Final PBC on NBC ratings (Figueroa-DeMarco): 1.817M average

[El-blanco]

I love the excuses for why these ratings suck , especially relative to their budget. College football, ufc pre-lim, blah, blah. Just accept the fact that boxing can't compete with other sports and stop looking for excuses.

[Dr Rumack]

Dr Rumack -

I'm not saying HBO is in immediate danger, what I'm saying is that they will be slowly boxed out of the business if one of those four bite and with HBO's biggest obstacle being Netflix, before long, they may realize that being in the boxing business is a waste of time.

It's not impossible. But to be honest I think it's absolutely essential for Haymon's grand plan that HBO pull out of the business. Because with the current state of affairs he seems to have a bit of a problem.

Let me elaborate. TV advertising is sold at a rate of $10-50 per 1000 viewers. So Sunday Night Football, for example, has about 20 million viewers, which is 20,000 blocks of 1000 viewers. It sells its units (30 second slots) at about $650,000 each, which equates to a $30 rate for each of those 1000 viewer blocks. I doubt boxing commands the $30 rate that the NFL does, but for the sake of argument let's pretend it can.

So let's look at a fight like Quillin-Jacobs. It died on Showtime, but again let's take a high estimate and assume it does 10x those ratings on NBC and hits 3 million. That's 3000 of those 1000 viewer blocks. At the $30 rate that's $90,000 per advertising unit for PBC on NBC.

Ok, so the purse for the main event was $3 million.

So 3,000,000/90,000
= 33.33 units

That's 33 units to cover the main event purse alone.

The undercard also featured guys like Cuellar and Algieri, who aren't big names but nevertheless are top fighters and presumably aren't with Al to get paid chickenfeed. But let's lowball it again and say $500k covers Cuellar, Algieri, and everyone else on the undercard.

So 500,000/90,000
= 5.5 units.

So let's just call it 38 units so far, just to cover the fighters' fees.

Haymon also has to pay NBC their fee for the time-buy, which is reported at $1 million a show.

So 1,000,000/90,000
= 11.11 units

So we're at 49 units already, just to cover the fighter fees and the time-buy. Now we have to consider production and promotional costs. For big PPV fights this can easily be $5 million. But again let's take a real low number and say they produce the show and pay everyone involved in the broadcast for $100k. They probably don't, but let's just settle on that.

This puts us at 50 units, just to cover costs on the show, if we assume that the show can be sold as if it averages 3 million viewers for the whole broadcast, and if we also assume that boxing can get the same rate for 1000 viewers as the NFL can. Are there even 50 advertising slots on a PBC on NBC broadcast? I very much doubt there are. There certainly aren't 50 advertising slots during a main event which is the peak viewing time.

These numbers seem problematic to me. Even with very generous estimates on all fronts they simply don't look sustainable. Not by a long shot. There are only two ways this venture can work.

The first, is that the ratings grow exponentially to the point where Haymon can sell his ad space at $150k a unit in the very near future. On in other words, be able to promise advertisers a 5 million or so average rating that justifies sustainable ad revenue. I'm not even sure that would cut it. But it would at least be a trend in the right direction.

The other solution is that HBO pull out of the game completely. This won't have a major effect on viewing figures in the short run, but it will give Haymon much better bargaining power with the fighters. Because the truth is this, Al Haymon cannot afford to keep paying premium network purses to fighters without his ratings improving dramatically in the immediate future. It doesn't make economic sense.

There was a great article written for UCN by a guy called John Chavez back in January where he heralded the PBC project as a huge win for the sport, as he foresaw the type of deals landed by the UFC with Fox as the future not just for Haymon, but for the sport itself.

But there's a huge flaw in that vision. And it's that the UFC is sustained only by paying purses that fall dramatically short of the fees expected by the top fighters in boxing. And, there are a lot more boxers to pay. Additionally, the UFC does not have a rival premium network that can outspend it on individual events for as long as it is willing to put money on the table, simply because they need a fraction of the viewing figures to make just as much money.

At the very least, I see problems in the PBC vision. There are huge outlays that are not justified given the unit advertising revenue the shows are generating. Unless things change dramatically, and soon, I would not be surprised to see things start to unravel.

[Jsmooth9876]

Yes, each successive PBC telecast has had a decrease in ratings.

First card (Thurman-Guerrero main event) averaged 3.374M.
Second card (Garcia-Peterson main event) averaged 2.882M. Decreased by 492K.
Third card (Broner-Porter main event) averaged 2.327M. Decreased by 555K.
Fourth card (Wilder-Duhaupas main event) averaged 2.179M. Decreased by 148K.
Fifth card (Figueroa-DeMarco main event) averaged 1.817M. Decreased by 362K.

My bigger concern is the main event quality. First three were quality, last two were not, and NBC primetime shows were supposed to produce the best quality main events. Figueroa-DeMarco was a joke.

Wasn't the main event originally supposed to be Thurman-Porter? That was the rumor then it changed to Jan 23 and now Thurman is on the back of a milk carton missing...

I agree, for an NBC show, you'd think they'd put on a great card, should have waited a week and had Quillen-Jacobs card on.

