Inoue/Cardenas Fight Night In Las Vegas At T-Mobile Arena Is Part Of Closing Chapter Of ESPN-Top Rank Media Deal
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By Cassandra Cousineau, LVSportsBiz.com Boxing Writer
LAS VEGAS, Nevada — A high-profile boxing match at T-Mobile Arena Sunday between Naoya Inoue, the 122-pound man out of Japan known as “The Monster,” and San Antonio’s Ramon Cardenas marks the closing chapter of one of modern boxing’s most influential media partnerships.
The bout not only marks Inoue’s long-awaited return to the U.S. after a three-year absence and is a title defense, the fight serves as one of the final major events under a promotional company’s soon-to-expire deal with ESPN.
After an eight-year relationship that reshaped how boxing was delivered to American audiences, ESPN informed Top Rank it will not renew the deal, which formally concludes in August. The final ESPN-televised Top Rank card is tentatively scheduled for July 26.
That means Sunday night will carry more than just title implications—it represents the end of an era.
The End of the ESPN Era
Top Rank, led by its founder and chairman Bob Arum, partnered with ESPN in July 2017 in spectacular fashion. Their first event featured Australian underdog Jeff Horn shocking Manny Pacquiao in front of over 50,000 fans in Brisbane. The fight averaged 3.1 million viewers on ESPN and signaled a revival of boxing on basic cable television.
A year later, the partnership expanded to a seven-year agreement featuring 54 events annually, split between ESPN and the then-new ESPN+ streaming service. The arrangement helped launch ESPN+ with exclusive live fight cards, weigh-ins, pressers, and a steady stream of shoulder content.
In the early years, the formula worked.
Early in Top Rank’s history fighters like —Floyd Mayweather, and Pacquio and most recently, Tyson Fury, Vasiliy Lomachenko, and Terence Crawford—have delivered main events that averaged well over 1 million viewers. But as the sports media world evolved and ESPN’s priorities shifted toward consolidating rights and building its UFC portfolio, boxing began to slide down the content ladder.
Now, with the deal nearing its end, Top Rank is expected to pursue a more flexible model involving multiple broadcast and streaming partners, including potential deals outside the U.S. The era of one promotion, one network appears to be ending—ushered out in part by the global rise of fighters like Inoue.
Las Vegas Rolls Out the Red Carpet for Inoue
Inoue’s face is everywhere—from the green facade of the MGM Grand to the blackjack felt inside the casino. His likeness lights up digital marquees at New York-New York and graces the cover of Las Vegas Magazine in Strip hotel rooms.
The 32-year-old Japanese superstar (29-0, 26 KOs) has fought in the U.S. just three times before—twice in Las Vegas during the pandemic with no fans and once in 2017 on a small undercard in Los Angeles. A planned 2020 bout against John Riel Casimero at Mandalay Bay was canceled due to COVID-19. Sunday night is Inoue’s first major U.S. fight in front of a live crowd since becoming an undisputed champion, and it’s being treated like a coronation.
Cardenas Gets His Shot
Standing across from Inoue on Sunday will be Cardenas (23-1, 12 KOs), a skilled and scrappy challenger from San Antonio, Texas. While few are picking the American to pull off the upset, he enters the ring on a 10-fight win streak and knows this is the opportunity of a lifetime.
For Top Rank, the matchup is a chance to showcase Inoue’s global star power one more time under the ESPN banner—before the promotional landscape inevitably shifts.
