HBO may air Manny’s latest fight

MANILA—Showtime has the inside track, but HBO may yet spring a surprise and make a solid bid to air the third fight of the Manny Pacquiao-Juan Manuel Marquez trilogy on Nov. 12.

After all, a Pacquiao headliner, regardless of the opponent, is a guaranteed blockbuster as proven by the pound-for-pound king’s 147-pound clash with Shane Mosley on May 7.

Though perceived to be a mismatch after it was first announced, Pacquiao-Mosley raked in a lofty 1.3 million pay-per-view buys, worth about $71 million, for Showtime, which was given the broadcast rights by fight promoter Top Rank over longtime partner HBO.

As a result, Showtime enjoys the right of first refusal in Pacquiao-Marquez III.

Kevin Iole of Yahoo Sports tweeted that Top Rank chief Bob Arum will meet with Showtime executives today to receive its initial offer.

If CBS throws its full support behind Showtime in the endeavor, then HBO will need to use its persuasive powers and shell out more money to reclaim the broadcast rights.

Pacquiao’s fights have generated an average of more than a million buys for HBO. His fight with Oscar De La Hoya raked in 1.25 million PPV buys, Ricky Hatton (850,000), Miguel Cotto (1.25 million), Joshua Clottey (700,000) and Antonio Margarito (1.15 million).

Showtime showed a viewer base larger than HBO’s after Pacquiao’s fight with Mosley exceeded these PPV figures.