Steve Kim from MaxBoxing wrote interesting piece I though I was share.
Cotto and Pavlik, two stars of the Top Rank promotional stable, are facing opponents that are considered heavy underdogs as they are brought back judiciously from their first professional blemishes.
But guess what?
Cards of this nature are a necessary evil. Without them, fighters sit and stay idle. In today’s business, if either HBO or Showtime pass on a show – this is the only route to go. Once those two networks decided that Cotto-Michael Jennings and Pavlik-Marco Antonio Rubio weren’t worthy of airtime, this in essence, became a more expensive ‘Latin Fury’ for Bob Arum, who has had no success in convincing either network to showcase Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. in handpicked fights.
“That’s correct,” said Arum a few weeks back, “and HBO and Showtime don’t want to go down to Mexico and televise an event with Julio Cesar Chavez Jr, but we’re happy to go to Mexico and put on fights and so we’ll let those people who want to see these events with other title fights on the card, to pay a reasonable amount to see them on pay-per-view. It’s as simple as that.
“It’s much simpler for a fight to be on HBO. I don’t have to be on the phone every ten minutes to see how sales we have in Wichita.”
Let’s make this clear, this column is not advocating that everybody go out and order this, or any other event. But there is a reason why these second-tier pay-per-views take place. And while Top Rank has done more of these self-produced shows than any other promotional outfit the past several years, they are not the only ones to do so. Don King has done a multitude of cards that featured his deep roster of heavyweights and belt-holders in the past. Golden Boy has done small pay-per-views that featured main events like Marco Antonio Barrera-Mzonke Fana and Daniel Ponce de Leon-Al Seeger.
Why?
Because they had to.
“Promoters like Top Rank and Golden Boy, we have a large stable of fighters and we have a responsibility to them, to ensure that we’re going to keep them busy and to put them into fights that will lead to something else,” explained Golden Boy CEO, Richard Schaefer, whose company will soon be putting on an independently produced pay-per-view showcasing their lightweights. “Bob is doing that this weekend and we’re going to be doing that on April 4th. I do believe that there is a market for those smaller pay-per-views, if they are priced accordingly. We’re pricing ours at $39.95, like Bob is doing with his ‘Latin Fury’s and so on.
“There’s a certain market, a certain sector of people who like to watch pay-per-views at home. And you see it actually with the movies. Do you realize that movies, weekend after weekend, they’re breaking all-time records? People are looking for cheap ways of entertainment. Maybe they’re not traveling as much, maybe they’re not going on their vacations, maybe they’re not going for expensive dinners. Maybe they are going to the movies and maybe, yes, they are staying at home with their friends and watching their pay-per-views. These are facts.”
Shows of this nature are specifically catered to the hardcore boxing fan. Expectations for these events are modest – oftentimes, getting just 50,000 to 75,000 buys is considered a home run, if not a grand slam. Then there are shows like the March 14th encounter between Amir Khan and Marco Antonio Barrera that offer fans a chance to see a fight (for a price) that they otherwise wouldn’t, since it will not be televised by any U.S. network. The next week, Roy Jones faces Omar Sheika, which gives the last remaining followers of Jonestown an opportunity to see their faded idol.
HBO analyst Larry Merchant has described these types of telecasts as essentially, ‘putting in extra bleacher seats.’ And say what you will about the matchups that take place at the Chevrolet Center in Youngstown, Ohio and Madison Square Garden in New York, but there will be a combined total of about 17,000 patrons that will be enjoying the action live. And in many respects, these types of pay-per-views are the truest form of promoting. A promoter puts out his own money for the fighters purses, rents a venue and hopes that people come through the turnstiles inside the arena and turn on the fight at home. The risk is all on the promoter, who has no license fee from a network to act as an insurance policy. And if you go back to when boxing was truly in it’s heyday, not every fight was televised. In fact, it’s part of the reason why boxing did so well at the gate back then.
Golden Boy’s April 4th show has matchups like Antonio Pitalua-Edwin Valero, Joel Casamayor-Julio Diaz, Jesus Chavez-Michael Katsidis and Carlos Hernandez-Jorge Barrios. I have to admit, I really like this show. Yeah, some of the guys are long in the tooth, but these hook-ups look intriguing and have a chance to be very entertaining. (And folks, I’ve paid for a LOT worse. I don’t know if I should admit this, but I chipped in for George Foreman-Crawford Grimsley back in the day. Yeah, I know, I know.) In a perfect world, these fights take place on ‘Boxing After Dark’ but it beats the alternative, which is not having these fights at all, or having no opportunity to view them live.
Schaefer says, “I do believe a pay-per-view, if you give a quality fight, that people will buy it and people will watch it and this is one form of entertainment. The fact is that the April 4th card is a very, very evenly matched card, where you’re going to have a difficult time for each one of these fights to really say who is going to win.”
This phenomenon is not just exclusive to the sport of boxing. If you are a New England Patriots fan living in Texas, to view all their games you will have to pay for the NFL season package on DirecTV. Other leagues like the NBA and NHL have similar pay-per-view offerings. Myself, being an ardent Miami Hurricanes fan, had to shell out for the weekly ESPN Game Plan package (which gives you a roster of games not shown in your area that Saturday afternoon for $21.95) more than once to see them battle the likes of Texas A&M and Virginia this past season. There was a time when the Hurricanes were nationally televised almost week, so this wasn’t necessary. Well, until coach Randy Shannon brings them back to that plateau (knock on wood), I have a choice to make: either buy the Game Plan or torture myself on certain Saturdays (ESPN360 is great, but I need my Canes on a bigger screen).
I’m sure it’s the same situation for many of you when it comes to boxing. I know that there are a lot of individuals who have sworn up and down that they would never, ever, ever, ever, purchase another pay-per-view fight, again. No way, ain’t happening, only to relapse like Steve Howe in the ’80’s. Or go nuts trying to not find out the results of a fight before you get a bootleg copy of it from your buddy. Hey, I feel for you guys. Boxing is an addiction, and not an easy one to kick. And no, not getting this particular card – or any other – doesn’t make you any less of a boxing fan. It just means you might have more restraint or that quite frankly, you can’t afford it. No shame in that.
You could read his full article on MaxBoxing