According to Dan Rafael of espn.com, longtime HBO executive Mark Taffet will leave the company at the end of the year.
“I recognized early on that boxing had a unique characteristic which would lead to success on pay-per-view,” Taffet told ESPN.com. “The opportunity to watch a big fight in the comfort of your living room was a significant improvement over the then-existing big-fight experience of having to drive to an arena or racetrack [to watch on closed circuit], where picture quality and sound were poor at best and the possibility of having food and beverage being tossed through the air was great.”
“My intention is to work with the fighters, promoters and entities that will be most directly involved in the formation of the next great era of boxing,” he said. “That also includes sites, sponsors and foreign broadcasters, all the key players necessary. Most likely I’m going to speak with people who HBO is already involved with, but I will be on the other side.
“I have the passion to want to be part of it. I feel the best way to do that at this point is not with HBO but with entities on the other side of the playing field. It will give me tremendous fulfillment. I have no intention of leaving boxing.”
“At this point in my life and career, as we begin the inevitable transition period to boxing’s next great era, I believe my greatest contribution to the sport going forward is not with HBO. … I was blessed to have one of the greatest runs in the history of HBO Sports.
“I came to work every one of my 11,576 days with passion, energy, a commitment to excellence and the desire to win. We dared to be great and, thanks to an incredible team of professionals at HBO Sports, we were.”
“I was fortunate to learn a very valuable lesson in just our first two pay-per-view fights,” Taffet said. “Holyfield-Foreman generated 1.4 million buys while a great fight the following month, James Toney versus Michael Nunn, generated just 19,000 buys. From that day forward, I never forgot that pay-per-view was a business of hits and misses, and asking people for their money rather than just their time was a very significant proposition.
“Of all the things I’ve done over the past 25 years, the most rewarding was being able to provide a television platform with significant earning capability for scores of incredibly talented fighters in lighter weight classes who were previously underappreciated in a heavyweight-dominated environment. It was the [Michael] Carbajal-[Chiquita] Gonzalez [junior flyweight title] fight in 1993, where each fighter earned $1 million, which opened the door for a future which included great fights of Marco Antonio Barrera, Erik Morales, Manny Pacquiao and Juan Manuel Marquez.”
“My quarter-century at HBO Sports is bookended by Holyfield-Foreman and pay-per-view’s first great year in 1991 on one end, and Mayweather-Pacquiao and the biggest year in the history of the sport on the other,” Taffet wrote to his colleagues. “And in between, not only mega fights like De La Hoya-Mayweather, Lewis-Tyson, De La Hoya-Trinidad, Mayweather-Cotto and De La Hoya-Pacquiao; but also some of the biggest multi-fight matchups, including Pacquiao-Marquez I-IV, the Holyfield-[Riddick] Bowe trilogy, Barrera-Morales trilogy, Pacquiao-Morales trilogy, Holyfield-Lewis I and II, De La Hoya-Mosley I and II, and the middleweight world championship series culminating in Trinidad-Hopkins. The greatest events, staged at the greatest venues — Caesar’s Palace outdoor stadium, MGM Grand Garden Arena, Madison Square Garden, Staples Center, Mandalay Bay, Thomas & Mack Center and Cowboys Stadium.
“I had the incredible opportunity to learn this sport and business through days, nights and years with boxing’s legendary promoters Don King, Bob Arum and Dan Duva — larger-than-life figures who took me behind the curtain and inside the control center to collaborate on some of the most exciting and fulfilling experiences of my life.”
“I’ve been asked if my dreams came true during my era at HBO,” Taffet wrote. “The truth is, as a hardworking kid from humble beginnings in Jersey, I never even dreamed of anything as extraordinary as what I experienced.”
