How popular was boxing in the US at its peak?

[Banderivets]

I'm curious being from commie block and all...

It appears to me that boxing is at a low all around the US not just the heavyweight division. I mean sure there are a lot of boxing fans, there is TV coverage, but hey its a 300+ mil population. Even if 5% of that figure are fans that is a significant market.

It would appear to me that most boxing fans in the US today are Americans of/or immigrants from Latin America and the odd drunk Irish j/k.

And here is where I draw the comparison.

When I went to Mexico boxing is on TV there all the time. JMM was there all the time on some boxing show on their version of ESPN or whatever every day or was it every week...People talk about boxing on the street you just see it in the culture......(although I must say, from my experience they only knew of Mexican and Puerto Rican fighters....apart from the obvious names such as pac and may)

In Ukraine there is boxing every morning on TV on lets say Sunday, they cover a broad range of fighters, every sports site has a boxing section as one of the 3 or 4 main sections.

But being in Canada and given the fact that 80% of our TV is American, I see little boxing coverage on the tely...I mean minimum that comes from the states...

So was it different before? How was it during its heyday? Where there boxing shows? Did people talk about it how lets say they talk about baseball, nfl, nba?

All we get now is a ****load of classless, angry, MMA shows...

[StarshipTrooper]

I see fights on TV all the time but then again I watch hockey everyday so.....

The popularity of boxing peaked in the United States from the 1920s to the 1950s when it was the second most popular sport in the country after only baseball. Since the 1950s it's popularity has been on a steady and precipitous decline to where it is today: A niche sport that barely registers on the national radar screen.

Poet

[Anthony342]

Yeah, I remember reading that in a Bill Gallo article online a few years ago too. And not all the MMA shows are clasless.

[greynotsoold]

Boxing was huge in the 1920s, 30s and 40s. Babe Ruth was making $80,000/year when Dempsey was making $550,000 and more. Benny Leonard was LW champ and made more than Babe Ruth. In the early 1950s, Sugar Ray Robinson had a fight in a football arena that drew "only" 51,000.

[Ray Corso]

A good example is that Dempsey was more popular than Ruth and as the Worlds Heavyweight Champion he was known all over the free world as it was called back then. Hell Ruth wanted to be Dempsey !!!! Ray.

[Barn]

1/3 of the world (literally) stopped to access Louis vs Schmeling II in some way.

[winky's right]

1/3 of the world (literally) stopped to access Louis vs Schmeling II in some way.

source????

[Barn]

source????

Hurry Mullans encyclopedia of boxing was where I read it.

[hhascup]

Just look at the front page of the New York Times of July 3rd, 1921. Across the top you will see "Dempsey knocks out Carpentier in the Fourth Round."

Of the 8 columns on that front page, 6 full colunms were on the fight, and continued on another page. On one of the other colunms, it states, "Harding Ends War." The Times thought more of the fight then they did ending the War.

For years, a Big Heavyweight Championship fight would be on the front and back pages of the New York Daily News.

Now that's what I call being popular.

[Cloud]

The BBC and ITV only talk about boxing if it's to do with a ''controversy'' like when Khan-Peterson happened and when Haye and Chisora brawled in Munich.

Other than the bad stuff, the British media doesn't really give a fuck about boxing.

Sadly, we have to rely on Sky, Boxnation and Channel 5 to see some boxing.

I can't afford to pay for Sky Sports and Boxnation so I'm happy to wait for Channel 5 and Youtube.

I'll only sit and watch a stream if somebody uploads a link.

British media doesn't even talk about amateur boxing, despite us having a decent group of amateurs for the Olympics.

I've never once seen boxing talked about in a program to do with the 2012 Olympics.