With Top Rank’s deal to air boxing on ESPN currently slated to end in or around August 2025, the promotional company is in the process of looking at another home, or potentially multiple homes, to broadcast boxing. Top Rank could also remain in some fashion with the “Worldwide Leader in Sports.”
That’s according to Todd DuBoef, Top Rank’s president,.
“We are out there talking to everybody,” DuBoef said. “We actually love our partnership with ESPN. It’s so interesting because we’ve seen the deck change so much with the other sports. It’s been wonderful to watch. If it’s the NBA going to three media partners, the NFL’s at five. And then also looking at the perspective between legacy media and technology companies. Even compounding that, are you only looking at domestic rights or are you looking at global rights? I think all of these things are on the table. We’re really excited about what this next chapter looks like.”
DuBoef confirmed to Helwani that Top Rank is able to speak with other suitors. He wouldn’t commit to making an announcement by a certain date, however.
“I don’t want a clock on us,” he said. “I really want to make sure we make the right decisions. We have a team of agents at CAA [Creative Artists Agency] that do our media rights and are terrific at it. And that we come up with a really good strategy, looking at what’s the best platform. [...] We have to look at everybody. I think this is an exciting time. I’m not sure exactly on the timing. We’re not going to be rushed on the timing. We want to make sure we have the right partners in place.”
And DuBoef said that ESPN isn’t necessarily going to follow HBO and Showtime and stop showing boxing as a whole.
“We’re actually having conversations with ESPN as well,” he said. “We’ve had a great relationship with them. What it looks like after we go out into the marketplace and start talking to them and talking to the other players, we’ll see if there’s a place for them in our content stack. Obviously the guys there have been longtime relationships [...] so I really value them.”
David Greisman, who has covered boxing since 2004, is on Twitter and. He is the co-host of the. David’s book, “,” is available on Amazon.
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