Boxing returns to PPV on Saturday featuring the Charlo brothers in what many boxing fans see as a quality card with the potential for excitement. However, it goes up against the UFC’s monthly PPV. What will combat sports fans do?
First off, the Showtime PPV is priced at $74.95 which makes many fans apprehensive of the purchase right off the top. The old questions about paying for fights you can see for free on television are abound. Yet, Showtime is offering an undercard which could spark some entertainment instead of the standard boxing PPV which relies on the main event and then younger boxers to fill-in the rest of the three hours. There will be more fights on the PPV and arguably good ones.
The main event features Jermall Charlo vs. Sergiy Derevyanchenko for the WBC middleweight title. Jermell Charlo takes on Jeison Rosario for the WBA, WBC and IBF junior middleweight belts. On the undercard, John Riel Casimero defends his WBO bantamweight title against Duke Micah.
Despite 3 title fights on the same PPV card, the UFC airs its PPV on ESPN+ from Fight Island. The event has middleweight Israel Adesanya defending the title against Paulo Costa in a battle of unbeatens. It also has Dominick Reyes and Jan Blachowicz vying for the vacant light heavyweight title. The price point for this fight is $64.99 in addition to be a subscriber to its digital platform.
Despite the competition on Saturday night, Dana White seems less than threatened about the competition telling The Athletic, “That’s like the toughest kid in school picking on the biggest nerd. My daughter is 14 and her Instagram account is private and she gets more views than Showtime Boxing does.”
So, White is confident that when it comes to competition Saturday night, there is no competition. Of course, the UFC’s relationship with ESPN doesn’t hurt as the company has been surging since it came back from the pandemic. Ratings on ESPN are up and its dominating the younger demo whenever it airs on the network bolstering viewership on the digital platform. According to a source procured from Mike Coppinger (which many infer was White himself), the event featuring Tyron Woodley and Colby Covington drew 1 million unique viewers to its platform this past Saturday. Post-pandemic stoppage, the UFC ratings on ESPN have been on the rise.
Conversely, when Top Rank Boxing returned to the network, it did not do well as ratings for its Summer Session of fights drew an average of 330,000 viewers for the Tuesday/Thursday events on the network.
With two other boxing PPVs by year’s end, this Saturday’s Showtime event might be on the short end of the buys. While the UFC has made a model of putting together monthly PPVs, boxing has saved their special events it. Yet, boxing has not produced high PPVs except for the Canelo, Manny or Mayweather events the past several years. The boxing model has been disrupted by DAZN which is now in the midst of what could turn out to be a messy lawsuit with Canelo Alvarez and Golden Boy Boxing.
Payout Perspective:
While hardcore boxing fans will be excited with this offering by Showtime, I would not expect a huge buy rate this weekend. Even though the double main event featuring the Charlo brothers looks good on paper, it’s hard to see casual boxing fans spending $75 to watch. Conversely, I can see MMA fans paying to watch this Saturday’s UFC card. What is the difference? The UFC fans have been trained to pay for PPVs while boxing fans do not have that ingrained into their fighter entertainment budget. Certainly, Showtime is doing something more by having multiple fights to promote the card rather the traditional one big fight and several opening acts. We will see how many folks tune in to support it.
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