Promoters Eddie Hearn and Bob Arum had various comments about Showtime Boxing yesterday suggesting that they will follow HBO in the near future and leave the sport of boxing.
HBO and Showtime have long been champions for the sport of boxing in America throughout the dark ages when boxing was relegated to being a niche sport.
Like Sky Sports in the UK, without HBO and Showtime in the US, boxing in those days giving boxing coverage when no one else was showing the sport around ten years ago, boxing really would have been dead.
As painful as it is to admit.
With HBO formally announcing their exit from carrying boxing at the end of the year, both Hearn who is aligned with streaming service DAZN and Arum with ESPN and their streaming service ESPN+ each made comments this week that Showtime will be next.
Hearn for his part also believes that pay per view boxing in America is now over after the biggest pay per view star in US boxing Canelo Alvarez signed for DAZN this week.
Showtime Boxing boss Stephen Espinoza has now responded to both:
I’ll take the over…way over. https://t.co/2IRtk4nGvZ
— Stephen Espinoza (@StephenEspinoza) October 18, 2018
So one fighter moves from HBO to a streaming service, & that means boxing on both premium TV & PPV are over? OK, whatever. Keep believing what those press releases say.
Meanwhile, we’ve been streaming all our fights (& series) since 2015, well before anyone else was doing that.
— Stephen Espinoza (@StephenEspinoza) October 18, 2018
The streaming arms race is well and truly underway in boxing. Fail to prepare then prepare to fail.