Why doesnt boxing get any mainstream publicity

On ESPN today as i type this,,, they are having a live interview with rampage jackson and tito ortiz,,, to of MMA's biggest names, but both pretty much retired,,, They have fought for many years in UFC, but both have signed with bellator,,, yeah you may have never heard of bellator but to their credit they have a 5 min segment on the most watched sporting show in the world,,, and floyd-canelo, lucas-danny, tim-jmm, manny-rios, wont recieve that type of attention.... Kinda sad when boxing has their biggest brand name fighters all having upcoming fights, yet ESPN is giving a whole segment and answering fans questions on air, to some retired MMA guys coming back for one last hurrah, and the biggest guys in boxing dont get anytime of airtime,,, What gives,,,,, And to the idiots that think MMA is struggling then how does their #2 promotion in the world land its own segment on SPortcenters for 2 aging fighters that wont fight till november,,,, Why doesnt boxing get the same publicity Easy answer. A station, such as ESPN, if vying for ratings against other sports oriented stations.....or any other station, really. The way that happens is by talking about what you think the viewers want to know about. Sad fact is, boxing is at an all-time low in the states from a publicity and popularity standpoint. ESPN knows which side their bread is buttered on, so they cater to the public they want watching them and buying the products that are advertised during that time slot. Boxing began shooting itself in the foot back in the early 90's when it ceased to exist on free tv, aka ABC, NBC, and CBS. Without regular boxing programming to attract new fans, all that was left was those of us who became fans before they took the toys away. Newer fans now are mostly grandfathered in by someone else in the house hold. You don't really stumble across boxing anymore like you could when in used to appear on Saturday afternoon on Wild World of Sports. In addition to that (and this is where the MMA fans are gonna get pissed), professional wrestling was growing in the 90's and exploded during the Monday Night wars with the WWF and WCW; and is still popular. Now, I ask you, what's better than Rasslin that's real? MMA is as popular as it is 'cause it feeds into a more base nature of pure violence. No holds barred (essentially), cage matches. See where I'm going with this? The media, ESPN included, is all about money, as is everything in our capitalistic society. People wanna watch MMA more than boxing. It's that simple. From James Figg until John L. Sullivan, boxing was illegal because it was immoral. You used to have to ride a train to a secret location to avoid the cops, who would inevitably stop the fight and throw the participants in jail. Boxing became popular first as the sport of kings, then as the outlaw sport. Now, we live in a society that celebrates brutality; and MMA has it all over boxing in this regard. If you give the people what they want or talk about what they want to hear, they will watch.......and you can sell your on-air slots for much more money than if they didn't. The dollar my man. That's your answer. :usa2:

Honestly, Pay-Per-View has killed boxing. I see some posters claiming that Boxing PPV numbers dwarf MMA numbers and honestly that shouldn't matter. I don't know the exact number of PPV's that boxing does a year but I would rather see that it be shown in over at least 50 Million homes on regular television than by say a million PPV customers per bout. The big shows do limit viewers to just a few boxers. The numerous amount of belt holders also hurts Boxing. You can sometimes have more than 12 "Champions" in one weight division. I live in the South Florida area and rarely can I find a fellow boxing enthusiast. I did happen to find a radio show here on Espn's radio that diverts some of it's air time to Boxing/MMA on Sunday's 10AM-Noon. I enjoy when they devote time to Boxing but about 60-70% of the time they talk about MMA. I agree with most, Espn's coverage of Boxing consists of recaps or a quick snippet on the ticker. Soccer is starting to get more coverage on Espn compared to Boxing.

ESPN can't show actual footage or they get sued I believe people also got tired of not seeing big fights that rarely happen ABC used to show fights every week on wide world of sports and big fights at that but it all went to HBO and SHOWTIME and for the average fan to come back they need either free fights to watch and or big names facing off for free not PPV that might bring back casual fans and popularize more names and make espn cover more HBO just signed a deal awhile back to allow espn to show highlights,,,,, How absurd is it for boxing not to let ESPN run highlights,,,, ESPN makes huge stars out of every sports top guys,,,, they basically are one big hype machine for athletes,,, its absurd that boxing doesnt take advantage of it...

