Canelo Alvarez's Saturday night bout on HBO pay-per-view is the final fight on his current deal with the premium network, and promoter Oscar De La Hoya indicated the sport's most powerful draw could leave for a new suitor.
"It makes me wonder if HBO even wants to be in boxing," De La Hoya told the Los Angeles Times on Wednesday.
Alvarez (49-1-2, 34 knockouts) will seek the two middleweight belts belonging to unbeaten champion Gennady Golovkin on Saturday night at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on HBO ($84.95), and De La Hoya said, "I do want to fight him in December."
The suitors will be plenty.
In addition to ESPN investing deeply in a seven-year union with veteran promoter Top Rank to stage bouts on cable, pay-per-view and to stream them on ESPN-Plus, Fox just announced a deal with Premier Boxing Champions to place bouts on network and pay-per-view television while the new streaming service DAZN will launch next week with heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua's title fight.
"Given the circumstances that boxing is in line at this moment, with ESPN, DAZN and the fact that Fox television has paid millions and Showtime's doing many things, it's going to be very interesting for us and Canelo to see what HBO can do to keep him," De La Hoya said.
De La Hoya was long featured on HBO, which maintained a dominant position in boxing ratings before a withdrawal from the sport the last few years.
"HBO's been my family since I started boxing and it has been my family up until today," De La Hoya said. "I've always given HBO the first and last opportunity, but this is a business and I must do what's best for my fighters. I want to do what's best for Canelo's career, and right now particularly, boxing is big business on television, with more than 200 fights on a year."
De La Hoya said he will act swiftly on the matter as a likely frenzied pursuit toward Alvarez is launched.
"I'm going to carefully analyze everything and right after the final bell Saturday, I'm moving forward with this decision to explore what's in Canelo's best interest."
