Showtime, Premier Boxing Champions Finalize New 3-Year Deal

[Ruthless-RKO]

SHOWTIME Sports and Premier Boxing Champions have entered into a three-year boxing programming agreement extending their long-term partnership. The deal calls for a monthly series of events presented by Premier Boxing Champions to air live on SHOWTIME, ensuring the network’s access to the deepest talent pool in boxing and its continued ability to deliver the industry’s leading programming.

The agreement also calls for Premier Boxing Champions to deliver content for a significant expansion of live boxing programming from SHOWTIME Sports coming in 2019. The announcement was made today by Stephen Espinoza, President, Sports and Event Programming for Showtime Networks Inc.

Premier Boxing Champions, a live boxing series created by Haymon Sports, LLC, features more than 160 boxers from around the world. Founded in 2014, Premier Boxing Champions boasts the largest collection of world champions from bantamweight to heavyweight, 14 in total and far more than any other entity in the sport.

SHOWTIME and Premier Boxing Champions have collaborated to set the standard for live boxing where the brightest stars in the sport compete in the most compelling and competitive matchups on a consistent basis.

https://www.BS.com/showtime-pr ... al--131367

[Best Coast]

Hopefully this means more quality boxing matches on TV...but I'm not convinced that's what it really means. PBC's track record has been inconsistent so far.

[Enlightened-One]

Hopefully this means more quality boxing matches on TV...but I'm not convinced that's what it really means. PBC's track record has been inconsistent so far.

PBC's shows are consistently better than HBO's and arguably ESPN's.

There are a few exceptions, for sure, but in terms of volume and consistency, the PBC are superior.

Look at the PBC shows televised so far in 2018.

The only time I recall the PBC shows covering mediocre events, was when they staged fight cards on free-to-air TV networks that were charging Haymon a time-buy fee.

Now that Showtime are paying for events, the PBC cards are consistently impressive.

If you're up for it, we can have a discussion about the quality of shows televised by HBO over the last 18 months in comparison to those covered by Showtime using PBC fighters?

[Best Coast]

I'm not saying Showtime hasnt surpassed HBO in terms of both quantity and quality of their matchups, because they clearly have. Arum/Top Rank now has most of his fights on ESPN so that waters down HBO's schedule.

My problem is NOT with Showtime but with PBC, which tends to put a lot of their young fighters in with scrubs. Their MOST RECENT card last Friday (the freshest in my memory) was a disaster (and I dont just mean Harper walking out of his fight with Ajagba). That night's PBC main event was a joke by ANY standard with Jamal James against a veteran scrub named Mahhonri Montes. Predictably the inept Montes got blown out in 2 rounds and there is no way a tomato can like Montes should be fighting in a main event on any network.

Earlier in August, PBC actually tried to pawn off a deadend matchup between 2 washed-up has-beens like Alexander and Berto as a main event.

I'm not saying PBC never has good matchups because they do, but I just gave you 2 main events in the past 3 weeks that were horrible. That balances out PBC's quality matchups and confirms my charge that PBC is INCONSISTENT!!

[Enlightened-One]

Has Showtime signed a deal with Al Haymon to prevent PBC fighters (or even the entire brand itself) from working exclusively with Eddie Hearn's DAZN?

Showtime didn't seem as motivated previously to commit themselves to a long-term cintractual relationship with the PBC, as they held all the power in their relationship, but since the threat of DAZN has emerged (coupled with Haymon previously working many times with Hearn), Stephen Espinoza suddenly feels the need to establish a long term relationship with the PBC brand, which many haters claimed was "dying"?