ESPN can't show actual footage or they get sued I believe people also got tired of not seeing big fights that rarely happen ABC used to show fights every week on wide world of sports and big fights at that but it all went to HBO and SHOWTIME and for the average fan to come back they need either free fights to watch and or big names facing off for free not PPV that might bring back casual fans and popularize more names and make espn cover more

YEs, but they arent paying for it,,, when espn brings in people to interveiw, its very similar to when someone goes on jay leno or letterman to promote their own movie,,, they arent paying for it,,, ESPN doesnt sell interviews,, they will sell you everything else like promotions, ads, sponsorships etc, but they arent getting paid to do interviews, much like how nobody pays to get on the tonight show or conan obrien,,, ESPN obviously wants ratings so they try and cover what is current,,, but they arent selling it,,, Nobody is paying them to put ortiz and rampage on air,,,, like i said, its similar to going on the tonight show or letterman,,,, ESPN gets live interview and hopefully ratings, and the guys get some publicity,, its a win win for everyone involved,,, MMA has a slower growth rate than it did 10 years ago,,, it much like a stock like apple,,, Apple wasnt worth crap in the late 90's, much like mma, then got hot with ipad, itunes, etc and stock soared for a decade, much like mma, but then everyone that was going to buy apple products has bought them so they have slower growth which in the last year hurt their stock, even though it was rebounded yet,,, It is known as a mature stock instead of a growth stock now, because it will still grow but just very slowly, much like mma,, it grew fast, everyone knows about it,, but now they are stagnant and not growing as fast,, but they are still growing, and still make money but it takes decades to surpass other sports,, baseball was huge, and it took the nba and nfl decades to surpass them... same thing with mma,,, it may have lost its hot growth but its still a tremendously successful sport and isnt going anywhere anytime soon Real boxing fans yes,,,,, but casual mainstream fans,, the ones that watch fights on cbs and other free channels would be bored to death with an alexander fight,, I know this is devon,, so please just log off and keep training for the khan fight,,, he might be the only one to make you look exciting,,, ppv buys, which are the best means to measure success in the UFC, have gone down. the guy that generated the biggest PPV dates for the UFC was brock lesnar. only three of their biggest PPV of all time ahve come in the last three years, and only one didn't involve lesnar. it's also speculated quite frequently, and from learned sources, that the UFC pads their PPV numbers like crazy. i'm not saying that mma is dying, only that it's losing a lot of it's steam. it will become a niche sport like boxing once the initial buzz dies out completely.

I'm totally fine with Boxing not being mainstream.

Politely said,"I don't give a **** about the UFC or MMA,period." Boxing is healthy and alive and well in the US. I have been to many live events and there is a boxing revival going on so to speak as the product is that good. US TV : EPSN 2 FRIDAY NIGHT FIGHTS EPIX..MOSTLY KO BROS AND HW WEALTH TV...MOSTLY EURO FIGHTS FOX 1..GBP 24 MONDAY NIGHT CARDS FOX..GBP COMMCAST SPORTS..LOCAL SHOWS AND SOUTHERN CIRCUIT DIRECTV..BUYING MORE HBO..MOVING TO TRIPLE HEADER FORMATS FOR CARDS AND MORE EXPOSURE FOR YOUNGER STARS SHOWTIME...GBP CHAMPIONSHIP CARDS AND SHOWBOX ON FRIDAYS SHOWTIME EXTREME..SHOWING NEW TALENT AND UP AND COMING FIGHTERS NBC SPORTS...BOUGHT TON OF CARDS FOR 2013-2016 AT $150-$250 K BUDGET PER CARD AND ALREADY EXTENDED 2017 NBS SPORTS FUTURE STARS..SHOWCASING YOUNGER FIGHTERS NBC...3-4 MAJOR CARDS PER YEAR ON NBC NOW MSG..DIBELLA BROADWAY BOXING UNIMAS AND OTHER SPANISH STATIONS...SHOWCASING YOUNG LATIN TALENT CBS Sports launched their new channel and should have live cards on IN 2014. The future of boxing looks great in US. :boxing::boxing::boxing: That all looks good on paper,, but in terms of free tv and regular cable,,, All the big fights will happen on either hbo or showtime or ppv,,, Anything you get on actual cable is mismatches and tune-ups,, and never any big names like broner, GGG, ortiz, canelo, maidana, khan, bradley etc that would draw big numbers and help the younger fighters on the undercard build their name,,, I will agree that over the past 2 years, boxing has improved its outlets, but now they just need to improve the matches on these shows,,,, then hopefully the mainstream will slowly get back into boxing instead of just focusing on floyd and manny

