Bob Arum: HBO Fighters vs. PBC Fighters = No Contest!
By Steve Kim
It's an interesting time for the sport of boxing which has seen Premier Boxing Champions [PBC] come onto the scene in 2015. Whatever the intentions are of PBC creator, manager/adviser Al Haymon - it has certainly impacted the business in many ways.
So how has it affected Top Rank and their dealings?
According to Top Rank's CEO Bob Arum - "The only way that it affects it is when you sit down with these fighters and you negotiate a purse. Some of the purses that the PBC has paid are really out-of-whack, so that does have some affect, at least in negotiations. But other than that, no."
"Y'know, since this PBC started, the programming on HBO is unbelievable, better than it ever was."
To Arum, this certainly isn't a coincidence that HBO has played to strong television ratings this year and clearly re-established itself as the top premium cable network for boxing in the United States.
"I think just that everybody is getting together, putting on the best possible match-ups and putting on matches with guys who have real credibility that have been built up on HBO," stated the veteran promoter.
"And I don't want to talk about my fighters, but like ( Gennady) Golovkin and (Sergey) Kovalev, they've become household names. Then ( Akihiro) Honda's little flyweight, Roman Gonzalez, a terrific little fighter.
"So again, when you look at fighters who fight on HBO - compared to all the hundreds, the horde of hundreds on the PBC - there's no contest."
