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The odds of The Contender returning next season are looking better all the time. On Monday, July 18th, ESPN announced it was close to acquiring the rights for a second season of “The Contender.”
My guess is that if ESPN picks it up, Sly won’t appear each week. I say this for two reasons: 1] ESPN‘s budget won’t match NBC‘s and 2] Sly is gearing up for some major film work.
Still, I’m hoping that The Contender is able to make a comeback! – Craig
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MSNBC.com‘s Ask the Reality Show Experts posted an insteresting answer to the following question: Will ESPN pick up the boxing reality show? Here’s a bit of their answer: Contender fans aren’t going down without a fight… NBC’s “The Contender” |
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Executive producers Sugar Ray Leonard, Sylvester Stallone, and Mark Burnett are reportedly talking to ESPN about taking the series to the cable network for a second season… NBC has said they haven’t officially turned down the show yet. Last week Burnett told the New York Times that a renewal announcement was “highly likely” last week. There hasn’t been word yet, but all of these seem to add up to a return for “The Contender.” For full details click HERE. – Craig |
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Want to win Sylvester Stallone‘s desk? You can be the proud owner, if you’re the high bidder in a charity auction to benefit Sly‘s favorite charity, The Heart of a Child. The auction’s going on right now. I was going to bid, but the price is way out of my range. Heck, Sugar Ray and Jackie Kallen‘s desks are up for auction as well. But they’re not in the budget either. Still, maybe one of you ZONErs with deep pockets will win. If so, you can thank me later! : ) – Craig |
Sly Stallone announced Peter Manfredo Jr. will fight Sergio Mora for the $1 million prize Tuesday night at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. The Manfredo-Mora fight is scheduled for seven rounds and will be shown live on NBC.
– Craig
Can Stallone Save The Contender?
by Mary Murphy From TVGuide.com
With less than championship ratings, NBC’s The Contender is definitely on the ropes. Unwilling to admit defeat, cohosts Sylvester Stallone and Sugar Ray Leonard rushed this week to create a one-hour special that will air just before Sunday night’s regularly scheduled episode. On Thursday afternoon, these two tough superstars, both significantly dressed in black, met TVGuide.com for an exclusive interview at a Los Angeles boxing club.
TVGuide.com: Despite your star power and a tremendous amount of on-air promotion, The Contender has not lived up to expectations in the ratings. Why?
Sylvester Stallone: Other networks were dropping nuclear weapons on us. They were trying to see if we had the legs to survive.
Sugar Ray Leonard: Based upon what we have been up against, with the other networks doing everything they can to break us down, we stayed strong.
Stallone: [Fox’s] The Next Great Champ put a negative spin on boxing, which is a subject that was dubious to start off with. No one really knew or cared about boxing anymore, so we were really starting off from ground zero. But it is building momentum, not just here but in England, where we moved into first place in our time slot. And we are going to be opening in Germany, Australia, Italy and Spain. So the idea of this American dream still translates. The Rocky philosophy still resonates. So I think it’s really going to catch on. I really do.
TVG: Is that why you’re doing the extra hour? What are you doing in it?
Stallone: We decided to do this three days ago. [NBC-Universal president] Jeff Zucker is taking Dateline off the air this Sunday [to make room for our] hour special. So from 7 pm to 9 pm/ET will be The Contender. It will be me interviewing the wives, showing a different aspect, and then Sugar Ray and I will be recapping the four wonderful battles in the ring. We will sit there with the four winners and analyze what they did. You are going to meet them up close and personal.
Leonard: We are going to recap the first four episodes to let people catch up. There are some very dramatic moments, [like] the big shock in the first episode, when Alfonso Gomez decided to fight the most celebrated boxer of the competition, and it blew everybody away. And then in the third episode the fight with [Ishe Smith and] Ahmed Kadour [who lost]. They hated Ahmed. He walked around like he was God’s gift to the earth and to women. And last week [featured] the heartbreaking fight with Najai Turpin [who later committed suicide].
TVG: This show has been an uphill battle all the way. Why continue to fight so hard?
Stallone: We really love this show. And strangers were coming up to us in the street and recapping it. Then the studio executives caught all the chat on the Internet and it was so positive, they thought they were really getting something at the grass-roots level. The odd thing is, this is how the first Rocky started off. [Producers] Irwin Winkler and Robert Chartoff took this canister of film to people’s homes and created a buzz — because nobody wanted to see an unknown in a boxing film that was done for under $1 million. We couldn’t even get distribution. It was hard. So we did the same with The Contender. We said, “Let’s flog it. Let’s work it.”
TVG: So The Contender will not be pulled from the network’s schedule?
Stallone: NBC is not giving up. We are going to the end with a fight at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. I am even thinking about ways to do a second season, which would be dramatically different from the first.
– Craig
On Monday, March 7, 2005, Sylvester Stallone and Sugar Ray Leondard attended the premier party for NBC’s reality show, The Contender, at Planet Hollywood. Other celebrities including California’s Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, Liza Minnelli and Tony Danza joined in the festivities.
In this undated promotional photo provided by NBC Universal, Sugar Ray Leonard and Sylvester Stallone, hosts of NBC reality show ‘The Contender,’ pose. ‘The Contender’ is offering an impressive prize, $1 million and a four-year contract, to one of the 16 professional boxers competing in the new NBC reality series.
(AP Photo/NBC Universal, Chris Hasto)
– Craig
Sly Stallone and Sugar Ray Leonard were two of the pallbearers for Najai Turpin on Friday, Feb. 18, 2005 In Philadelphia. Najai Turpin was a promising young boxer who appeared as a contestant on NBC’s new reality TV program, ‘The Contender”. Turpin took his own life.
Ernest Jazzman Resendes sent in the following scan November 2004 issue of DirectTV along with this:
The November 2004 issue of DIRECT TV has Sly on it’s cover and a real nice article entitled “Saved by the Bell.” And here’s a quote that sums it up: “If The Contender scores a knockout, SYLVESTER STALLONE will once again be called a genius.”
Thanks to Jazz for the scan and quotes! – Craig
From the USA Weekend for October 29-31, 2004
Sylvester Stallone goes back to a boxing ring in January as host and co-producer of The Contender, an NBC “reality” entry. The man who became a star as Rocky Balboa offers potential Rockys a shot at fame and fortune, but he promises his audience more than a fight.
“The fights will just be about five minutes,” says Stallone, 58. Co-Producer Mark Burnett says Stallone is right for the job because “he loves boxing and what it means to the fans.” He’s been cold at the box office, though, so it’s unlikely a planned Rocky VI will happen now.
– Craig Zablo