By Keith Idec

Richard Schaefer felt confident about the pay-per-view business Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Canelo Alvarez would generate before the Danny Garcia-Lucas Matthysse fight was officially added to the card Thursday.

Now the Golden Boy Promotions chief executive officer feels strongly about the possibility of the Sept. 14 show approaching the boxing pay-per-view record established by Mayweather and Oscar De La Hoya in May 2007. Mayweather-De La Hoya produced 2.525 million buys and made roughly $140 million in pay-per-view revenue.

“After we finished the press tour, after the final stop in Los Angeles, we had 10,000 people in front of Staples Center and all the L.A. media said they’ve never seen anything like that,” Schaefer said on a conference call Thursday. “It was pretty much the same at every stop we had in those 10 cities. After the tour, to be honest, I have to tell you that I felt very comfortable to predict that this fight between Mayweather and Canelo is going to match or beat the gross number of the numbers generated [by Mayweather-De La Hoya] from pay-per-view, which was around $140 million. I felt very comfortable.

“Now, with the addition of [the Garcia-Matthysse] fight, I feel even more comfortable. Whether it’s going to break the 2.525 million homes, we’ll see. I don’t want to be that bold to predict that, but certainly, I think it laid the foundation to have a serious shot at breaking that record as well.”

The Mayweather-Alvarez show might have a better chance at eclipsing the revenue record than the buy mark because it’ll cost $75 in HD, $10 more than the Mayweather-De La Hoya card.

Regardless, Mayweather-Alvarez sold out the MGM Grand in Las Vegas in less than 24 hours last month and made nearly $19 million at the gate, a record for a boxing event in the United States. Mayweather-De La Hoya established the previous record by earning about $18.4 million at the MGM Grand gate.

“Usually if the gate does well and closed circuit does well,” Schaefer said, “it’s sort of like a chain reaction and that usually means that the pay-per-view will do extremely well as well. So we’ll just have to see, but I like our chances.”

Keith Idec covers boxing for The Record and Herald News, of Woodland Park, N.J., and BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.