This weekend's busy, live TV sports lineup starts on the soccer field with World Cup quarterfinals round action.

Fox on Saturday will televise live World Cup games between Morocco and Portugal, along with England versus France. The winners from the two games will meet in a December 14 semifinal matchup, with that winner qualifying for the World Cup finals against the winner of the December 13 semifinal game.

In the boxing ring, welterweight champion Terence Crawford on Saturday will step into the ring against David Avanesyan in a pay-per-view fight. Also on PPV, retired eight-division champion Manny Pacquiao will fight an exhibition bout against martial arts fighter DK Yoo.

ESPN Plus on Saturday will stream the Teofimo Lopez-Sandor Martin fight, while DAZN will carry the Josh Warrington-Luis Alberto Lopez featherweight championship bout.

Also: Manny Pacquiao, Terence Crawford Fights Round Out 2022 PPV Boxing Card

In the octagon, ESPN will distribute via PPV the UFC 282 mixed martial arts fight card featuring a main event light heavyweight championship bout between Jan Blachowicz and Magomed Ankalaev.

ABC will air a Saturday primetime matchup between the Boston Celtics and the Golden State Warriors in a rematch of the 2022 NBA Finals won by the Warriors.

On the links, TNT on Saturday will air its golf exhibition event The Match, featuring Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy facing Justin Thomas and Jordan Spieth. NBC and Golf Channel will offer weekend coverage of the PGA’s QBE Shootout event.

Also: TNT Turns Primetime Spotlight on 'The Match' Golf Event

Week 14 of the NFL season picks up Sunday with regional action on CBS and Fox, followed by NBC’s primetime Sunday Night Football contest between the Miami Dolphins and the Los Angeles Chargers. ■

The pay-per-view boxing category will look to pack one last revenue punch this weekend as marquee fighters Terence Crawford and Manny Pacquaio step into the ring in separate fights.

Crawford, the undefeated WBO welterweight champion, will defend his title December 10 against top contender David Avanesyan in an event that will retail at a suggested PPV price of $39.99. Crawford last fought on PPV in November 2021, drawing a reported 135,000 PPV buys in his win over former welterweight champion Shawn Porter.

Pacquiao, the second biggest PPV boxing draw behind Floyd Mayweather, will fight Saturday in an exhibition match against mixed martial arts fighter DK Yoo that will retail for $29.99. The eight-division world champion retired in 2021 after suffering a loss to then welterweight champion Yordenis Ugas in a PPV bout that drew 250,000 PPV buys, according to reports.

Overall, Manny Pacquiao has generated 20 million PPV buys and around $1.25 billion in PPV revenue over 24 PPV bouts.  Pacquiao's 2015 fight against Mayweather remains the biggest PPV event of all time, drawing 4.6 million PPV buys.

The two fights will effectively end a busy PPV boxing year that didn’t include a blockbuster 1 million PPV buy event but included several mid-range events featuring such high-profile boxers as Canelo Alvarez, Deontay Wilder, Gennady Golovkin, Tyson Fury and Gervonta Davis.

Lightweight champion Davis will launch the category’s 2023 PPV lineup with a Showtime-distributed January 7 bout against Héctor Luis García. A Davis win would set up a major spring 2023 PPV fight against unbeaten Ryan Garcia. ■

Showtime hopes to give a big promotional punch to Saturday’s Errol Spence Jr.-Yordenis Ugás welterweight championship pay-per-view fight by showcasing a live fight card on the premium channel and on YouTube leading into the PPV event. 

The premium network enters the pay-per-view boxing ring for the first time this year with its Spence-Ugás event, which will retail at a suggested price of $79.99. The fight, a unification of three welterweight titles, pits arguably the sport’s pound-for-pound champion in Spence against Ugás, who defeated Manny Pacquiao last August. Spence was initially scheduled to fight Pacquiao, but had to pull out of the fight with an eye injury. 

Showtime Sports & Event Programming President Stephen Espinoza said Spence is also among the sport’s biggest PPV draws, having pulled in nearly 500,000 buys for his last fight, a 2020 win against Danny Garcia. His return to the ring after the eye injury should drive boxing fans’ interest in the fight. 

“We have a long history with Spence going back to his pro debut, and this matchup falls right within our wheelhouse of us trying to provide elite matchups at the highest level of the sport,” he said.

Showtime will support the fight with a live, two-fight boxing event that will air on the premium service Saturday night prior to the PPV event. Espinoza said the fight card -- which features the Radzhab Butaev-Eimantas Stanionis welterweight bout as well as the Brandun Lee-Zachary Ochoa super lightweight match -- is also one of the main highlights of the network’s current subscriber acquisition campaign offering Showtime free to non-subscribers for 30-days. The Showtime fight card will also be offered for free on the network’s YouTube page. 

“There’s a lot of value in this offering,” Espinoza said. “We’re trying to make it as easy for subscribers and non-subscribers to enjoy a great day of boxing as possible.”

Espinoza wouldn’t predict how many buys Spence-Ugás would generate, but he did say that he expects the fight to do very well. “This is as tough of a fight as Errol has had arguably in his career, and with the stakes of three championship belts on the line, there’s a lot to attract the boxing fan," he said. "Errol has a pretty well established track record of over 300,000 pay-per-view buys in his past fights – we certainly see that as a floor with the potential for more than that.”

Spence-Ugás is the first of at least four PPV boxing events Showtime is planning to distribute in 2022. The network already has scheduled a May 28 Gervonta “Tank” Davis-Rolando Romero PPV fight. Espinoza said Showtime will use the PPV platform only for big PPV events featuring the top fighters in the sport.

“Pay-per-view is a useful tool to help finance fights that wouldn’t otherwise happen without the pay-per-view revenue mechanism,” he said. “Our core business remains programming for Showtime – we have the deepest and highest profile schedule of any network in the sport – but occasionally we have to use that mechanism to allow fights to happen.” ■

In a major upset, welterweight champion Yordenis Ugas defeated boxing icon Manny Pacquiao by unanimous decision Saturday night in what could be the eight-division world champion’s final bout. 

In the PPV boxing event, Ugas -- who took the fight against Pacquiao on two weeks notice after Pacquiao’s original opponent, Errol Spence Jr., pulled out of the fight with an eye injury -- was able to use his height and stinging jab to keep Pacquiao from landing effective punches. All three judges gave the fight to Ugas, who retained his WBA “super” welterweight championship. The fight was the first for the 42-year old Pacquiao since defeating Keith Thurman in 2019. 

After the fight, Pacquiao, who is the PPV industry’s second biggest revenue generator behind Floyd Mayweather Jr., was noncommittal when asked if he would fight again. Pacquiao did say he would make a decision in September as to whether he would run for President in his home country of the Philippines next May.

The Fox Sports-distributed fight was the first of two rare late August PPV boxing events. Showtime will distribute an Aug. 29 exhibition fight featuring YouTube star Jake Paul and Tyron Woodley.

 This weekend’s spotlight on live sports programming starts in the boxing ring with Saturday’s Fox Sports-distributed Manny Pacquiao-Yordenis Ugas pay-per-view fight card. Pacquiao will be fighting the current welterweight champion after his original opponent, Errol Spence had to pull out of the fight earlier this month due to an eye injury.

Read Also: Manny Pacquiao-Errol Spence PPV Fight KO'd

ESPN on Saturday will offer mixed martial arts action with a UFC Fight Night card headlined by the Jared Cannonier-Kelvin Gastelum middleweight bout. 

In other sports, ESPN and ABC will offer coverage of the Little League Baseball World Series on Saturday and Sunday. On the pro side, ESPN’s Sunday Night Baseball will feature the Los Angeles Angels-Cleveland Indians matchup.

On the auto race track, Fox will provide live coverage of the NHRA Lucas Oil Nationals, while on the greens CBS and Golf Channel will offer weekend coverage of the PGA Northern Trust tournament. 

On the soccer field, ABC Saturday will feature a Bundesliga League matchup between Bayer 04 Leverkusen vs. Borussia Mönchengladbach, USA Network and NBC will offer Premier League action, and Fox, ESPN, and FS1 will televise Major League Soccer games. On Sunday, NBCSN will televise a Premier League soccer doubleheader.

The highly anticipated Aug. 21 Manny Pacquiao-Errol Spence pay-per-view fight is officially off after Spence was diagnosed with an eye injury, according to Fox Sports.

Pacquiao will instead fight World Boxing Association welterweight champion Yordenis Ugas in the PPV event, according to Fox. Ugas was scheduled to fight on the undercard of Pacquiao-Spence, but his opponent Fabian Maidana recently suffered a sparring injury and had to pull out of the fight, according to ESPN.com. 

Spence was diagnosed with a retinal tear to his left eye during a recent medical exam. In an Instagram post the undefeated welterweight champion expressed his disappointment in having to pull out of the fight but vows to return from his injury.

The Pacquiao-Spence fight is the latest PPV boxing event in recent months to be altered due to fighter injury/sickness. The scheduled July 24 Tyson Fury-Deontay Wilder trilogy fight was postponed to Oct. 9 after Fury tested positive for COVID-19. The June 19 Teofimo Lopez-George Kambosos lightweight championship PPV fight was postponed after Lopez was diagnosed with COVID. The fight has yet to be rescheduled.

Read Also: Fury-Wilder III PPV Fight Rescheduled for Oct. 9

As the TV sports world continues to recover from the pandemic, few sports are in a position to experience a greater renaissance than boxing -- particularly on the pay-per-view event platform.

The addition this week of the July 24 Tyson Fury-Deontay Wilder trilogy fight to an already stacked summer PPV boxing schedule creates a dream lineup that could generate significant revenue for the PPV industry.

The PPV boxing industry was poised to have a strong 2020 after the second Deontay Wilder-Tyson Fury heavyweight championship fight in February of that year drew a reported 1.2 million PPV buys -- the first fight to break the industry standard mark since 2018. With potential fights being lined up featuring the top draws in the sport including Manny Pacquiao and Canelo Alvarez -- as well as up and coming PPV draws such as Gervonta Davis and Errol Spence Jr. -- the category in 2020 was well positioned to generate significant revenue. 

Also Read: Tyson Fury Defeats Deontay Wilder in Big Heavyweight PPV Fight

Then COVID-19 hit and nearly all of the proposed big PPV events fell by the wayside. Showtime and Fox Sports jump started the category in late 2020 with PPV fight cards headlined by champions Jermall Charlo, Davis and Spence that averaged around a reported 220,000 buys across three fights. But it was a November exhibition fight between Mike Tyson and Roy Jones Jr. that proved that boxing could still deliver significant PPV purchases and revenue.  

That event, distributed by social media company Triller and featuring musical performances alongside traditional fights, drew more than 1.6 million PPV buys -- finishing among the top 10 biggest PPV events ever -- and set the category in motion to create in 2021 one of the more impressive stretches of PPV fights in recent memory. 

The June 6 Showtime-distributed exhibition fight between all-time PPV revenue champion Floyd Mayweather and YouTube sensation Logan Paul is one of three PPV fights scheduled over the next three months that have a puncher’s chance of hitting the 1 million PPV buy mark. 

The Wilder-Fury trilogy fight as well as the Aug. 21 Pacquiao-Spence Jr. welterweight unification fight -- Spence is arguably among the best pound-for-pound fighters in the sport and Pacquiao is the second-biggest PPV revenue draw ever behind Mayweather -- could provide the industry its first year of three or more 1 million PPV buy events since 2017 when Mayweather-Conor McGregor, Alvarez-Julio Cesar Chavez Jr., and Alvarez-Gennady Golovkin II all surpassed the mark.   

