Hbo throws in the towel

After 45 years, more than 1,000 fights and some of the most lucrative and controversial matches of all time, HBO is throwing in the towel on professional boxing.

What started with a monumental upset seen by a relative handful of customers — George Foreman’s knockout of the heavyweight champion Joe Frazier in 1973 — will come to a close at the end of 2018. Currently, the network has no boxing broadcasts scheduled beyond a middleweight title fight at Madison Square Garden on Oct. 27.

Peter Nelson, the 37-year-old executive vice president of HBO Sports, made the announcement that the new network was dropping boxing Thursday morning in a meeting with the HBO Boxing production staff, a group that includes the play-by-play announcer Jim Lampley, the analyst Max Kellerman, the ringside scorer Harold Lederman and the former boxing champions Andre Ward and Roy Jones Jr., who work for HBO as freelance commentators. Of the announcing staff, only Lampley is expected to remain with HBO.

“This is not a subjective decision,” Nelson said in a recent interview. “Our audience research informs us that boxing is no longer a determinant factor for subscribing to HBO.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/27/sports/hbo-boxing.html

Wow. Article says only boxing related programming in 2019 will be a Muhammad Ali documentary.

Wonder what happens to GGG?
 
Well they must have some fucking genius working this one out.

They have fuck all scheduled, and are surprised that Boxing is not a determining factor in subscribing to HBO....

Someone tell them water is wet as well
 
Wow this is big news.

Hearn and Dzon or whatever its called will be happy.

Hearn and co could of picked a better name that's for sure.
 
HBO has been slowly moving this way for awhile. I wasn't a big fan of their commentary and now I can save another $15 a month.
 
Wow this is big news.

Hearn and Dzon or whatever its called will be happy.

Hearn and co could of picked a better name that's for sure.

I was actually thinking of using my money saved on HBO for a Days Inn subscription.
 
Not surprising, everybody saw this coming, its a new frontier for sports and television but damn, I grew up watching HBO boxing, they had the most memorable fights on there, they sure left their mark on boxing
 
This is sad. Knew it was on the horizon, but still. Even though jim lampley is a drama queen fanboy I'm gonna miss HBO commentary during big fights.
 
It's the end of an era.

What will their boxing broadcasters do?
 
Not surprised.

Means fuck all to the rest of the world. Here's hoping you can stop getting raped for your hobby now.
 
Damn, this is surprising (I just expected a budget cut again). R.I.P. HBO boxing.
 
wow that's a shame, much better than espn and the 24/7 series were great.
 
Sad, but I'll be saving on my monthly sub, so I'll probably follow Shoemaker's lead.
Boxing is literally the ONLY thing I watch on HBO. It's the only thing that I watch live as well, any of their other shit I can download should I ever feel the need.
 
@podsox beat your thread creation by 1 minute. Just saying. R.I.P. HBO boxing. You'll be missed (except the commentary).
 
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