David Benavidez has no shortage of HUGE fights on his radar. In an exclusive interview with BoxingScene, Jose Benavidez Sr. makes it clear that David still wants the biggest names at 175lbs including Dmitry Bivol and Artur Beterbiev. Benavidez has previously said those are two fights he wants to make as he pursues more titles and major challenges. But there’s another name that could make things very interesting: Andy Ruiz Jr. Jose discusses the possibility of an all-Mexican showdown between Benavidez and the former heavyweight champion, along with David’s plans across multiple divisions. And with a potential Jai Opetaia showdown also building after the pair came face-to-face following Opetaia’s latest victory, Benavidez has some massive options ahead.
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FOX’s viewership of its main event Saturday night was almost identical to the totals from the network’s previous boxing broadcast.
Nielsen Media Research revealed Tuesday that FOX’s main event Saturday night, Shawn Porter-Sebastian Formella, drew a peak audience of 1,225,000 and an average audience of 1,077,000. FOX’s prior main event, Jamal James-Thomas Dulorme on August 8, was watched by a peak audience of 1,224,000 and drew an average viewership of 1,076,000.
The average viewership of FOX’s entire three-bout broadcast Saturday night was 810,000 – 75,000 fewer than the average audience for the August 8 telecast. The show Saturday night also included Sebastian Fundora’s sixth-round stoppage of veteran Nathaniel Gallimore in a junior middleweight match and junior middleweight prospect Joey Spencer’s fourth-round knockout of Shawn West.
Porter’s prior appearance on FOX drew nearly twice as many viewers as the former IBF/WBC welterweight champ’s easy 12-round, unanimous-decision victory over the previously undefeated Formella at Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles. Viewership of that fight – Porter’s controversial, 12-round, split-decision win against Yordenis Ugas in March 2019 in Carson, California – peaked at 2,197,000 viewers and averaged 2,142,000.
The Cuban-born Ugas (25-4, 12 KOs) isn’t a high-profile fighter, but he is much more known among American boxing fans than Formella (22-1, 10 KOs, 1 NC). Germany’s Formella made his debut on U.S. television versus Las Vegas’ Porter (31-3-1, 17 KOs).
FOX’s entire telecast aired at the same time as an eight-bout stream of live boxing by ESPN+ as well. There was no overlap, however, between the Porter-Formella fight and ESPN’s main event, Joe Smith Jr.’s ninth-round knockout of Eleider Alvarez in a WBO light heavyweight elimination match from Las Vegas.
Nielsen doesn’t track streaming audiences. ESPN doesn’t release viewership figures from its streaming service, either, thus viewership for the Smith-Alvarez show isn’t available.
The Porter-Formella card continued on FS1 following Porter’s victory.
FS1’s two-fight offering averaged 121,000 viewers and attracted a peak audience of 150,000. Welterweight veteran Justin DeLoach (19-4, 10 KOs) knocked out Livan Navarro (11-1, 7 KOs) in the first round of the main event of FS1’s broadcast.
The FS1 viewership Saturday night also was comparable to FS1’s three-fight show following James’ 12-round, unanimous-decision victory over Dulorme two weeks earlier at Microsoft Theater. That telecast attracted an average of 127,000 viewers and also peaked at 150,000 toward the beginning of the main event – welterweight Luke Santamaria’s upset of Mykal Fox by 10-round unanimous decision.
Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.
