SHO Executive Stephen Espinoza Interview with Kurt Emhoff

[Kezzer]

Wow does he sound bitter/jealous of DAZN?

[DaBeastO]

espinoza will be a homeless bum when showtime goes out of business.

[KTFOKING]

Wow does he sound bitter/jealous of DAZN?

Sound bitter? Actually no, he just responded to what Hearn/Arum have been saying to the media for the past few weeks.

[KTFOKING]

espinoza will be a homeless bum when showtime goes out of business.

Showtime going out of business? Like the actual network or boxing? Because the actual network isn't going anywhere. Even if they get rid of boxing (highly doubtful), he will still be running the sports department. He's not just the boxing guy at SHO. Espinoza runs LeBron's mini series of "Shut up and Dribble" and other documentaries along with Inside The NFL.

[N/A]

Wow does he sound bitter/jealous of DAZN?

Didn't get that impression at all. Stephen's really not an emotional guy. He's very pragmatic. Before, he was battling HBO. Now, he's battling DAZN. Which do you think he'd rather battle? The 45 year leader that's in tens of millions of homes and has a ton of advantages over him? Or a new app that's in no homes that is starting from scratch and is very limited in their ability to reach casual observers?

If you're Espinoza, the shift in the business is a great thing for him.

[Kezzer]

Didn't get that impression at all. Stephen's really not an emotional guy. He's very pragmatic. Before, he was battling HBO. Now, he's battling DAZN. Which do you think he'd rather battle? The 45 year leader that's in tens of millions of homes and has a ton of advantages over him? Or a new app that's in no homes that is starting from scratch and is very limited in their ability to reach casual observers?

If you're Espinoza, the shift in the business is a great thing for him.

If you want a balanced view then he was clearly want to still be fighting HBO. He knew what he was up against and he had the better of them for several years.

Fighting DAZN is going into the unknown as they are far less predicatable. Do we know how many subscribers they are going to get? Do we know how much they are going to invest?

What we do know is they having already invested big bucks across boxing and other avenues. What other sports will they Go for next to increase subscribers?

They have overpaid to get canelo on board and similarly have done in europe for a sponsorship deal with Ronaldo for example.

The risk is that technological advancement towards apps goes quickly and that showtime is left behind.

[Curt Henning]

If you want a balanced view then he was clearly want to still be fighting HBO. He knew what he was up against and he had the better of them for several years.

Fighting DAZN is going into the unknown as they are far less predicatable. Do we know how many subscribers they are going to get? Do we know how much they are going to invest?

What we do know is they having already invested big bucks across boxing and other avenues. What other sports will they Go for next to increase subscribers?

They have overpaid to get canelo on board and similarly have done in europe for a sponsorship deal with Ronaldo for example.

The risk is that technological advancement towards apps goes quickly and that showtime is left behind.

showtime has an app....you can get it for like 10 bucks a month if you dont have cable...you get their boxing program along with everything else.....geeesh...you think DAZN is the first app in history or something? lol

[Kezzer]

showtime has an app....you can get it for like 10 bucks a month if you dont have cable...you get their boxing program along with everything else.....geeesh...you think DAZN is the first app in history or something? lol

Just look at mobile phones and see how they developed. Nokia had a stranglehold br let it slip because they didn’t understand how things were developing. You never know how it’s going and what the market will react hence why any business leader would prefer certainty if they are in a more dominant position.

DAZN are obviously a year away from really getting started properly as they are only just starting globally from a boxing perspective (Italy, Canada and Germany deals) and have limited sports in America already. So time will tell how they progress and how many subscribers they develop - but you would suggest at first viewing they are ahead of the game when it comes to sport apps.

[N/A]

If you want a balanced view then he was clearly want to still be fighting HBO.

If you want to argue that he SHOULD be more concerned about DAZN, that's fine. Certainly legitimate reasons to make that argument.

But if you're arguing that he IS more concerned about DAZN, from those I stay in touch with from my time at Showtime, the indication that I get is that Stephen prefers to battle DAZN instead of HBO.

HBO has so many subscribers, had so much history, and had so many reporters in their back pocket, that SHO always had an uphill battle, despite offering the best boxing the last few years.

Now SHO gets to inherit the #1 position, with a huge huge head start over DAZN. It could take 30 years for DAZN to ever catch SHO in subscriber numbers. Stephen will be long gone by then. Executives only worry about however long they expect to be around. For Stephen, swapping HBO for DAZN is a huge win for him.