The HBO Budget Crisis and What it Means

[mathed]

I read about how they're trying to learn from last year's fights and schedule their fights around college football and basketball as competition. They were very careful not to put anything on during the NFL playoffs. I'm guessing this could have something to do with it. The NBA playoffs will be over in June.

If people can't see the problem, that is an even bigger problem. Everyone jumped ship to PBC because Hymen was getting guys over a million dollars for chump fights. Now every fighter wants to make that no matter who they fight and there is absolutely no money being spent on building the sport.

Boxers' paychecks are too inflated but no one will want to take a paycut now that the precedent has been set.

[bballchump11]

If people can't see the problem, that is an even bigger problem. Everyone jumped ship to PBC because Hymen was getting guys over a million dollars for chump fights. Now every fighter wants to make that no matter who they fight and there is absolutely no money being spent on building the sport.

Boxers' paychecks are too inflated but no one will want to take a paycut now that the precedent has been set.

I do agree that fighter's purses are probably going to have to take a cut. One thing I've noticed with the way Haymon pays his fighters though is that he pays them close to the same amount from fight to fight. If it is a big fight, they'll get just a slight bump up.
I guess that's the strategy. Pay them $1 million for fights that deserve $500K and make it up by paying them $1.5 million for fights that deserve $2 million. Here's an example.

Robert Guerrero
1,200,000 Garcia
1,000,000 Martinez
1,225,000 Thurman
1,000,000 Kamegai
1,000,000 Berto
3,000,000 Mayweather

Guerrero barely got a raise from Kamegai to Thurman. Thurman has a pretty decent fanbase in California too. Then again barely gets a raise to fight Garcia.

Now compare it to HBO and Top Rank fighters.

Timothy Bradley
1,900,000 Rios
1,500,000 Vargas
2,000,000 Chaves
6,000,000 Pacquiao II
4,100,000 Marquez
1,750,000 Provodnikov
1,300,000 Casamayor
5,000,000 Pacquiao
1,100,000 Alexander
230,000 Peterson

look how much Bradley's purses fluctuates not counting the fights on ppv.

[.!WAR MIKEY!.]

I dont see the problem, HBO is gonna be putting on alot less shows not because they dont have the budget (the budget was changed to reflect the landscape), when the decision awas mde to cut HBO boxing budget it was because boxing landscape, haymon fighters are fighting on PBC or showtime, Top rank is looking to move to exlusively to showtime. GBP doesnt have the rodster to support a full HBO year long sechdule. So HBO boxing budget doesnt need that much.

[Sweet Jones]

PBC being better than HBO is what you guys wanted though. "Al Haymon, Al Haymon, I got these cheeseburgers." "Haymon is changing boxing! Haymon is boxings hero! Savior Haymon!"

Be real with yourself, you and many others wanted Haymon to change things so bad, you forgot that it was just fine the way it was. Now, crappy matchups are the norm rather than the exception because guys like you accepted such mediocrity because "boxing is a business".

You guys wanted it like this. Don't complain now.

No, it wasn't. There is a reason boxers are rejecting en masse the old 'promoter-and-network-run-my-career' model.

[kej718]

I will be going to the Spence fight (already got my tickets), and I went to the Jacobs fight and that had a pretty big crowd from what I saw.
HBO hurts itself by talking bad about their own fighters, and then trying to get us to buy PPV of foreign fighters and wonder why it doesn't sell. They really don't have much outside of Canelo and keep preventing the fights we want to see unless it is on their network.

[kej718]

If people can't see the problem, that is an even bigger problem. Everyone jumped ship to PBC because Hymen was getting guys over a million dollars for chump fights. Now every fighter wants to make that no matter who they fight and there is absolutely no money being spent on building the sport.

Boxers' paychecks are too inflated but no one will want to take a paycut now that the precedent has been set.

The PBC has fights on regular TV now, I think that helps to build the sport. You talk about fighters purse but they can only fight a certain amount of times a year, and then they have to pay taxes, trainers, and other expenses. What you will never see is how much they were paying managers before Haymon. Danny Garcia has a video on YouTube where he talks about how much he made before Al Haymon and after he signed with him (I would rather see a guy get over paid for risking his life and well being that under paid to be honest with you.).

Arum and Haymon are already millionaires, and any time a fighter goes into that ring it could be his last fight so they should cash out any chance they get. If it was me I would do the same.

Last year HBO had the better match ups but this year Haymon seems to be putting on the better cards.

Keith Thurman - Shawn Porter
Abner Mares - Fernando Montiel
Anthony Joshua - Charles Martin
Errol Spence Jr. - Chris Algieri
Krzysztof Glowacki - Steve Cunningham

He is also working with other promoters to make these fights:
Gennady Golovkin - Dominic Wade
Anthony Joshua - Charles Martin
Saul 'Canelo' Alvarez - Amir Khan (is he still with Haymon)

Plus we have these fights being discussed:
Badou Jack - Julio Cesar Chavez Jr.
Adonis Stevenson - Andrzej Fonfara
Deontay Wilder - Alexander Povetkin
Andre Berto - Victor Ortiz

[HeroBando]

No, it wasn't. There is a reason boxers are rejecting en masse the old 'promoter-and-network-run-my-career' model.

Then they better hope there's a hedge fund around to pay their purses, since there's a handful of guys that can make any money at the gate, never mind on ppv

[Sweet Jones]

Then they better hope there's a hedge fund around to pay their purses, since there's a handful of guys that can make any money at the gate, never mind on ppv

Considering that we're talking about the increasingly shrinking pot of money from HBO that almost exclusively funded the vast majority of these major promoters' fights/purses, then I would say those promoters need to get off their azz and see if they can find new revenue sources just like Haymon did.

[HeroBando]

Considering that we're talking about the increasingly shrinking pot of money from HBO that almost exclusively funded the vast majority of these major promoters' fights/purses, then I would say those promoters need to get off their azz and see if they can find new revenue sources just like Haymon did.

Problem is finding sustainable ones. Used to be you could depend on HBO, and Sho to lesser extent to subsidize the very high purses many of these non draws command. Boxing was lucky like that for a fringe sport

[Mitchell Kane]

shrinking pot of money from HBO that almost exclusively funded the vast majority of these major promoters' fights/purses

And that's because SHO has been basically under Haymon/Schaefer control since Stephen Espinoza took over in 2011.

And more recently, Haymon's hedge fund money has helped bump other promoters off networks like ESPN2 and FOX Sports 1, which were useful in helping build some fighters to the HBO/SHO level.

These time buys won't be around forever, so let's see what happens in a year or two if/when some of these networks open themselves up to other promoters.