Boxing has long since left terrestrial television to find a home on cable. Over the years with no presence on the major broadcast networks, the sport has drifted into the niche realm and is being more and more marginalized as the better matches end up on Pay Per View.
Now NBC is inching back into boxing, but not on the network level. NBC Sports Network, which is part of the Comcast/NBC group of networks and formerly Versus, will air its first boxing show from the Asylum Arena in Philadelphia on Saturday night.
The inaugural show was to feature a couple of established heavyweights in former champion Sergiy Liahovich and contender Eddie Chambers, but that match was scrubbed when Chambers suffered a rib injury in training camp. Now the card will be headlined by a couple of undefeated heavyweights, Maurice Byram (13-0-1, 9 KOs) and Bryant Jennings (11-0, 5 KOs). It does not have the sizzle as Liahovich-Chambers, but it could turn out to be good TV.
And that’s really where this series is trying to establish its beachhead. Kathy Duva of Main Events is promoting the first four cards in the series and Russell Peltz is acting as the matchmaker and quality control man for NBC. Duva said she will be working with other promoters to produce shows in the future.
The last boxing series on Versus was a disaster. It was run by Bob Arum of Top Rank Boxing and he used the show as a playground for mismatches and an unsuccessful launching pad for heavyweight Tye Fields. It once even featured a dicey match involving former heavyweight contender Tommy Morrison, who claims to be cured of HIV. Eventually Versus pulled the plug on the show.
Jon Miller, President of Programming for NBC Sports and NBC Sports Network, has changed the way things are set up and he doesn’t see a repeat of the Versus-Top Rank fiasco.
“This is a unique approach to have multiple promoters competing to put fights on NBC Sports Network,” Miller said. “That, coupled with the legendary matchmaker J Russell Peltz serving as our quality control expert, ensures that boxing fans will enjoy exciting and competitive matches.”
Peltz said he isn’t going to make matches to protect anyone’s fighter, including those belonging to Duva, who is the lead promoter for the series. Peltz has a history of making good matches and if he stays true to form, it could be a dynamite series.
Whether any of this leads to boxing making a return to network television no one knows, not even Miller. I doubt whether the sport, at its highest level, ever returns to network television because there is too much money being spread around by premium cable networks like HBO and Showtime. But the NBC Sports Network is a sleeping giant as far as the second-tier cable boxing shows like ESPN’s “Friday Night Fights” and Showtime’s “ShoBox.”
