NO HOLDS BARRED

On this edition of No Holds Barred, host Eddie Goldman previews the Lara-Foreman and DeGale-Jack fights coming up this weekend, and discusses why the Premier Boxing Champion, the PBC, is by far America's number one boxing TV series.

On Friday, January 13, WBA 154-pound champ Erislandy Lara (23-2-2, 13 KOs) takes on Yuri Foreman (34-2, 10 KOs), and Anthony Dirrell (29-1-1, 23 KOs) fights Norbert Nemesapati (24-4, 17 KOs). This PBC card takes place at the Hialeah Park Racing and Casino in Miami, Florida, and will be shown live in the U.S. on Spike TV. Also on the card, two undefeated welterweights with identical 13-0 records, Miguel Cruz and Alex Martin, face each other in a bout that may be shown on TV.

On Saturday, January 14, IBF super middleweight champion James DeGale (23-1, 14 KOs) faces WBC super middleweight champion Badou Jack (20-1-2, 12 KOs) in a title unification bout. The co-feature has two unbeaten fighters fighting each others, IBF junior lightweight champion Jose Pedraza (22-0, 12 KOs) and Gervonta Davis (16-0, 15 KOs). This card will take place at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn and will be shown live in the U.S. on Showtime and in the U.K. on Sky Sports.

We spoke with James DeGale and Badou Jack on a recent media conference call.

We open with a discussion about why boxing is a primarily TV sport, and how all the shills, propagandists, nitwits, incompetents, and zombies writing in boxing's multitude of fake news sites have missed or failed to report one of the top boxing stories in the U.S. for 2016: the PBC is by far America's number one boxing TV series.

Here, based on compiling TV ratings from Nielsen, are the most-watched boxing shows in the U.S. for 2016:

1 - Errol Spence Jr. vs. Leonard Bundu, Aug. 21, 2016, PBC on NBC: average 4.8 million viewers, peak of 6.34 million.

2 - Keith Thurman vs. Shawn Porter, June 25, 2016, Showtime Championship Boxing on CBS presented by Premier Boxing Champions: averaged 3.1 million viewers, peaked at 3.94 million viewers.

3 - Danny Garcia vs. Robert Guerrero, Jan. 23, 2016, PBC on Fox: ave. 2.1 million, main event peaked at 3.5 million viewers.

4 - Andre Berto vs. Victor Ortiz, April 30, 2016, PBC on Fox: 1.6 million viewers.

5 (tie) - Gennady Golovkin vs. Dominic Wade, April 23, 2016, HBO: 1,325,000 viewers. (Note also that Wade is a PBC boxer and is managed by Al Haymon.)

5 (tie) - Joe Smith Jr. vs. Andrzej Fonfara, June 18, 2016, PBC on NBC: 1.32 million.

And for 2017, the PBC has said, beginning with this January 13 card, they will have more shows than in either of their first two seasons.

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Labels: Badou Jack, Eddie Goldman, Erislandy Lara, James DeGale, No Holds Barred, PBC, Premier Boxing Champions, Showtime, Spike, television, TV, Yuri Foreman