On Thursday, Showtime announced that the official domestic PPV buys for August’s Mayweather-McGregor fight drew 4.3 million PPV buys which fell short of the record set by Mayweather against Manny Pacquiao in May 2015.
Showtime also announced that it drew over $600 million in total revenue.
The Mayweather-McGregor fight was second biggest gate ever with $55,414,865.79 in ticket sales, according to the Nevada State Athletic Commission. Mayweather-Pacquiao was the biggest with a gate of over $72 million.
Dana White indicated to Jason Gay of the Wall Street Journal that the event drew 6.7 million PPV buys globally with it breaking records in Australia, UK, Spain and Canada. The simple math based on White’s comments would be that global PPV drew 2.4 million PPV buys.
Payout Perspective:
The announcement confirms what many within the industry already knew – the August novelty fight reined in tons of money. It was only a question as to whether it would break the all-time U.S. record set by Mayweather and Pacquiao. Regardless of breaking a record, the PPV buys were enormous considering McGregor had never had a professional boxing match. Regardless of what you thought of the matchup, the fight elevated McGregor’s draw and could make it hard for the UFC to meet his monetary demands in the future.
Leave a Reply