Premier Boxing Champions has signed its major TV deal, the WBA is once again up to no good, Amir Khan’s fight gets a US outlet, and more all in the latest news roundup here at S8C.
- PBC’s Big Deal – First, Al Haymon has done it. He has finally caught his white whale. For years now PBC has been paying everyone from SpikeTV to ESPN to FOX to NBC to air their fights. These networks have not been paying for the content, but instead Haymon and company have been paying for the air time. The only network that has actually been paying out rights fees for PBC fights has been Showtime which is why they’ve housed all of the organization’s best fighters. Indeed, Showtime and PBC recently doubled down on their relationship with an extended and deepened commitment for monthly fights. That news is now dwarfed by the fact that PBC has signed a $60 million deal with FOX annually. The major network in need of content post-UFC has buckled. The deal is for 22 cards, 10 on FOX and 12 on FS1. Some reports are saying that between what PBC got from Showtime on top of this FOX deal, they’ve surpassed Eddie Hearn and DAZN for the richest arrangement in the sport. No numbers have been officially released for the first deal, however. One thing that is for sure is that PBC’s issues with inactive fighters should be in the past. I’m assuming the Showtime deal is for something close to a monthly show, which would bring their total up to around 34 or so a year. There is so much content about to hit us. The sport as a whole hasn’t been this financially healthy in a long time.
- Worst Boxing Assocation – The WBA is at it again. With Oleksandr Usyk and Tony Bellew close to signing on for the closest thing to a cruiserweight megafight possible, the most corrupt sanctioning body of all has reminded us all that it exists. The WBA has ordered Oleksandr Usyk to defend against Denis Lebedev. Why now? Why do this right before that fight was reportedly to be announced? Is it because he will now need to pay them and Lebedev a fee in order to take the undisputed cruiserweight championship into that fight? Careful now. That sounds like accusing the WBA of extortion. We’d never do that here at S8C, no sir. It isn’t that Usyk-Lebedev would be a bad fight by any means, but the timing does make an educated fan wonder.
- Early DAZN for Khan – Taking a page out of Showtime’s playbook, soon to be launched sports streaming service DAZN (pronounced “Da Zone” for some reason) will be streaming Amir Khan’s tune up this Saturday against Samuel Vargas live on its social media pages, specifically Twitter and Facebook. I don’t think anyone stateside was particularly broken up that they weren’t going to be able to see the grand mismatch, but now it is an option. The main event stream is set to begin around 5 PM Eastern. If you want the somehow even less relevant undercard, that begins two hours earlier at 3 PM Eastern. Credit where credits is due, however. As much as I’ve been down on this card, it is pretty cool of DAZN to stream it free days before their service launches. They certainly didn’t have to do anything like this, even if it is ultimately a well marketed way to beta test their servers before launching.
- Chris Algieri – It is time to let Chris Algieri out of the cage, finally. The former junior welterweight contender had a good run financially in the sport after rallying to decision Ruslan Provodnikov in 2014 following a disastrous first couple rounds. He launched that win into a big payday against Manny Pacquiao. While he was soundly defeated, Algieri did much better against Amir Khan in what was a pretty competitive fight despite it being another loss. After a tough win over the always game Erick Bone, Algieri was absolutely destroyed by rising force Errol Spence Jr in April of 2016. He has been unofficially retired since, but that ends soon. The Long Island native doesn’t have a return date even much as rumored yet, but the reported plan is to return to junior welterweight and take two tune ups before looking for a bigger fight.
- Double Mandatories – Finally, the WBC has gone on record to say that the winner of this weekend’s vacant welterweight title fight between Shawn Porter and Danny Garcia will have to face consecutive mandatory challengers. Apparently this is a WBC rule that applies to all vacant titles being won. Has this never been enforced? Have I just never noticed? Is it even actually a rule at all? Those are the questions here, I guess.
