BOXXER, a boxing promotional company in the UK, and NBC Sports have announced a media rights partnership on Monday. BOXXER bouts will stream live exclusively on NBCUniversal’s streaming platform Peacock with select events airing on NBC.
Yep, you read that right, a reference to placing content on an old fashioned throwback, sound waves through the air platform.
Boxxer Founder Is Very Young
Founded by Ben Shalom, BOXXER is described in a release as “a next generation professional boxing promoter focused on bringing inclusivity, innovation, and entertainment to one of the oldest sports in the world.”
More from a release:
Home to world champions, Olympic gold medallists and some of the sport’s most exciting contenders, the org has broken a host of viewership records in the UK and Ireland.
All the while delivering unmissable events featuring sold-out arenas and stadia, and boxing’s biggest names going head-to-head.
The events air live and exclusively on Sky Sports in the UK and Ireland, after the leading UK sports broadcaster signed BOXXER as its exclusive British provider of boxing content in a landmark deal in 2021.
The new partnership will create a powerful extension to BOXXER’s and Sky Sports’ existing collaboration and provide trans-Atlantic distribution of Sky Sports’ world class production.
The deal will see the fight nights added to NBC Sports’ portfolio of premium sport programming, which includes the Olympic Games, Premier League, Sunday Night Football, Big Ten Football and Basketball, Notre Dame Football, NASCAR, golf and much more.
Together BOXXER and NBC Sports will build a boxing product for Peacock subscribers to enjoy with the ultimate goal to bring the events to the USA.
The action begins on Saturday, October 21 LIVE from The O2 in London when #1 and #2 world ranked light heavyweights Joshua Buatsi and Dan Azeez put a decade long friendship aside to battle for bragging rights and a shot at the WBA World Title live on Peacock.
Founder/editor Michael Woods got addicted to boxing in 1990, when Buster Douglas shocked the world with his demolition of the then-impregnable Mike Tyson.
The Brooklyn-based journalist has covered the sport since for ESPN The Magazine, ESPN.com, Bad Left Hook and RING. His journalism career started with NY Newsday in 1999.
Michael Woods is also an accomplished blow by blow and color man, having done work for Top Rank, DiBella Entertainment, EPIX, and for Facebook Fightnight Live, since 2017.