Boxing Off-Topic

[ubernoob]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

He's made plenty of money and isn't a draw so why keep doing it?

He is still absolutely a draw.

ESPN got huge ratings from this, and there was like 55,000 people in the stadium.

[JayBee74]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

Horn coming into every exchange head first is gonna be funny when he faces someone who can side step/step back and bang him on the chin with some thump.

It was an entertaining fight overall. Was never really a big fan of Pac in boxing because I felt like he let Bob Arum run him too much (and you could argue that is how he lost to Bradley the first time). But he has had a very good career and its always sad to see guys decline so much. I really hope he doesn't take the rematch and just goes about his business. He's made plenty of money and isn't a draw so why keep doing it?

Agree with everything you said except the draw part. He has virtually an entire large country of fans in addition to anti-Mayweather forces and people around the world who just like this guy.

[N51_rob]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

Fair enough on him still being a draw. I shouldve said PPV draw. I'm not paying $70 to watch him fight and I heard Australia subsidized this fight which is why it was free. So I started d corrected on his drawing power.

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[JayBee74]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

Fair enough on him still being a draw. I shouldve said PPV draw. I'm not paying $70 to watch him fight and I heard Australia subsidized this fight which is why it was free. So I started d corrected on his drawing power.

The opponent (Horn) had something to do with that, but look at his fairly recent PPV fights:

Tim Bradley III, April 2016: 400,000
Chris Algeria, November 2014: 400,000
Jesse Vargas, November 2016: 300,000

Nothing great but how many people were worn out by Pac-Bradley fatigue and the other two guys were not draws in the least.

Meanwhile two great fighters (Ward, Kovalez) average around 150K for their two fights.

I think he is still PPV relevant with the right opponent, but I don't think he wants that right opponent.

[ubernoob]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

The opponent (Horn) had something to do with that, but look at his fairly recent PPV fights:

Tim Bradley III, April 2016: 400,000
Chris Algeria, November 2014: 400,000
Jesse Vargas, November 2016: 300,000

Nothing great but how many people were worn out by Pac-Bradley fatigue and the other two guys were not draws in the least.

Meanwhile two great fighters (Ward, Kovalez) average around 150K for their two fights.

I think he is still PPV relevant with the right opponent, but I don't think he wants that right opponent.

On the flip side, I think giving him that opponent doesn't bump sales much.

Pac's draw doesn't come from the crazy about boxing crowd. It comes from the Pinoy crowds that eat that **** up.

Put Pac/Crawford on PPV and promote it and it sells slightly more than Pac/Horn would have on PPV, but not much more.

And it still sells more than something like Ward or Kovalez fights would do as JayBee said.

[JayBee74]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

Pac's draw doesn't come from the crazy about boxing crowd. It comes from the Pinoy crowds that eat that **** up.

I can't speak to the "crazy about boxing crowd" because I am of that and have never been a Pac fan.

At this point, I don't even think his Philippine base is going to get too excited about Pac fighting a non-contender but I suspect they will wildly support him in a rematch against "The Hornet".

Fair enough on him still being a draw. I shouldve said PPV draw. I'm not paying $70 to watch him fight and I heard Australia subsidized this fight which is why it was free. So I started d corrected on his drawing power.

Yeah, I knew about the subsidy part, but I never heard any specifics.

[JayBee74]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

Significant fact?:

Pacquiao's 32% landed power punches vs. Horn is his third lowest power connect percentage in 40 of his fights tracked by CompuBox.

His fight against Mayweather (27%) also falls into that category.

[gmac0322]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

Significant fact?:

Pacquiao's 32% landed power punches vs. Horn is his third lowest power connect percentage in 40 of his fights tracked by CompuBox.

His fight against Mayweather (27%) also falls into that category.

Great insight and facts Jaybee

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[sheredia]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

Atlas was so far up Pac's so and so he could taste Brylcreem.

his rant after the fight was pretty entertaining, especially the awkward moment he asked bradley if he thought manny won the fight (with bradley getting a bogus decision against manny himself in their first fight)....he paused for a second, and said he thought manny won too. probably afraid to disagree with atlas at that point. lol.

[JayBee74]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

Pac wanted WBO to investigate "unfair decision and officiating".

The WBO countered with "The discretion of a referee or judge cannot be reversed, except in a case of fraud or violation of laws which is not the case in Pacquiao vs Horn".

As to his complaints about officiating what illegal tactics is he alleging Horn got away with?

Many might disagree but Pac comes off as "not great" by carrying it that far after he was so classy immediately after the fight. Just my opinion.

Finally, The Hornet got somewhat of a compliment from the former champ-"He's not really good but he's really strong."

[pk500]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

I do like Horn's fighting style, but he needs to get a new trainer to discipline him in the art of NOT rushing in to throw punches. Of course, that will not happen.

Horn is SO flawed. Leans into punches, leaving him susceptible to uppercuts. Fights far too square. Plus his hooks are looping, leaving him open for counters.

To be fair, Horn has better ring movement than expected for someone with such clumsy form.

Pacquiao's inability to figure out Horn, other than the ninth round, further illustrates Pacman's steep decline. The vintage 2007-10 Pacquiao would have taken out Horn within five rounds.

Crawford would knock out Horn within six rounds. Easily.

[pk500]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

I can't speak to the "crazy about boxing crowd" because I am of that and have never been a Pac fan.

At this point, I don't even think his Philippine base is going to get too excited about Pac fighting a non-contender but I suspect they will wildly support him in a rematch against "The Hornet".

You guys underestimate Pacquiao's remaining drawing power. Ask any non-boxing fan to name two active fighters today, and the answers will remain "Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao."

