HBO Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ====Boxing==== {{Main|HBO World Championship Boxing}} HBO's sports coverage was long synonymous with its boxing telecasts, fronted by matches featured on HBO Sports' longtime flagship series, ''HBO World Championship Boxing''. Its first boxing telecast, on January 22, 1973, was "[[Joe Frazier vs. George Foreman|The Sunshine Showdown]]", the world [[heavyweight]] championship bout from [[Kingston, Jamaica]] in which [[George Foreman]] defeated [[Joe Frazier]] in two rounds. Outside of high-profile matches held at exotic locales, most of the boxing events shown during HBO's early existence as a regional service were bouts held at Madison Square Garden; once HBO became a national service, boxing coverage began to regularly cover fights held at [[The Forum (Inglewood, California)|The Forum]] (as part of its television contract with the Los Angeles Lakers and Kings<ref name="b&c-hbograbssports"/>) and other arenas. On September 30, 1975, the "Thrilla in Manila" boxing match between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier aired on HBO (under a licensing agreement with television program distributor Video Techniques) and was the first program on the network to be broadcast via satellite.<ref>{{cite magazine |title=In Brief |periodical=Broadcasting |page=18 |date=August 18, 1975}}</ref> (HBO also provided the first interconnected satellite demonstration broadcast on June 18, 1973, in which a heavyweight championship match between [[Jimmy Ellis (boxer)|Jimmy Ellis]] and [[Earnie Shavers]] was relayed via [[Anik (satellite)|Anik A]] to a closed-circuit system at the [[Anaheim Convention Center]] in [[Anaheim, California]] and to a Teleprompter Cable system in [[San Bernardino, California|San Bernardino]].)<ref>{{cite magazine |title=Domsat shows for Anaheim. |periodical=Broadcasting |page=60 |date=June 18, 1973}}</ref> Boxing telecasts aired on various scheduled nights through 1979, and mainly aired thereafter on Fridays; boxing telecasts moved to Saturdays full-time in 1987. (All boxing events shown on HBO aired on average in two- to three-week intervals.) Through 1979, HBO also carried various [[Golden Gloves|National Golden Gloves]] competitions, and from 1978 to 1979, carried the [[National Collegiate Boxing Association]] championships. HBO expanded its boxing content to [[pay-per-view]] in December 1990, when it created a production arm to distribute and organize marquee boxing matches in conjunction with participating promoters, TVKO (rebranded HBO PPV in 2001 and HBO Boxing Pay-Per-View in 2013); the first TVKO-produced boxing event was April 19, 1991, [[Evander Holyfield vs. George Foreman|"Battle of the Ages" bout]] between [[Evander Holyfield]] and [[George Foreman]]. (TVKO signed Holyfield away from Showtime, which had been carrying his matches since its ''[[Showtime Championship Boxing]]'' telecasts premiered in 1986, under an agreement with promoter [[Dan Duva]] during Holyfield's reign as cruiserweight champion.)<ref>{{cite magazine |title=HBO and Showtime Climb Into the PPV Ring |periodical=Broadcasting |page=28 |date=December 24, 1990}}<br />{{cite magazine |title=HBO and Showtime Climb Into the PPV Ring |periodical=Broadcasting |page=29 |date=December 24, 1990}}</ref> HBO expanded its boxing slate on February 3, 1996, when ''[[HBO Boxing After Dark]]'' (titled ''HBO Late Night Fights'' for its inaugural edition) premiered with title fights involving contenders in the [[super bantamweight|junior featherweight]] ([[Marco Antonio Barrera]] vs. [[Kennedy McKinney]]) and [[super flyweight|junior bantamweight]] ([[Johnny Tapia]] vs. Giovanni Andrade) classes. The program typically featured fight cards involving well-known contenders (generally those not designated as "championship" or "title" bouts), and up-and-coming boxing talents that had previously been featured mainly on basic cable boxing showcases (such as ESPN's ''[[Friday Night Fights]]''). A second franchise extension, ''[[KO Nation]]'' (which ran from May 6, 2000, to August 11, 2001), attempted to incorporate [[hip-hop]] music performances between matches involving up-and-coming boxers to attract the show's target audience of males 18 to 24 (later broadened to ages 18 to 34) to the sport; former ''[[Yo! MTV Raps]]'' VJ [[Ed Lover]] was the "face" of the show and acted as its ring announcer. (Internal research stated that males aged 18–34 accounted for 3% of boxing viewership, while men 50 and older made up 60% of the sport's audience.)