NEW YORK – Bob Arum can call Showtime’s Stephen Espinoza during his search for a U.S. television partner for the Manny Pacquiao-Jeff Horn fight. The Hall-of-Fame promoter told A rival site last week that he would like to avoid making Pacquiao-Horn a pay-per-view event and Espinoza expressed interest Thursday in Showtime televising it. A preliminary agreement is in place for the Philippines’ Pacquiao (59-6-2, 38 KOs) to make a WBO welterweight title defense against the unknown Australian contender on April 22 either in Australia or the United Arab Emirates. Arum wants to stage the fight at Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane, Australia, because the 28-year-old Horn (16-0-1, 11 KOs) is very popular in his homeland. The Top Rank Inc. founder also is open to televising Pacquiao-Horn on premium cable, basic cable or free TV, depending upon which networks are interested in it. Keeping that lower-profile fight away from pay-per-view makes perfect sense to Espinoza, executive vice president and general manager for Showtime Sports. “I think it would be great for the sport, in particular with those overseas pay-per-views that are a challenge to market in the U.S.,” Espinoza said Thursday before a press conference for the James DeGale-Badou Jack super middleweight title fight Saturday night at Barclays Center. “So there’s some logic to what Bob says. And if there’s an opportunity to be in that [Pacquiao] business, we would love to be in the running for it.” Showtime hasn’t been the exclusive broadcaster for a Pacquiao fight since May 2011, when he out-pointed Shane Mosely in a Showtime Pay-Per-View main event in Las Vegas. Pacquiao’s last fight, a unanimous-decision defeat of Jessie Vargas (27-2, 10 KOs) on November 5 in Las Vegas, was televised via pay-per-view, but HBO Sports wasn’t involved in its distribution or production. The 38-year-old Pacquiao’s pay-per-view production, apart from his record-shattering fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr. in May 2015, has decreased in recent years. He remains one of boxing’s biggest stars, however, which could help Showtime generate ratings in its continuous viewership battle with HBO. “He’s still a name,” Espinoza said of Pacquiao. “There’s some challenges in the U.S. with the name recognition of Jeff Horn. That’s remedied by not going to pay-per-view. You look at the elements for a successful pay-per-view, it’s a competitive matchup and ideally, two known commodities that are available and able to market. And if you’re missing any of those elements, you probably shouldn’t be going to pay-per-view, if you’re looking for a big level of success.” Espinoza also acknowledged that he hasn’t seen Horn fight. “I haven’t,” Espinoza said. “I’ve spoken with his promoters [Duco Events]. They’ve been high on him for some time and we’ve talked about it. But I actually haven’t seen footage of him.”
I wonder what Disney_Master aka boxing_master has to say about Pacquiao fighting again on Showtime...!!! Last year he said Showtime sucked and HBO was better...!!! https://www.boxingforum24.com/threads/espn-showtime-announces-big-plans-for-upcoming-months.561060/
What is so special about Horn? There are so many choices that I'd pick before him, am I missing something here?
He's an exciting all action fighter who's easy to work and put a fight together with? Horn, that is. There doesn't need to be any more validation for the current matchmaking for a nearly 40 year old ex-flyweight titlist who was in his prime a decade ago now.
Well fellas Horn is getting his shot, let's just hope Greedy bob can put this crap on Showtime instead of Showtime PPV.
He is no 2 wbo no 2 ibf. In all honesty I didn't realise how many casuals came in this forum making out they know **** about boxing... **** sake most boxing purists should know who Jeff horn is...
How many knockouts did Pac score in his last 10 fights? He has basically become a offensive fighting Floyd
While it would be nice to get a Pacquiao fight that isn't ppv for a change I don't really like the idea of Showtime using up part of its budget on this fight. I have no idea what the financials would be and what it would cost Showtime if it were to do this fight but I'd imagine they could do a few good competitive fights for the same price as this one fight that nobody really seems to want outside of Arum and Horn's team.
Algieri was out. He was robbed of a KO when the ref claled break for NO REASON. An this is comin from a floyd fan
Nice to make a free TV fight but what the hell is Pacman doing fighting a guy no one has ever heard of in a Australia out of all places? He needs to retire already, this isn't doing anyone any good.
I don't fault anyone for not knowing who he is. He hasn't fought anyone notable as far as I can recall. His matchmaking has been very smart though. He's put himself in a position to make a lot of money and get notable fights in the future.