ESPN's huge numbers for the fight prove this. Pacquiao remains one of the two biggest names in boxing.

We pay enough attention to the sport to know Pacman's skills don't merit that status. But the rest of the general sporting public does not.

I think Canelo and GGG will elevate into the general sports consciousness after their mega-bout in September, although I would feel more confident about that if either guy was represented by Top Rank.

Say what you want about Arum, but he's more willing to take risks like putting the Pac fight and the upcoming Lomachenko and Crawford fights on ESPN to grow the sport than Oscar and Golden Boy are. Loeffler and K2 do a terrific job with Golovkin, but they're too small of an operation to make a huge publicity dent.

ODLH and Golden Boy love to talk about how they're so active on social media and promote better than Top Rank. But what are they doing differently for the Canelo-GGG fight than the tired, old London-New York-LA press tour, "24/7" show and weigh-in hype show? Nothing that I can see.

Arum might be a cranky octogenarian, but he still knows how to sell sand in the Sahara better than any other promoter.

[aholbert32]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

You guys underestimate Pacquiao's remaining drawing power. Ask any non-boxing fan to name two active fighters today, and the answers will remain "Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao."

ESPN's huge numbers for the fight prove this. Pacquiao remains one of the two biggest names in boxing.

We pay enough attention to the sport to know Pacman's skills don't merit that status. But the rest of the general sporting public does not.

I think Canelo and GGG will elevate into the general sports consciousness after their mega-bout in September, although I would feel more confident about that if either guy was represented by Top Rank.

Say what you want about Arum, but he's more willing to take risks like putting the Pac fight and the upcoming Lomachenko and Crawford fights on ESPN to grow the sport than Oscar and Golden Boy are. Loeffler and K2 do a terrific job with Golovkin, but they're too small of an operation to make a huge publicity dent.

ODLH and Golden Boy love to talk about how they're so active on social media and promote better than Top Rank. But what are they doing differently for the Canelo-GGG fight than the tired, old London-New York-LA press tour, "24/7" show and weigh-in hype show? Nothing that I can see.

Arum might be a cranky octogenarian, but he still knows how to sell sand in the Sahara better than any other promoter.

I'm not willing to crown Arum yet for this move because he kind of was forced to do this. Top Rank's 3 biggest fighters are Pac, Lomo and Crawford right now. Pac is on his way out. Top Rank has tried the HBO promotion route for Lomo and Crawford for years now and they still arent PPV draws yet. Arum took a chance by partnering with ESPN here but I heard that HBO turned down the Horn fight initially and ESPN or losing money on PPV were his only options.

If anything they took the PBC/Haymon route and decided to put their stars on national TV in lopsided matches (I'm not including the Crawford/Indongo fight which is very good).

Also dont underestimate the general public's hunger for good matchup or big names. For Pac to do 4 million on ESPN on a holiday weekend is a credit to his drawing power but Garcia/Thurman did 5.1 mil on CBS. That shows me that the public just wants to see top boxing fights for free.

The problem is it seems promoters are only interested in short money. Your point about Oscar is dead on. He's a lazy promoter that relies solely on Canelo and his Mexican support to draw. He has no other potential stars on the rise. He relies on either HBO/PPV to pay for his fights or low cost venues/networks to showcase future stars. Its all low risk. If Canelo gets destroyed by GGG, Golden boy will go into a tailspin.

The long money play is what Haymon and Arum now seem to be doing. Thurman is probably one fight away from being a big enough name to challenge Floyd and that is after multiple free PBC fights. Same with Spence. I hope the world gets to see Lomo and he becomes a star with the ESPN promotional machine behind him. Same with Crawford.

My fear though is that HBO will see the Pac numbers, open up the bank again and future top level Top Rank fights will be on pay cable again.

[JayBee74]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

You guys underestimate Pacquiao's remaining drawing power. Ask any non-boxing fan to name two active fighters today, and the answers will remain "Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao."

Yeah, but non-boxing fans aren't going to throw PPV dollars at a Pac fight short of a Floyd rematch. They won't do it for Thurman, Garcia, Crawford or Spence.

Because of his super loyal base Pac's drawing power may be significantly reduced but it's not going away.

Also dont underestimate the general public's hunger for good matchup or big names. For Pac to do 4 million on ESPN on a holiday weekend is a credit to his drawing power but Garcia/Thurman did 5.1 mil on CBS. That shows me that the public just wants to see top boxing fights for free.

Yes, I even found myself passing on Ward-Kovalez II after exhausting all options on cutting into the $70 price. I didn't hesitate to watch Pac fight someone for free, but I wasn't super excited about it.

[pietasterp]

Re: Boxing Off-Topic

All very good points; excellent discussion in the posts above.

I hope we are witnessing a sea change in boxing, though, whether it's planned or promoters are just being dragged kicking-and-screaming into a new era. One of the factors that may be contributing to promoters finally looking outside the PPV model is that there are almost no sure-fire PPV draws in boxing anymore, and I think after the Pac-Mayweather fight, nothing short of a new Tyson is going to rekindle the public interest in PPV boxing cards.

As for the Showtime/HBO stranglehold on big name fights, I wonder if acquisition costs combined with cord-cutting are starting to erode the ability of those networks to keep boxing as a profitable engine on their networks (I have no evidence or data to back that hypothesis up; pure conjecture on my part). It may be a simple matter of diversification of portfolios by the major promoters.

One thing I'm 100% sure that it is NOT, though, is any long-term vision by the big-3 promoter shops to try to grow the sport and regain a foothold in the public sporting consciousness.