Comments Thread For: HBO Sports Issues Statement on Decision To Drop Boxing

[!! Shawn]

I don't think people are celebrating the end of HBO Boxing. I myself am a little sadden only because I grew up watching it but I also grew up playing Nintendo and doesn't mean I continue to play Nintendo today.

HBO boxing in many aspects was a black eye to boxing and one of the reasons many fights didn't get made. The battle between showtime and HBO is over which allows matchups to now be made between Fighters that belong to each company.

Somewhere in the life of boxing, boxing became less about rankings and champions and more about alliances and money. Gone are the days where promoters and networks co-promoted fights and the best fought the best.

HBO leaving now opens up the door to some great matchups potentially happening. Let's hope that showtime, ESPN, PBC, and Dazn take this opportunity to come together and bring boxing back!

Its just incredibly strange that we have people who are fans of networks and promoters and managers, instead of fights, fighters, and boxing.

HBO is the most storied brand in boxing. They had great production value. They have been slowly stepping out of the industry for years.

That a brand that has been in boxing for 45 years is deciding to get out of the game isnt good for anyone.

[elfag]

They had nobody left. Haymond and Arum both jumped ship.

I am a bit concerned though that a lot of promoters are getting more intertwined with the networks and signing exclusive content deals. Like Arum with ESPN. And Matchroom with DAZN.

Can fighters even be independant now? So lets say Canelo wants to still use GBP, if he wants to fight on ESPN, does he have to work through arum since they have an exclusive contract? What about showtime, can he go directly to them or does he have to go through Haymond? DAZN has an exclusive contract, so would he have to pay BOTH matchroom AND GBP?

[Motofan]

Sad, sad day. In their prime there was nothing like a great HBO telecast. It looked, sounded and felt like an event. The best fighters, best announcers, everything. But hey, their shows have mostly been **** for years so it is what it is. Nothing, to me, will ever capture that feel again. I love Showtime but they have always felt like the cheap version of HBO. ESPN and the rest feel like I'm watching a local toughman competition on a local public access channel. The look, sound, and feel are trash. Oh well. HBO did nothing to prevent this and they had years.

[elfag]

Its just incredibly strange that we have people who are fans of networks and promoters and managers, instead of fights, fighters, and boxing.

HBO is the most storied brand in boxing. They had great production value. They have been slowly stepping out of the industry for years.

That a brand that has been in boxing for 45 years is deciding to get out of the game isnt good for anyone.

HBO used to be the best and Showtime was second rate. Even my old man noticed and used to clown showtime with their cheesy "its show time..." announcement they used to just flick the lights on and off real quick, while HBO had a higher quality.

That was a few years back though and they basically had no fighters left now.

[Sweet_Science2]

Cu

Agreed. HBO has a rich Boxing history. Leonard vs Haglar, Tyson vs Douglas, Chavez vs Taylor, I can go on and further back in time. Showtime boxing program spends money on the wrong things. Instead of investing on better production value they spend money on getting more announcers. Showtime does not even show punchstats.

Yes, boxing is on other channels now, but now we have to sit through commercials, we do not get to hear what is going on between rounds. ESPN seems to think its ok to advertise a show, but then let other sows run late and us boxing fans miss anywhere from 3 rds to an entire fight.

PBS failed in spectacular fashion. They lost all the channels they initially signed up with and now they are only with FOX. And I doubt they they will honor their new contract with FOX since Haymon cannot seem to get his fighters to fight each other often enough.

This is not a day to celebrate. Those who are celebrating HBO leaving boxing are petty, immature babies. They are not true boxing fans if they think HBO dropping boxing is a good thing.

PBC has failed f@ggot? Shut your hating pussie ass up. These are facts Haymon just signed a nasty TV deal this year. Wilder vs Fury is a big fight with great PBC fights all year.

And HBO just dropped boxing. These are facts pussie. Haymon and PBC/Showtime are running boxing.

In 2013 when Floyd went to Showtime damage was done. Sweet justice for hating ******* like you who spoke bad on Haymon a dude who doesn't do interviews.

