MANILA, Philippines – American cable giant HBO is splitting up with Golden Boy Promotions after the promotional firm’s biggest attraction, Floyd Mayweather Jr., signed a multi-year deal with CBS’ Showtime.
ESPN’s Dan Rafael reported that HBO’s relationship with Oscar dela Hoya’s Golden Boy has deteriorated in the past year when the company’s output deal with the cable firm has not been renewed since 2011.
Since 2012, most of Golden Boy’s stars, like as Saul "Canelo" Alvarez, Danny Garcia, Amir Khan, Victor Ortiz, have been fighting on Showtime.
The last straw for HBO was Mayweather’s multi-fight contract with CBS’ Showtime, whose sports division chief is headed by former Golden Boy chief counsel Stephen Espinoza.
"In order to achieve our goal of the best fighters in the most compelling matchups we've decided to focus our efforts and resources on those strategic relationships where we better share common goals and business philosophies," HBO sports division president Ken Hershman said.
Golden Boy chief executive officer Richard Schaefer said he was not surprised by HBO’s announcement, noting that he hasn’t spoken with HBO Sports since November last year.
“It is clear that in the aftermath of the biggest names in the sport, Floyd Mayweather and Canelo Alvarez, leaving HBO for Showtime that HBO is obviously upset at [Mayweather adviser] Al Haymon and me, and this is their way of getting back at us,” he said.
The Golden Boy executive added that HBO’s move will hurt the cable company’s subscribers.
"I think it's an ill-advised strategy because the only ones that are getting hurt are the HBO subscribers, which were used to seeing the best fighters on HBO. That will obviously no longer be the case. Having said that, I wish HBO well. They're a terrific company, and life goes on. For us, it's business as usual," Schaefer said.
source: abs-cbnnews.com
