by Thomas Hauser, Top Rank

Editor’s Note: This is the third article in a four-part series by Hauser examining the May 7th welterweight title fight between champ Manny Pacquiao and Shane Mosley. The second one is available here. The first one is available here.

On June 22, 1979, Larry Holmes successfully defended the heavyweight championship of the world by knocking out Mike Weaver in the twelfth round at Madison Square Garden. Two days later, an article by Pulitzer-Prize-winning sports columnist Red Smith appeared in the New York Times.

The article was entitled “The One That Got Away,” and recounted how a fledging premium-cable network called Home Box Office had outwitted “the big brains of television’s major networks” to snare Holmes-Weaver. Smith began his appraisal of the situation with the words, “It was Home Box Office’s finest hour.”

HBO Sports had come of age.

Thirty-two years later, the May 7th fight between Manny Pacquiao and Shane Mosley is “The One That Got Away.” Pacquiao-Mosley will be televised by Showtime PPV, not HBO. Depending on how events unfold, boxing might be on the verge of another significant shift in power.

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