I was happy to hear that the promotion for the mega showdown between Oscar De la Hoya and Floyd Mayweather Jr. went very well generating 2.15 million pay-per-view buys. Some people have stated that this is a clear indication that boxing is alive and kicking. For some reason this internet hack doesn’t see the correlation between the record-breaking pay-per-view buys and whether boxing as a whole is in a healthy state. The only point that the huge amount of purchases said to me, was that through the various big name advertisers such as Cazadores, Rockstar, Tecate, and Southwest working in conjunction with Touch-Point Marketing, sure knew how to spread the word. They were able to create a buzz that the mainstream viewers and even non-boxing fans couldn’t resist. My question now is… did this fight revive boxing?
Unfortunately, according to virtually every casual viewer I’ve spoken to this past week has deemed the fight as rather boring. I’ve even heard people who missed out on the event say, “I didn’t see it but I heard it sucked anyways!”
I’ve even heard some boxing fans in disappointment say, “I don’t know about boxing anymore, at least in the UFC those guys will really fight. I think I might take a break from ordering this stuff.”
While I don’t necessarily wholeheartedly agree with these sentiments, I will say that the fight didn’t live up to the expectations. Castillo-Corrales 1 it was not. Barrera-Morales 1 or 3 it was not. Even the Miguel Cotto-Paulie Malinaggi fight provided a good deal more action than this last bout. Don’t get me wrong, I love the subtle facets of boxing being a big Bernard Hopkins, James Toney, and Stevie Forbes fan. However, when a fight is built up to a certain magnitude and has been deemed “the fight to save boxing”, it better bring the heat in terms of action and aggressiveness.
Just like the detractors of UFC don’t appreciate the subtle facets of joint-locks, ground-work, and seemingly sloppy stand-up fighting, the casual boxing viewer won’t appreciate a tactical boxing match. These viewers don’t care about the shoulder rolls, tight angles, feints, and fancy footwork that were on show this past Saturday. What they wanted to see was two guys fighting on the level of Mickey Ward and Arturo Gatti. They wanted to see an action-packed bout with blood and guts flying everywhere in a battle they could tell their off-spring for generations to come. Will they talk about how great the De la Hoya-Mayweather battle was down the line? I highly doubt it. If anything, they might talk negatively about how it failed to live up to their expectations.
There’s a good and bad side to the fact that the fight was viewed by so many people. The good is quite obvious in that the exposure for the sport was ridiculously high and the big-name sponsors brought on by Touch-Point Marketing will continue to target boxing fans in the future. This might allow boxing to be shown on network television to reach an even broader fan base than it currently has. The bad is that the general consensus from what I’ve seen and heard is that the viewers were generally disappointed in the fight itself. I guess I have another question for you readers. Does it really matter if they were disappointed in the fight?
From what I’ve seen people enjoy any excuse to get together and party their asses off. Just like the Superbowl is viewed by people who couldn’t tell the difference between a football and a foosball, people just don’t want to miss out on the water-cooler talk. They feel the need to be part of something and maybe they will pay for the rematch regardless of their current feelings. My main point is this. We all know that millions of people will pay to see Oscar De la Hoya fight. We all know that Las Vegas will be a madhouse when the “Golden Boy” decides to lace them up. What we must remember is that Oscar is not boxing. There is a lot more to boxing than just Oscar and Mike Tyson. We have a large amount of budding stars waiting to shine but due to these letdowns people won’t take those risks and pay to see them scrap.
What boxing needs to do to really generate a revival of the sport is offer big-name, action-packed battles on either regular HBO, Showtime, ESPN and especially network television. We as a fraternity need to take a current pay-cut in order to set the ground-work for the future generations to once again embrace this unique sport. I mean seriously, I took a pay-cut from zero to paying Michael Marley to post my articles here at Boxingconfidential. I for one would like to see the same big time promotion go into a card guaranteed to bring some serious action from all demographics and facets.
Let’s make an Antonio Margarito-Kassim Ouma, Ricky Hatton-Miguel Cotto, Manny Pacquiao-Juan Manuel Marquez card. Let’s put these multi-million dollar budgets into the promotion of a ridiculously stacked card with up and coming fighters to really revive the sport. To truly see how the industry is fairing, we must focus on more than one superstar in the game today and more importantly, like Don and Lorraine Chargin promotions, we must guarantee that all fans in the arena and at home watching on TV have something to pass down for generations to come. Boxing will definitely survive because everyone within the game is a fighter at heart, I just feel that it could be a bit healthier if it took care of it’s body aka the prospects and fans a little better.
PS. Rest in Peace to one of the most action-packed, true warriors of the sport Diego “Chico” Corrales. You gave the fans everything you had each and everytime out and for that we salute you brother. Our thoughts are with your family, friends, and loved ones.
