The “Rocky” and “Creed” films have long boasted boxing champions in their respective casts with loads of announcer and referee cameos. The “Rocky” franchise cast real-life champions like Tommy Morrison and Antonio Traver as antagonists, while “Creed” antagonist Ricky Conlan is played by champion boxer Tony Bellew. It’s a franchise that pulls in real talent and loads of cameos whenever possible.
“Creed III” brings in cameos by some of the very best pound-for-pound fighters in the world. In the circus around Dame’s fight against “Creed III” heavyweight Felix Chavez, champion Saúl “Canelo” Álvarez poses with Adonis, while Terence Crawford is both featured in the fight’s lead-up and later in Adonis’ final training camp.
The film is littered with other cameos, like broadcasters Chris Mannix, Todd Grisham, Jessica McCaskill, Al Bernstein, and Mauro Ranallo, referees Kenny Bayless, Russell Mora, and Tony Weeks, and ring announcers Jimmy Lennon Jr. and David Diamante–and here’s the best detail. DAZN announcer Diamante has a now-unique announcing style with a great boxing history, one that made it into the final film.
While announcing the competing fighters, Diamante repeats the last names once (aka “Damian Anderson… Anderson”). It’s a tradition he borrowed from classic announcers like Mark Bureau and Ed Derian, a throwback to the era when bouts had poor speaker systems. Announcers would repeat the names in order for different parts of an arena to hear the fighters’ names. It’s rare now due to the widespread availability of great AV setups, but it’s a wonderful tradition to include in Diamante’s “Creed III” cameo.