Also Read: Manny Pacquiao-Errol Spence PPV Fight Set for August

Also on the summer PPV boxing schedule is Triller’s June 19 Teófimo López-George Kambosos Jr. lightweight championship PPV event and Showtime’s June 27 Mario Barrios-Gervonta Davis junior welterweight title PPV fight.

And that’s all before the fall when iconic fighters Oscar De La Hoya, Evander Holyfield and Tyson potentially return to the ring in PPV exhibition fights.

"2020 was incredible for PPV - we didn’t think we could top it but we’re on our way," said In Demand SVP programming and marketing Mark Boccardi. “2021 is shaping up to be a great year for PPV with a heavyweight title at stake, the return of Floyd Mayweather, possibly Manny Pacquiao’s last fight which will be against superstar Errol Spence, crossover social media fights, and still more to come.”

Even as the country begins to open up this summer and show signs of returning back to some sense of normalcy, the PPV boxing category is set to keep millions of fight fans glued to their TV screens over the next few months

Fox Sports’ Andy Ruiz Jr.-Chris Arreola heavyweight pay-per-view boxing event this past Saturday night ushered in what is shaping up to be a busy -- and hopefully lucrative -- spring and early summer period for the PPV boxing category. 

After a relatively quiet 2020 -- mostly due to the crippling effects of the pandemic on live sports events -- 2021 is already shaping up to be a comeback year for the PPV boxing category. It’s too early to tell how many PPV buys were generated from Saturday’s event -- in which Ruiz Jr. won in a majority decision over the veteran Arreola -- but the event serves as a launching pad for at least four PPV flights over the next three months. 

This Saturday, arguably PPV boxing’s current pound-for-pound champion Canelo Alvarez fights Billy Joe Saunders in a super-middleweight unification championship fight that will also stream on the DAZN sports service. 

Showtime will step into the PPV ring June 6 with an exhibition bout featuring retired PPV boxing champion Floyd Mayweather and  YouTube star Logan Paul, according to sources. Showtime will follow that fight up with a more conventional PPV fight card June 27 headlined by its Gervonta Davis-Mario Barrios super lightweight championship fight.

Read Also: Showtime Sets Gervonta Davis-Mario Barrios PPV Boxing Event 

The company having arguably the biggest influence on the PPV boxing genre this year is social media company Triller. Fresh off its April 17 Jake Paul-Ben Askren event that featured a mix of boxing matches and musical performances -- and still giddy over the success of last November's Mike Tyson-Roy Jones Jr. exhibition boxing/concert event which drew north of 1.6 million PPV buys -- the company will offer via PPV a June 5 fight card featuring the Teofimo Lopez-George Kambosos Jr. lightweight championship fight. The card will also feature the return of former heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield to the ring against journeyman Kevin McBride.  

The company is also reportedly working on a July 3 fight that would mark the ring return of former six division champion Oscar De La Hoya. 

Read Also: Triller Looking to Shake Up PPV Event Category

The industry is hoping that the success and appeal of these events could help build momentum for some potentially lucrative Fall PPV boxing events that could feature such PPV draws as Manny Pacquiao, welterweight champion Errol Spence, heavyweight champions Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua, as well as a second Tyson event. 

Veteran welterweight boxing champion Manny Pacquiao turned back the clock to beat former undefeated champion Keith Thruman in a split decision during Fox Sports’ second pay-per-view boxing event.

The 40-year old Pacquiao knocked down Thurman in the first round and controlled the pace for much of the 12-round fight to run his record to 62-7-2. Thurman’s first loss dropped his record to 29-1.

In the aftermath of the fight, Pacquiao said he most likely would not fight again until 2020. Pacquiao could next face the winner of the Sept. 28 Errol Spence Jr.-Shawn Porter welterweight unification PPV fight, which Fox Sports and Premier Boxing Champions announced Saturday.

The undefeated Spence fought Mikey Garcia on Fox Sports' inaugural PPV boxing event in March, drawing more than 330,000 PPV buys, according to the company. 

RELATED:Fox Sports Takes Second Jab at PPV Boxing with Pacquiao-Thurman

Fox Sports continues its busy summer of televising live, marquee sports programming events this Saturday (July 20) as it steps into the pay-per-view boxing ring with the Manny Pacquiao-Keith Thurman welterweight championship boxing card promoted by Premier Boxing Champions. The company is hoping to build on the performance of its March Errol Spence-Mikey Garcia inaugural PPV boxing event, which drew more than 300,000 pay-per-view buys, according to company executives.

Fox Sports executive vice president and head of programming Bill Wanger discusses the company’s strategy in distributing the PPV boxing event, including using its lineup of high-profile summer sports events like the FIFA Women’s World Cup, baseball’s All-Star Game and the U.S. Open Golf Championship to promote Pacquiao-Thurman, which retails at a PPV suggested price of $74.99.

Why does Fox Sports consider the Pacquiao-Thurman fight a marquee pay-per-view event?

Obviously it starts with Manny Pacquiao, who is a living legend in the boxing world, going up against a legit competitor in Keith Thurman. Before [Thurman] was injured [Thurman had elbow surgery in May 2018], he was considered one of the best welterweights in the world. We consider this a heavyweight matchup of welterweights.

What are your PPV buy expectations for Pacquiao-Thurman?

We’re going to do better than Spence-Garcia, our first pay-per-view, which was in the 330,000 [buy] range. We’ll definitely be above that, although we’re not going to release any sort of estimates. To the boxing world -- and even to the casual boxing fan -- Manny versus Keith is a true 50-50 fight where you really don’t know who is going to win. That doesn’t always happen in boxing, so it's pretty special.

The summertime hasn’t been an ideal time to schedule a big pay-per-view fight -- does that concern you at all?

Quite frankly a little bit, but it just worked out in terms of timing from when Manny and Keith’s last fight was [both fighters fought this past January]. We’re coming off of out most-watched month ever across the Fox Sports networks with the [Women’s] World Cup, The US Open, NASCAR and the baseball All-Star game, so we feel we've had a pretty strong promotional platform. We’ve been running the sprockets off of our promo for the fight in those big sports events. We actually ran seven [promotional] elements for the fight during the All-Star Game. On fight night we’re going to have Caleb Plant fighting Mike Lee in a super welterweight fight that will air on Fox broadcast prior to the pay-per-view event starting, so we’re going to have a significant amount of people watching boxing on free television on Fox while promoting the pay-per-view card. That’s fairly unusual for a boxing event.

Is Fox Sports still looking at doing as many as six PP boxing cards in 2019?

Right now we’re looking in the four to five range which could go up. There's been some exciting things that have happened over the past couple of months in boxing where we could do some more potential pay-per-view events, including Andy Ruiz Jr.’s win over [former heavyweight champion] Anthony Joshua, which shocked the world and really attracted alot of casual fans back to boxing. We’ll see how things play out, but I think the future is really bright.

There’s been alot of boxing events distributed on various platforms so far this year. Does the increased exposure of the sport help or hurt Fox Sports’ efforts to develop marquee pay-per-view events?

I think it helps. Just on the various Fox Sports distribution platforms alone we’ve reached close to 20 million people through our live [boxing] events, studio shows and original programming. I think that we’re bringing attention to boxing, and we’re not so concerned about the competition. We’re growing our portfolio of boxing -- on Fox [broadcasting] alone, our [boxing] ratings are up 50% versus what they were a year ago. We’re in a good position. 

Showtime’s live telecast Saturday night of heavyweight champion Deyontay Wilder’s thrilling first round knockout of Dominic Breazeale kicked off what looks to be a summer of  intriguing TV fights featuring several of boxing’s biggest stars that could lead to huge pay-per-view fights later in the year.

Boxing’s other heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua will look to defend his portion of the title on June 1 against Andy Ruiz Jr. on the DAZN sports streaming service. If the undefeated Joshua wins, the hope among boxing fans and industry observers is that Joshua will meet Wilder in a mega heavyweight unification bout later this year or early 2020.

The wildcard in the heavyweight division is Tyson Fury, who this past December fought Wilder to an action-packed draw, which drew a reported 325,000 pay-per-view buys. Fury will fight June 15 against Tom Schwartz on ESPN+, the first of a multi-fight deal between the “Gypsy King” and ESPN.

Related: The PPV Event Category Ends With a Flury

The three heavyweight champions could generate some big money fights for the PPV category if they agree to fight each other in the ring.

Also in June, former middleweight champion Genaddy Golovkin will look to position himself for a third fight against current middleweight champion Canelo Alvarez with a June 8 bout against Steve Rolls. Golovkin and Alvarez fought to a draw in their first fight in 2017, with Golovkin losing a close decision to Alvarez this past September.

Alvarez on May 5 outpointed former middleweight champion Daniel Jacobs on DAZN to retain his titles.

In July, 40-year old Manny Pacquiao -- fresh off a dominating win against Adrien Broner this past February on Showtime PPV -- will put his welterweight championship on the line against undefeated Keith Thurman via Fox Sports PPV. The winner of the fight could be in a position to fight welterweight champion Errol Spence Jr., who himself is coming off a dominating March performance against Mikey Garcia in Fox Sports’ inaugural PPV event. 

Industry observers hope a hot summer of live boxing telecasts featuring the top stars of the sport could lead to a lucrative fall for the PPV boxing category. 

Usually when two marquee premium ring events compete against one another, one or both of the events tend to suffer from a performance perspective.

But this past Saturday’s live UFC card on subscription streaming sports service ESPN+ and Showtime’s Manny Pacquiao-Adrien Broner pay-per-view boxing match drew impressive performance numbers despite the competition, according to the distributors.

The inaugural Jan. 19 UFC Fight Night on ESPN+ event in New York featuring 13 live fights -- including TJ Dillashaw’s 32-second knockout win to defend his flyweight championship -- drew a whopping 568,000 new subscribers for the $4.99 per month ESPN+ service on Friday and Saturday combined, according to ESPN officials.

The event was the first collaboration between the UFC and ESPN as part of a new five five-year distribution deal between the two companies. The network has already announced its first quarter UFC event lineup -- which includes more than 36 hours of live UFC action on ESPN+. The network is hoping its UFC content will continue to boost subscriber numbers for ESPN+, which has already surpassed the 1 million subscriber mark in less than a year after its April 2018 launch.

In Las Vegas that night, Showtime was offering its first pay-per-view boxing card of 2019 featuring boxing legend and current welterweight champion Manny Pacquiao and former champion Adrien Broner. The fight, in which Pacquiao scored an easy, unanimous decision win, drew approximately 400,000 PPV buys, according to published reports. While the performance pales in comparison to the 4.5 million buys Pacquiao generated for his record-setting 2015 fight with Floyd Mayweather, the fight -- at a suggested retail price of $55 -- reportedly performed above expectations.

It’s also marks a good start for the PPV boxing category, which will offer two more fights over the next three months, including Fox Sports’ March 16 Mikey Garcia-Errol Spence Jr. fight, and ESPN/Top Rank Inc.’s April 20 Terence Crawford-Amir Kahn welterweight championship fight. 

ESPN will throw its hat into the pay-per-view boxing ring in April when it teams with boxing promoter Top Rank Inc. for the Terence Crawford-Amir Kahn welterweight championship fight.