I know it hurts your heart pussie and lil g the hype machine leaves with getting his ass whooped and face busted. I love it

[BM dnobagaV]

Sad, sad day. In their prime there was nothing like a great HBO telecast. It looked, sounded and felt like an event. The best fighters, best announcers, everything. But hey, their shows have mostly been **** for years so it is what it is. Nothing, to me, will ever capture that feel again. I love Showtime but they have always felt like the cheap version of HBO. ESPN and the rest feel like I'm watching a local toughman competition on a local public access channel. The look, sound, and feel are trash. Oh well. HBO did nothing to prevent this and they had years.

Good post..

[!! Shawn]

HBO used to be the best and Showtime was second rate. Even my old man noticed and used to clown showtime with their cheesy "its show time..." announcement they used to just flick the lights on and off real quick, while HBO had a higher quality.

That was a few years back though and they basically had no fighters left now.

HBO was the Marquee, and Showtime Paid for individual fights.

It was a beautiful symbiosis. HBO had all the big name fights and unifications, and Showtime, had the Coralles-Castillos, and the Marquez-Vazquezes.

Then a large portions of HBO's marquee names stable moved to Showtime, and Showtime abandoned its pay for the best fights mantra, and the quality of matchups we have seen since then has been really disappointing.

I mean honestly, as a fan, the frequency of relevant fights has just gone down hill so quickly since.

The whole market went from HBO for Marquee, Sho for great fights, and Friday Night Fights to watch young talent develop.

Today the market has shattered into 1000 peices. Boxing on so many different networks, you never know what is on and when and what network.

Hopefully DAZN becomes the new mainstay of boxing. As a streaming service that I can get on my TV that is international.

Hopefully we can start getting great fights again in one place from all over the world.

[jdp28tx]

I don't think people are celebrating the end of HBO Boxing. I myself am a little sadden only because I grew up watching it but I also grew up playing Nintendo and doesn't mean I continue to play Nintendo today.

HBO boxing in many aspects was a black eye to boxing and one of the reasons many fights didn't get made. The battle between showtime and HBO is over which allows matchups to now be made between Fighters that belong to each company.

Somewhere in the life of boxing, boxing became less about rankings and champions and more about alliances and money. Gone are the days where promoters and networks co-promoted fights and the best fought the best.

HBO leaving now opens up the door to some great matchups potentially happening. Let's hope that showtime, ESPN, PBC, and Dazn take this opportunity to come together and bring boxing back!

That is naive. Fights will continue to not get made. The only difference is HBO will not be involved. ESPN fighters will not fight Showtime fighters and DANZ fighters will not fight ESPN or Showtime fighters. The same **** just different networks.

[jdp28tx]

HBO was the Marquee, and Showtime Paid for individual fights.

It was a beautiful symbiosis. HBO had all the big name fights and unifications, and Showtime, had the Coralles-Castillos, and the Marquez-Vazquezes.

Then a large portions of HBO's marquee names stable moved to Showtime, and Showtime abandoned its pay for the best fights mantra, and the quality of matchups we have seen since then has been really disappointing.

I mean honestly, as a fan, the frequency of relevant fights has just gone down hill so quickly since.

The whole market went from HBO for Marquee, Sho for great fights, and Friday Night Fights to watch young talent develop.

Today the market has shattered into 1000 peices. Boxing on so many different networks, you never know what is on and when and what network.

Hopefully DAZN becomes the new mainstay of boxing. As a streaming service that I can get on my TV that is international.

Hopefully we can start getting great fights again in one place from all over the world.

It is because what Haymon was doing to HBO he just went to Showtime and did the same thing. Low quality fights and big licensing fees for them. The only way Haymon keeps getting away with this is because he probably gives Espinoza a kick-back.

[richardt]

I definitely didn’t mean that either. I’m talking about the minority who have some sort of strange loyalty to channels and constantly bash anything non pbc related. You can be obtuse if you want but I think you know what I mean. I have nothing against pbc at All. In fact I recently went to the Garcia vs porter fight when I was in nyc and I had an amazing time.

There are also the people who attack PBC just because of an obvious BIAS and then those same people will watch every PBC show.