HBO Wins Rights For Mayweather-Cotto Fight On May 5, Beating Rival Showtime

Floyd Mayweather Jr.'s challenge of junior middleweight title holder Miguel Cotto from the MGM Grand in Las Vegas on May 5 “will be carried on HBO PPV, which secured rights to the fight on Thursday despite competition from rival Showtime PPV,” according to Dan Rafael of ESPN.com. The fight will be Mayweather's “eighth in a row on HBO PPV and ninth in his last 10 fights.” When HBO lost the Manny Pacquiao-Shane Mosley fight last year to Showtime, it was “one of the key factors in the forced resignation of former HBO Sports president Ross Greenburg in July.” Ken Hershman, who used to run the sports division at Showtime, left the network and was hired to replace Greenburg in October. Hershman started at HBO in January and “landed Mayweather-Cotto as the first major pay-per-view of his administration.” Although not “formally announced, there will be a ‘24/7’ reality series in the build-up to the fight, plus additional programming and marketing that HBO promised as part of the deal” (ESPN.com, 2/16).