At age 77, you’d think that Bob Arum, CEO of Top Rank Inc., would be taking his victory lap. But instead, he seems to be in his salad days. There is no promotional firm in the world that is as active as his and involved in as many big events. On June 7th, Kelly Pavlik defends his middleweight championship in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Three weeks later, Filipino icon Manny Pacquiao takes on WBC lightweight champion David Diaz. And then on July 26th, they promote the highly anticipated welterweight showdown between Antonio Margarito and Miguel Cotto.
Arum is as spry as ever, and what keeps him young is promoting. Don’t expect him to go out like Bear Bryant – who died just a few weeks after giving up his playbook and whistle. As long as there is a fight to be consummated and a deal to be made, he’s young at heart. He won’t be calling it a day anytime soon.
And he can be as stubborn and as irascible as Archie Bunker, as outspoken and unfiltered as Charles Barkley, and as politically incorrect as five episodes of the ?Family Guy.’
He’s also the last, real independent promoter in this country, one that isn’t completely beholden to the premium networks that subsidize the sport?s biggest events nowadays. And nobody knows how to cultivate talent and develop attractions quite like his company.
They are the last of a dying breed in America.
While other promoters are afraid to speak on the record regarding the role of the networks and the impact they have on the business, Arum has never been afraid to shoot from the hip. Yes, he can and will be biased at times (after all, he is a promoter) and he can have his agendas, but there is nobody in his position so willing to point out what ails the boxing business.
He is who he is, for better or worse.
Last Tuesday he was in Los Angeles to begin the promotional push for Margarito-Cotto, which through his machinations will be taking place at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. After asking him a few of the perfunctory questions regarding that fight, I asked him what HBO’s recent ratings – which were mediocre, at best, despite huge license fees – said about the current state of the marketplace.
As usual, he didn’t hold back.
“We need to do things differently,” he would state. “Look, boxing for 15 years was dead in Mexico. Through the efforts of ourselves and Fernando Beltran and TV Azteca, we’re able to bring boxing back. Why? Because we offered on free television Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. and Arce. Saturday night (May 17th) in Aguascaliente, Arce versus a virtual unknown Thai fighter, we did 18,000 people, a complete sell-out in the arena. 10,000 outside couldn’t get in. We did a 14-rating, not a share, a rating. It was the highest rated program in Mexico for the weekend. Bigger than soccer. bigger than the novelas, bigger than anything.”
On that same night in Durango, another 10,000 fans were on hand to see Cristian Mijares defeat Alexander Munoz.
“So it kills me that because of HBO and Showtime we’re unable to have that breakthrough to the public at large. But it’s coming, it’s coming!!!,” he adds, sounding a bit like Paul Revere. “I’m telling you that the networks, HBO, we should be thankful, it’s all boxing has. But boxing needs free television.”
While he says this, it has to be pointed out that Arum himself for years has contributed to the transition of boxing being on network television to the premium networks and he himself isn’t beyond taking a big check from an HBO to put on a perceived mismatch like Pavlik-Lockett. And you’d have to question if a fight like Pacquiao-Diaz, even with ‘The Pac Man?s huge following, is really worthy of pay-per-view.
Those are two examples of how the game is being marginalized in the United States. But while this is taking place, markets in Mexico, Asia and Europe seem to be flourishing. Fighters are well-compensated and play to full arenas on a consistent basis. The reality is that the boxing business is more broken out here than anywhere else.
“Yes,” agreed the veteran promoter, “because it hasn’t had an outlet in free over-the-air-television.”
For all this talk of needing one recognized champion per division being the solution to boxing ills – the splintered belts sure don’t seem to hurt business overseas – what the sport needs are more real promoters. Not entities who say they are promoters that are nothing more than television packagers, booking agents or casino brokers. ‘Promoting’ today has basically been relegated to welfare recipients receiving their monthly check and block of cheese in the form of license fees from particular networks. Without them, you wonder how they would survive.
“Because when you have the two premium networks controlling all the action, then everybody feeds at their trough,” says Arum. “And sure, you have what you have now, a bad, bad situation.”
But going back, is Arum’s quest to get boxing back into the mainstream through network television just a Quixotic quest where he’s tilting at windmills aimlessly, or something more realistic?