[El-blanco]

It's not impossible. But to be honest I think it's absolutely essential for Haymon's grand plan that HBO pull out of the business. Because with the current state of affairs he seems to have a bit of a problem.

Let me elaborate. TV advertising is sold at a rate of $10-50 per 1000 viewers. So Sunday Night Football, for example, has about 20 million viewers, which is 20,000 blocks of 1000 viewers. It sells its units (30 second slots) at about $650,000 each, which equates to a $30 rate for each of those 1000 viewer blocks. I doubt boxing commands the $30 rate that the NFL does, but for the sake of argument let's pretend it can.

So let's look at a fight like Quillin-Jacobs. It died on Showtime, but again let's take a high estimate and assume it does 10x those ratings on NBC and hits 3 million. That's 3000 of those 1000 viewer blocks. At the $30 rate that's $90,000 per advertising unit for PBC on NBC.

Ok, so the purse for the main event was $3 million.

So 3,000,000/90,000
= 33.33 units

That's 33 units to cover the main event purse alone.

The undercard also featured guys like Cuellar and Algieri, who aren't big names but nevertheless are top fighters and presumably aren't with Al to get paid chickenfeed. But let's lowball it again and say $500k covers Cuellar, Algieri, and everyone else on the undercard.

So 500,000/90,000
= 5.5 units.

So let's just call it 38 units so far, just to cover the fighters' fees.

Haymon also has to pay NBC their fee for the time-buy, which is reported at $1 million a show.

So 1,000,000/90,000
= 11.11 units

So we're at 49 units already, just to cover the fighter fees and the time-buy. Now we have to consider production and promotional costs. For big PPV fights this can easily be $5 million. But again let's take a real low number and say they produce the show and pay everyone involved in the broadcast for $100k. They probably don't, but let's just settle on that.

This puts us at 50 units, just to cover costs on the show, if we assume that the show can be sold as if it averages 3 million viewers for the whole broadcast, and if we also assume that boxing can get the same rate for 1000 viewers as the NFL can. Are there even 50 advertising slots on a PBC on NBC broadcast? I very much doubt there are. There certainly aren't 50 advertising slots during a main event which is the peak viewing time.

These numbers seem problematic to me. Even with very generous estimates on all fronts they simply don't look sustainable. Not by a long shot. There are only two ways this venture can work.

The first, is that the ratings grow exponentially to the point where Haymon can sell his ad space at $150k a unit in the very near future. On in other words, be able to promise advertisers a 5 million or so average rating that justifies sustainable ad revenue. I'm not even sure that would cut it. But it would at least be a trend in the right direction.

The other solution is that HBO pull out of the game completely. This won't have a major effect on viewing figures in the short run, but it will give Haymon much better bargaining power with the fighters. Because the truth is this, Al Haymon cannot afford to keep paying premium network purses to fighters without his ratings improving dramatically in the immediate future. It doesn't make economic sense.

There was a great article written for UCN by a guy called John Chavez back in January where he heralded the PBC project as a huge win for the sport, as he foresaw the type of deals landed by the UFC with Fox as the future not just for Haymon, but for the sport itself.

But there's a huge flaw in that vision. And it's that the UFC is sustained only by paying purses that fall dramatically short of the fees expected by the top fighters in boxing. And, there are a lot more boxers to pay. Additionally, the UFC does not have a rival premium network that can outspend it on individual events for as long as it is willing to put money on the table, simply because they need a fraction of the viewing figures to make just as much money.

At the very least, I see problems in the PBC vision. There are huge outlays that are not justified given the unit advertising revenue the shows are generating. Unless things change dramatically, and soon, I would not be surprised to see things start to unravel.

Fanatics of PBC keep overlooking that vital point when trying to prove how great the ratings are. It's such a simple concept but it escapes them. Great post.

[Pigeons]

MLS has a $100M per year TV deal with ESPN, FOX, and Univision.

I don't think an MLS game on ESPN has ever surpassed 750K average viewers.

Food for thought.

[2501]

Honestly Haymon should not showcase guys like Arreola and Omar Figueroa. I understand theyre action packed fighters but its obvious to even casual fans that these guys have no skill whatsoever. Boxing fans complain about lateral movers and defensive boxers but volume punchers with no power are even worse to watch. If a guys throwing 1000 punches and lands 19%, whats the point, this inst the amateurs. Anyways, fights like this is going to bring PBC downward.

Casuals dont care about skills. They care about action.

[El-blanco]

Who is saying the ratings are great? The point is that they don't suck.

Nobody is dis*****g that PBC will go bankrupt if they have to keep paying for TV time. Either they land a real TV deal in 2018 or they don't. We shall see. They're losing money to prove to the networks that people will watch boxing. Considering way more are watching than watch on HBO, I'd say PBC is proving its point.

If PBC can land a deal on par with UFC's current deal, it would be a huge smash success. Look at UFC's ratings on Fox. If PBC can do ratings on that level, they will be fine. You can't expect them to blow through all of their big fights right off the bat.

