Fury v Makhmudov Officially Announced

If this is as good as it gets for DAZN UK a full 5 years and 48 days post launch, with both Sky and TNT Sports currently out of the boxing game in the short term, then it is unlikely to succeed and grow from 300 subscribers now the big fights are on Netflix.

Ironic that the 'Netflix of Sports' is losing the big fights to Netflix

The demand for DAZN UK at previous and current prices for the sports offering is simply not there in the UK.

The sports washers know it hence the fights moving to a streaming service with a wide subscriber base.

 

I thought Turki was just a massive boxing fan?

 

Thing is, if your people-pleasing ‘PPVs’ are on Netflix - Alvarez v Crawford, Joshua v Paul, Fury etc. then why on earth would someone bother with DAZN Ultimate?

Stevenson v Lopez and Barrios v Garcia are decent enough fights, but never PPVs in this country, and if that, plus that Inoue card over Christmas are what you get in your Ultimate sub, why bother? I bet Turki would’ve put the Eubank Jr v Benn rematch on Netflix if he had the chance again now.

 

Yes 1 year from now, Mr Turki will know the difference between a boxing glove and a mitten

 

Word in New York at the Dalton Smith fight week was that allegedly Uncle Frank is no longer flavour of the month with HE.

 

I have been told that Mr. Turkey wants to go solo without any interference from other promoters.

Going forward, it´s going to be difficult for both Warren and Hearn.

 

If we get Tyson Fury vs AJ in September its going to be on Netflix (I still think AJ is retiring).

 

Oh really?
Wonder what's gone on there.
Doesn't Turki know that Frank has more lives than a cat.

 

I'm on the fence whether Joshua will retire.
On one hand he's lost 2 members of his close team and it may have made him think about calling it a day.
But on the other hand it may spur him on to get back and beat Fury in memory of them.

Money is no object to Joshua now- he could fight Fury and give a big chunk/all his purse to the families of the team members who died. After all Fury gave away all his Wilder purse to charity

 

Interesting.

 

Yup, barely a month into the year and the biggest names in the sport for casuals are all heading to Netflix. DAZN looks pretty much cooked in the UK now, subs going up, discounts for paying upfront, and Conor Benn about to be the face of the product isn’t exactly a growth strategy.

Netflix is basically doing what Sky originally did, tie up the biggest names to drive the subscriber base, except they already have the scale baked in.

 

The thing with DAZN is, and I might be completely wrong about this, the fights do get shown around the world in ' 200 (?) ' countries. I've no idea how many viewers , it might be tiny, but it's some sort of exposure I suppose. Maybe more than being on BBC2. I've been a subscriber from the start. I pretty much hate it. The app's clunky, Adam Smith is the voice of boxing and despite it having ' 185 shows a year ', many are poor, almost certainly picked up for free while other more watchable events aren't on there. I'm not going to mention PPVs as I'm speaking to the converted. I subscribe cause I like watching boxing and this is where the boxing is. Look at the state of boxing currently. Other than Matchroom, Queensbury and PBC ( though they are hanging by a thread I think ), Top Rank, TOP RANK !, have no TV deal, Golden boy look like they are about to be dumped by DAZN, Boxxer look like they are going PPV only ( good luck with that), ZUFFA, no idea how that ends up though according to Thomas Hauser they are being paid $8 million a show and those other people, iVisit Boxing are going to put on ' mega ' events mainly on YouTube PPV. Plus Netflix. Oh and Wasserman are putting Chisora Wilder on Sky Sports ppv. Its f**king chaos. If Top Rank can't get a TV deal with their stable of fighters, most of this will fail. Its mental but it's actually a lot of fun keeping up with all this. There's great ' banter ' on here which I love with everyone taking the p1ss. It's never boring, often more enjoyable than the fights and even though it's spread over loads of different platforms, we all get to see the fights, one way or another. It is frustrating but it's also crazy and I like that, a lot.

 

Thing is, for hardcore boxing fans who follow the sport globally (not just a niche home-country view), DAZN is basically the ideal platform.

The problem is the new consumers coming through are the social-media generation – their attention spans are cooked. They want clickbait, controversy and dopamine hit after dopamine hit. Boxing doesn’t really fit that model unless the whole structure changes.

Prizefighter-style nights or 1–3 round sprints would absolutely bang, because it’s basically stitching a bunch of TikToks into a “product”. What does sell to that crowd is spectacle shows, everyone turns up just to post it and chase clout with their fake IG mates. And the next generation will want gratification even faster.

Or they bring back a reality “Contender” type series. Streaming would absolutely inhale that. Mix the sexes, stick them in a house, lean into the storylines and drama, then it’s basically Love Island boxing style… they'd eat that **** up on streaming.

And tbh, DAZN probably won’t make it through long-term with the losses it’s racking up. If/when it wobbles, Sky will be there to pick up the pieces for pennies on the pound.

 

Which is where Dana White comes in. Like or hate UFC, it's an actual global brand with a single front man. Most people in the street couldn't name boxing promoters and even if they knew Hearn it's probably from "no context" memes or carrying AJ's bag.

Hearn wanted to create a UFC type brand within DAZN but backed the wrong horse and did it too early. The Ring via massive platforms like Netflix or via clever distribution of deals in specific markets, means it's more likely Matchroom will be bought out and Queensberry go back to being a European niche promoter, than either being part of a global takeover.

 

They’ve got a name for that model, mate – it’s called a cartel. Turki will feel right at home fronting one, coming from where he does.