Top Rank Set To Venture Into New Media Deals As Current One Elapses

With the current contract between ESPN and Top Rank ending in August, Top Rank will be looking for other media outlets to air their fights.

There has been an emergence of various media outlets that currently showcase various sports events, and that has been beneficial to the sport.

Netflix is an example that not only sports channels can be used to showcase sports, as it has been used to air recent huge events like the Jake Paul vs Mike Tyson fight, the Super Bowl, and is currently set to showcase an all-women card at the MGM Grand Arena.

Top Rank’s CEO Bob Arum, while recently talking to reporters, expressed his desire not to depend on only one outlet to showcase your fight. Currently, there are many platforms and, like other sports, various outlets can take and showcase the product globally, which allows the fans to choose how they find it convenient to get and watch the event.

Arum has organized boxing matches for more than 60 years now, and he has seen a lot of changes coming through, throughout his involvement in the sport.

“The reason for that is because there are so many different outlets for people, different streaming services that are still over the air, there are other ways like YouTube to reach consumers, so there is tremendous demand for the product. Now, when you look at the cost of boxing, it is relatively low compared to other sports,” said Bob Arum.

With the monetary value of the rights to air by Top Rank yet to be made public, it is already clear that it would be a good deal for media companies as compared to high-profile combat sports like UFC.

Top Rank and ESPN signed the deal back in 2017, the agreement was that ESPN would be airing 54 events annually for the promotion. A new deal would see Top Rank split the deal into multiple packages, and this would only mean more income, which would benefit everyone involved, from the promoters, networks, and even the boxers.