Any numbers on the Haye-Klit PPV?

That was a pretty rotten article, mate. Thomas Hauser has said it better and with better analysis. Basically – that writer doesn't like PPV and thinks all fights should be free. He's identified that as the major problem with the sport's waning popularity, and it is a part of it, but there's a lot more to the story. You need to look at WHY promoters and fighters rely on PPV.

Since the 70s, there's been a proliferation of weight-classes and trinket belts to increase revenues. Before you had to be the best, most dominant guy in your division to hold the belt and make the money – because if you were the best, even if you were a little dull, you would get on TV. Now you just need to buy your way to a paper title and hold on for a HBO/Showtime/Sky date.

Because of that change, fighters now have higher expectations about their fiscal worth, even in a depressed economy and when they've done little to deserve it. Aligned with promoters who find it easier to make money on TV than at the gate (Gary Shaw and Dan Goosen), this has led to the PPV explosion. Free TV cannot and will not offer the money the promoters need to cover costs. There's no sport-wide promotion as with the NBA or NFL, so every promoter looks out for themselves.

Few promoters know how to make a profit off the gate (King, Arum and Fwank and Duva are the only ones I can think of). And that means fighters aren't building fanbases for when they do go to PPV.

Here's an example – Devon Alexander is a big draw in his hometown of St Louis. He sells out small arenas. Against Tim Bradley, who's from Palm Springs, their promoters took a site fee in Detroit because it made them a fortune regardless of the fact it left the hall half-dead. They ended up papering the venue to get anyone in.

HBO paid them both a fortune for this and their next fight. They proceeded to put on a stinker. Anyone who did watch it was unlikely to tune in to either guy again. But because, in their heads, both guys are superstars, all they now want is HBO money. And who can blame them?

And as their demands grow, they need to be funded. Which is why PPV becomes so essential. The problem though is that it's used for nothing fights. Mayweather-Ortiz is a WCB show at best. What the hell has Ortiz done to justify a PPV at this stage?

But Mayweather's purse demands are far in excess of what the networks can fund with advertising. So we're stuck with it. But this wasn't a situation created by PPV itself, it was created by greedy boxers and promoters. PPV is a symptom of the illness.

 

This surely would ave been down to Lewis losing and it being a repeat?

 

Didn't they massively increase the ticket prices from normal Klitschko defense levels? The real interesting figure would be comparing gate numbers - after all its not how many people you have in the stadium that's important its how much they've paid to be there.