Despite all the canned kerfuffle about its worthiness as a pay-per-view main event, Andy Ruiz Jr. vs. Chris Arreola was as good as we all expected. And, despite Ruiz taking a fairly wide unanimous decision on the scorecards, the stock of both fighters rose following this bout. Arreola dropped Ruiz in the second round and looked solid throughout; Ruiz overcame the adversity and executed his game adeptly. Given the honest, earnest nature of both fighters and their ring efforts, the only way this one was going to disappoint was via some sort of early fight-ending injury.
But the question that got crammed into the proverbial pie hole of the narrative surrounding this fight and its undercard was whether it was worth the $50 pay-per-view asking price. And if the fans weren’t debating this quite enough, the boxing media made sure to make it an issue. Last I counted, there were 5 articles from large to large-ish sites on the subject.
Freedom of speech...freedom of the press, right? Yeah.
I do, however, find it a bit odd that the swamp-assed media “experts” would draw the “we have to call them out” card on THIS event-- filled with four guaranteed blue collar-fun fights that everyone agreed would be fun. This sudden mass concern for quality control was especially strange for an event scheduled to take place smack dab in the middle of a fat roster of nonsense exhibition fights and play-act boxing cards at a similar, or greater, price.
But the double-standard when it comes to PBC shows is a subject for another article.
So, the question right now is: Was it wrong to have Andy Ruiz-Chris Arreola on pay-per-view?
Full Disclosure No. 1: I wrote the official Premier Boxing Champions preview for Ruiz-Arreola. Those familiar with my work, though, should know that I have no problem biting a hand that feeds me and I’ve never held back with criticisms that I felt were valid and needed to be put out there. In other words, I say what I want, how I want, no matter what. And I have the battle scars in this boxing media business to prove it. I certainly have no vested interest in the success or failure of Saturday’s card. And, honestly, I don’t give a rat’s ass whether Ruiz-Arreola made any money.
Full Disclosure No. 2: I never pay for any boxing pay-per-views. For the last 21 years, I’ve been living in Mexico, where everything is free. I think the last pay-per-view I actually bought was Oscar De La Hoya-Felix Trinidad in 1999.
Okay, back to the main subject.
In a perfect boxing world, NOTHING would be on pay-per-view or behind a paywall. When the sport’s bossmen first grasped at this pay-for-everything model, they were dooming themselves to diminishing returns. You simply can’t grow a sport by making it less accessible and more expensive to follow. 50 years (or so) of this strategy has led to considerable shrinkage in overall audience and mainstream appeal. This is undeniable, no matter how fancily execs dress up stats and spin reality.
In the present tense, however, a case could be made for passing the hat.
With the sport experiencing considerable downtime due to the Covid shutdown and in-person attendance limits still in place in most areas, the sport has to adapt. And as the fighters have been mostly reluctant to take pay cuts for their pandemic-era efforts, the money has to come from the sport’s most loyal fans.
This Saturday’s FOX PPV was full of fun fights. Ruiz-Arreola, despite slowing down a bit in the second half, delivered quality entertainment. The undercard was entertaining as well, with the emergence of a new young star in Jesus Ramos and decisive victories by Sebastian Fundora and Abel Ramos in entertaining tussles. Throw in a free FOX pre-show headlined by the crunchingly dominant middleweight debut of Erislandy Lara, plus the continued emergence of featherweight Eduardo Ramirez as he stopped Isaac Avelar in a barn-burner, and you had a pretty good late afternoon/evening of boxing for the hardcore fight fan.
But was it worth the $50 asking price?
I grasp at the cop-out and say “That depends on the consumer.”
If the buyer was entertained, then, yeah, it was worth it. I think everyone universally acknowledged that this card would be entertaining. Many just felt that the star power was lacking and that the main event simply wasn’t a big enough bout.
Some fans have pointed out that both Ruiz and Arreola were coming off losses and, therefore, shouldn’t have been on pay-per-view. They argue that pay-per-view is a premium platform reserved for those who “deserve” it, not for those coming off a loss or working to make a comeback of sorts.
All of that is a bunch of nonsense, IMO. Pay-per-view is not a meritocracy where the best can demand the biggest prices. This is business. Who gets the pay-per-view stage depends on the ability to generate buys at the suggested price and nothing more. It’s the reason Jake Paul-Ben Askren can outsell pretty much any “legit” main stage boxing match at this point and Floyd Mayweather-Logan Paul could outsell Spence-Crawford.
FOX and PBC were rolling the dice on this Ruiz-Arreola card. Fifty bucks is half the price of some high-end pay-per-views and two-thirds the price of pay-per-views in general these days. The one thing you can’t deny, though, is that, pound-for-pound, it featured more in-ring boxing entertainment than most pay-per-view cards these days. If you’re a fight fan and wanted a six-hour chunk of good, compelling fights on a Saturday, this whole FOX boxing block, from pre-show to main event, delivered. But I do get where that price tag turned people off, especially when boxing consumers have been bred to value the sizzle over the steak.
If I were a big shot executive with some shot-calling power, I would’ve put Ruiz-Arreola on regular FOX and accepted that I’d maybe take a bit of a money loss this time in order to build towards something bigger a bit further down the road. This Arreola fight was bound to be a good fight, a slate-cleaner for a rebuild-minded Ruiz and, ideally, you’d want as many people exposed to it as possible.
But, then again, even tucked behind a paywall, millions and millions will still see bits of this fight via social media. So, why not try to turn a profit now and, then, more of a profit later. Maybe?
All of this is a bit beyond my responsibility level. Maybe I would think differently if my job depended on turning profits every time out and it just wasn’t realistic to take a short-term loss for long-term gain if I wanted to keep my gig. Maybe Ruiz’s contractual money demands made pay-per-view a must. There are a lot of maybes that you and I aren’t really qualified to address.
What I AM qualified to address is that this was a good card that even held the interest of a jaded old boxing guy like myself. If we’re talking BOXING and not star gazing, then 50 bucks was, comparatively, not a lot of money for pretty much a whole afternoon and evening of quality scraps.
Again, I think all of this should be free. Find a fucking way to pay for these fights without passing the hat to the fans who’ve been hit up way too much already. I mean, shit, how long would a diner stay in business if they told their customers that they’d have to pay a cover fee to get in, pay the normal price on the menu, and then dish out another charge if they wanted their food prepared properly?
But, if you’re gonna charge fans for their boxing, at least make it top-to-bottom entertaining with good matchmaking, like Ruiz-Arreola. If you objected to the price tag, no problem. You didn’t have to buy. It’s just hard to hurl shit at this pay-per-view when other companies have been asking you for 50 bucks (or more) for fake fights, bad musical performances, crappy jokes, and novice-level main events.
Got something for Magno? Send it here: paulmagno@theboxingtribune.com