The April 20 Crawford-Kahn fight marks the first time ESPN and Top Rank have co-promoted a major PPV boxing card since the two reached a distribution agreement in 2017. It’s unclear how much the fight will cost consumers, or how viewers will be able to access the PPV event.

“Showcasing Crawford-Khan as the first pay-per-view event under the Top Rank on ESPN banner is truly a cause for celebration. Crawford is a world champion, a global phenomenon and perhaps the best pound-for-pound fighter in the sport and Khan is a fighter that everyone wants to see every time he steps in the ring,” said ESPN executive vice president, programming and scheduling Burke Magnus in a statement. “This is what boxing needs, more big-name showdowns, and this fight is a perfect example of the vision that we had when we teamed up with Top Rank.”

The Crawford-Kahn fight is the third PPV boxing match scheduled thus far in 2019, following this Saturday’s (Jan. 19) Showtime-distributed Manny Pacquiao-Adrien Broner fight and Fox Sports’ March 16 Mikey Garcia-Errol Spence Jr. fight. 

After a slow 2018, the pay-per-view boxing category is expected to come out swinging in 2019.

Already two fights are positioned to vie for boxing fans’ dollars in the first quarter of next year, which would match the number of marquee fights distributed in all of 2018. Fox Sports will join the ranks of PPV distributors when it offers its first ever PPV event in March.

Fox and fight promoter Premier Boxing Champions will distribute the March 16 welterweight championship fight between current titleholder Errol Spence Jr. and four-division world champion Mikey Garcia, part of 10 televised fight cards to be carried by Fox Broadcasting and FS1 in the first three months of 2019. Fox and PBC announced the fights -- part of a recently signed, four-year agreement between the two companies -- during a Tuesday afternoon press conference. 

Fox Sports’ PPV distribution of the Spence-Garcia PPV fight is significant for a category that will lose one of its most dependable partners in HBO Sports, which after a 45-year run will stop airing live boxing matches beginning in 2019. If successful, Fox’s first PPV boxing event could set up the possibility of future big ticket PPV events featuring some of the top fighters in the sport, including welterweights Keith Thurman, Danny Garcia and Shawn Porter; and middleweights Anthony Dirrell, Jermall and Jermell Charlo.

The Spence-Garcia fight is expected to be preceded in the PPV arena by a proposed,  Showtime-distributed fight between current PPV boxing champion Manny Pacquiao and former four-time champion Adrien Broner. The fight would mark the return of Pacquiao -- the second-most lucrative PPV fighter in history behind retired boxer Floyd Mayweather – to the PPV ring in more than two years.

The fight would also mark Showtime’s second PPV bout in as many months, following its scheduled Dec. 1 Deontay Wilder-Tyson Fury heavyweight championship fight. 

HBO is getting out of the live boxing TV business after 45 years of televising some of the biggest events in the history of the sweet science.

With some 1,111 live boxing telecasts under its belt and one more fight telecast scheduled – the Oct. 27 Daniel Jacobs/Sergiy Derevyanchenko middleweight championship from New York – the pay TV service will walk away from the boxing ring at the end of the year. HBO and its pay-per-view arm TVKO/HBO PPV have been the home for some of the most memorable fights for nearly a half a century featuring some of the most iconic and successful fighters of all time, including Floyd Mayweather, Joe Frazier, Tommy Hearns, Oscar De La Hoya, Marvelous Marvin Hagler, Mike Tyson, Manny Pacquiao and Roy Jones Jr. 

The influx of new fight distributors including streaming services like ESPN+ and DAZN coupled with declining ratings for live fights – HBO boxing telecasts, which once attracted as much as one-third of HBO’s subscribers, drew about about 2% of the network’s audience according to the New York Times – factored into the network’s decision.

I had a chance to speak to HBO Sports executive vice president Peter Nelson regarding the network’s departure from boxing as well as HBO’s future plans for sports programming.

Why has HBO decided to walk away from televising live boxing events?

We evaluate what we do consistently, and over period of time it's been indicated to us through our research that boxing is no longer a major factor for our subscribers. Our job is to take care of our viewers, and we listen to them. Storytelling is obviously intimately intertwined with our legacy in the sport and we'll never forget our roots. You're going to see a continued presence in boxing from a storytelling capacity, not least of which will be 2019's multipart series on Muhammad Ali directed by Antoine Fuqua that will come out in spring of 2019.

So when you say that it's no longer a factor for subscribers, is that based on ratings or are subscribers are actually telling you they don't want to see boxing on the network?

It's internal research that looks at a variety of metrics with a raft of different methodology in terms of approaching consumer habits and their interests. We've done a critical assessment of where we are and where we're heading into the future. As a caveat I should say that we still remain open to the idea that if there is a large-scale event that transcends the sport that we'd be open to having those conversations.

What role did the influx of new distributors of live boxing events like DAZN play in this decision?

I can tell you that it didn't inform our decision at all. Our decision was informed by where our viewers and our subscribers’ interests lie. We think it's great that there are other places for fans of the sport to find it, and if that creates more opportunities for fighters than we feel great about that.

Are you worried about losing some hardcore boxing fans as subscribers with this move?

From everything that we've seen in terms of our research department's understanding of the data we don't foresee that being the case. We believe that there's a great interest in storytelling in the categories of news and journalism like Real Sports; in reality like Hard Knocks, which is up double digits in viewership this season from last; like the Being Serena series on Serena Williams; in the conversation genre that has opened up for us with shows like The Shop featuring LeBron James; and of course in our documentaries that we produce entirely in-house.

Did the recent AT&T acquisition of Time Warner play a part in this decision?

All of our decisions from a programming standpoint have been made on the basis and the merit of how we feel best aligns with HBO. HBO Sports has made this decision and made the strategic shift based on what our own criteria is and our own definition of success.

You mentioned that HBO would be open to coming back to the sport for a big pay-per-view opportunity. Are there any matches in your mind that could prompt the network to step back into the live TV boxing ring?

I think we'd have to evaluate events on a case by case basis. Boxing is constantly shape shifting, and you can never predict based on what's happening in September what's going to be true in November. We're going to take it in stride and see what the future holds. We're obviously going to be continuing to have conversations; if there's a mega event to be had we would hope to be considered as one of the homes of it.

What is the legacy of HBO Boxing?

The legacy will continue to be defined as a living breathing part of what we've done and where we're going. I think the storytelling aspect of what HBO Sports has always been known for is intimately entwined with what we have done in the past in terms of humanizing fighters; in terms of allowing viewers to empathize not just with them but with the communities from which they have arrived on the scene from. As we look ahead that will continue to be true in the stories that we look to tell as we try to bring forth to our viewers stories that enrich their own lives and their view of the world. 

For the first eight months of the year pay-per-view boxing  was off the sports industry's radar, but the events of this past weekend may have put the category back in the TV sports ring.

Saturday’s Canelo Alvarez-Gennady Golovkin pay-per-view boxing match lived up to its pre-fight hype and delivered an exciting, action-packed event for boxing fans. Alvarez won a close, majority decision over Golovkin in the rematch of the fighters’ November 2017 bout, which ended in a controversial draw.

Alvarez-Golovkin II provided a needed punch to the category, which hadn’t offered a marquee PPV fight card all year to starved boxing fans. The fighters were scheduled to square off this past May, but the fight was postponed after Alvarez failed two tests for performance-enhancing drugs.

It’s still too early to determine how many PPV buys the Alvarez-Golovkin II bout drew, but those who dished out at least $74.99 to watch the fight arguably got their money’s worth.

Going into the weekend the Alvarez-Golovkin fight was considered to be the most lucrative PPV event the sport could deliver in 2018, but social media posts Saturday from PPV boxing's revenue champions Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao about a potential rematch fight had the industry buzzing.

[embed]https://twitter.com/mannypacquiao/status/1040956990090969090[/embed]

While both fighters are well past their primes – and their much-anticipated 2015 fight produced a lackluster performance in the ring – a Mayweather-Pacquiao rematch still could go a long way in offsetting what has been a disappointing financial year for the category. 

Mayweather-Pacquiao drew an industry record 4.6 million PPV buys. Cable, satellite and telco distributors would be overjoyed if a rematch between the 41-year old Mayweather and the 39-year old Pacquiao could generate business close to the PPV performance of their first encounter.

Showtime and HBO enter the TV boxing ring together on April 29 to co-televise the Vladimir Klitschko-Anthony Joshua heavyweight championship fight – the first time the two networks have come together to televise a non-pay-per-view boxing match.

After the fight however, the two networks will retreat into their neutral corners with two distinctly different strategies on distributing live boxing matches.

Showtime, which only a few years ago was arguably the most prolific distributor of marque pay-per-view fights in the industry, is now focusing on putting its biggest and best fights via its premium service and on broadcast television through its sister broadcast network CBS.

In fact, the network’s last high-profile PPV fight was Floyd Mayweather’s fairwell fight in September 2015 against Andre Berto. That came four months after Showtime and HBO hooked up to co-distribute the Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao fight -- the most lucrative PPV event of all time.

Since then, Showtime has offered several quality primetime fights featuring the top names in boxing today, including welterweight champion, Keith Thurman, heavyweight champs Joshua and Deontay Wilder, and former champions Danny Garcia, Shawn Porter, and Adrien Broner.

The network recently released its upcoming fight schedule that will offer big fights featuring light heavyweight champion Adonis Stevenson and welterweight champion Kell Brook among others, but none that will be offered on a PPV basis.

That leaves HBO as the main distributor of PPV boxing fights. The network, which has already distributed one high-profile PPV boxing event this year – the March Golovkin-Daniel Jacobs fight drew 170,000 buys according to published reports – will return to the PPV ring next week (May 6) with the highly-anticipated Canelo Alvarez-Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. fight. Also on tap for the pay network is a June 17 Andre Ward-Sergey Kovalev light heavyweight championship rematch and a potential July PPV fight featuring Pacquiao.

As for tonight’s Klitschko-Joshua fight, Showtime will air the fight live this afternoon at 4:15 while HBO will distribute the bout on a taped delayed basis at 11 p.m.

UFC superstar Ronda Rousey’s return to the octagon in tonight’s UFC 207 pay-per-view event will cap off what has easily been one of the mixed martial arts franchise’s most lucrative PPV campaigns ever.

While the company has not officially released PPV buy numbers for its 2016 events, industry observers say the performance of the MMA organization’s landmark UFC 200 event in July, its November UFC 205 event featuring Colin McGregor – which also served as the first UFC event held in New York’s Madison Square Garden – as well as the predicted strong PPV revenue and buy returns from tonight’s event will certainly push the UFC past boxing as the king of the PPV ring in 2016.

The PPV boxing category delivered a weak revenue jab to distributors this year compared to the knockout punch the category landed in 2015, bolstered by the record-setting Manny Pacquiao-Floyd Mayweather fight. Not even the presence of two Pacquiao PPV fights in 2016 could lift the fortunes of a category in transition after losing its most lucrative draw in Mayweather to retirement.

Fighters headlining PPV boxing cards in 2016 like Canelo Alvarez, Andre Ward, Sergey Kovalev and Terrance Crawford are still building awareness and appeal with boxing fans and could create some buzzworthy PPV bouts in 2017, but it will take some time before the category can generate PPV revenue and buys in the neighborhood of Pacquiao-Mayweather.

