He has been in several television shows, but is better known for his participation in the HBO Boxing series. He works alongside Larry Merchant and Roy Jones, Jr. in that series.
Lampley's career as a broadcaster began in 1974, when he was chosen among others in what ABC called a talent hunt. ABC executives thought that Lampley's youthful looks would make him endearing to the college crowds they looked to attract for their college football games. At ABC, he covered such events as baseball games, the 1986-87 Indianapolis 500, five Olympics, as well as the program Wide World of Sports.

In 1987, Lampley moved to CBS, where he took over duties as sports news anchor on the daily news show in Los Angeles, and also was a correspondent. That same year, he began working for HBO, covering the boxing fights and HBO's annual telecast of Wimbledon. He also attended the Albertville Olympics in 1992, as a news anchor for CBS. Lampley left his wife when he began an affair with his co-worker, local news woman Bree Walker, whom he later married.

That same year, Lampley moved to NBC, where he helped cover the 1992 Barcelona Olympics and the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. Before the Atlanta games, in 1995, he began working at the Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel HBO series. For his participation in that show, he has earned three Emmy awards. In 1998, he covered the Nagano Olympics and the Goodwill Games for Turner, and in 2000, he covered the Sydney Olympics, again for NBC.

Most casual fans, however, probably know Lampley more than anything else, for his work on the almost monthly, occasionally twice-a-month HBO Boxing show, and on the show's Pay Per View version. As commentator in that show, he has had the opportunity to call some of boxing's most famous moments, such as Thunder Meets Lightning, when Julio Cesar Chavez saved himself from a decision defeat by knocking out Meldrick Taylor (who was leading the fight on two of the three official scorecards) with only two seconds to go in the last round; the fight where James "Buster" Douglas upset Mike Tyson for the world's Heavyweight championship; and the first Riddick Bowe-Andrew Golota fight, where a riot was formed after the fight. In a rare moment where Lampley's personal life inter-connected with his on camera personality, he told the audience that they were telling him to try to close the show, but that he had a 16 year old daughter somewhere in the middle of that riot and he needed to go and look for her.

Lampley's movie production company, Crystal Spring Productions, has produced a handful of movies, including 2000's Welcome to Hollywood. The company has plans of producing a movie about tennis player Pancho Gonzalez, with Benjamin Bratt in the leading role.

Lampley is the owner of two restaurants in Utah, both of which are named the Lakota restaurant and bar. He is the father of three girls and one boy, and he resides in Rancho Santa Fe, California.

In 2004, Lampley was the daytime anchor for NBC's Olympics coverage for the 2004 Summer Olympics, as well as anchoring the USA Network's coverage of the Games.

In 2005, Lampley turned political and began posting on the Huffington Post, where he revealed his belief that George W. Bush stole the 2004 election via vote tampering in Ohio. [1] He also had to retract a claim that American deaths in Iraq are several times higher than official reports after finding out his source was fraudulent. [2] [3]

In 2006, Lampley served as a central correspondent for the 2006 Winter Olympics which aired on the networks of NBC Universal. Torino 2006 was the 13th Olympics Lampley covered, surpassing the record set by America's original voice of the Olympics, Jim McKay.

In addition to hosting Olympic coverage and commentating on boxing, Jim Lampley can often be heard on The Jim Rome Show as a substitute host. Rome considers Lampley to be one of the most intelligent people he's interviewed on the show.