Top 10 PPV's in 2008...

[Soda Popinski]

Thought this would be interesting.

Top 10 North American PPV buy rates, 2008

1. Boxing: Oscar De La Hoya vs. Manny Pacquiao, Dec. 6, 1,250,000

2. UFC: Brock Lesnar vs. Randy Couture, Nov. 15, 1,010,000

3. Wrestling: WrestleMania, Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Paul “Big Show” Wight, March 30, 670,000

4. UFC: Georges St. Pierre vs. Jon Fitch/Lesnar vs. Heath Herring, Aug. 9, 625,000

5. UFC: Lesnar vs. Frank Mir, Feb. 2, 600,000

6. UFC: Quinton Jackson vs. Forrest Griffin, July 5, 540,000

7. UFC: St. Pierre vs. Matt Serra, April 19, 530,000

8. Boxing: Felix Trinidad vs. Roy Jones Jr., Jan. 19, 500,000

9. UFC: Chuck Liddell vs. Rashad Evans, Sept. 6, 480,000

10. UFC: B.J. Penn vs. Sean Sherk/Tito Ortiz vs. Lyoto Machida, May 24, 475,000

Obviously yahoo sports is all over MMA's collective nuts these days, but the numbers don't lie. Boxing does bigger numbers for a single card, but MMA has 7 of the top 10 spots. Although Floyd headlined the #3 PPV so that's gotta count for something. Pac vs. Mayweather beats all of these handily, IMO.

http://sports.yahoo.com/mma/news?slug=dm-ppvbuys121208&prov=yhoo&type=lgns

[Mojita]

I see UFC basically took over.

Only way boxing has great PPV numbers if its a BIG-name, alas Jones, Tito, DLH ; but there past their best years, Mayweather retired, Pac won't be around for long - doesn't look good.

[KantotSilog]

man that sucks. sad too see UFC taking over like that. MMA will never have the the history boxing has. LONG LIVE BOXING!!!!!!

[JunglistSoldja]

History is everything

[mrpain81]

According to this article Mark Taffet of HBO said Pacquiao vs Marquez II did 525,000 PPV buys.

The network's last PPV show -- the Pacquiao-Marquez rematch on March 15 -- logged some 525,000 buys, making it the highest-grossing bout in history at or below 135 pounds.

http://www.sportsnetwork.com/merge/tsnform.aspx?c=sportsnetwork&page=boxing/news/news.aspx?id=4142452

Let's not forget Cotto vs Margarito did real close to 500k buys which would put it right on the bottom of that top 10.

But Arum’s judgment was vindicated by the first post-fight pay-per-view numbers, which indicate that there were close to 500,000 buys.

http://www.secondsout.com/Columns/index.cfm?ccs=208&cs=27341

[Danny Gunz]

Boxing has to start getting the younger guys out now like putting pavlik, miguel cotto, or paul williams on the undercard of pac vs. mayweather (if their is this fight of course)

but everyone knows the promoters are waaayyy to greedy to ever do that

[Soda Popinski]

Boxing has to start getting the younger guys out now like putting pavlik, miguel cotto, or paul williams on the undercard of pac vs. mayweather (if their is this fight of course)

but everyone knows the promoters are waaayyy to greedy to ever do that

Agree. I think that's where boxing could take a page out of the UFC's book and make it work. Boxing doesn't do a very good job of planting up and coming names in the casual fans head the way the UFC does. There's also no promoting future events between fights on a PPV, the UFC does that constantly. In boxing, it's all about tonight, whereas in the UFC they're laying out the future every chance they get. The way boxing is promoted is too "smash and grab" for it's own good.

[Flawless.]

1. Boxing: Oscar De La Hoya vs. Manny Pacquiao, Dec. 6, 1,250,000

I thought it was 1.5

[mrpain81]

1. Boxing: Oscar De La Hoya vs. Manny Pacquiao, Dec. 6, 1,250,000

I thought it was 1.5

Will probably end up 1.4 mil

[Cadillac Man]

Yeah Yahoo LOVES MMA/UFC...I heard Lesnar-Coutoure did 850K...Notice how the cutoff was 475k while Cotto-Margo did 450k and JMM-Pac did better than 400k. It is also Meltzers column who is a UFC fan/writer.