HBO could offer as many as three PPV boxing events in the first half of 2017 including a scheduled Feb. 25 Miguel Cotto-James Kirkland bout and a March 18 Gennady Golovkin-Daniel Jacobs championship fight card that will receive some fanfare, but will be hard pressed to reach the category’s gold standard of 1 million PPV buys. A potential Alvarez-Julio Cesar Chavez Jr fight in May could also generate some decent noise and buys for the category among hard core fight fans, but could be a tough sell to casual sports fans.

Meanwhile, the UFC will look to build on its big 2016 PPV performance with the promise of a slew of PPV events next year featuring the organization’s top fighters, beginning in February with its UFC 208 event in New York. Whether Rousey will join the UFC’s roster of 2017 PPV headliners remains to be seen, but tonight’s card closes a successful 2016 PPV campaign for the organization and serves as a strong lead-in to what is expected to be another knockout PPV year for the UFC in 2017.

Four marquee boxing and UFC pay-per- view events over the next two months could salvage what has been an otherwise weak year for the category.

After generating more than $500 million in revenue last year — some $400 million from just the May 2, 2015 Floyd Mayweather- Manny Pacquiao welterweight title fight — the live PPV-event category has garnered less than half of that take through the first 10 months of 2016, industry sources said.

Distributors hope a flurry of big PPV events in November and December will help pad the category’s revenue take. The latest addition to the PPV category is the Dec. 30 return of UFC star Ronda Rousey to the octagon, more than a year after her shocking loss to Holly Holm in last November’s UFC 193.

UFC CARRYING THE LOAD

The show joins UFC’s Nov. 12 PPV event from New York’s Madison Square Garden, which will feature popular UFC fighter Conor McGregor. In Demand senior vice president of programming and business development Mark Boccardi said that the appearance of Rousey and McGregor in two of the final three UFC PPV events -- the MMA outfit will also distribute its UFC 206 event on Dec. 10 -- will cap off what has been one of the most lucrative years for the UFC in terms of PPV revenue, although he would not disclose specifics.

“Clearly, this is a year where the UFC is helping the entire category,” Boccardi said. “Everyone sees that boxing is down — we had no Mayweather and one Pacquaio fight so far [this past April against Timothy Bradley Jr.] — so the UFC’s really strong performance is good for the overall health of the business. The events feature two tentpole athletes for PPV in Rousey and McGregor — the two are by far the biggest UFC PPV stars — and the crossover appeal that Ronda has you can’t overstate.”

Related > UFC: Too Legit to Quit

Two high-profile PPV boxing events will also take place within two weeks of each other in November. This Saturday ([Nov. 5) Pacquiao will step into the PPV ring for a fight against WBO welterweight champion Jessie Vargas, while Nov. 19 will pit Sergey Kovalev against Andre Ward in a battle of undefeated light heavyweight boxers.

Boxing promotion company Top Rank, which is distributing the Pacquiao-Vargas fight, isn’t concerned about cannibalization, given the back-to-back-to-back marquee PPV events, company president Todd duBoef said.

DAILY DOC SERIES KICKS OFF

Top Rank recently turned to the Web to promote the fight. The network last week launched ALL IN: Pacquiao-Vargas, a daily documentary series on Top Rank’s Facebook page and Twitter feed that it said will give boxing fans an inside look at each fighter’s daily preparations.

Related > Building Boxing's Next PPV Champ [subscription required]

HBO will push the lion’s share of its promotional efforts for the Kovalev-Ward fight to the week before the event in an effort to avoid the marketing noise from the Pacquiao-Vargas and UFC 205 events. While there is a concern about potential cannibalization of viewers, HBO vice president of programming Tony Walker said the network is confident its event would appeal to boxing fans looking for a competitive matchup between undefeated fighters.

“There are some [cannibalization] concerns, but we think our fight is of a quality that will make people watch it,” Walker said.

After a relatively quiet year thus far on the pay-per-view boxing front, November is shaping up to be a knockout month for the category with two high-profile events scheduled over a three-week period.

The latest event to join the November PPV lineup is Top Rank’s scheduled Nov. 5 bout featuring top PPV draw Manny Pacquiao against welterweight champion Jessie Vargas.

The fight will take place two weeks before HBO’s Nov. 19 Andre Ward-Sergey Kovalev light heavyweight championship fight card.

Further crowding November’s fight schedule is UFC’s high-profile Nov. 12 event from New York’s Madison Square Garden — the organization’s first event in the Big Apple since New York State legalized UFC events as part of a bill signed this past April.

One hiccup in the lineup is that HBO — which has distributed most of Pacquiao’s PPV fights throughout his career — has decided not to distribute Pacquiao-Vargas due to the fight’s proximity to its Ward-Kovalev fight, according to sources close to the network.

HBO officials would not comment on the matter.

Top Rank CEO Bob Arum told the Los Angeles Times last week that he is considering other potential companies, including Showtime, to distribute the Pacquiao PPV fight.

Showtime Sports officials told Multichannel News the network would consider talking to Top Rank about distributing the fight. Showtime and HBO teamed in May 2015 to distribute the Pacquiao-Floyd Mayweather PPV event, which set an all-time PPV record with more than 4 million PPV buys for more than $400 million in revenue.

Top Rank president Todd duBoef told Multichannel News could also distribute the fight on its own to the industry as well as via online to consumers though its TopRank.tv website. “I think there are a lot of options for us,” he said. “I think it has a great opportunity for us to explore different creative ways that have not necessarily been looked at in the past.”

Overall, Pacquiao has generated the second-highest level of PPV revenue within the boxing category, behind only Mayweather.

November’s two scheduled pay-per-view fights would add to a 2016 PPV boxing lineup that has already featured HBO’s April Pacquiao-Timothy Bradley Jr. bout, its May Canelo Alvarez-Amir Kahn bout and last month’s Terrance Crawford- Viktor Postol fight.

HBO also has a Sept. 17 Alvarez-Liam Smith PPV fight on the docket.

Boxing icon and humanitarian Muhammad Ali has died at the age of 74. 

Ali, who had battled Parkinson's disease for decades, passed away Friday after being hospitalized in the Phoenix area earlier this week with respiratory issues, according to the Associated Press. During a legendary pro boxing career, Ali -- considered by many boxing observers as the greatest boxer of all time -- won the heavyweight boxing title three times and fought a number of iconic fights throughout the 1960s and 1970s.

Ali retired from boxing in 1981 but remained one of the most popular and well-known athletes in the world. 

Ali, whose conversion to Islam and his opposition to the Vietnam War and the military draft during the 1960s drew criticism and condemnation from many circles, was revered later in life for advocating peace and equal rights for all. 

Several cable networks released statements early Saturday morning reacting to the death of Ali. 

ESPN president John Skipper reflected on Ali's passing, saying: “We are sad to hear of the passing of Muhammad Ali. However, we revel in the memory of his athletic excellence in the ring, we recollect with pleasure the charm of the charismatic young man from Louisville who would shock the world and we celebrate the dramatic achievement of a champion of civil rights who changed the world. In many ways, he was truly the greatest of all time.”

HBO in a statement said: "We join the rest of the world in mourning the passing of Muhammad Ali and celebrating the legacy of this unique man in unifying us through his acts and gifts. Ali's charisma, grace, and genius transcended all races, religions, nationalities, and generations. His spirit will inspire people forever. HBO is honored to have known Muhammad Ali as a fighter of beauty and a man of principle. We experienced the joy of working with him in support of initiatives he passionately cared about including, most importantly, his never-ending desire to teach tolerance and understanding of others to all people. Muhammad Ali was an icon and hero, father and friend, and beacon of hope for oppressed people throughout the world. He will be missed by all of those whose lives he touched. There are not enough bells to toll this loss."

Showtime also released the following statement: "Muhammad Ali was The Greatest of all time.  Perhaps the greatest in any sport.  The outpouring of emotion currently taking place around the world is a testament to his impact beyond boxing and beyond sports.On behalf of everyone at Showtime Networks, and our extended boxing family, we offer our condolences to the Ali family and to the millions of people the world over that were inspired by his grace, poise and prowess in life."

Boxing promoter Bob Arum, who promoted numerous Ali fights, said in a statement: "A true great has left us. Muhammad Ali transformed this country and impacted the world with his spirit.  His legacy will be part of our history for all time." 

Don King, who also promoted several Ali fights, including his memorable 1974 bout against George Foreman, told the Associated Press: "It's a sad day for life, man. I loved Muhammad Ali, he was my friend. Ali will never die. Like Martin Luther King his spirit will live on, he stood for the world." 

Retired, undefeated boxing champion Floyd Mayweather told ESPN early Saturday that Ali was a "hero" and paved the way for fighters like himself to be successful. Recently retired boxing champion Manny Pacquiao also said in a statement: "We lost a giant today ... boxing benefitted from Muhammad Ali's talents but not nearly as much as mankind benefitted from his humanity.  Our hearts and prayers go out to the Ali family.  May God bless them."  

Showtime Sports has been at the forefront of televised boxing for 30 years, taking a sport that for a generation was the purview of the broadcast networks and effectively promoting, marketing and distributing some of the most successful and lucrative fight cards in the history of the fight game.

Showtime and HBO’s co-distributed May 2015 Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao pay-per-view fight remains the biggest pay TV event of all time, drawing more than 4.4 million buys and more than $400 million in revenue. Boxing has become a staple of Showtime’s programming offerings, and both on its premium channel and via PPV, the network has showcased arguably the biggest names in the sport, including Tommy Hearns, Evander Holyfield, Mike Tyson, Julio Cesar Chavez, Lennox Lewis, Canelo Alvarez and Floyd Mayweather.

Showtime Sports and Event Programming executive vice president and general manager Stephen Espinoza talked about the impact boxing has had on Showtime and vice versa over the past 30 years — as well as what the network is doing to ensure its future success with the sweet science — with Multichannel News programming editor R. Thomas Umstead.

MCN:How infl uential has boxing been to overall development of the Showtime brand?

Stephen Espinoza: It’s fair to say that boxing has been critical to the development of Showtime. It has provided another genre of programming that is completely consistent with the network’s overall brand. Showtime has become known for provocative, high-quality entertainment, with compelling characters, and there is nothing more provocative and there’s nothing more provocative and compelling than characters like Mike Tyson, Holyfield and Mayweather. Although it’s a much different type of programming in that its live sports as opposed to scripted dramas and comedies, its value to the network is the same — delivering unique, compelling, provocative programming at the highest level of quality.

MCN:How has Showtime enhanced the viewer’s experience of watching boxing on television compared to the broadcast television networks?

SE: I think there was a certain consistency in presentation that premium television offered to boxing. The ability to stay with a fight between rounds without going to commercial break is something that greatly enhances the presentation of the sport as a whole. The ability to do things without really needing to take a break in the action and to present [uncensored] content to an adult audience, in some cases, were really things that premium television could offer, so I think the experience of professional boxing on premium television was qualitatively different than anything else.

I also think the technology has impacted how the sport is presented and how we market, distribute and deliver the bout. We were covering the events with 15 cameras to be able to deliver the bout that mimics as close as possible the in-arena look and feel of the event. The advent of HD, Dolby 5.1, were also critical pieces of delivering that feeling of a live event. More recently, going to a 4K camera, which we started using three or four years ago, added another layer of detail of the visual presentation. Equally important was marketing and advertising the event. The advent of social media and digital marketing in general have been critical in being able to reach fans.

