Turning Back on Pay-Per-View Could Be Costly

Although promoter Bob Arum is predicting huge rewards from his decision--he terms it “Back to the Future”--to move this landmark fight to closed-circuit venues and away from the pay-per-view networks that have dominated boxing, at least one major PPV executive warns that all is not rosy on the closed-circuit front.

“Bob is kind of a brilliant guy and he’s probably gotten some naive people to put up guarantees for the rights to distribute it on a closed-circuit basis,” said Hugh Panero, president of Request TV, the nation’s largest PPV distributor.

“Those are the people who are really at risk, and Bob has spent the last three or four months, or even longer, negotiating these deals. While Bob will cover most of his costs, if he ever tries to resurrect this again, none of these guys will be around. They will all have lost money.”

Arum, who charges that the cable companies have done little to prevent the stealing of signals with “black boxes” sold cheaply on the street, says he has cut deals with closed-circuit distributors guaranteeing a total of about $12 million to help cover the almost $18 million he has guaranteed to the two fighters.

Panero, who calls Arum’s black-box charges “just rhetoric,” estimated that, if this fight were on PPV, it could have had a 4% tune-in, or about one million buyers--and triggered a $35-40 million gross--without the hassle of negotiating 100 different deals with the closed-circuit operators.

The PPV companies are counter-programming a Luis Miguel concert the night of the fight, Panero said.

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Panero also pointed to wide industry speculation that the fight will be reshown on HBO the following weekend--as has every one of Arum’s past PPV or closed-circuit fights.

Lou DiBella, an HBO executive, declined to say whether the fight would be shown again that soon.

“I will not confirm that,” DiBella said. “But I will say it’s inappropriate for Hugh Panero to be talking about this promotion.”

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Betting action is so heavy on this fight that there’s little doubt the handle will break the sport’s record of about $22 million bet on the 1987 Sugar Ray Leonard-Marvelous Marvin Hagler fight, according to Art N. Manteris, the director of race and sports operations at the Las Vegas Hilton.

“And it’s all coming on Chavez,” Manteris said. “It’s just pouring in.”

Manteris projects a total of $35 million bet on this fight. The average amount bet on Super Bowls, gambling’s biggest event, is about $60 million.

De La Hoya opened as a 3-1 favorite in most sports books, and has been bet down to 2-1 as of Monday afternoon by a steady stream of Chavez money. By fight time Friday, Manteris predicts it could go to 7-5.

“There’s no question, we have a lot at stake Friday,” Manteris said, noting that the books will take a huge hit if Chavez wins.

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De La Hoya’s trainer, Jesus Rivero, from the Yucatan peninsula of Mexico, says he doesn’t understand why Chavez is a hero in Mexico.

“Why does the Mexican public favor Chavez and boo Oscar? I don’t understand,” Rivero said through a translator. “Oscar is a good person, he’s not arrogant. Chavez is arrogant.

“Chavez has embraced a corrupt government, he has dedicated every one of his fights to the [former] president Carlos Salinas.

“How is it possible that a boxer gains prestige by serving a government that steals from its people?”

Chavez, in response, has called Rivero “a traitor” recently and declined to say anything more.