31 events last year. Why are you counting episodes of a reality show as an event? GBP has 24 events on FS1 alone this year. UFC put on 31 events in 2012, 27 in 2011 of which 16 were PPV 60% http://themmacorner.com/2013/06/05/balancing-act-the-ufc-working-to-find-the-right-number-of-events-per-year/ 14 were PPV. Thats roughly 48% of shows on PPV. So we were both off, but I was closer :buttkick::buttkick::bukkake: You make good points,, I do count the reality shows, because they show live fights, and are used to build fighters names,, UFC has had tremendous amount of success using that show as a springboard for fighters to make a name,,, UFC is slowly moving away from PPVs,, or at least trimming back and using them for just the big fights for the most part,,,, GPB can do as many free shows as they want,,, its all crap, and doesnt do anything for the sport,,, Will a maidana, broner, ghost, floyd, khan etc be on any of the shows in a fight,,, nope,,, Its all prospects vs bums in showcase fights,,, UFC at least gives you top level fighters and fights on their free shows,,, I wish GBP and TR would do the same,,,,,, That would help build the sport back up to where it should be,,,,IMO

@marvelousmatt thanks for the list. I wish they had more advertisement of their boxing programming.

Boxing has q huge fan base. Its just its on such niche channels nobody can watch it. 50 million fans and 15 million avid fans. That's why we get around 1 mill views on HBO and St but get tens of mills for ppv events. Anyone can order ppv, its not restricted to a single network.

Not a big enough fanbase. Especially compared to baseball, basketball, etc. That's true, it's like in the UK, football, cricket and rugby all get more coverage than boxing but it's hard for a sport to get more coverage than something which is team based and reliant on constant support. Boxing probably has 2-3 MAJOR events per year and a tonne of good cards put on that either end up being inconsequential or have guys who have little support out side of the hardcore fan base. Speaking about the UK only, I think boxing is doing a lot better here than it was in the 80s and I'm sure boxing is in a better place then it was post 2001 in the US.

I know that there is spanish coverage on espn deportes but where is the african american coverage of boxing (channels/websites)? Politely said,"I don't give a **** about the UFC or MMA,period." Boxing is healthy and alive and well in the US. I have been to many live events and there is a boxing revival going on so to speak as the product is that good. US TV : EPSN 2 FRIDAY NIGHT FIGHTS EPIX..MOSTLY KO BROS AND HW WEALTH TV...MOSTLY EURO FIGHTS FOX 1..GBP 24 MONDAY NIGHT CARDS FOX..GBP COMMCAST SPORTS..LOCAL SHOWS AND SOUTHERN CIRCUIT DIRECTV..BUYING MORE HBO..MOVING TO TRIPLE HEADER FORMATS FOR CARDS AND MORE EXPOSURE FOR YOUNGER STARS SHOWTIME...GBP CHAMPIONSHIP CARDS AND SHOWBOX ON FRIDAYS SHOWTIME EXTREME..SHOWING NEW TALENT AND UP AND COMING FIGHTERS NBC SPORTS...BOUGHT TON OF CARDS FOR 2013-2016 AT $150-$250 K BUDGET PER CARD AND ALREADY EXTENDED 2017 NBS SPORTS FUTURE STARS..SHOWCASING YOUNGER FIGHTERS NBC...3-4 MAJOR CARDS PER YEAR ON NBC NOW MSG..DIBELLA BROADWAY BOXING UNIMAS AND OTHER SPANISH STATIONS...SHOWCASING YOUNG LATIN TALENT CBS Sports launched their new channel and should have live cards on IN 2014. The future of boxing looks great in US. :boxing::boxing::boxing:

thats not 70% like you claimed, and they did more than 32 shows last year,,, 32 shows is about the equal to the amount of ultimate fighter episodes they have over the 2 seasons per year, and all of those show fights,, plus all the prelims,, plus the fights on fueltv, fox, foxsports1, and fx,,,, plus they replay like crazy all the time on foxsports, which isnt the case for boxing,, yes they will replay classic boxing stuff but not so much modern stuff like bradley-manny or floyd-ghost,,, and like i asked before, what fights have GBP shown for free,,, what were those great main events or name fighters that were on for free,,, UFC has shown title fights, and eliminators and big name fighters,, what has GBP shown or any boxing promoter,,, I did like the nbcsport fights when it was fury-cunningham,, that is a step in the right direction for boxing 31 events last year. Why are you counting episodes of a reality show as an event? GBP has 24 events on FS1 alone this year. UFC put on 31 events in 2012, 27 in 2011 of which 16 were PPV 60% http://themmacorner.com/2013/06/05/balancing-act-the-ufc-working-to-find-the-right-number-of-events-per-year/ 14 were PPV. Thats roughly 48% of shows on PPV. So we were both off, but I was closer :buttkick::buttkick::bukkake:

I understand where you are coming from about the lack of coverage of Boxing on ESPN but Mayweather-Canelo, Marquez-Bradley and Pacquiao-Rios will have far greater coverage on ESPN than Rampage-Ortiz and each event will have far more ppv buys. Boxing has a lot of coverage in America just not much mainstream coverage. Most Boxing coverage is outlets that hit the Latino and African American communities. I know that there is spanish coverage on espn deportes but where is the african american coverage of boxing (channels/websites)?

They did 32 shows last year. 16ppv. You do the math. thats not 70% like you claimed, and they did more than 32 shows last year,,, 32 shows is about the equal to the amount of ultimate fighter episodes they have over the 2 seasons per year, and all of those show fights,, plus all the prelims,, plus the fights on fueltv, fox, foxsports1, and fx,,,, plus they replay like crazy all the time on foxsports, which isnt the case for boxing,, yes they will replay classic boxing stuff but not so much modern stuff like bradley-manny or floyd-ghost,,, and like i asked before, what fights have GBP shown for free,,, what were those great main events or name fighters that were on for free,,, UFC has shown title fights, and eliminators and big name fighters,, what has GBP shown or any boxing promoter,,, I did like the nbcsport fights when it was fury-cunningham,, that is a step in the right direction for boxing

yes its about 20%,,, UFC now does about 8-10 ppvs a year,,,and they do about 26 live shows with actual meaningful fight... and thats not including the prelim shows for the ppvs, plus the facebook fights,,,,, GPB does crap shows,,, quick name the main events of these shows,,, name one title fight on that show,, name one big name that was on these shows,, On the UFC free shows, i have seen the heavyweight title on defense and actually change hands, and have seen numerous other title fights and eliminators with numerous big names like rashad evans, cheal sonnen, shogun, machida, rampage, cain, dos santos, faber, etc..... To compare the crappy GBP shows to to actual competitive meaningful cards the UFC puts on is laughable,,,,, once again, please name the title fights, and main event fighters showcased on these free GBP shows They did 32 shows last year. 16ppv. You do the math.

ESPN,always covers boxing,hell Friday night fights is on ESPN... ESPN doesn't talk boxing except for 20 second recaps of some important fights and Pac and Floyd. Even if they're talking to someone who isn't Pac or Floyd, they find a way to talk about them. Friday Night Fights isn't much compared to the coverage every other sport gets.

ESPN,always covers boxing,hell Friday night fights is on ESPN...

20%? You are so full of it I don't even know where to begin. Gbp alone has more free shows on fs1 then all free ufc shows combined. yes its about 20%,,, UFC now does about 8-10 ppvs a year,,,and they do about 26 live shows with actual meaningful fight... and thats not including the prelim shows for the ppvs, plus the facebook fights,,,,, GPB does crap shows,,, quick name the main events of these shows,,, name one title fight on that show,, name one big name that was on these shows,, On the UFC free shows, i have seen the heavyweight title on defense and actually change hands, and have seen numerous other title fights and eliminators with numerous big names like rashad evans, cheal sonnen, shogun, machida, rampage, cain, dos santos, faber, etc..... To compare the crappy GBP shows to to actual competitive meaningful cards the UFC puts on is laughable,,,,, once again, please name the title fights, and main event fighters showcased on these free GBP shows

Your wrong about this,, yes that was true a decade ago but now ppvs are roughly only about 20% of UFC shows, and if you count other mma promotions the number drops to about 3-4%....... UFC has a very lucrative contract with fox to show live fights, in total about 20 shows a year split between fueltv, fox, foxsports, and FX,,,, and thats not even including the 2 seasons a year of ultimate fighter,,, or bellator's fight game....... MMA has a much bigger presence on free tv than boxing,,,,, You can actually watch meaningful fights on these cards, and us boxing fans are left with crappy FNF and sometimes the occasion good fight on nbcsports like fury-cunningham,,,,, 20%? You are so full of it I don't even know where to begin. Gbp alone has more free shows on fs1 then all free ufc shows combined.