MCN:The premium category over the years has also been criticized for hurting the sport by taking its biggest stars away from broadcast television and forcing fans to pay to watch big fights. Do you think that is a fair criticism?

SE: I don’t think premium television hurt the sport per se. The shift to premium television was a significant change, but that was really more a factor of premium networks stepping into the void created by a decrease in networks televising boxing. There was the death of a fighter in the ring during the [1982 CBS-televised] Ray Mancini-Duk Koo Kim fight, and that caused some broadcasters to reconsider their commitment to the sport. It was a result of several factors that allowed premium television to become more active.

We can certainly debate whether [boxing’s move to premium cable] was a positive or negative development for the visibility of the sport. In an ideal case, having regular exposure of boxing on a broad, over-the-air platform is something that would have helped the sport overall historically. But overall, I think we have been good stewards of the sport and the sport has done wonders for the network as well.

MCN:Looking ahead, is the sport currently flourishing on Showtime?

SE: It is. The entire media market is undergoing changes, and that’s true for premium television, as well as boxing. There’s uncertainty as we undergo those changes, but there’s huge opportunity as well. For Showtime, our investment has been in the heavyweight division with such stars as [champions] Dante Wilder and Anthony Joshua are two investments that will provide us with hours and hours of great fights. More generally we are developing the largest pool of young, talented fighters that are going to lead the post Mayweather era. That includes Leo Santa Cruz, Keith Thurman, Sean Porter and Danny Garcia.

MCN:Who is the most impactful fighter to fight on Showtime?

SE: I’d say in terms of impact I’d say it’s a three-way tie between Tyson, Holyfi eld and Mayweather, with a close second being the fighter that’s appeared more than any fighter on Showtime, Julio Cesar Chavez.

MCN:What was the most memorable fight on Showtime?

SE: The one that immediately jumps to mind is the 2005 Diego Corrales- Jose Louis Castillo fight which, during my lifetime, is the best fight that I’ve ever seen and was later named fight of the decade.

When pound for pound pay-per-view boxing champion Manny Pacquiao stepped out of the ring and into retirement after his April 9 unanimous decision win over Timothy Bradley Jr., so went the second-biggest revenue generator in pay-per-view event history.

Pay-per-view boxing’s all-time revenue generator, Floyd Mayweather, had already hung up his gloves last year. The retirements of PPV boxing’s two top draws leaves the category with huge shoes to fill as it comes off its most-successful year ever — success due largely to the record-setting “Fight of the Century” between Mayweather and Pacquiao on May 2, 2015.

It could be years before another PPV-boxing match rises to match the performance of Mayweather-Pacquiao, which raked in 4.5 million buys and more than $400 million in revenue. But it might take just a few rounds for the sweet science to crown some new champions capable of consistently surpassing the industry’s benchmark of 1 million PPV buys, boxing observers said.

Up-and-coming champions aren’t just getting greater television exposure from traditional boxing outlets like HBO and Showtime. New distribution hubs such as the Premier Boxing Champions series — which airs on NBC, Fox, CBS, ESPN and Spike TV, among other outlets — are affording exposure to young fighters. And digital media, with its reach and immediacy, can help a fighter quickly build a brand beyond boxing circles.

“There’s always going to be the question of who’s next,” In Demand senior vice president of programming and business development Mark Boccardi said. “It’s a cyclical business and since the late 1990s, there’s always been someone to be that guy or those guys, and within the industry everyone is confident there will be a fighter or fighters who can do that.”

Indeed, after such heavyweights as Mike Tyson, George Foreman, Evander Holyfield and Lennox Lewis — as well as lighter-weight fighters like welterweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez — dominated the PPV category in the 1990s, there was a lull before Oscar De La Hoya assumed the mantle in the mid-2000s. Once De La Hoya retired, the stage was set for Mayweather and Pacquiao to rule the PPV event business.

STAR SEARCH

The template for building a PPV fighter has already been established, said Bob Arum, the president of boxing promotion company Top Rank. The key now is to find a fighter or fighters who can follow the game plan.

“It all depends on taking a fighter and putting him in a position where he can attract people to spend money on PPV to watch him fight,” Arum said. “That’s easily said and hard to do.”

Arum, a veteran promoter who worked with Pacquaio and promoted Mayweather in his early boxing years, said that in addition to championship in-ring skills, first and foremost a successful PPV fighter must appeal to as many demographic groups as possible — something both of the aforementioned fighters were able to accomplish over the years.

So who’s closest to stepping into the vaunted PPV ring? The consensus among most boxing observers is that Mexican boxer Canelo Alvarez is poised to make the quickest move to PPV superstar status. The middleweight champion — who’ll fight Amir Kahn in a May 7 HBO-distributed PPV event — has already participated in the third-biggest PPV event of all time: his 2013 fight against Mayweather, which drew 2.2 million PPV buys.

His last fight, in November 2015 against Miguel Cotto, pulled in more than 900,000 buys, according to HBO.

“Clearly, with Canelo, you have a PPV superstar that can transition into the next great era,” Mark Taffet, president of sports marketing/consulting company Mark Taffet Media, said. “The challenge for the sport, in order to create a regular flow of million-buy mega-fights, is to develop a great supporting crew.”

Other up-and-coming fighters like welterweight champion Keith Thurman, junior welterweight champ Terence Crawford, middleweight titleholder Gennady Golovkin, undefeated former super middleweight champion Andre Ward and heavyweight champions Deontay Wilder and Anthony Joshua have been identified as potential draws either on their own, or pitted against one another in PPV mega-fights.

Top Rank will look to build a July PPV card featuring Crawford, Arum said, while the industry is hoping to schedule at least one fall PPV mega-event, although it’s unclear who would headline it.

STILL BUILDING FANS

But as good as those fighters are — and as well-known as they are within boxing circles — they still have yet to develop the broad, diverse audience they’ll need to win in the PPV arena, according to boxing observers.

“It takes time,” said Tony Paige, a boxing broadcaster and sports-talk host on New York radio station WFAN. “The fighters will have to build themselves up with big fights over time to become big PPV draws. If you get enough big wins, you’re driving the bus, so to speak.”

Some observers said the development of the Premier Boxing Champions series, which showcases current champions and young fighters on live fight cards airing on NBC, CBS, Spike TV, ESPN, NBCSN, CBS Sports Network and FS1 — along with other networks like BET and truTV from time to time — as a step in the right direction.

“The sport is not only in the transition to see who ascends to the mountaintop next, but I think there’s a great opportunity with the quickly changing television landscape and technology to reach out and attract the next generation of fans to support the next generation of fighters,” said Taffet, who most recently served as senior vice president of HBO Sports. “It’s a challenge promoters and networks must readily accept to insure a very fertile environment for the sport going forward.”

But offering fights on too many outlets could actually curtail the ability to create one or two mega-stars, Paige cautioned. “It’s hard to build up interest in one particular fighter when that fighter fights one month on one network and then maybe three months later on another network,” he said. “It’s hard for fans to keep up with the schedule.”

Developing continuity in the sport’s message to the consumers is critical if boxing is to build its next wave of top fighters into PPV superstars, Taffet said. “It’s important for consumers to regularly be in touch with the sport, the athletes and the storylines, so that in their increasingly busy, media-savvy days they can develop the attachment that leads to true fan support on an ongoing basis.”

One way to get a fighter’s brand beyond boxing’s core fan base is via social media. Digital platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram give promoters, fighters and sponsors a chance to continuously feed fans’ appetites in ways that have yet to be fully exploited, Taffet said.

Added WFAN’s Paige: “If you don’t get beyond your core followers you’re just preaching to the choir. What always makes boxers and boxing successful is when you get a crossover audience of people that don’t have anything to do with boxing, but are interested in the fighter.”

Getting to that point will take a combined eff ort from several corners, according to executives.

“It’s not just as simple as everyone getting together and saying let’s just create someone,” said In Demand’s Boccardi. “It’s a combination of the promoter doing their job and finding the fighters, the networks doing their job and helping to develop them, and the PPV industry doing their job to help promote those fighters.”

HBO officials confirmed Monday that it will distribute the April 9 Manny Pacquiao-Timothy Bradley pay-per-view boxing event, the third fight between the two former welterweight champions.

The fight is the first for Pacquiao since his record-setting May 2 PPV fight against Floyd Mayweather. That fight, in which Pacquiao lost a lackluster unanimous decision to the undefeated Mayweather, drew 4.4 million buys and more than $400 million in revenue.

Pacquiao claimed he hurt his shoulder prior to the Mayweather fight and underwent shoulder surgery shorlty after the event.

Pacquiao and Bradley have split their first two encounters, with Bradley winning a highly disputed split decision over Pacquiao in September 2013 and Pacquiao winning a unanimous decision against the then undefeated welterweight champion in April 2014.

That April rematch fight drew between 750,000 and 800,000 PPV buys, but industry observers said it will be hard for the fighters – both of whom are passed their prime – to ring up similar numbers for their rubber match.

Fight promoter Bob Arum admitted as much to ESPN.com, saying that was concerned that many boxing fans would react negatively to the fight. Arum did say to ESPN.com that Bradley’s recent partnering with veteran trainer Teddy Atlas throws a different wrinkle into this fight compared to the previous two.  

Bradley looked sharp in his first fight with Atlas in his corner, scoring a TKO over an overmatched, former champion Fernando Vargas on Nov. 7.

Pound-For-Pound Pay-per-view boxing champion Floyd Mayweather will step in the ring Sept. 12 in a Showtime PPV fight against former champion Andre Berto, Showtime said Tuesday.

The fight is the final bout for Mayweather as part of the undefeated boxer's six-fight, multi-million dollar PPV deal with Showtime. The Mayweather-Berto fight had been rumored to be moving to free Tv as part of CBS’ deal with Premier Boxing Champions. 

Instead the PPV industry hopes it will get one more mega PPV payday from Mayweather, coming off the record 4.4 million buys generated from the May 2 Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao fight.

It’s unclear how much Mayweather-Berto will cost boxing fans to watch on PPV, but its unlikely to hit the record $89 suggested retail price for Mayweather-Pacquiao.

ESPN will team with Premier Boxing Champions tonight (July 11) to air the Keith Thurman/Luis Collazo welterweight championship fight card – the first of several PBC On ESPN boxing events the 24-hour sports network will distribute as part of a multi-year deal.

The PBC On ESPN telecasts will represent a major upgrade from ESPN’s long-running Friday Night Fights boxing series. The network will utilize 11 cameras to shoot the fights – nearly double the number used for Friday Night Fights  -- and a 360-degree “Round-A-Bout” camera system about the ring comprised of 32 cameras which will allow viewers to see every punch and hit from all angles, according to network officials.

I had a chance to speak with Brian Kweder, senior director of programming and acquisitions at ESPN, and here’s what he and ESPN want you to know about the network’s PBC on ESPN telecasts.

PBC On ESPN Packs A Bigger TV Punch: “This is not Friday Night Fights that we’re delivering anymore; it’s definitely a bigger and better production. We have entered into the space that was previously the domain of the premium cable channels, so it’s important for fans to understand that we’re delivering major championship fights now and no longer dealing with young upstarts and the over the hill gang. Our telecasts will be more in line with how we treat some of the other big sports events like college football, NBA and MLB. It will be bigger and better than anything we’ve done for the sport of boxing."

