Jones was never a mainstream superstar. a lot of people still don't know who he is. Mayweather only gained mainstream attention whenn he fought de la hoya
Its kind of hard to compare why he wouldn't be as popular as someone like Roy Jones Jr. Two things immediately come to mind: Roy Jones (in his prime), even to a casual fan who doesn't watch much boxing, but may be flipping through the channels, would certainly appear more impressive due to his style. Very flashy, fast punch throwing combinations. With his physique and things he did in the ring (knock out someone with hands behind his back), Jones in a way resembled a boxer who was superhuman in the ring. People like superheros. In addition, also Roy's style was much more flamboyant in the ring, and he had much more of extroverted personality. Kelly on the other hand, although to the hard core boxing fan, shows he can box and is the champion, "looks" like your average guy next door who learned how to box, dedicated himself to the craft and is successful. In addition, he has an "average" personality, in addition to orthodox style in the ring. My point is that at first glance, everything about Kelly appears to be average, until you actually sit there and watch him fight. The other thing is that you can't compare Kelly to Jones at this point if his career, because Jones obviously is more accomplished. He had some big wins, and then moved up in weight and won belts in multiple weight classes, lets not forget heavyweight, which really put his name on the map even more.
his fights arent exciting to me at all... he's just a 1-2 puncher with power in my book....granted it gets the job done apparently but still....and yeah not to mention fighting gary locket (who prior to that fight i've never heard of)....then you throw in the fact that he's white with an unappealing personality (not that either make to big of a deal to me, but for alot of people, it might).....just alotta stuff against him, also maybe because he's bald headed?, who knows....
and uhh..... if ya'll can handle reality.... most of my freinds and people who i speak boxing with that aren't hardcore boxing fans or boxers, just casual viewers or sports fans as a whole.....just dont like him because he's white.....and most black people dont like seeing white people beat black people.....nor see two white guys fight each other....so it's kind of a lose-lose situation for him.......although on the other hand i do know a grip of people who like Paulie Maliginagi
Jeez I knew the US still has a race issue but damn I really hope that is f**k all to do with it. I hope Bachatu is right and its more down to style. Roy was all over the place , doing rap songs , mental ring entrances and utterly ripped to bits, he did look and act like a superstar. Kelly is a balding dude next door who just happens to be knocking people out ( and before the torrent of abuse I DO rate Pavlik highly ) Would Ali have been Ali had he not ryhmed about his fights , had he not been the flamboyant showman ? Yes multiple divisons/belts etc are really bad for boxing but sport is entertaiment , put an entertainer in there and people will watch !
Because the average American sports fan hasn't had exposure to top boxing in at least a decade. It's not on regular tv. It's not covered in the newpapers, and barely gets a nod in Sports Illustrated. And the television sports media, if they deign to mention it at all, only discuss boxing with respect to its imminent demise. You can't support what you can't see. Pavlik isn't even on the sports radar compared with football, baseball and basketball stars. It has zero to do with his skin color, talent or personality.
I think it's because his promotion got started kind of late. You see the guys that have been huge draws, DLH, Tyson etc. Arum and King promoted them heavily from their very first fight. Pavlik's promotion just got going heavy somewhere around the Mirand fight
I have no idea... He's a very nice guy (well, cheap trash talk is more popular nowadays), a huge puncher, had great fights vs. Zuniga, Miranda, Taylor and he's the MW World Champion yet to taste defeat... Well... maybe the non-existing media hype kicks back... Cotto had tremendous media support of Arum, fighters like DLH or Khan were already very popular when turned pro and for most of the fans Pavlik came out of nowhere in the Miranda fight... unfortunately Kelly Pavlik is the proof that it doesn't matter how good or even exciting you are, YOU NEED MEDIA HYPE!
he's not popular because he's only had fights with other unpopular fighters (well, bums if we're honest).
Several reasons. 1) There are so many damn weight classes and each class has up to four champions, that it's really hard to keep track of. I'm not one of those "good old days" guys, but in the 50's you had what, 8 divisions & 1 champ per division so it was much easier for the average sports fan to understand who the best were, and that made it much easier to become a fan of the whole sport. Today, other than a few champs who really show their dominance, most people don't take the time, not that I blame them, to grasp the whole sport. 2) Pavlik is relatively new to the spotlight and the fact that he's such a regular guy, and not a flashy boxer, it will be a slower climb up the popularity ladder than if he was flambouyant in and/or out the ring. Contrast that to Haye, talks the talk, Ko's guys quick, and looks like a Greek God and it's easy to predict, that if successful, Haye will be a worldwide superstar within the next year or two. 3) I'm not convinced that the fact he's white is that big of a deal. If there was a white guy out there doing what Tyson was doing in the 80's, he'd be plenty popular.
It's quite simple. He's not a big draw because he is STILL getting bigger and more known. WTF...did you expect him to be a draw overnight or something?