York for the telecast (Albert and Michaels are from Brooklyn, Costas from Commack, Long Island), the trio is synonymous with the biggest events in sports – combining to work 25 Super Bowls, 25 NBA Finals, 23 Olympics, 19 World Series, and numerous championship boxing events on television and radio.

Costas presented a feature on the history of boxing in New York. Michaels hosts the broadcast. Albert calls the fights alongside analyst “Sugar” Ray Leonard, the six-time world champion and 1976 Olympic gold medalist. B.J. Flores serves as corner analyst, with Kenny Rice reporting ring-side.

Below is the first on-set photo of the trio as well as highlights of Costas-Michaels-Albert opening the show (high-res, downloadable photo in link):

http://nbcsportsgrouppressbox.com/photo/michaels-costas-albert/

Michaels, Costas, Albert

“New York is the site for a big night of boxing. A sell-out crowd of 12,000 expected here. I’m Al Michaels and this is the second Premier Boxing champions telecast in the series.” – Al Michaels

“This leads us to the man who called 19 innings in seven hours – that was Yankees-Red Sox last night, that’s one ‘Rapping’ Roberto Costas. Fancy meeting you here, by the way.” – Al Michaels

“Thank you Alfalfa, and since we’re all from New York, pretty soon we’ll welcome in ‘Marvelous’ Marv Albert. We remember growing up following this sport, sometimes attending the big fights here. This really was the mecca of boxing. These days, maybe if there’s a city we associate with boxing in the U.S. it has to be Las Vegas, but for much of the 20th century, before the big fights moved to Vegas, the most anticipated and most historic fights often happened here in New York. There are far too many to cite them all, so, with apologies to the likes of Tony Zale, Henry Armstrong, the ‘Cinderella Man’ Jim Braddock, Rocky Graziano, Archie Moore, Jersey Joe Walcott, Rocky Marciano, Emile Griffith, Dick Tiger and so many more, here’s just a small sample of the memorable fights at New York’s iconic venues.” – Bob Costas

“Wladimir Klitschko fought in New York. With apologies to now to Marvin Hagler, let’s welcome in ‘Marvelous’ Marv Albert.” – Costas

“Guys, growing up in Brooklyn, my earliest memories of boxing were produced by my father who would take me to fights in Coney Island – club fights, pro fights – in some rickety, old arena which no longer stands. I got to love the sport, and I would listen to fights on the radio with the blow-by-blow of Don Dunphy and Les Keiter, and I’ll never forget the Floyd Paterson – Ingemar Johansson bouts at Yankee Stadium and Polo Grounds, and of course Friday Night Fights which were brought to everybody across America.” – Marv Albert

“The ‘toonder,’ remember Johansson’s ‘toonder’ upset Floyd Patterson. We all remember Friday nights on NBC, even the Wednesday night fights on ABC, there were Monday night fights. Guys, it’s time for the Saturday night fights.” – Michaels

“You’re doing the heavy lifting” – Michaels to Albert

“You can take the rest of the night off if you wanted.” – Michaels to Costas

“Good to be here with you fellas, however briefly.” – Costas

“Nice of you to drop by, Bob.” – Albert

“A lot shorter than 19 innings at the ballpark.” – Costas

***

NBC and NBCSN will present 20 live PBC on NBC boxing events in 2015. Within the 20 live shows, NBC Sports Group will present more than 50 hours of PBC coverage, including NBCSN pre- and post-fight programming for NBC telecasts. The Premier Boxing Champions series is created for television by Haymon Boxing.  The PBC on NBC will feature many of today’s brightest stars, in their most compelling matches.

All PBC on NBC shows will be streamed live on NBC Sports Live Extra via “TV Everywhere,” giving consumers additional value for their subscription service, and making high quality content available to MVPD customers both in and out of the home and on multiple platforms. NBC Sports Live Extra is available for desktops at NBCSports.com/liveextra. The NBC Sports Live Extra app is available at the App Store for iPad and iPod touch, on select devices within Google Play, and on windows phones and tablets.

–NBC SPORTS GROUP–