Like all businesses and industries, boxing is withering in certain quarters.
But Big Gary Shaw, who nimbly walks the narrow path in selling fights and fighters to both Showtime and HBO, is not complaining.
Shaw wonders aloud why more people aren’t buying established promotional outfits and notes the increased amount of co-promotional work promoters are doing with each other.
He can’t understand how any promoter can think they will stay afloat without precious TV funding.
“Shawtime” may not be breaking any financial records but let’s say this, there’s no shortage of top quality groceries flowing into the Shaw Estate in North Jersey.
One network Shaw may avoid going forward is penny-pinching ESPN. He did a show for the “Leader” and got splashed with $52,000 worth of red ink. Now he’s once bitten, twice shy when it comes to the low budget ESPN saddles a promoter with.
Big Gary Shaw, who balances his HBO affairs with his Showtime business, says his “gut feeling” is that Oscar de la Hoya misses limelight, will fight one more time (Michael Marley Photo)
I caught up with Garrulous Gary at Gleason’s Gym on Wednesday where he watched his challenger Luis Carlos Agrebu of Argentina go through the training paces for his July 17 title shot against 140 pound leading light Timothy Bradley (HBO Boxing After Dark).
Agrebu’s steamy sparring session with unbeaten prospect Saddam Ali may have been a preview of the Bradley bout to an extent as the plodding Argentinian looked like a guy trying to keep pace with a greyhound. (Ali is, it must be noted, a southpaw unlike Bradley.)
But Shaw never blanched and why should he? He’s got Bradley and Agrebu so he will roll with winner and loser.
Here’s Shaw’s current outlook:
1. OSCAR DE LA HOYA FIGHTS UNO MAS: “It is just a gut feeling that I have. Nothing I can really point to our put my finger on…I just feel he misses the limelight more than it being about money. It can’t be the same for him when he’s out among the public. Oscar was the face of Golden Boy and now Richard (Schaefer) is the face of the company. No, I don’t think he’ll go after (Manny) Pacquiao in a rematch but he could fight once more.”
Gary Shaw is among those who think Oscar de la Hoya, viciously hammered into retirement by Manny Pacquiao, will fight one more time (Associated Press Photo)
2. HE CHARGES THE GOLDENS WITH HIDING AMIR KHAN FROM BRADLEY: “Look, Tim is in almost everybody’s Top 10 in the pound for pound rankings. Everyone says he’s Number One up to 147 pounds. He may get into the Pacquiao Sweepstakes. We should’ve had the 140 pound tournament on HBO but Golden Boy killed it. Too many promoters only want in house fights, their guys fighting only their guys. Golden Boy told us they won’t do Khan-Bradley even though we said we’d go to England for it. You could put that bout in the 02 Arena in London, that’s how eager Bradley is to fight Khan.”
3. ANDRE 1 AND ANDRE 2 RULE SHOWTIME SUPER MIDDLES: “My guy, Andre Dirrell, is a little bit better, has faster hands than Andre Ward. They’re fighting each other Sept. 25 and there’s not a chance we’d go to (Ward’s hometown) Oakland for the bout. (Allen) Green is the inferior fighter of the tournament group. By far, he is the inferior guy. I’d rank (Arthur) Abraham, who is tough, third behind the two Andres. (Carl) Froch is a decent fighter. People ask about Lucian Bute but we’re going to take care of him with my light heavyweight champ Bad Chad Dawson. After Chad beats Jean Pascal in Montreal, we can go back to handle Bute. and they will draw 20,000 people.”
Being always thrifty, Shaw noted with delight how he picked up the plucky Agrebu.
“I got him for free when Sycuan (the San Diego Indian tribe) got out of the boxing business,” Shaw said. “They wound up giving him to me for nothing.”
Btw, it is not true that when Shaw visited the Sycuan Band of the Kumeyaay Nation in El Cajon, when he went on to tribal lands, that it was billed as “the return of the White Buffalo.”
Just thought I should clear that up.
Nothing Gary likes more than getting a fighter for free.
Other promoters are bobbing up and down on the stormy seas but Admiral Shaw is powering ahead, damn the whitecaps.
Of course, unlike some rivals, Shaw plies the two biggest oceans, HBO and Showtime.
Let others work the Seven Seas, Shaw continues on his well set course.
Big Gar’s got it like that.
