Do you feel like you’re watching less boxing?

Say 10-15 years ago, I felt like I had at least one decent card to watch near enough every Saturday. Whether that be a big US card, a UK card or even places like Germany, Canada, Russia etc who all regularly showed championship boxing. Nowadays I feel like I maybe get one good card a month. Anyone else feel like this? If you go say 10 years back, the biggest fight of that year was May-Pac on May 2nd, yet the weekend after we had Canelo-Kirkland, both Warren and Hearn had UK shows that same weekend, PBC also had a solid card May 9th featuring Burns-Figueroa and McDonnell-Kameda, whilst in Germamy Sturm and Chudinov fought for the WBA 168 title. The following Saturday Gennady Golovkin and Roman Gonzalez both defended their world titles in a HBO doubleheader. The Saturday after had DeGale vs Dirrell for the IBF 168 title and a monster card topped by Povetkin-Perez in Russia. The 30th saw a great triple header from Hearn featuring Linares-Mitchell, Selby-Gradovich and Brook-Gavin and the night before Khan fought Algieri at the Barclays Center. Compare that to the weeks following the biggest fight of this year in Crawford-Canelo and it’s a stark contrast. Aside from watching Inoue in my hotel room a couple hours after, I haven’t watched another fight live. Why is boxing on so sparingly these days?

Comments (19)

solidman

coincidentally Usyk and TBud are also hurting the sport by setting an example of the one fight per year program I agree with that. The boxers are to blame also. They get paid far too much money and this takes away their motivation to be active.

8mo ago

SouthpaRight

In a way think Alashikh is hurting the sport. He is stacking cards with box office matches and this is reducing the amount of shows in usa etc.coincidentally Usyk and TBud are also hurting the sport by setting an example of the one fight per year program

8mo ago

solidman

In a way think Alashikh is hurting the sport. He is stacking cards with box office matches and this is reducing the amount of shows in usa etc.

8mo ago

dibzvincent143

I only watch them big and popular ones….if someone like rolly fights a nobody i aint watching that, or munguia fights a bum…. I almost wouldnt watch inoue if he chooses a lower competition…

8mo ago

TelMex

Biggest thing for me are no free televised fights. Boxing used to be everywhere. Flip through the Spanish channels and find some boxing. USA Tuesday Night Fights. If you had a subscription to HBO or Showtime anyway, you always had boxing. Now, ESPN - the leader in televised sports, doesn't even carry the sport. The prices being charged for PPVs are ridiculous and the majority of the events aren't even PPV worthy. I had DAZN in the beginning and they slowly priced themselves out.

8mo ago

SouthpaRight

They should start staging boxing tournaments every now and then.. 6 man tournaments. bring some excitement back. They already do...the WBC Grand Prix's been going all year long and is nearing it's finale. Tournament is where Usyk showed the rest of the world outside of Russia what COSSACK is

8mo ago

DeeMoney

Not to get off on a tangent, and I am halfway in a meeting now so I may ramble. But as I wrote earlier, the division amongst differing promotional groups has caused a lot of these problems in my opinion. Part of the cause is them realizing that the most money to be made comes from having a big name boxer in their stable, and that the easiest way to create a big name boxer is to protect that '0'. Ergo, the best way to make money is to have a fighter with an '0' who you can market. So now these fighters and promoters are less inclined to fight as often as before.

8mo ago

BigBobArum

8mo ago

IceTrayDaGang

8mo ago

IceTrayDaGang

Yes, I only tune in for the big fights. Other than that, I don't watch it.

