In yet another boldly dumb move, the two chief American boxing networks will go head-to-head again on June 7, as ESPN's Dan Rafael reports that Showtime will air the rematch between Carlos Quintana and Paul Williams alongside an already yawn-inducing 154-pound title fight between Vernon Forrest and Sergio Mora.
HBO, of course, is running Kelly Pavlik's first middleweight title defense, against Welsh challenger Gary Lockett, on that very same night. Reports are that HBO is looking to make their card a televised tripleheader.
While I could definitely take or leave Forrest walking over the undeserving Mora, Quintana-Williams II is a fight I want to see, and so is Pavlik-Lockett. I hate the networks making us choose like this. We don't often get as lucky as we did this past Saturday, when David Haye got rid of Enzo Maccarinelli in time for us to switch over to HBO and catch both fights.
I will never understand why they split the audience like this. Showtime will now get maybe 30% of the boxing audience instead of 100% of it. They got 273,000 viewers for Haye-Maccarinelli, and HBO did about 1.24 million for their doubleheader. HBO is in more homes, promotes their fights better, and is still recognized by most as the real leader in boxing TV. Making a ridiculous competition of this isn't good for anyone.
But this is the three millionth time that someone has said these things, and we'll never really be heard. They'll just keep doing it. C'est la vie!