In the past Showtime had big stars like Tyson and Trinidad so it's nothing new but once these guys were done it was back to normal until recently when Mayweather signed the contract, I think they will do very good for now but I suspect they will be like from when Tyson retired until early last year once Mayweather retires.
I kind of disagree about uncle Bobby throwing two young lions in the ring, lets not forget the highly awaited fight between ironically Gamboa and Lopez when they were undefeated champs because he wanted it to 'marinate' well, he left it to marinate too long because the fight never happened after Lopez got stopped....
I think he likes to feed the old cash cow to the young lion and will do this again, he did the same thing with Morales to Pacquiao and I think his business plan is to build a young star to beat Manny and take over his throne as the cash cow. He must have been dancing in his living room when he tied Manny down until late 2016 because now he has loads of time to build the star who is either Mikey (if he stays) or Crawford. Notice how there is no longer talk of that Mikey Garcia fast track weight climb to fight Pacquiao? because they know he's sticking around now so they can move up slowly. As for Crawford he will probably throw him in the ring with Manny first just for an experiment but I get the feeling he would prefer Mikey to take over the throne due to the possible Mexican fanbase,
While it is true that the exit of Floyd Mayweather and other marquee name fighters identified with Schaefer/Haymon will hurt GBP, it will not affect CBS/Showtime because Floyd and most GBP fighters are tied up by contract with the giant network.
Despite their promotional successes lately there's still no one and that includes Manny Pacquiao, from the Top Rank/HBO stable who could approximate the numbers churned out by Mayweather and Alvarez. Lest anyone forgets, GBP still has Amir Khan ( yes he is still with GBP) ,Bernard Hopkins, Abner Mares, Leo Santacruz Danny Garcia, Adrien Broner Lucas Matthysse, Lamont Peterson, Peter Quillin,and even heavyweight KO sensation Deontay Wilder and upcomers Randy Caballero, Yamaguchi Falcao Anthony Agogo who all fight on Showtime some of whom can carry the torch down the road.
I'll admit HBO is in the lead right now in terms of non PPV cards being better. Showtime is good but they're a little behind. But that should change after Canelo-Lara and if they can come up with something better than the pathetic DSG card they have coming up. I have HBO in the lead right now. But in PPV and quality undercards Showtime kills HBO. But since HBO frequently puts on decent cards featuring they're top guys. They edge it out.
To HBO/Arum's credit you forgot Lomanchenko.
But with Canelo, Stevenson, Danny Garcia, and others ...Showtime is fine.
You have to give it to Bob Arum, he sure knows how to build a star! It's simple, You throw two lions into a lions den, and one of them emerges wearing a lion skin jacket! F@ck Al Haymon trying to sell every guy as a star rather than making them prove they are stars.
