WAIT ---- Pascal vs. Hopkins is on SHOWTIME?!?!

[ИATAS]

I have been saying B-hop is going to win and ruin the LHW division.

Bhop has been known to spoil *****.

Roy Jones vs Trinidad (back when it would have mattered)
Pavlik vs Calzaghe (or Pavlik vs no rehab)

Don't count the old fart out this time either. Pascal vs Bute or Carl Froch. DENIED!!!

Hopkins will never lose to no French Canadian Haitian boy.

[Gino Ros]

well, i'm in.

thanks, SHO

[AllEyesOpen]

I'm sitting here watching some boxing and I see a promo for Pascal vs. Hopkins. I have to do a double-take to realize that it's on SHO.

Did you guys know this?

What is the promotional situation for this fight? Did HBO turn this bout down?

HBO allowed Pascal to fight their boy Dawson but didn't get options on him?

I can't get answers until Monday.... what was the deal here?



Showtime will be putting on their first pay-per-view boxing event since 2007 on December 18, as they're backing the light heavyweight world championship fight between champion Jean Pascal and challenger and living legend Bernard Hopkins.

Dan Rafael reported the signing of the contracts and the fact that it was headed to Showtime PPV, and Corey Erdman of Sirius 98 and The Boxing Bulletin confirmed with Showtime earlier.

From Rafael's report:

Pascal-Hopkins, which had been agreed to earlier this month, will take place in Quebec City and mark Hopkins' return to Showtime. Schaefer said he has finalized a deal for the network to produce and distribute the fight as a Showtime pay-per-view.

"Showtime will be using their announcers and doing it like a first-class Showtime broadcast. Showtime is excited about it and so are we," Schaefer said.

Showtime has not been associated with a pay-per-view event since November 23, 2007, when they backed the fight between Fernando Vargas and Ricardo Mayorga.

Pascal (26-1, 16 KO) won the vacant lineal light heavyweight championship in August, starting a new line that will hopefully not get interrupted any time soon. His win over a heavily-favored Chad Dawson is in the running for Upset of the Year.

Now he'll face Hopkins (51-5-1, 32 KO), who will be fighting just about a month shy of his 46th birthday. The former middleweight and light heavyweight champion hasn't had what many would consider a tough fight on paper in two years, when he dominated then-middleweight champ Kelly Pavlik at a 170-pound catchweight. Since then, Hopkins has fought twice. He beat Enrique Ornelas in a tune-up bout last December, a fight meant to set up a long overdue rematch with Roy Jones Jr.

Jones lost his fight on the same day in Australia to Danny Green, which in the end didn't change plans at all. Hopkins and Jones both looked downright terrible in their horrifying April rematch, with Hopkins taking a unanimous decision that was wide on the scores but is hard to call dominant, given that Jones barely fought at all and Hopkins' performance is most memorable for his writhing about on the canvas in what appeared to most observers to be little shy of a B-movie acting performance.

But Hopkins has in recent years showed up for serious challenges. He decimated Pavlik and Antonio Tarver, was competitive with Joe Calzaghe and a young Jermain Taylor in three highly-disputed losses, and thoroughly beat Winky Wright. Jean Pascal gets a chance to retire a legend, but so did all of those other guys, and they couldn't do it.

HBO Dropped B-Hop like a bad habit, pretty cold but then again B-Hop had been going down hill, lackluster fights, faking low blows to get extended breaks, **** like that.

[Southpawology]

Paulie's "welterweight" debut is against a guy who was KO'd by Valero and Santa Cruz, who weren't even junior welterweights. It's not nearly a TV worthy fight.

i dont buy that...there's a sh.it load of undercards that get televised that are alot worse than paulie vs some bum

[mgsooner]

i dont buy that...there's a sh.it load of undercards that get televised that are alot worse than paulie vs some bum

On ShoBox or ESPN maybe. Not on major Showtime or HBO telecasts.

[Heru]

HBO passed on the fight and I don't blame them. Hopkins commands over $3M per fight, combine that with him having a 50/50 split or close to it and you're talking about over $6M for what's sure to be a **** fight and not a guarantee to get the ratings to justify the expense.

[-EX-]

I had almost forgot about the entire fight with some of the other fights we just had...hope Bernard turns back the clock...

[Kevin Malone]

The main reason why this fight went from PPV to Showtime is because of Dirrell dropping out of the Super 6 (Ward v Bika was a lot cheaper than Ward v Dirrell would have been). Showtime had some more money in their boxing budget.