A Showtime Boxing Special Edition on Saturday night drew an event high of 311,000 Showtime subscribers on Saturday night with the main event being Julian Williams defeating Marcello Matano in a middleweight bout.
The Williams-Matano bout drew just 125,000 viewers in the 18-49 demo per Sports TV Ratings. The event high occurred between 11:50pm-12:19am ET.
Payout Perspective:
On a night with UFC and HBO Boxing it’s pretty clear that only hardest of hardcore boxing fans tuned in for this special event. The 311,000 is one of the lowest-rated live boxing event for Showtime in some time.
d says
Haha.
tops E says
Whoooo fought? Hahaha
Not as bad says
as the UFC’s events with Arlovski which drew less than 100,000 viewers.
Right, d?
Wil says
Too bad on that one, all the fights were excellent. All ended on stoppages. Absolutely more entertaining than the HBO fights on the same day. HBO had the bigger names though, thats how the cookie crumbles. Showtime needs to do a better job of staggering its cards so they are not opposite HBO cards.
Diego says
Wil, once upon a time they aspired to be able to go head-to-head, but those days are long gone.
The Greatest says
311k is decent for who was fighting, with two other fights going on at the same time.
Boxing did over 1M viewers that Saturday with not very notable names and a UFC ppv going on with McGregor at the same time.
Not bad
Wil says
Diego, this card was basically a Shobox card and Shobox I think is slighty above what we used to see from ESPN Friday Night Fights….prospects and contenders, most of whom dont have any hype. I think it would have been a better play to put the card 2 hours prior to the HBO card. Showtime has not had a good start to the year, neither has PBC. Based on the showing PBC had during March of last year, I would have expected a stronger start by the Haymon umbrella with the end of football season. Thankfully though both Showtime and PBC came out yesterday and announced a STACKED Spring and Summer schedule….thank God.
Wil says
you know, I just had a though. We all as combat sports fans know the power of name, much like having the label “Americas team” does for an NFL team……but this card battle with HBO and Showtime really showed the power of having a bigger name and that name being a heavyweight with wrecking ball knockout power. People still prefer to see the big men hit hard, and no one on the Showtime card had the name. It reminds me of the times when Bellator outdoes the UFC on viewership, when it happens, its because of recognizeable names like Shamrock, GRacie, Slice, and colorful names like Dada 5000……I even tuned into the WSOF card that had the superhero from Seattle, Phoenix Jones. To this date, that is one of 3 WSOF cards I have watched, and the only one that I looked forward to for weeks. Names matter…..
Wil says
a thought that is