HBO Boxing?
HBO Boxing?
Does it even exist anymore? They have like 1 card every 2 months. Showtime has a card seemingly every week. There’s basically no reason for me to keep HBO at this point. ESPN seems to have swallowed up much of their boxing and I don’t watch any of those HBO shows.
Re: HBO Boxing?
I dropped HBO due to the lack of Boxing on the network long ago.
It's basically gotten down to like 9 or 10 broadcasts a year. Not worthwhile to have just for Boxing when you can find the fights online anyway, and that's the only damn reason you'd want the network.
I could give a f*ck less about Game of Thrones and all that bullsh*t.
It's basically gotten down to like 9 or 10 broadcasts a year. Not worthwhile to have just for Boxing when you can find the fights online anyway, and that's the only damn reason you'd want the network.
I could give a f*ck less about Game of Thrones and all that bullsh*t.
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Best Coast
- Welterweight
- Posts: 3133
- Joined: 07 Mar 2016, 22:53
Re: HBO Boxing?
Arum's contract with ESPN has left HBO without one of their best promoters. I'm no ESPN fan but at least its basic cable and not Premium like HBO and Showtime.
Re: HBO Boxing?
They cut down their boxing budget a while ago.
There's a silver lining to it as well though. The lowered budget meant no more spending big money on Floyd / Pacquiao type nonsense (during their era only THEY got coverage; there was no boxing on free TV/basic cable, and nobody cared about other fighters outside of their division). And they introduced a slew of newer divisions instead, like the whole Superfly series was because the lower weight divisions cost less. HBO has a diverse variety of fighters and divisions now that I appreciate: from the Russians at Light Heavyweight to the various Asian fighters at the lower weights, which previously never got shine in the US. The light heavyweight division was completely dead on US TV until Hopkins went on that run and Kovalev inherited that renewed-interest from him.
Top Rank on ESPN does the same, albeit on a smaller scale (number of events) and way too much cherrypicked bouts. But they still have that diversity in weight-classes and talent. The problem with PBC and SHO is that it lacks that diversity. Like they literally do not have a single Asian fighter, you'd think they have a ban on Asians or something! They don't have Russians, Central-Asians, Thai, Japanese. Just all North American fighters. Its redundant and uninteresting. They also had 6 of the 8 belts at WW and Super WW but took ages just to get a single unification going in either division. They're all signed in-house but don't even fight each other.
I want to see the Lomas, GGGs and Inoue's of the world. Not just the same old faces from the same corner of the planet.
There's a silver lining to it as well though. The lowered budget meant no more spending big money on Floyd / Pacquiao type nonsense (during their era only THEY got coverage; there was no boxing on free TV/basic cable, and nobody cared about other fighters outside of their division). And they introduced a slew of newer divisions instead, like the whole Superfly series was because the lower weight divisions cost less. HBO has a diverse variety of fighters and divisions now that I appreciate: from the Russians at Light Heavyweight to the various Asian fighters at the lower weights, which previously never got shine in the US. The light heavyweight division was completely dead on US TV until Hopkins went on that run and Kovalev inherited that renewed-interest from him.
Top Rank on ESPN does the same, albeit on a smaller scale (number of events) and way too much cherrypicked bouts. But they still have that diversity in weight-classes and talent. The problem with PBC and SHO is that it lacks that diversity. Like they literally do not have a single Asian fighter, you'd think they have a ban on Asians or something! They don't have Russians, Central-Asians, Thai, Japanese. Just all North American fighters. Its redundant and uninteresting. They also had 6 of the 8 belts at WW and Super WW but took ages just to get a single unification going in either division. They're all signed in-house but don't even fight each other.
I want to see the Lomas, GGGs and Inoue's of the world. Not just the same old faces from the same corner of the planet.
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Ruthless-RKO
- Welterweight
- Posts: 101401
- Joined: 24 Apr 2016, 11:59
Re: HBO Boxing?
They used to have a lot of 'Boxing after Dark' as well. The bigger fights on 'Championship boxing.'
Showtime do well with their ShoBox: Next Generation etc. As well as their bigger events too. PBC guys usually fight on Showtime, and the lesser on CBS, NBC, FOX, SPIKE.
HBO don't have many fighters on under contract.
Showtime do well with their ShoBox: Next Generation etc. As well as their bigger events too. PBC guys usually fight on Showtime, and the lesser on CBS, NBC, FOX, SPIKE.
HBO don't have many fighters on under contract.