The Spin!

The game is the game, we may not like it but sky are never going to change

 

Exactly. It's all about marginal gains. People who regularly post on a fairly niche boxing forum aren't really their audience. It's primarily people who's main sport is football who watch 'big fights'. Sky's agenda is to make the Matchroom roster of fighters household names to sell PPVs.

Dillian Whyte is usually in exciting fights hence why Matchroom have tried to plug him. Commentators steering the narrative a certain way helps him whatever the outcome.

 

Joshua brought a lot of the current audience, they basically pay thier 20 spot and want a few knockouts and excitement, and they buy into thier stars like Whyte, they dont look too deeply into the sport, well thats how id view the people i know that are more footie fans than boxing ones.

 

Yep, that's the same with the people I know who watch big fights. There's nothing wrong with that really, I used to be like that before getting into boxing properly. The issue is that it means Matchroom alter their coverage to account for this audience which is quite annoying.

 

It's all really unnecessary.
A little bit of bias is to be expected and comes with coverage of any sport.
But I don't think the casual fan in Britain needs to be lied to for them to support good plucky British fighters like Whyte.
The whole SKY/Matchroom culture of excessive spin is weird.
And, yes, it might well be linked to the whole PPV market thing. It's as if they need to portray their fighters as "super" quality fighters to justify that extra premium. They live in fear of the casual fans discerning the next one aint quite worth the £20.

 

Exactly. I’ll get behind any British fighter. Chisora appears to have got himself a bit of a following despite his limitations both in the ring and out of it, and the many losses on his record. He doesn’t need to be marketed as a world beater for us all to tune in. We all know (and I think even the casual audience know) that he’s essentially a fun gatekeeper. We can enjoy him for what he is. Whyte is on the same level....put him in with Fury, Joshua again, Usyk, Ruiz and a few others and he’d be knocking on 5, 6, 7 career losses in a few years time. That’s absolutely fine with me, I’ll be right behind him cheering him on...just stop telling me he’s a top 4 heavyweight who everyone is ducking.

 

Great thing about Chizzy is he can errupt at anytime in the build up

 

Very true. He’s an entertainer, off his cake, and he’s always got that big overhand right in him that could turn a fight on its head. I buzz off him but he’s realistically only just a top 20 heavyweight.

 

There was a time, probably many years ago now, when the broadcaster was, if not impartial, not uncritical. There may be a bias towards a Brit for instance, but it didn't extend to saying water isn't wet or the like. The problem comes when a broadcaster is too tightly invested with a promotional team. The Matchroom fighters are assets and Sky has no interest in devaluing them, even when they're deserving of criticism. Same for BT Sport's coverage of Frank's stable really.

I don't really watch those cards now with any expectation of an honest commentary, which is a little sad. Occasionally you get some who are a bit more independent. I think Mike Costello still embodies the older approach, perhaps because the BBC aren't into this for millions and not pressuring him to say the right thing?

 

I still really like listening to the Costello and Bunce podcast. They bounce off eachother quite well. Bunce is a bit cartoonish but his enthusiasm is infectious and you can tell they're both sincere.

I think they're at their best in the shows overseas for the biggest fights - Joshua vs Ruiz and Fury vs Wilder for example.

 

Yes I agree. Bunce is best taken in smaller doses with Mike gently pulling him down from the ceiling when he threatens to achieve low earth orbit. I also like Andy Lee when he's sharing the commentary booth on the radio fights and is presumably under less pressure to push a particular line.

 

The spin regarding Whyte is standard, Sky and Hearn rewrite history, they actually tell you you're watching something you are clearly not most weeks.

The one we should be looking at is the PPV spin has started already, apparently the PPV numbers were "OK" "Good" Saturday, so they believe they have the market for the rematch on PPV at the end of the year.

So when Hearn was asked in an interview if they could put Whyte Vs Povetkin II on the AJ Vs Pulev card..

Well, Hearn basically laughed it off and asked how you would pay the fighters? Or some crap about "should we just throw money at it"?


So, we had a 40 year old SPARK a Matchroom fighter in a Back Garden PPV event with 5 fights on it, £20, there wasn't any real value on that card in my opinion, the KO was spectacular but on paper it was a terrible PPV card and sure that KO made it worth a watch, but still not worth £20.

Now, at this time boxing shows haven't got live gates, so I sort of understand, that was the reasoning for this being PPV in some arguments, well is was definely one of the arguments.. "how do we generate money to pay fighters"?

Well Hearn is expecting the rematch to be in front of a crowd, but is still going to make the rematch PPV.


So we are going to have AJ Vs Pulev PPV, Povetkin Vs Whyte II PPV, I'm sure Hearn and Sky will make at least one or two more.

We will also have Fury Vs Whoever PPV at the end of the year. December could be a very expensive month for boxing fans.

 

The whole "how are we gonna pay the fighters?", "how are we gonna make the fight without PPV?" is a bit of a nonsense. Even with the pandemic and lack of 'live gate'.
I'm not talking about the huge fights, like AJ or Fury, guys who are at a point where they should expect to command near-career-high purses and hold major titles, or if they wanted to bring Canelo over.
We're talking about a proposed fight between a guy who's just been sparked by a worn-out 40 year old versus the same worn-out 40 year old (41 actually) again.
Neither of them have a ton of better options. Frankly, Whyte should be quite willing to do it for almost nothing, if he really wants the fight.
ALL Hearn needs to propose is more incentive than they get elsewhere in current climate. Whyte's incentive at this stage shouldn't be all monetary.

SKY has money from subscriptions.
Matchroom has money in the bank to invest if they really believe in their fighter, and they get money from SKY.
There's money to pay these fighters.

These are hard times.
A lot of people are taking pay cuts or have lost their jobs completely.
The idea that Dillian Whyte's "fee" should remain high and we all fork out £20 again.

 

I remember Harry carpenter was emotionally bias for Frank Bruno as in clearly wanting him to win. But he was also quite balanced in terms of when Frank was doing when and when he wasn't, giving credit to his opponent as necessary.

Now the Sky mob just paint a rosy rosy picture all the time of their man regardless of whats going on. It comes across as beyond fake and pretty stupid tbh.

I radio 5 are on I'll put the Sky nonsense on mute and listen to the radio commentary which is usually pretty good.