A One Off or a New Approach for DAZN?

Once a week, a search through the cable channel guide insures anything with boxing in the title not already set for DVR gets, well, set.

Last Sunday, the guide scrub found something unexpected.

The channel for InDemand pay-per-view was showing boxing at 8 PM EST Saturday night. Saturday was already looking pretty full. Showtime has an excellent card and DAZN has the return of Saul Alvarez.

There was no need to worry. Right there, in the listings: Alvarez’s challenge of Callum Smith, available for purchase a la carte. No official announcement had been made at that point but this scribe tweeted about it as a curiosity. After all, it could have been a mistake.

It wasn’t.

On Tuesday, the streaming service launched with much ballyhoo about the end of pay-per-view, announced it will be simulcasting for both their stream subscribers and pay-per-viewers. For those not already subscribed to DAZN, but desperate to see Alvarez back in the ring, there are two solid options.

The pay-per-view will cost $69.99 but will also come with a free four month subscription to sample DAZN. Considering the DAZN schedule already has Ryan Garcia-Luke Campbell, Patrick Texiera-Brian Castano, and Alexander Povetkin-Dillian Whyte on tap, with hopes for a Juan Francisco Estrada-Roman Gonzalez rematch inside that four month frame, it’s good value.

A better value would be to get a yearly subscription for DAZN now, spend thirty more bucks, and have a whole year’s worth of whatever will come.

One has to wonder if DAZN might prefer more opt for the former.

To the surprise of no one, pay-per-view has not died and remains, when executed effectively, boxing’s biggest revenue driver. Let’s do a little math. At the low end of estimates, Tyson Fury-Deontay Wilder II did at least 800,000 buys earlier this year at $79.99. That’s a gross revenue, split several ways of course, of almost $64 million.

For DAZN to derive that amount of American revenue for a boxing event, they would need roughly more than 3 million subscribers at the monthly rate of $19.99. Of course, standard pay-per-view doesn’t see all the event revenue go to the boxing side. Even considering what cable companies take off the top for pay-per-view distribution, DAZN would still need probably between 1-2 million subscribers to match the potential of pay-per-view in a single month for a ‘superfight.’

The last domestic pay-per-view to do around a million buys in the US was Alvarez-Gennady Golovkin II.

And look who else fought on DAZN this weekend.

Friday night, Golovkin returned for a mandatory defense of his IBF middleweight belt against unheralded Kamil Szeremeta (21-0, 5 KO). It has been no secret what the fledgling service has lusted for from the moment they signed both men to lucrative deals. Even now, with Alvarez no longer exclusive, it’s hard to see Golovkin’s seventh round stoppage win over Kamil Szeremeta (21-1, 5 KO) as anything more than shoulder programming for Saturday’s big event and a dream of another day.

Perhaps a day in May?

If DAZN can finally get the fight they’ve wanted all along, and stay in the Alvarez business for at least one more fight, the short term subscriptions acquired this weekend through the pay-per-view offer expire just short of May. That could be coincidental. Considering Alvarez is unlikely to miss a second consecutive Cinco De Mayo weekend, it’s canny if so.  

If it’s not coincidental, it could be the beginning of a wise two-tiered approach. DAZN’s boxing content has been high in volume so all of it isn’t good but the best of it since their launch in 2018 has been fantastic for serious fight fans. Significant heavyweight action (much of it from overseas), World Boxing Super Series bouts, and some of the best sub-bantamweights in the world have been among the highlights along with Golovkin and Alvarez.

It hasn’t been enough yet by most estimates.

It’s what makes the angle this weekend interesting. While still trying to build their subscriber base, DAZN has been leaving money on the table. There are plenty of viewers who would be happy to just see Alvarez a couple times a year without an enduring subscription. If they opt not to become regular DAZN viewers, they’d likely pay the full freight again in May if Alvarez-Golovkin III became reality.

Throw on another four month freebie in May and it would appear by inexact calculation here to expire just short of Mexican Independence day weekend…

...hmmm.

That’s thinking too far ahead and Alvarez has so many options outside the DAZN tent that it will be lucky to keep him for even one more date.  Either way, it creates a scenario where the hardcore boxing viewers DAZN has maintained all along get what they paid for and DAZN gets paid more over the next year from the passer by, picking up inevitable keepers along the way.

Could all this lead eventually to even the regular subscribers being asked to pay more for bigger fights? It could. We’re not there yet but this weekend could open the door for the option though it’s probably not a smart move. Special events that protect the loyal and drive new business would be.

All we know for now is the death knell for pay-per-view is kneeling at boxing’s still reigning, undisputed money fountain.

This likely won’t be their last trip.             

Cliff Rold is the Managing Editor of BoxingScene, a founding member of the Transnational Boxing Rankings Board, a member of the International Boxing Research Organization, and a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America.  He can be reached at roldboxing@hotmail.com