American boxing was jolted with energy yesterday. Al Haymon announced at a super-secrete New York City press conference that Keith Thurman will challenge multiple-division titlist Robert Guerrero on March 7th at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. This bout will be the first airing as a part of his multi-million dollar deal with NBC networks.
It was a grand announcement for a series that had received very nondescript television advertising during NFL playoff games and numerous other sporting events. NBC will be showing boxing — big time boxing — again.
March 7th will be the beginning of a series dubbed “Premier Boxing Champions”. Whether that name has all the catchiness or flare to it you would expect is one question. Another is, “who’s fighting?”
The aforementioned twelve-round Welterweight bout between big-punching Keith Thurman and multiple-division titlist Robert Guerrero will air live on NBC. Also, Light Welterweight Adrien Broner takes up the co-featured slot against veteran John Molina Jr. These fights aren’t half-bad for the platform in which they will be shown.
The deal with NBC will consist of 20 fight-dates through 2015 airing on the NBC networks. 11 of these dates will feature on the flagship NBC station. The rest will be shown on NBC Sports Network. Also, 5 of the NBC broadcasts will take place in prime-time — bringing increased viewership to boxing, if all goes as anticipated.
Al Michaels is slated to function as a studio-host for these shows, and Sugar Ray Leonard is also expected to take a position in the commentary booth.
Of course, many other details still aren’t known, but it is quite clear that the series is ambitious. Whether or not it fulfills boxing’s “rebirth” has yet to be seen. It will, at very least, offer us boxing on network television — something which Kathy Duva and Main Events did scarcely over the passing years on a much lighter budget. Their broadcast deal with NBC and NBCSN expired in November of last year. This takes NBC’s boxing coverage to a wholly different level.
A good show of faith on the part of Haymon Boxing is the announcement of their second show. It’s location is still unsettled upon, but it will be taking place on April 11th and feature a Light Welterweight championship unification between Danny Garcia and Lamont Peterson — both prominent staples of his ever-expanding roster.
If that doesn’t grasp your attention; I do not know what will.
With that said, it’s easy to be skeptical of what comes of this investment. It would be nice to think that shows of this caliber will be shown consistently on a major outlet, like NBC. It is a leap-of-faith. We’ll see what it gives in return.
For the time being, boxing takes home a much-needed victory.