PBC Delivers Better Talent, more competitive matches:– “The PBC is bringing a level of talent we’ve never seen on ESPN. Guys like Keith Thurman and Danny Garcia (scheduled to fight Paulie Malignaggi Aug. 1 on ESPN) – those guys we used to see either at very young stages of their career or when they are way over the hill. Now we’re getting these top notch boxers in their primes, which is the biggest difference.”

PBC On ESPN Riding Boxing's Growing Momentum: “Starting from [the May 2] Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao fight, which went way off the [PPV performance] charts from a popularity standpoint, and then with the launch of the PBC on the various broadcast and cable networks as well as ESPN, people have begun to stand up and take notice of the sport again. Fights had been limited to PPV and premium cable for so many years, and now that they’re available to more viewers the [PBC ratings] are higher than we anticipated because you obviously have a bigger audience to choose from. Typically from a Friday Night Fights standpoint we would receive very little editorial coverage from the SportsCenters of the world,  but because these are such big events and the PBC is bringing quality fights to such a mass audience, it's also garnering the attention of our editorial folks who are starting to pay more attention to boxing.”

Showtime Sports recently announced it will telecast a big June 13 Deontay Wilder-Eric Molina heavyweight championship fight, but boxing fans are still talking about the mega May 2 Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao pay-per-view event Showtime co-promoted with HBO.

Showtime Sports executive vice president and general manager Stephen Espinoza discusses the record breaking PPV results of the event with Multichannel News programming editor R. Thomas Umstead. Espinoza also talks about Mayweather’s future in the ring, including a potential rematch with Pacquiao.

An edited version of the interview appears below.

MCN: Did the fight meet your PPV performance expectations?

Stephen Espinoza: It far exceeded our expectations, even what we were expecting late in the week. We were monitoring pre-buys all week but there was nothing in the ballpark to compare it to … they were so high we couldn’t use it to extrapolate any numbers. We were largely flying blind.

MCN: Were you surprised with the significant amount of day of buys for the fight despite heavy promotion to drive pre-buys?

SE: We were. One of the elements that made it hard to predict was that we did message so heavily on early buying by the viewer to avoid technical difficulties, so we weren’t sure how much of the early activity was in response to that messaging and how much was genuine overall excitement and enthusiasm for the fight. I guess our first real indication that there was a huge expansion of the audience was during the telecast itself when we starting getting some reports that some operators were experiencing technical difficulties processing the huge volume of orders that were coming in on Saturday evening. Ultimately we were able to buy some time by stalling the main event and that hopefully that allowed everything to get cleared up in time for a successful main event telecast.

MCN: Did everything go as well as expected behind the scenes?

SE: It was a tremendous amount of work by a tremendous amount of people in a very short period of time. To have not just the two networks (co-fight promoters HBO and Showtime) but also two fighter promotional groups come together, learn how to work together and execute this huge event in a period of eight or nine weeks was a daunting task. But I think the telecast and the PPV results speak for themselves. I have nothing but praise for everyone who worked on this event.

MCN: So put the fight’s PPV performance in perspective: what does the event’s 4.4 million buys and more than $400 million mean for the future of the sport?

SE: What it means for the fight and the sport is sort of a new measuring stick for mainstream appeal of boxing. It’s been decades since the sport has received this level of attention and maybe not even then. To be able to capture the imagination and attention of the mainstream audience in such a short period of time on a very, very busy sports weekend speaks volumes about the continued appeal of this sport. Having said that, not every fight is going to be Mayweather/Pacquiao, but for the right matchups there’s still tremendous appeal and demand for boxing.

MCN: What do you say to the folks who say the fight itself was lackluster and failed to live up to the hype?

SE: When you’re dealing with two elite athletes like Mayweather and Pacquiao the distinction and separation in skill between them is going to be relatively minute. These are the two best fighters in the world, so you can look at that and realize that it was very unlikely that there was going to be a knockout. Having said that, there was plenty of action throughout the fight and there was risk on both sides. The fight had thrilling moments – there was plenty for the casual fan and for the hard core fan. Those who were looking for a brutal slugfest were obviously disappointed, but anyone who appreciates the skill and technical prowess that’s required at the highest levels of boxing was treated to a unique and perhaps once in a lifetime exhibition of that.

MCN: Mayweather has one more fight on his six-fight deal with Showtime. Have you begun to think about the next fight?

SE: Yes. Floyd has continued to tell us that he intends to fight Sept. 12 and that it will be the last fight of his career. So we are beginning the very preliminary preparations for exactly that. We will be getting into discussions about an opponent for him very quickly. We will look to ride the momentum of this event and capitalize on the fact that Floyd has now distinguished himself as the fighter of his era.

MCN: Any thought whatsoever about a possible Mayweather-Pacquiao rematch?

SE: I think we have to remain open to it. There’s a lot of chatter on both sides about the possibility – once Manny successfully recovers from [shoulder] surgery, if there a demand and if Floyd is still active or would consider coming back to being active then it would be a topic of conversation. But it will be driven by demand.

As expected the May 2 Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao fight obliterated all pay-per-view event records, generating 4.4 million buys and more
than $400 million in PPV revenue. While the fighters delivered a lackluster performance throughout the 12-round fight, the event’s remarkable PPV
returns will place it as one of the most successful events in sport’s history.

Here are three takeaways from MayPac’s stellar PPV performance:

Boxing is still the PPV Champion: The sweet science may not dominate the sports pages or weekly television schedules like it did in the 50s through
70s, but when it comes to big events no other event genre can touch the sweet science in terms of drawing eyeballs and dollars. The top 10 most watched PPV events of all time are boxing
matches, with the top three having occurred within the last decade and two of the top three in the last two years. It may take a while for another fight to capture the public’s interest on the
level of Mayweather-Pacquiao, but it’s a good bet that no music, pro wrestling or mixed martial arts will challenge the record in the meantime.

The industry can market big events: In a crowded entertainment environment, cable operators, telcos, satellite providers and networks proved that they can still reach a significant amount of
consumers with a marketing message that can lure viewers to traditional cable. Rabid boxing fans and casual sports fans alike couldn’t turn on their television sets or scan the Web without seeing some form of promotion for the fight, especially in the last two weeks of the event.

Live Sports Rules: Mayweather-Pacquiao continued an impressive run of major sporting events drawing record-breaking numbers on cable in 2015, joining ESPN’s January Ohio State-Oregon telecast as the most watched cable program of all time and TBS’ Kentucky-Wisconsin April Final Four telecast as the highest rated college basketball game ever. Live sports remains one of the few DVR and OTT-proof content on cable.

Its official: The May 2 Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao ‘fight of the century’ is the greatest performing pay-per-view event ever, generating a whopping 4.4 million buys, fight co-promoters HBO and Showtime announced Tuesday.

The fight, which was projected to break all PPV records, also garnered more than $400 million in PPV revenue, according to HBO and Showtime. The numbers bested the 2.48 million PPV buys generated by the 2007 Floyd Mayweather-Oscar De La Hoya bout, and the $150 million earned by the 2013 Mayweather-Canelo Alvarez fight.

“The 4.4 million buys could not have been achieved without the promotional support and early order initiatives put in place by distributors across the country,” said Mark Taffet, HBO Sports senior vice president.

Mayweather defeated Pacquiao in a 12-round unanimous decision which many observers felt fell short action-wise of the massive hype surrounding the event.

HBO and Showtime tonight (May 9) will simultaneously air a replay of last Saturday's Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao fight, and while the action in the ring didn't quite live up to expectations, the fight's pay-per-view performance is shaping up to be a knockout for the industry.

Fight co-distributors HBO and Showtime are still saying that it’s still too early to project a PPV buy number for the heavily hyped "fight of the century," but satellite, cable and telco distributors are reporting record-breaking numbers that are poised to easily push the fight beyond the industry record 2.5 million buy mark set by the 2007 Mayweather-Oscar De La Hoya fight and the $152 million PPV revenue record pinned down by the 2013 Mayweather-Canelo Alvarez fight.

The fight could approach the rarified air of 3 to 4 million buys and more than $300 million in PPV revenues if early buy numbers are any indication, according to industry observers.

Satellite provider DirecTv alone drew more than 1 million buys for the fight despite facing some challenges with processing a multitiude of same-day fight purchases, DirecTv chairman Mike White said during the company’s first quarter earnings call last week.

“There's no doubt that sports, particularly live sports, continues to draw massive audience. We were thrilled with the results of the fight … it was a record for us,” he said. “We had some challenges getting everybody through, but we did get everybody through. We were ready to go by the end and we learned a lot out of it, but we just blew the doors off in terms of sales, which was nice because it will help the second quarter."

Cable industry PPV event aggregator In Demand would not reveal specific numbers, but a spokesperson said that, “early estimates indicate that the MayPac event will shatter both the buy and revenue records for a single event in the PPV category.” 

Telco provider Verizon also set a company PPV buy record with the fight, which had generated more than 250,000 purchases, according to Bob Elek, Verizon spokesman. He added that the provider experienced “minor” problems with order processing due to a 500% increase in fight buys on the day of the event compared to the number of buys generated prior to the May 2 bout.

Even reported illegal streaming of the fight from social media apps Periscope and Meerkat could stop the PPV momentum for Mayweather-Pacquiao.

While the fight generated what many observers called a lackluster 12-round majority decision win for Mayweather, talk about a potential rematch had begun to build throughout the week – especially when it was revealed that Pacquiao suffered a shoulder injury in training which may have hampered his performance in the ring.

But Mayweather all but squashed any talk of a fight sequel in an interview with Showtime that will air in its entirety tonight. After initially revealing that he would be open to a rematch, Mayweather told Showtime reporter Jim Gray that Pacquiao doesn't deserve a rematch. “Did I text Stephen A. Smith and say I will fight him again?  Yeah, but I change my mind,” said Mayweather.  “At this particular time, no, because he’s a sore loser and he’s a coward… If you lost, accept the loss and say, ‘Mayweather, you were the better fighter.’” 

There’s no question the May 2 Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao pay-per-view event will knock out all pay-per-view records. What industry observers are asking now is how high is up.

At press time, fight co-promoters Showtime and HBO were still adding up all the numbers for the mega fight and would not provide specific figures.

But it’s clear the fight as predicted will eclipse the record 2.48 million buys generated by HBO’s 2007 Mayweather-Oscar De La Hoya fight and the $152 million in PPV revenue set by the Showtime’s 2013 Mayweather-Canelo Alvarez fight.

Heading into the fight, the networks reported early fight buys had put the fight on a record-setting pace. With most buys taking place the day of the event, industry observers believe the fight could approach or surpass the 3 million buy mark.

With a record high $89 suggested retail price – some operators charged $99 for the high definition feed – industry estimates of at least $300 million in PPV revenues are not far-fetched.

Verizon has already declared Mayweather-Pacquiao as its biggest PPV event ever, generating more than 250,000 PPV buys, said Bob Elek, Verizon spokesman.

The fight generated big PPV numbers despite some distributors struggling to process the slew of last-minute buys coming in for the fight. Many fans took to social media Saturday night to complain about being unable to purchase and view the fight.

Fight co-promoters HBO and Showtime announced during the fight telecast that it was delaying the Mayweather-Pacquiao main event to allow distributors to process all PPV buys.

Verizon representatives reported “minor” problems with order processing despite the fact the telco experienced a 500% increase in fight buys the day of the event compared to the number of buys generated prior to the event.