<ref>{{cite web|title=HBO seeks younger auds with 'KO'|url=https://variety.com/2000/tv/news/hbo-seeks-younger-auds-with-ko-1117778808/|author=R. Thomas Umstead|periodical=Variety|date=February 27, 2000|access-date=July 7, 2020}}</ref><ref>{{cite magazine |title=HBO adds afternoon boxing series |periodical=Broadcasting & Cable |page=69 |date=February 28, 2000}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=HBO Has High Hopes For New KO Nation|url=https://www.multichannel.com/news/hbo-has-high-hopes-new-ko-nation-152794|author=R. Thomas Umstead|periodical=Multichannel News|date=August 20, 2000|access-date=July 7, 2020}}</ref> ''KO Nation'' drew low ratings throughout its run, even after it was moved from Saturday afternoons to Saturday late nights in January 2001. HBO Sports then refocused its efforts at attracting younger viewers through ''Boxing After Dark''.<ref>{{cite web|title=HBO Sports plans to take boxing series 'KO Nation' into the night|url=https://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Journal/Issues/2000/11/27/This-Weeks-Issue/HBO-Sports-Plans-To-Take-Boxing-Series-KO-Nation-Into-The-Night.aspx|author=Langdon Brockinton|periodical=Sports Business Daily|date=November 27, 2000|access-date=July 7, 2020}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=HBO Knocks Out KO Nation|url=https://www.multichannel.com/news/hbo-knocks-out-ko-nation-139493|author=R. Thomas Umstead|periodical=Multichannel News|date=July 2, 2001|access-date=July 7, 2020}}</ref> To court the sport's Hispanic and Latino fans, the network's boxing franchises expanded to HBO Latino with the January 2003 premiere of ''[[Oscar De La Hoya]] Presenta Boxeo De Oro'', a showcase of up-and-coming boxers represented by the De La Hoya-founded [[Golden Boy Promotions]]. A second boxing series for HBO Latino, ''Generación Boxeo'', premiered on the multiplex channel in April 2006.<ref>{{cite web|title=HBO Latino Enters the Ring|url=https://www.multichannel.com/news/hbo-latino-enters-ring-136521|periodical=Multichannel News|date=October 9, 2002|access-date=May 9, 2020}}</ref><ref>{{cite press release|title=HBO Latino Launches New Boxing Series, Generación Boxeo, Debuting Exclusively, Thursday, April 27|url=https://www.warnermediagroup.com/newsroom/press-releases/2006/04/24/hbo-latino-launches-new-boxing-series-generaci-n-boxeo-debuting|website=WarnerMedia|date=April 24, 2006|access-date=May 9, 2020}}</ref> On September 27, 2018, HBO announced it would discontinue its boxing telecasts after 45 years, following its last televised match on October 27, marking the end of live sports on the network. (Two additional ''World Championship Boxing''/''Boxing After Dark'' cards would follow that originally scheduled final broadcast, airing respectively on November 24 and December 8, 2018.) HBO's decision to bow out of boxing telecasts was due to factors that included the influx of sports-based streaming services (such as [[DAZN]] and [[ESPN+]]) and issues with [[Promoter (entertainment)|promoters]] that hampered its ability to acquire high-profile fight cards, and resulting declining ratings and loss of interest in the sport among HBO's subscribers. Also factoring into the move was HBO parent WarnerMedia's then-recent ownership transfer to AT&T, and the network's efforts to focus on its scripted programming; network executives thought that "HBO [was] not a sports network."<ref>{{cite news|title=HBO Says It Is Leaving the Boxing Business|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/27/sports/hbo-boxing.html|author=Wallace Matthews|newspaper=The New York Times|date=September 27, 2018|access-date=September 27, 2018}}</ref> Since then, although it no longer produces sporting event telecasts, HBO Sports has continued to exist as a production unit for the network's sports magazine shows and documentaries. Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. 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