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

On this edition of No Holds Barred, host Eddie Goldman speaks with Bellator MMA Chairman and CEO Bjorn Rebney.

Bellator's eighth season, which concluded in April, and which was its first on Spike TV, was its most successful and had the most viewers in the organization's history. While another full regular season will commence in the fall, Bellator will be starting a Summer Series of monthly shows on Wednesday, June 19.

Taking place at the WinStar World Casino in Thackerville, Oklahoma, and again televised live in the U.S. on Spike TV, the main event will have the unbeaten Bellator lightweight champion Michael Chandler defending his belt against Bellator season seven lightweight tournament winner Dave Jansen.

The June 19 event will also see the introduction of four-fighter, two-round tournaments in Bellator. Previously, all tournaments had eight competitors and three rounds.

In the first round of this tournament, which is in the light heavyweight division, "King" Mo Lawal will face Seth Petruzelli and Renato "Babalu" Sobral will fight Jacob Noe.

The four-man tournament format "just gives us the opportunity to keep guys rolling through the tournaments and get those champions title defense after title defense," said Bjorn Rebney in this interview, which was recorded by phone Thursday. "It's going to keep the ball moving. Occasionally you're going to see four-mans thrown in. You're going to see a four-man, and then you might see another four-man in the fall."

In addition, Bellator's "Fight Master" pre-recorded series also debuts on Wednesday, June 19, on Spike TV, featuring 32 welterweight fighters competing for a spot in a Bellator MMA tournament, with MMA legends Randy Couture, Greg Jackson, Frank Shamrock, and Joe Warren as coaches.

We also discussed with Bjorn Rebney how he is still running Bellator on a day-to-day basis with endless "20-hour days" even as Viacom is now majority owner of Bellator, why he will always maintain a tournament format for determining title challengers rather than using subjective matchmaking, the plans to have more women's fights in Bellator, plans to have every champion defend their belts at least three times a year, the overall status of relations with Bellator fighters, the Eddie Alvarez legal situation, and much more.

You can play or download No Holds Barred here and here. If one link doesn't work, please try another.

No Holds Barred is also available on mobile phones and iPads through Stitcher.

Also, No Holds Barred is available through iTunes.

The No Holds Barred theme song is called "The Heist", which is also available on iTunes by composer Ian Snow.

No Holds Barred is free to listen to and is sponsored by:

ONE Fighting Championship. ONE FC is Asia's largest and most prestigious mixed martial arts event. ONE FC features the best Asian fighters and has initiated the ONE Asia Partnership Network, which includes most of the major MMA promotions and MMA gyms in Asia. For more information, go to their web site, at ONEFC.com.

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Labels: Bellator, Bjorn Rebney, Dave Jansen, Eddie Goldman, Jacob Noe, King Mo Lawal, Michael Chandler, MMA, No Holds Barred, Renato Babalu Sobral, Seth Petruzelli, Spike