I wonder how this model would work in the USA, to bring more fights to HBO, Showtime, and commercial broadcast TV?

http://news.boxrec.com/news/2011/sky-puts-freeze-ppvs

Jack

looks like its back to streaming fights again. am guessing boxing in the UK will take a huge hit for this. I don't blame sky, but the quality of the fighters, it seems David Haye put sky off lol

Disagree.

This will be excellent news for boxing in the UK. Sky have long been taking the piss with their PPV shows, none of which were worth the extra fee. With terrestrial television getting back in the mix boxing will regain a much larger viewing audience. You gotta bare in mind that when Hatton fought say Mayweather, the fight was on at 4am UK time. So people have to stay up all fuckin' night and pay an extra £15 for the fight. Only the devoted fans are gonna do that.

To see Tyson Fury-Derrick Chisora got 2.9m viewers on the unfashionable channel 5 is bloody brilliant news. Check this out for viewing figures in the UK when the fights were all shown free.

Ali v Frazier 1971 BBC 27.3m
McGuigan v Cabrera 1986 BBC 18.3m
McGuigan v Pedroza 1985 BBC 18.0m
Eubank v Benn 1993 ITV 16.3m
Malinga v Eubank 1992 ITV 13.3m
Benn v McClellan 1995 ITV 13.1m
Rocchigiani v Eubank 1994 ITV 12.3m
Eubank v Close 1993 ITV 11.5m
Eubank v Thornton 1992 ITV 10.3m
Eubank v Holmes 1993 ITV 10.1m
Bruno v Marin 1995 ITV 10.m

Assuming Sky keep their Saturday Fight nights show going where they show all the domestic stuff, and we still get the occasional show from overseas from them, then its pretty much business as usual as far as Skys boxing coverage goes. Amir Khan has fell out with them and Davids Hayes future is unclear. And even if he fights on, they would have a brass neck to put him on PPV. Other than those two, there is no one PPV worthy over here anyway.

The best bit about this is the terrestrial channels getting involved in boxing. The sport has suffered since the death of Setanta and hopefully it will be brought back into the mainstream, and more importantly, hopefully fights like Agbeko v Mares etc will appear over here, cos there are still far too many big fights that we simply cant see over here except for streaming.

And, as always on this subject, Fuck the BBC.

Are those numbers for real???

Maxy, you hit the nail on the head. This is great news for boxing!

I'm pretty sure they are. I had just arrived in England in 1995 and remember watching the Benn/McClellan fight, it seemed like the whole freaken country watched it. Amazing.

Isn't it interesting that Chris Eubank featured in so many of those big numbers? I think Eubank was the prototype for many of the big PPV stars today. Yes he wasn't big in America but in England he was massive and provided the blueprint for guys like Hamed and Mayweather to follow.

I bet a good proportion (well over half) the people that tuned in to watch Eubank were watching purely to see him lose. He inhabited that cocky flashy bad guy persona very well. I'm not saying Mayweather has stolen directly from the Eubank 'character' (Hamed certainly did) but Eubank was certainly the first guy in the modern era to realize that maybe playing the villian (and pimping it up) paid even better than playing the good guy.

Yeah, good point mate. Eubank was fuckin' loathed by so many people, especially Benn fans and there was a massive divide in who people liked outta the two. Both drew in the crowds though. I used to watch several Eubank fights ringside (in the arena anyway) and even when he was fighting Johnny Foreigner many Brits still wanted him to get turned over. He was the polar opposite to the loveable Frank Bruno but he brought a bravado and nonchalance to the ring that was usually only seen by the flashy yanks. Hamed claims otherwise but it's pretty damn obvious he took the Eubank blueprint and extended it. Miss those days.

Although Sky have been good for boxing if you are prepared to stump up the extra cash, they have also eliminated the casual fan who used to tune into the big fight live on a Saturday night on prime time free to air television. Hence why people on the street ain't got the foffiest idea who Carl Froch is and only know a small handful of other boxers. Hopefully ITV, BBC and Channel 5 will bring back a period where the sport has a larger following again, making household names out of people. There are some good up-coming fighters over here.