8mo ago

LA_2_Vegas

The big Saudi cards and the new entrants have been bringing me back in after a short hiatus last year. I've been increasing my viewership recently, with most attention going to these new entrants. I've attended fewer events recently, but I am very optimistic about the future so I know I;ll be back soon. I get what you're saying though - the main promoters seem to be sitting on their hands until they get new funding? I hope that is happening this quarter. Top Rank being on Facebook is unacceptable. How I see it: ProboxTV=SHOBox OTX= Telefutura, Box Azteca TKO=says they want to be Tuesday Night Fights MVP=not as good as Probox, but they have some talent, PBC affiliates

8mo ago

OnePunch1099

Definitely watching less, as it becomes more and more difficult to find good content. No more HBO, Showtime, ESPN Tuesday Night Fights, ESPN Friday Night Fights, Boxeo Telemundo, Telefutura, etc etc.

8mo ago

DeeMoney

HBO no longer has boxing, Showtime no longer has boxing, USA Network no longer has boxing, ESPN no longer has regularly scheduled boxing. Most major sports leagues have a unified league to work out a TV deal. Boxing promoters (the closest to leagues we have) still view other promoters as their competition, when in fact their competition is other forms of entertainment. So they fight amongst each other for the scraps being left behind, not realizing that if they unified they could have more. Ergo, we have fewer big and medium sized fights to look forward to. PS -Dont try to BS twist this into me calling for communism, I am supporting the ideals of competition. Just stating that the powers that be in boxing view the others as a competition, which is a mistake. Its as if the clothing department in a WalMart was competing with the electronic dept within the same WalMart. They backstab and hold back the other department within the same store so that they come out ahead relative to them, not realizing they are making the store worse compared to the Target across the street.

8mo ago

SouthpaRight

I tend to agree but do MISS having a decent fight to look forward to every other weekend as the original poster mentioned. For example, Benavidez-Yarde has a couple of cracking undercard fights (Norman-Haney & Noakes-Mason) which could BOTH be main events in their own right. Therefore, the question is, would you like to eat your birthday cake in one night or would you rather keep some to look forward to over the next couple of weekends? I'm not so sure.Allah will give you time machine into the 50s the Sugar Robinson era where they'd fight twice a month

8mo ago

BigBobArum

superior format for fans who are hustlers only retired old guys and those doing Jack sht have the energy and time to catch something every weekend do not turn boxing into American football with tailgaters who dedicate weekends to spectating rofl maybe 5 or 6 actives max at a time worth following closely A major event every 2 to 3 months:cool: I tend to agree but do MISS having a decent fight to look forward to every other weekend as the original poster mentioned. For example, Benavidez-Yarde has a couple of cracking undercard fights (Norman-Haney & Noakes-Mason) which could BOTH be main events in their own right. Therefore, the question is, would you like to eat your birthday cake in one night or would you rather keep some to look forward to over the next couple of weekends? I'm not so sure.

8mo ago

SouthpaRight

Because the Saudi's are stacking their undercards with main event fights which reduces the number of offerings but increases the overall quality of the product.superior format for fans who are hustlers only retired old guys and those doing Jack sht have the energy and time to catch something every weekend do not turn boxing into American football with tailgaters who dedicate weekends to spectating rofl maybe 5 or 6 actives max at a time worth following closely A major event every 2 to 3 months:cool:

8mo ago

ELPacman

You need to subscribe to various Youtube smaller promos. They do live cards on YT. Cotto has one. Goldenboy Promotions has one. Most Valuable Promotions. Probox of course. There's one from the DR. Just need to try and find them and subscribe to keep posted when they have new events going on. Though yeah, for bigger higher production events, they are becoming less frequent.

8mo ago

Coverdale

Part of the reason is because of how inactive US fighters are these days. I suppose another part is how motivated you are to actually seek it out and watch it and if you can tolerate lower level fights. edpboxing has something to share most weeks, do you watch much of that? When I got into boxing around 2001, Sky Sports had boxing on almost every week. Warren and both Maloneys frequently had cards. The landscape has definitely changed, especially with Hearn and Warren effectively becoming international promoters.

8mo ago

BigBobArum

Because the Saudi's are stacking their undercards with main event fights which reduces the number of offerings but increases the overall quality of the product.

8mo ago