Mayweather-Pacquiao’ PPV performance also set records despite illegal streams of the fight from social media apps Periscope and Meerkat, according to several published reports. App users reportedly live streamed video of the fight from their television sets or live from the venue itself.

As for the fight, Mayweather used his superior defensive skills, speed and footwork to keep Pacquiao at bay to win comfortably in a unanimous decision that many observers said fell short of the massive hype generated for the event.

For those who missed the “Fight of The Century” HBO and Showtime will simultaneously telecast a replay of the event Saturday at 9 p.m. HBO will pair the fight the Canelo Alvarez/James Kirkland live boxing match, while Showtime will premiere its Inside Mayweather vs. Pacquiao Epilogue special.

Floyd Mayweather defeated Manny Pacquiao by unanimous decision in Saturday night's big boxing event, but at the end of the day it will be the pay-per-view industry that ends up the ultimate winner.

Mayweather used his quick hands and long jab to keep the more aggressive Pacquiao at bay for most of the 12-round fight, winning comfortably on all three of the official judges’ scorecards. Two judges saw the fight 116-112, while a third judge saw the fight 118-110 for the welterweight champion.

Mayweather remains undefeated at 48-0. He said after the fight that he will return to the ring in September in the last of his six-fight deal with Showtime.

HBO and Showtime will simultaneously air a replay of the fight next Saturday at 9 p.m. HBO will pair the fight the Canelo Alvarez/James Kirkland live boxing match, while Showtime will premiere its Inside Mayweather vs. Pacquiao Epiloge speical, said representatives from both networks.   

The highly anticipated Mayweather-Pacquiao fight is expected to break all PPV buy and revenue records. Prior to the fight, numeorus subscribers complained of having trouble accessing the fight feed, prompting Charter to send out a Tweet acknowledging the outages by saying, “we are working to resolve as soon as possible.”

The main event was even delayed for approximately 30 minutes to allow last minute PPV orders to be processed, according to fight announcers.

 HBO Sports senior vice president Mark Taffet said earlier in the evening that a record number of orders were being processed so fans should be “patient” as distributors processed the orders.

Today’s consumers often complain about the rising cost of a pay TV package, costing an average $75 for roughly 300 channels.

Yet two weeks before the blockbuster May 2 Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao pay-per-view event, sports fans don’t seem too upset about dropping a C-note to watch the most anticipated boxing match in decades.

With a record $89 suggested retail price set by HBO and Showtime  -- $99 charged by some distributors to watch the fight in high definition -- Mayweather-Pacquiao is the most expensive ever for consumers, costing upwards of $25 more than any previous event.

Some operators initially suffered “sticker shock” at the record-setting price point, but most are dealing with it within the scope of the massive interest the fight is generating, said Mark Boccardi, senior vice president of programming and business development for In Demand, which negotiates PPV licensing and marketing deals for most cable distributors.

“The price point has been in the marketplace for a while, and I haven’t seen any real groundswell of opposition with it,” he said. “What you’ll end up seeing is, you’ll have more and more groups of people getting together, and the commercial business for the fight will be off the charts.”

While the fight is almost a lock to knock out the $152 million PPV-revenue record, some observers believe the phenomenon of watching in groups — whether it’s 20 people in a house or 100 in a local bar — could jeopardize the fight’s ability to match or surpass the record 2.4 million buys generated by 2007’s Mayweather-De La Hoya fight.

Yet so far, the price doesn’t seem to be affecting early buys. Showtime Sports executive vice president and general manager Stephen Espinoza said some operators are already experiencing Mayweather-Pacquiao purchases at numbers comparable to those that usually come in two or three days before other huge PPV fights, a phenomenon also confirmed by several distributors.

And that’s before the lion’s share of Mayweather-Pacquaio marketing campaigns begin this week.

“We think there’s an enthusiasm that’s been pent up for many years for this fight and an awareness that this is a premium event,” Espinoza said. “It is slightly more expensive than a typical PPV, but then again, what the consumers are getting is not a typical PPV either.”

For boxing fans anticipating for more than five years this fight between arguably the two most well-known and popular fighters in the sport, the steep price tag could end up being well worth the money.

HBO Tuesday announced it will develop a special profiling the May 2 Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao pay-per-view fight.

The one-hour special, Mayweather/Pacquiao: At Last will premiere April 18 following the network’s Boxing After Dark live show and will follow Pacquiao as he prepares for the much anticipated boxing event. The special will also air in primetime on HBO April 23, said the network.

“This is the mega-fight fans have been anticipating for many years, and we are thrilled to chronicle Manny Pacquiao’s path to this defining moment in his career,” says Rick Bernstein, executive producer, HBO Sports in a statement. “This special will provide viewers with a narrative of how this fight came to be and spotlight Team Pacquiao’s preparations heading into the biggest challenge Manny has confronted in the ring. It will be a terrific primer for any viewer eager to go behind the scenes in the lead-up to May 2.”

The announcement comes a week after Showtime, which will co-distribute the PPV fight with HBO, announced a four-part documentary, Inside Mayweather vs. Pacquiao debuting April 18, that will showcase the undefeated Mayweather’s preparation for what is expected to be the biggest pay-per-view boxing event in history.   

TruTv is the latest cable network to add boxing to its primetime lineup, partnering with Top Rank to create a live Friday primetime series launching May 1.

The new series, in association with Turner Sports and HBO Sports, will launch on the eve of the May 2 Floyd Mayweather vs. Manny Pacquiao pay-per-view fight with a card featuring two title bouts inside The Chelsea at The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas.

The card will feature a lightweight world championship fight between Takahiro and Ray Beltran as well as a NABF welterweight championship fight between Mikael Zewski and Konstantin Ponomarev.

“We’re excited to partner with Top Rank and our colleagues at HBO Sports to bring this high-caliber boxing series to truTV,” said Lenny Daniels, president of Turner Sports in a statement.  “We share a common vision to present these events in a new and inventive way and look forward to offering this compelling content to our viewers.”

Added Chris Linn, truTV president and head of programming: “We see this as a great opportunity to bring more coveted live sports programming to the network and believe Friday night primetime fights will resonate with truTV’s young audience.”

truTV is the latest in a growing list of networks launching live boxing shows. Cable network Spike TV along with broadcast networks NBC, CBS and Bounce TV have announced deals with Premier Boxing Champions for upcoming live boxing cards.  

Super welterweight boxer and former champion Canelo Alvarez will fight on HBO May 9 against James Kirkland, a week after the mega May 2 Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao pay-per-view boxing match.

The bout will be the first for Alvarez on HBO since signing a multi-year deal with the pay TV network last year. Prior to that Alvarez fought several bouts on Showtime, including a September 2013 PPV fight against Mayweather which stands as the most lucrative PPV boxing event of all time.

“Because of the quality of fighter he is and quality of fight he is in, Canelo Alvarez’s 2015 debut may be more heavily anticipated than any others,” said Peter Nelson, HBO Sports vice president of programming in a statement. “That’s because when Canelo decided to face the incarnate wrecking-ball that is James Kirkland, fans recognize both that Alvarez is choosing a hard road and that Kirkland has been paving that road his whole career in hope of one day reaching a landmark opportunity like this one. Alvarez-Kirkland is a signature World Championship Boxing event.”

It’s unclear whether the Alvarez-Kirkland fight will be packaged with the replay of the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight, which is being co-promoted by both HBO and Showtime. Typically replays of PPV fights air during a week after its live telecast and aren’t announced until after the fight has taken place.

Neither Showtime nor HBO have discussed live telecast plans or fight replay options for Mayweather-Pacquiao.

HBO Sports on Wednesday held a press conference for its April 25 Wladamir Klitschko-Bryant Jennings heavyweight championship boxing telecast, but the proposed May 2 Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao was on the minds of many boxing observers attending the conference at New York City’s Madison Square Garden.

Negotiations continue between the Mayweather and Pacquiao camps -- as well as between the fight's co-PPV distributors HBO and Showtime -- to make what is expected to be the most lucrative pay-per-view boxing match of all time. But the clock is ticking on the event.

In order to effectively market and promote the event, as well as to give the fighters adequate time to train, a deal for the fight needs to happen over the next week, according to sources close to the situation. Yet issues remain unresolved between the two parties.

HBO Sports president Ken Hershman told several reporters after the Klitschko-Jennings press conference that the network is ready and willing to make the fight, but would not reveal any specifics on the negotiations.

Just two days earlier, HBO released a statement saying that it is not impeding negotiations for the fight after published reports intimated that the pay service -- which has multi-fight agreement with Pacquiao -- has less incentive to make the Maywether-Pacquiao fight than Showtime, which has two fights left on its six fight, multi-million dollar TV deal with Mayweather.

“We stand ready to do the fight and if the [fighters] come to an agreement, that’s great for boxing," he said. "We stand ready to do it, and that’s what we hope happens."

As for Klitschko-Jennings, that fight will mark the first time the 38 year-old German-based Klitschko has fought in the United States since 2008. The World Boxing Association, International Boxing Federation and World Boxing Organization heavyweight champion said he’s looking forward to “entertaining” the Madison Square Garden crowd when he meets the undefeated Jennings in April. “I know this will be a tough challenge," he added.

Maybe as tough as making Mayweather-Pacquiao happen. 

HBO said Monday that it is not standing in the way of making the May 2 Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao pay-per-view fight as negotiations for the mega fight continue.

Neither Showtime nor HBO would comment on the particulars of their negotiations to co-distribute the PPV fight, but late Monday HBO released a statement saying that they are not hampering negotiations for what is expected to be the most lucrative boxing event in history.

While there seemed to be recent progress being made to reach a fight deal – late last week Pacquiao promoter Bob Arum said a fight deal would be finalized over the next couple of days – an agreement has yet to be secured.

Recent published reports have intimated that the HBO – which has a multi-fight deal with Pacquiao – has less incentive to make the fight than Showtime, which has two more fights on its six-fight deal with Mayweather and wants to finish the contract with a huge PPV payday.   

HBO Sports in a statement said: “We are not an impediment to this fight. We stand ready to go. The principals need to agree to terms and come to a deal.”

Boxing champion Floyd Mayweather is “laser-focused” on putting together a May 2 fight with Manny Pacquiao as negotiations proceed, Showtime Sports executive vice president and general manager Stephen Espinoza said Saturday. 

Espinoza confirmed to Multichannel News that there are parts that have been completed for a May 2  Mayweather-Pacquiao mega pay-per-view fight, but a final agreement has yet to be reached.

“Talks are continuing and we’ve made meaningful progress, but we still have a significant distance to cover on a number of open points,” he said. “Until the whole thing is done, nothing’s done.”

Espinoza would not provide specifics on the talks. Showtime, which has two more fights on its six-fight TV deal with Mayweather, and HBO -- which has Pacquiao under contract -- are in negotiations to co-distribute the event via PPV.

 The last time the two rival pay TV services teamed to distribute a PPV fight was the 2002 Lennox Lewis-Mike Tyson fight.

Earlier this week Pacquiao promoter Bob Arum said the Filipino fighter has agreed to terms to the fight, but added the undefeated Mayweather had not signed off on the deal. 

But Espinoza said that Mayweather is not hesitant to fight Pacquiao, but his strategy has been to keep as much of the negotiations out of the press as possible.

“Some has perceived that as lack of interest, but it’s the opposite – he’s so focused on getting it done that he doesn’t want to say anything publically that would complicate the negotiations,” Espinoza said. “He wants it as much as he’s ever had for any fight, and our marching orders are to do our best to get it done as fast as possible.”

