It wasn’t just Game of Thrones it was also Westworld and a few other shows that went way over budget. I think eventually HBO will return with a Boxing After Dark type series that has a low budget to test the waters again at some point.
crazy how much they were spending on it. Ironically, the more they spent, the crappier the show got. Last 2 seasons were the most expensive and it was utter shite compared to the rest of the seasons.
The blackwater scene in season 1 (?) almost cancelled the show entirely it was so expensive. They only got a few chances to make it work, they dialed down the budget quickly after that since the show became so huge. Too bad Clarke never got her tits out much after that. (She refused)
Lampley was an exciting caller, talking about detractors, I was a huge Larry Merchant fan, there was no BS with Larry.
USA Tuesday Night Fights was brilliant, Steve Alberts brother was a terrific caller, him and O'Grady made a good team. Good production and most importantly, great fights!
I caught the series in it's last couple of years unfortunately. Only because it was around the time pay tv came to Australia. I would tune in weekly, some big name fighters too, mostly up and comers or making comebacks.
There may be something to that, in the recent era of cheap money diversified investors wanted companies to stick to what they were good at and not needlessly compete with their other portfolio companies. If we go into a period of higher interest rates we might see a movement toward to the sort of conglomerates that existed before. Butterfly effect kind of stuff here. Someday we're going to learn that "Al Haymon" is several neurosurgeons in a trench coat trying to destroy boxing. American boxing promoters would make so much more money holding fights on Friday instead of Saturday during college football season. That they never even try this goes to @kirk's point that they are, collectively, idiots.
HBO had come to have to much power and manipulation over boxing, promoters, and even judges. I for one am glad they bowed out of broadcasting boxing. I personally got sick and tired of hearing their scripted broadcasts. For many years they had a monopoly on boxing's biggest boxing matches, thankfully competition broke through and ended HBO's run and influence on the boxing scene.
And it was FREE!!!! I thought they eventually moved from Tuesday to Friday but my memory is not what it once was