Why are Cuban fighters poor draws in the US?

1.8m is not a lot when you consider there are 35m or so Mexicans or Mexican-Americans in the United States.

But yes, I think due to the very few marketable Cuban pro's, it is difficult for a promoter to establish a fanbase for them, couple that with the fact a lot of Cubans have an 'amateur', style, being very technically skilled, intelligent boxers (not neccesarily fan friendly), they become quite hard to sell.

Many US boxers of the same nature don't have a large fanbase at all, look at someone like Ward, who is the SMW champ, Olympic Gold medallist, but still couldn't draw flies to ****.

Nowadays you have to have either

1. Marketability
2. A fanatical fanbase

While there is great love for boxing amongst the Cuban population in both America and the Cuban homeland, Cuban, and indeed American fans are of an entirely different nature to Mexican & British fans, the latter of which will travel to the ends of the earth to support their fighters, in doing so outsing everybody else in the stadium.

It's a football culture that transfers over to Boxing in that respect.

Yuri has just signed with Al Hayman (and defacto Mayweather promotions?), he hasn't been fighting regularly, but he's one of the few Cubans who have both a fan friendly style and real skill who will be a draw with the right promotion, so we will have to see where he goes from here, I can see him being big.

 

Mostlikely due to inactivity. For example Gamboa had an opportunity to get his name on another level and he pulls some I'll advised stunt!

He isn't getting the exposure he needs...less people know him and less will pay to see him!

 

Also they tend to be far more technical than the other latinos.

They dont have that all guns blazing attitude you tend to see with the other fighters of latin backgrounds dur to their top class amateur background.

Less fan friendly basically, for the most part

 

^This...
Contrary to popular belief the average Latino fan will watch & support any fighter of Latin decent (Except of course when they are fighting one of our own).

 

Let me throw my opinion here;
The problem is boxing nowadays.There was a time when cubans will fill the Garden and sell out arenas.The times of kid chocolate( who was called the" best dressed man of the world and will drag multitudes behind him.At that time there were no cubans besides Desi Arnaz in USA.
Today boxing is different, fans are running away from the sport.Most people don't appreciate a good fight( only brawls or freak shows)
Mexicans remains faithful to their fighters,its why mexicans are always a guarantee to sell when their people fight.Its why Canelo and Junior are PPV material even when they are not yet true champs.
Promoters just look for whoever sells, and a show is settle where boxing is not the priority.
Pacquiao was built behind a very solid and skillful boxing who has been taking titles from catch up weight fights(wtf?) Floyd( the best p4p,no doubts) comes and goes pick pointing opponents.
Monzon didn't have any problems fighting the best around him.Maravilla Martinez was stripped from his title and has to be begging for a decent fight.

 

Cubans need to start defecting to the UK.

The weather might be **** over here but they'd get good support

 

Excellent thread.
Rigo and Gamboa need to sign up with Matchroom and start getting the respect they deserve.

 

I think it's less about the fans and more about the fighters themselves. imo the reason cuban fans do not come to see their cuban brethren fight, is that the fighters themselves lack marketability. gamboa's a whirlwind but he's pretty tame in pre and postfight press conferences, same goes for lara, solis, rigo and so on. they have the same problems most other small latino deominations have, no built in fanbase. I mean, even with built in fanbases, there are exceptions. people don't come to see carlos molina in droves, or robert guerrero.

 

what about Solis? Is he any different with a larger following?

 

rigo has been promoted badly. lara might start getting noticed now after signed with haymon. solis is an underachiever.

 

Other latins can speak some English. These Cubans can't speak a lick. They need to do more social media promoting. How many of them are on Twitter?

 

To be honest, as much as I hate to say it and perhaps make assumptions, racism might play a part. "Old" Cuban immigrants were mostly white (in the context of Cuba and their European ancestry), and many of them were wealthy. They also held very racist views, as does much of the Latin American bourgeoisie. Most recent Cuban immigrants are darker skinned, as the average Cuban is, and don't hold nearly as much wealth and political influence. Old Cuban immigrants are also known to have divorced themselves from the culture somewhat. So at the end of the day, the Cubans with the most money simply don't identify with someone like Gamboa fresh off the boat showing up in the ring.

 

I am not going to get in great detail because it would be too long but I will sum it up with great precision. 95% of US based Cubans are white and are not into boxing, their main passion is Baseball.

Cuba's main boxing supporters are their Afro-Cubans and 95% of them are inside Cuba.

The US white Cuban population only watches boxing occasionally but are not hard core boxing fans ( with very few exceptions ).

Not until Cuba totally opens up will the Cuban fighters enjoy a great Cuban fan base, but until that happens they will mostly have a very small group of US based Cuban supporters.

Understand better now?

:good