Espinoza, speaking from Las Vegas in support of tonight’s Showtime telecast of the Bermane Stiverne-Deontay Wilder heavyweight championship fight, added that Mayweather will fight on May 2 against Pacquiao or another opponent.

HBO will re-air eight of its top fights of 2014 over four consecutive nights beginning Dec. 27, the network announced Thursday.

The telecasts will feature fights from several marquee boxers including Manny Pacquiao, Miguel Cotto, Gennady Golovkin, Juan Manuel Marquez and Wladimir Klitschko, said network officials.

HBO’s Boxing’s Best lineup is as follows:

This past Saturday featured two pay-per-view events that could help set the stage for an interesting 2015 in the PPV event category.

First, boxing champion Manny Pacquiao’s destruction of game but overmatched Chris Algieri has all but set the stage for a potential mega matchup between Pacquiao and the reigning pound-for-pound PPV champion Floyd Mayweather. The two fighters are arguably the biggest attractions in PPV boxing today, but neither fighter is getting any younger. The window of opportunity is shrinking for the 35-year old Pacquiao and the 37-year old Mayweather to mix it up while their skills are still intact and their appeal to boxing fans remains strong.

While there are attractive opponents for both fighters, no other bout could match the potential PPV revenue that a Pacquiao-Mayweather fight could generate. Published reports recently quoted Pacquiao promoter Bob Arum as saying that talks have already begun to make the fight, which could set all PPV buy and revenue records.

For boxing fans, let’s hope 2015 is finally the year for Pacquiao-Mayweather.  

Another PPV event debuting that night with much less fanfare was the Lauryn Hill Live From Brooklyn Bowl concert, featuring one of the most popular female R&B/hip-hop artists over the past two decades.

The multi-Grammy winning Hill, who over the years has had her ups and downs but still has wide appeal within the urban music community, could bring with her to PPV a new generation of music fans that may not remember when music concerts drove the PPV category along with boxing and wrestling events during the 1990s. PPV music shows from the Rolling Stones, New Kids On The Block, Backstreet Boys, The Judds and others represented 15% of all PPV events and nearly $100 million in revenue during that decade, behind only boxing and wrestling.

The explosion of the Internet over the last two decades and the proliferation of free concert videos on websites like Youtube have all but silenced the PPV music category. Yet there may be room for special and unique performances like the Hill concert that could push young, urban music fans to pick up the remote and purchase a PPV music show.

Lauryn Hill fans who watched Pacquiao-Algieri live on Saturday night can still catch L Boogie’s performance via video on demand (VOD) or PPV for several more weeks.

PPV event distributors were pleasantly surprised by a 2012 Steve Harvey stand-up comedy concert that drew significantly more on demand purchases than expected in the weeks after it premiered. If Ms. Hill can do the same thing with her music concert, it may encourage other music performers to take a second look at the PPV category as a potentially viable distribution platform. 

Boxing champion Manny Pacquiao easily outclassed opponent Chris Algieri in last night’s big HBO Sports pay-per-view boxing card, setting the stage for a potential lucrative matchup with Floyd Mayweather.

Pacquiao knocked down the game but overmatched Algieri six times in winning a unanimous decision in front of a sell out crowd in Macau, China. The 35-year old Pacquiao was in complete control throughout the fight in winning nearly all 12 rounds on all the judges’ scorecards. 

During the post-fight news conference, Pacquiao said that he wants to fight Mayweather, adding that the fans deserve the fight, according to ESPN.com. A mega Mayweather/Pacquiao fight has been rumored for years, but the two fighters have never been able to agree to terms.

A potential fight 2009 was scratched over fighter drug testing disputes.

Early last week, Pacquiao promoter Bob Arum said that talks between HBO, which has a TV contract with Pacquiao and Showtime, which has two fights left as part of its six-fight deal with Mayweather, to promote a joint PPV event sometime in 2015, according to ESPN.

Mayweather has talked about fighting in May and September of 2015 on Showtime, but has not announced any opponents.

HBO Sports next month will look to promote its Nov. 22 Manny Pacquiao-Chris Algieri fight with a new special, Under The Lights: Pacquiao-Algieri.

The special, premiering Nov. 15, will dig deep into the world welterweight championship fight between Pacquiao and Algieri, according to the network. Hosted by HBO Boxing commentator Max Kellerman, Under The Lights will feature analysis from welterweight boxer Timothy Bradley Jr. – who both beat and lost to Pacquiao -- and boxing trainer Virgil Hunter.

HBO has also scheduled a three-part 24/7 Pacquiao-Algieri documentary series leading up to the fight. The documentary debuts Nov. 8, said HBO.

The network also announced it will premiere a new episode of its boxing information series The Fight Game With Jim Lampley on Oct. 28.

HBO’s 24/7 sports documentary show will take a look at the upcoming Nov. 22 Manny Pacquiao-Chris Algieri pay-per-view fight, the network said Friday.

The one-episode 24/7 Pacquiao/Algieri show will air Nov.8 on the pay service and will explore the storyline for the fight and follow the fighters as they train for the big event, said the network.

The special will air after the network’s Nov. 8 World Championship Boxing telecast featuring the Bernard Hopkins-Sergey Kovalev light heavyweight unification bout, said network officials.

New York -- Like most who favor the sweet science, count Stephen Espinoza among the crowd that would love to see Floyd Mayweather finally battle Manny Pacquiao.

Speaking at NewBay Media’s The Business of Live Television Summit here Tuesday, Espinoza, executive vice president, general manager Showtime Sports and Event Programming, Showtime Networks, Inc., said “we’re going to make another run at that. It’s something that should happen. I don’t know if it will” of the long-anticipated matchup between “Money” and “Pac Man.”

The fight, which would be pay-per-view gold and likely shatter boxing's $150 million revenue record for Mayweather-Canelo Alvarez, has been scotched in the past over disputes about drug testing methodologies and animus between the would-be participants. However, as Mayweather only has two bouts left on his six-fight contract with Showtime and Pacquiao is also nearing the end of his career, Espinoza remained hopeful that such a mega-bout could happen in 2015 during one of boxing/Mayweather’s May and  September windows.

Espinoza, who was interviewed by Multichannel News programming editor, R. Thomas Umstead, said that Mayweather’s most recent fight, another win over Marcus Maidana on Sept. 13 following their earlier confrontation in May, was a win for Showtime from broadcast, event and financial metrics.

He said that when it comes to great athletes – he called Mayweather, the Michael Jordan of boxing – fans only have a relatively short amount of time to appreciate their careers. “Tiger Woods was on top for 10 years;  Roger Federer for six.  For an athlete to be dominating a sport into his late thirties, to be undefeated for 17 years, to be regarded as one of the top fighters for 13 to 14 years, it’s rare that we get to see that kind of athletic performance.”

He said that Mayweather’s fights have been producing 900,000 to 1 million buys, but revenue have been supplemented by other platforms.  Espinoza said theater exhibition of Mayweather-Maidana was "a very big business." Harkening back to the closed circuit days before residential pay-per-view, there were 600 screens in play nationwide for Mayweather-Maidana, two thirds of which were "sold out at $20 a pop."

Espinoza said that exit polling revealed that most who witnessed the bout in the theater setting had visited the cineplex with the expectation to see a film; that two-thirds were not planning to buy the fight at home anyway; and that it was a very young demographic “This did not cannibalize the pay-per-view. This was completely additive,” Espinoza stated.

Similarly, he said Mayweather-Maidana picked up some business from Playstation users: “The fight performed at the upper end of UFC and WWE cards on this platform.  Again, this was additive from hard-core gamers.”

As to the value of live sports on Showtime, Espinoza said it’s somewhat difficult to get an exact read on why households subscriber to the premium service.

“We don’t monetize viewers through ads.  We don’t know who subscribes for boxing, for Dexter, for Ray Donovan or Homeland.  Generally, it’s probably a combination of it all,” he said. “But boxing and MMA appeal to different demos than say RayDonovan.  Boxing is slightly younger than the network overall and it’s more ethnic and educated than Showtime as a whole.”

Relative to PPV performance, it’s not only about the buys.  “We can’t get Peyton Manning, Michael Phelps or Roger Federer exclusively. But we can get the No. 1 boxer in Floyd Mayweather on our network. Sports has tremendous [promotional] value.  Pay-per-view is one of the only times we get to talk to non- subscribers. It provides multiple layers of value for the network.”

Television fans that used to gather around the office watercooler to talk about the previous night’s shows are now tweeting and messaging friends during live broadcasts, a shift that has programmers, advertisers and content developers looking for new ways to present content, panelists at the Business of Live Television Summit said.

But where once TV viewers used to gather together for big events, whether it be the Super Bowl or the finale of The Sopranos, they are siting at home and interacting with friends and strangers via social media like Twitter and Facebook.

“That ability to capture people interacting with their social group while watching is a powerful way to reach consumers,” said Horizon Media senior vice president and director of national broadcast Dave Campanelli at the Multichannel News/B&C-sponsored event in New York City Tuesday.

That level of engagement is not lost on those that measure viewership. Nielsen vice president of analytics Peter Katsingris noted that sporting events account for only 2% of all telecasts during a year, but more than 50% of the TV tweets generated are during sporting events.

“We know that everyone is connected when watching TV,” Katsingris said.

While Twitter’s impact on television viewership is well known to anyone who has heard of Sharknado, Facebook is becoming a force in driving viewership to live events as well. According to Facebook manager of public solutions Bob Morgan, live events like the Academy Awards, The MTV Video Music Awards and the FIFA World Cup not only attract the biggest audiences, they also drive the most social media traffic. Morgan estimated that unique engagements to the platform were about 11 million during his year’s Oscars, 13 million for the VMAs and 350 million for the World Cup. He added that the FIFA World Cup audience during the tournament also generated about 3 billion likes and shares.

Facebook, he said, is starting to investigate ways to bring TV networks, shows and personalities into the fold, with products like a mentions app, which allows verifiable public figures to engage in discussions about them or their shows. So in a Facebook thread after a National Football League game when users are talking about Arizona Cardinals wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald’s future with the team, Fitzgerald himself can chime in.

That level of engagement can help drive viewership to shows, even replacing traditional ads that promote programs before they air, said Anthem Media Group CEO Leonard Asper. 

“If somebody says they are going to be on a show [via facebook or Twitter], that is something that people are going to tune into,” Asper said. He added that while live sports programming is a huge driver of engagement, networks and programmers also can gain audiences through shoulder programming or content associated with those live events.

Asper pointed to his own Fight Network, which may offer a marathon of past Manny Pacquiao fights prior to one of the boxer’s pay-per-view events.

Asper added that partnering with athletes and leagues to help drive the social discussion, especially with fantasy sports leagues. Asper’s company also owns The Fantasy Sports Network.

Fantasy Sports has built a series of partnerships with players and organizations like the NFL Hall of Fame, where athletes will weigh in themselves about injuries and the like.

“Why do people watch the Cleveland Browns vs. the Buffalo Bills? Because they have fantasy players in that game,” Asper said. He added that the gambling aspect of fantasy leagues and sports in general also drives intense engagement.

“The betting side of it is a massive side that is going to keep driving live sports,” Asper said. “People in the UK are watching tennis matches and betting on whether Roger Federer is going to double fault.”