The only thing they're proving is that they can blow through money rapidly. No TV exec is looking at what they're doing and thinking its a good model. If they do ufc ratings they won't be fine because their shows are way too expensive. They have to drastically change how they pay fighters for it to work. I don't understand why you guys keep overlooking that reality.

[Dr Rumack]

The only thing they're proving is that they can blow through money rapidly. No TV exec is looking at what they're doing and thinking its a good model. If they do ufc ratings they won't be fine because their shows are way too expensive. They have to drastically change how they pay fighters for it to work. I don't understand why you guys keep overlooking that reality.

That seems to be the core difficulty alright. Even if things go really well for Haymon, i.e. Fox or a similar outfit offering them a UFC type deal, they still have to pay the fighters dramatically less for the model to make sense. Ad revenue is ad revenue, whether Haymon's collecting it or Fox is. The individual cards have to make sense financially. That's the bedrock of the entire enterprise. Revenue has to be higher or costs have to be lower. That principle can't be ignored.

But Haymon's business has been built on paying fighters extremely generously. It's not unreasonable to suggest that when he goes from paying guys way over the odds to way under what they've been used to, there are going to be some problems. And just like the fighters gravitated to him because he was paying the most, they will in time drift away from him for the very same reason.

[El-blanco]

How many TV execs do you know? I know plenty. How much experience do you have in TV? I have plenty. You're completely off base and I'm happy to explain things to you, but if you have absolutely no knowledge or experience and are convinced, despite those limitations, that you know exactly what is going on, then what is even the point of having a discussion?

They've proven they can garner ratings. THREE MILLION PEOPLE saw Deontay Wilder on NBC. Klitschko does half of that on HBO.

It doesn't matter to a TV exec how much fighters are getting paid. What a TV exec cares about is ratings. If PBC can deliver millions of viewers, they have a legitimate shot at a 9 figure annual TV deal in 2018.

How they split up that money and what they pay their fighters . . . is not a TV exec's problem. That is PBC's problem.

Considering HBO was paying $30 million a year and it was being split by multiple promoters, if PBC gets a hundred million a year, there will be plenty of money to pay their fighters.

You're stuck in the past. Back when HBO was paying $120 million and the NBA was only getting $250 million. Now HBO pays $30 million and the NBA gets $2.66 BILLION. BILLION. ***BILLION.***

The money for live sports is in traditional TV. The short sighted money grab of PPV & premium cable no longer makes any sense. If you don't see what Haymon is up to, I promise you the problem is that you aren't smart enough, not that Haymon doesn't know what he's doing . . .

Lol get over yourself man. I understand what haymon is doing and I'm in support of the idea. The problem is he's paying people too much for each event. After he blows through the $100 million fox gives him in four months, who is going to give him the money to keep putting on these shows? The amount of money he has lost proves those purses aren't sustainable and are overvalued. The problem with ****** people like you is, you think the other person doesn't see the obvious. We do, we just don't need to talk about it because it's implied.

That seems to be the core difficulty alright. Even if things go really well for Haymon, i.e. Fox or a similar outfit offering them a UFC type deal, they still have to pay the fighters dramatically less for the model to make sense. Ad revenue is ad revenue, whether Haymon's collecting it or Fox is. The individual cards have to make sense financially. That's the bedrock of the entire enterprise. Revenue has to be higher or costs have to be lower. That principle can't be ignored.

But Haymon's business has been built on paying fighters extremely generously. It's not unreasonable to suggest that when he goes from paying guys way over the odds to way under what they've been used to, there are going to be some problems. And just like the fighters gravitated to him because he was paying the most, they will in time drift away from him for the very same reason.

this concept escapes mr saint Laurent.

[Anton Chigurh]

How many TV execs do you know? I know plenty. How much experience do you have in TV? I have plenty. You're completely off base and I'm happy to explain things to you, but if you have absolutely no knowledge or experience and are convinced, despite those limitations, that you know exactly what is going on, then what is even the point of having a discussion?

They've proven they can garner ratings. THREE MILLION PEOPLE saw Deontay Wilder on NBC. Klitschko does half of that on HBO.

It doesn't matter to a TV exec how much fighters are getting paid. What a TV exec cares about is ratings. If PBC can deliver millions of viewers, they have a legitimate shot at a 9 figure annual TV deal in 2018.

How they split up that money and what they pay their fighters . . . is not a TV exec's problem. That is PBC's problem.

Considering HBO was paying $30 million a year and it was being split by multiple promoters, if PBC gets a hundred million a year, there will be plenty of money to pay their fighters.

You're stuck in the past. Back when HBO was paying $120 million and the NBA was only getting $250 million. Now HBO pays $30 million and the NBA gets $2.66 BILLION. BILLION. ***BILLION.***

The money for live sports is in traditional TV. The short sighted money grab of PPV & premium cable no longer makes any sense. If you don't see what Haymon is up to, I promise you the problem is that you aren't smart enough, not that Haymon doesn't know what he's doing . . .

It doesn't take a genius or someone with "TV experience" to know that Canelo drawing 2 million viewers out of a possible 28 million on HBO is better than Wilder drawing 3 million viewers out of a possible 100+ million on NBC.

F**kin' ******.