“I know for a fact it is (coming),” he states with confidence.
COUNTDOWN IS ON
Early last week, Arum was screaming bloody murder (and nobody can scream bloody murder quite like he can) when he was told that HBO would not be allotting time for a ‘Countdown’ show for Margarito-Cotto, like they do for the large majority of their pay-per-view – and some ‘Championship Boxing’ – telecasts.
But by the end of the week, they had changed their minds.
“I just wanted you to know after witnessing two exciting and engaging press conferences this week for Cotto-Margarito, HBO has decided to green light a countdown special for the fight,” came an email from Mark Taffett of HBO Pay-Per-View.
But Arum would say on Friday, while still in Puerto Rico, where the last leg of the press tour took place, “I think the press had a lot of influence. I think the press, by expressing their views, changed HBO?s mind because the press indicated that this was a major, major fight and how could they not do a countdown show when the fight was such an important fight. It’s as simple as that.
“And any issue like, ‘Well, one guy doesn’t speak English.’ Well, they did a countdown show for Barrera-Marquez, when neither guy spoke English. The point is, they’re doing it now. It’s a great countdown show because we have these two interesting guys ? forget how good the fight is. Their personalities are very interesting, Cotto and Margarito. So all’s well that ends well.”
The bottom line is HBO would’ve been hard-pressed to defend their position. Especially in light of the fact that, as Arum mentioned, other preview shows that featured non-English speaking boxers had been aired, and duds like Bernard Hopkins-Winky Wright had shows that were produced and aired by the network (Seriously, is Wright gorging himself on donuts before an important bout really that compelling?).
It’s pretty clear that there was an agenda or two beforehand with HBO. First, Arum is not their favorite promoter. Secondly – and this is where I go a little Oliver Stone – while this fight may not overshadow the rematch between Oscar De La Hoya and Floyd Mayweather, the powers that be probably did not want that fight to be cast in a certain negative light. In other words, here you have a ‘real’ fight between real fighters in Margarito and Cotto, while Mayweather-De La Hoya II is a business transaction taking place between two corporations.
As HBO sensed that the media was about to pounce on the story, they relented.
“If the press is outspoken on these issues, instead of currying favor and being quiet, the things happen because the press does have a tremendous influence. In fact, it’s like a bully pulpit, particularly as it affects these corporations who thrive and live on what the press says about them. The press may not have much of an effect on me or Don King or somebody, because we run our own businesses and we’re not beholden to anybody. But if you work for a big corporation and the press then takes a position, you better damn well at least listen to it.”
THE BATTLE
Ticket sales for Margarito-Cotto are brisk.
“It’s highly popular,” says Dena duBoef, V.P. of International Marketing for Top Rank. “Even before we went on sale, people were looking for the location since it was up in the air, whether it was the MGM in Vegas or the Madison Square Garden in New York. We could not give them the answer. When they determined where it was going to be, we just couldn’t stop all the phone calls from coming in.”
I can honestly say I have never gotten as many emails from readers beforehand asking when and where a fight was going to take place. Many of you played a game of Russian Roulette by booking flights to Las Vegas a few weeks ago, before the fight was signed, sealed and delivered.
DuBoef, who handles of all Top Rank’s ticket requests that come into the office, says it has been awhile since interest has been this high for one of their promotions.
“It’s one of our De La Hoya fights,” she says. “I didn’t do tickets at the time but that’s the only thing I would compare it to.”
The fans have responded quickly to the fight being made official.
“The $100’s have basically sold out, there’s only 18 left at Ticketmaster. I’ve almost sold out of all my 100’s. So now we’re going to the $200 price range,” duBoef would say on Friday afternoon. The box-office at the MGM Grand has been buzzing also. “I can tell you within the first 15 minutes when we went on sale – which was Thursday at 10 am, 635 tickets were sold. At the end of the day when they closed the box office, it was roughly around 1,100.”
The venue will be scaled at around 16,500 seats.
Ticket inquiries have come in from as far as London, England. And according to duBoef, “A lot of people in the Navy, Air Force. A lot of military people want to come and see the fight.”
Which is appropriate, given that the promotion has been dubbed ‘The Battle.’
LETHAL WEAPON III
So when can we see the trio of James Kirkland, Alfred Angulo and Yuriorkis Gamboa?
