Comments Thread For: Arum: Showtime/Espinoza at The Heart of The Cold War!

[tre101jac]

You know boxing is whack when it has fans choosing sides over networks. Dumbest crap I've ever seen. What aimless, uninformed fanboy trash. A real fan likes whatever fight is on no matter when or where. Im so ashamed of what fans have turned into and its all Manny and Floyd's fault.

I agree with you but I don't blame Manny or Floyd for the way fans have been! You know **** is crazy when fans fight over T.V. networks! Most fans don't understand they help keep this heated battle going by not pressuring there fighter to fight the best! At the end of the day, Manny, Floyd, Top Rank, GBP, HBO, & Showtime will have there millions in the bank & we the fans will have nothing but "what if".

[mrlopez]

i think arum said it best....

floyd fights on ppv, not reg showtime, so there shouldnt be an issue when it comes fights being made. for all the talk shafter spit about tr not working with other promoters, i only see gb making in house fights. i really think shafter is so much on fmjs side that he's not willing to work with tr for the sake of pissing fmj off!

[jlgonzalez07]

This is coming from the same guy who put Chavez Jr. on PPV against John Duddy on his "Latin Fury" series. Its nothing but sour g****s for the old man. This past year, Showtime put on way better cards than HBO. And it looks like the trend will continue b/c the Peterson/Jean card was way more entertaining than the Garcia/Burgos card.

[sampsonsimpson]

It's not like the cold war started when GBP partnered up with Showtime. All Arum proved with this rant is that he is a shameless hypocrite.

seriously

TR-GB werent matching up long before GB made the jump the showtime

just another lame excuse from bob the builder

[al-Xander]

Arum is right. The Showtime/Mayweather collaboration screwed up subscription-based fights. SHO is spending so much money on Mayweather fights that they have few fight events left for subscribers. Many of their stars are on a long layoff because they are laser- focused on supporting the fake PPV queen with expensive undercards. Just his $40 million guarantee alone will impoverish any network. You don't have to wonder why HBO let him go. They're not really making any money from this guy.

[jas]

You keep talking but have said nothing. If its so obvious why dont you just write why?

Could it be because you have no idea how the economics work? Probably

Promoters foot the bill for a PPV and own the event. They can leverage sponsors or other funding to put on the fight. They recoup all the revenue after expenses (purses, event costs, cable carriers, broadcast fees)

HBO/SHOW/etc. are distributors that broadcast the fight. They make around 10% of the gross and sometimes pay a fee to broadcast the fight a week later. They also work with the promoter to market the fight.

Cable companies carry the fight and make it available to their subscribers (EVEN PEOPLE THAT DONT HAVE HBO or SHOW duhhhhh) and make up to 50% of the gross.

So with this very obvious information why would networks want PPV. Viewers are not watching their channel (they are watching a broadcast, there is a difference) There is a limit on what they can make and they dont own the fight.

When they buy a fight for regular broadcast, then only their subs can see it and they own the broadcasting rights.

This isnt rocket science.

From 2007:

Ross Greenburg, then president of HBO Sports, called the expansion of pay-per-view "the biggest economic issue in boxing" and said:

"I can't tell you that pay-per-view helps the sport because it doesn't. It hurts the sport because it narrows our audience, but it's a fact of life. Every time we try to make an HBO World Championship Boxing fight, we're up against mythical pay-per-view numbers. HBO doesn't make a lot of money from pay-per-view. There's usually a cap on what we can make. But the promoters and fighters insist on pay-per-view because that's where their greatest profits lie."

"It's a big problem," Greenburg continues. "It's getting harder and harder to put fighters like Manny Pacquiao on HBO World Championship Boxing. If Floyd Mayweather beats Oscar, he might never fight on HBO World Championship Boxing again. But if HBO stopped doing pay-per-view, the promoters would simply do it on their own [like Bob Arum did with Cotto-Malignaggi in June 2006] or find someone else who will do it for them."

ill admit , you kno your ****!

[Porter's Dad]

Arum makes some good points, especially about Espinoza - his affiliation with GBP is very problematic - and down the line, when Mayweather has taken his $32m guarantees per fight and retires, I have a feeling Showtime Sports will be in big trouble financially.

However, let's get one thing straight - it was Arum who caused the cold war, before SHO vs HBO was even a thing. When Pac was in the ascendancy, the star of the sport, he stopped doing business with Golden Boy because they had slandered Manny with the PED allegations along with Floyd Jr/Sr. Arum is very much at the heart of these issues.

[JJRod]

Arum makes some good points, especially about Espinoza - his affiliation with GBP is very problematic - and down the line, when Mayweather has taken his $32m guarantees per fight and retires, I have a feeling Showtime Sports will be in big trouble financially.

However, let's get one thing straight - it was Arum who caused the cold war, before SHO vs HBO was even a thing. When Pac was in the ascendancy, the star of the sport, he stopped doing business with Golden Boy because they had slandered Manny with the PED allegations along with Floyd Jr/Sr. Arum is very much at the heart of these issues.

I just don't buy the whole Showtime is broke or will be because of Floyd. I'm pretty sure the network thought long and hard about what financially it was getting itself into before signing Floyd to the massive contract it did. If they guarantee him 32 million it's because they know they'll make up their money and then some in the long run.
Not to mention I feel they've invested wisely in Golden Boy since at least in the immediate future they seem to have the better stable of fighters and produce the better fights. I know I personally subscribed to Showtime last year, because the fights that were being broadcast were worth it to me. The ratings hike that SHO claims it has had the last 2 years shows to me they're doing something right.

[hitking]

Arum is right. The Showtime/Mayweather collaboration screwed up subscription-based fights. SHO is spending so much money on Mayweather fights that they have few fight events left for subscribers. Many of their stars are on a long layoff because they are laser- focused on supporting the fake PPV queen with expensive undercards. Just his $40 million guarantee alone will impoverish any network. You don't have to wonder why HBO let him go. They're not really making any money from this guy.

That's bull****. Showtime is giving us three, sometimes four quality match-ups a telecast. If you dislike of Floyd clouds your mind so much that you fail to appreciate that. All I can say is that you're dumb as f.uck and need to re-evaluate whether you're a real fight fan.

[hitking]

floyd fights on ppv, not reg showtime, so there shouldnt be an issue when it comes fights being made. for all the talk shafter spit about tr not working with other promoters, i only see gb making in house fights. i really think shafter is so much on fmjs side that he's not willing to work with tr for the sake of pissing fmj off!

Floyd fights on Showtime PPV. Which means Showtime would have to deal with Arum in order for Floyd to fight any of his fighters. They don't want to. So if Arum wants any of his guys to get a Floyd fight. He's gonna have to bow out. Case closed understood.