“The plans are for me to keep ‘the Night of the Rising Stars’ as a mini-series and hopefully HBO will continue it,” says their promoter, Gary Shaw, of the threesome that shined on May 17th on ‘Boxing After Dark’. “I would love for that to come back, hopefully in September or October. I’m in negotiations and discussions with HBO as we speak.”
But if HBO should not have an available date?
“I want to keep them where they are,” said Shaw. “The options are, obviously if they didn’t give us a date, to go back on Showtime and bring ’em back to where they grew up – and I don’t mean Shobox. They’re beyond that. But I don’t think that’s going to happen. I believe HBO has sincere interest in them and it’s going to do everything they can to keep them there and keep them intact.”
RUMOR MILL
The hot rumor making the rounds is that HBO and Golden Boy Promotions are entering into a deal where HBO guarantees Golden Boy a certain amount of dates and money for a period of several years.( Of course, one cynic would tell me, “Well, what’s the difference? That just means they’re putting it in writing now.”)
Let’s hope that’s not true. The bottom line is this: when promoters get the keys to the network house, it simply doesn’t work out and the quality of the product suffers. Case in point, when Don King leveraged Mike Tyson down Showtime’s throat and basically ran their boxing program into the ground as he got all their dates. Then you have the Versus network, which got into an exclusive deal with Top Rank and got stuck with way too many Tye Fields main events.
Also, I’ve heard that with a new premium network being formed (under the Viacom umbrella) with Mark Greenburg in charge, the word is that when they launch in a few years, they might have an interest in boxing.
STANDING EIGHT
I’m still a bit taken back by what I saw between Aaron Williams and Jose Luis Herrera on the past edition of ‘Friday Night Fights’ on ESPN2, where I twice saw a ring doctor come into the ring and check out a fighter because he was hurt during the course of the round.
In round one, a stunned and floored Herrera was given plenty of time to recover as he was being checked out. And later on, he would stop Williams, a highly touted cruiser prospect, in the fifth. Williams wouldn’t be so fortunate after being looked at by the same ringside physician.
I don’t know if that rule only exists in Rhode Island, where this bout took place, but here’s the thing – I thought that there were no timeouts or pitstops in boxing? And last I checked, this is professional boxing, right? It’s one thing to have a cut checked on, or having a few extra seconds allotted in-between rounds for a doctor to come in and look over a fighter, but for a doctor to just step onto the ring apron and decide that a guy needs a check-up because he’s getting hit and buzzed?
Sorry, but that’s a terrible rule. Everyone knows what they are getting into once they step inside those ropes, and the dangers that exist. This is basically a version of spitting out the mouthpiece on purpose or an administrative standing 8-count the way I look at it.
And one of the reasons why the standing 8-count is no longer used in most jurisdictions is that it was thought that by stopping the action so much, you’re actually prolonging the beatings by giving boxers these respites.
Good thing the first bout between Diego Corrales and Jose Luis Castillo didn’t take place in Rhode Island, or that fight would’ve been stopped two dozen times and that doctor would’ve gotten more air time than Ryan Seacrest.
What’s next in Rhode Island? Headgear, 18-ounce gloves and fights that can be no longer than six two minute rounds?
FINAL FLURRIES
In other good news from HBO, they will once again be doing their ‘Hard Knocks’ series this summer on the Dallas Cowboys, with TO, Romo and the other, notorious Pac Man. Get ya popcorn ready….I did not know this before, but the promoter pays for the production cost of the countdown shows on HBO….Ricky Hatton had his version of Joe Cortez in referee Howard Foster against Juan Lazcano….I don’t think either Hatton or Paulie (Milli) Malignaggi did much to really spark any interest in their fall matchup. In fact, they may have done just the opposite……As I saw Malignaggi and his hair, I couldn’t help keep ‘Blame it on the Rain’ or ‘Yes, You Know it’s True’ out of my head. What’s that old boxing adage?’ Hairstyles make fights’….Arum says that the contracts are out and the terms are agreed to by Joshua Clottey and Zab Judah to meet on August 2nd as the headliners on ‘Boxing After Dark’, somewhere in Connecticut….Speaking of Wright, Dodgers centerfielder Andruw Jones has been put on the DL. Does that mean ‘donut list’?
