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Introduction
As it has been a big debate, and there is bias on both sides, I wanted to come up with an objective way of determining whether PBC or HBO have been putting on better fights. My idea is this: if the "A-side" going into a fight doesn't win as often under one brand, their fights are less predictable and more even, making their matchmaking better.
Of course, there are other criteria that make fights interesting (such as rivalries, whether fight is for the no. 1 position, high action fights etc.), but these are harder to measure and compare objectively. Plus, top fighters not being put in enough close match ups is probably the biggest complaint of boxing fans today (too many tune-ups, fights against bums etc.), so I thought this would be the most important criteria to compare.
I plan to compare the same number of HBO and PBC shows and to use the HBO and PBC boxing schedules on their websites to determine whose name was first in the billing and so who was the "A-side" (This is normally the same order as on fight posters and other promotional material. For example HBO's website lists Floyd Mayweather vs. Manny Pacquiao, the same as the promotional material, even though Pacquiao was an HBO fighter and also a world champion).
Feel free to skip ahead to the results and analysis if you like, but first I'm going to outline my methodology for those of you that are interested.
Methodology
I'm using bouts from the beginning of March 2015, the month when PBC debuted, to the end of 2015, as after this point, HBO's budget cuts make a comparison unfair.
HBO put on fewer cards than PBC in 2015, so below I have compared all of the HBO cards that were shown to the biggest PBC events (in my view). I am only comparing the main events and co-main of each card because life's too short, and I think comparing these events are the most important thing and will give the overall trend anyway.
Sometimes co-main events are not listed on the websites (I'm not sure why - possibly because they weren't shown on TV) so it is impossible to include these. This means I might be comparing a different number of bouts for PBC and HBO. However, it is the percentage of "upsets" that we are interested in so this shouldn't matter.
To make a fair comparison, I am only going to compare bouts that take place in North America, as HBO, being a TV network, sometimes buys rights for fights from other countries, but I believe are not involved in putting those fights together (e.g. for Wladimir Klitschko vs. Tyson Fury their branding was not on the ring apron). PBC, of course, are not a TV network, so their branding is not involved in fights that they don't help to organise.
I have not included HBO PPV cards because I thought comparing "regular" HBO (World Championship Boxing and Boxing After Dark) with the top rated PBC network shows was comparing like for like. There were some Showtime shows that were not described as PBC cards during this time e.g. (Molina vs Providnikov) and I haven't included these in my comparison or any cards on any network not branded HBO Boxing or PBC.
PBC have a habit of listing an "A-side" by who the title holder is, not who the bigger name is when the bigger name is the challenger (e.g. ZLATICANIN vs GARCIA). HBO do this the other way around in the same circumstances (e.g. Canelo Alvarez vs. Liam Smith, not included in the results as it was a PPV). I swapped the order for PBC bouts where the "B-side" was obviously the bigger name before the bout. I denoted bouts where I have swapped the billing by an asterix (*). Of course this is done subjectively, but I have tried to err on the side of caution (The only change I made was for the Lee vs Quillin bout).
Some bouts are, of course, 50/50s and it may have been a toss up who was chosen to be the "A-side". Fortunately (for this study, anyway) such bouts are rare in non-PPV boxing main and co-main events, so they shouldn't effect results too much.
I am using the official results but, of course, some of these will be robberies/ incorrect based on subjective views. There is no way around this, but I assume bad decisions will average out the same over both schedules.
Finally, I am counting whether the "A-side" won rather than whether the "B-side" lost as the "B-side" acheiveing a draw is still an upset in my view.
Results
HBO 14 Cards - 24 Bouts
Bout - Did "A-side" win?
Zou Shiming vs. Amnet Ruenroeng - N
Sergey Kovalev vs. Jean Pascal - Y
Vyacheslav Glazkov vs. Steve Cunningham - Y
Lucas Matthysse vs. Ruslan Provodnikov - Y
Terence Crawford vs. Thomas Dulorme - Y
Wladimir Klitschko vs. Bryant Jennings - Y
Sadam Ali vs. Francisco Santana - Y
Canelo Alvarez vs. James Kirkland - Y
Gennady Golovkin vs. Willie Monroe Jr. - Y
Roman Gonzalez vs. Edgar Sosa - Y
Miguel Cotto vs. Daniel Geale - Y
Nicholas Walters vs. Miguel Marriaga - Y
Felix Verdejo vs. Ivan Najera - Y
Timothy Bradley Jr. vs. Jessie Vargas - Y
Oscar Valdez vs. Ruben Tamayo - Y
Sergey Kovalev vs. Nadjib Mohammedi - Y
Jean Pascal vs. Yuniesky Gonzalez - Y
Lucas Matthysse vs. Viktor Postol - N
Humberto Soto vs. Antonio Orozco - N
Terence Crawford vs. Dierry Jean - Y
Timothy Bradley vs. Brandon Rios - Y
Vasyl Lomachenko vs. Romulo Koasicha - Y
Bryant Jennings vs. Luis Ortiz - N
Nicholas Walters vs. Jason Sosa - N
5/ 24 - 20.8 % "upsets"
PBC 14 Cards - 28 Bouts
Bout - Did "A-side" win?
THURMAN vs GUERRERO - Y
BRONER vs MOLINA JR - Y
BERTO vs LOPEZ - Y
PORTER vs BONE - Y
STEVENSON vs BIKA - Y
GARCIA vs PETERSON - Y
QUILLIN vs LEE * - N
DIRRELL vs JACK - N
JACOBS vs TRUAX - Y
FIGUEROA vs BURNS - Y
KAMEDA vs MCDONNELL - N
DIRRELL vs DEGALE - N
RODRIGUEZ vs BAKER - Y
KHAN vs ALGIERI - Y
FORTUNA vs VASQUEZ - Y
GUERRERO vs MARTINEZ - Y
BRONER vs PORTER - N
SPENCE vs LO GRECO - Y
THURMAN vs COLLAZO - Y
HARRISON vs NELSON - N
GARCIA vs MALIGNAGGI - Y
JACOBS vs MORA - Y
TARVER vs CUNNINGHAM - N
HUCK vs GLOWACKI - N
SANTA CRUZ vs MARES - Y
RUIZ vs CEJA - N
WILDER vs DUHAUPAS - Y
BREAZEALE vs KASSI - Y
9/ 28 - 32.1 % "upsets"
Analysis
The results of the study show that there is around a 10% higher chance of a PBC bout ending in an upset than an HBO bout. Considering that the chances of upset can never exceed 50%, this is a significantly better for PBC. It is also significant because PBC is generally criticised for having more predictable match ups than HBO.
Although the study was only done for 2015, due to budget cuts for both HBO and PBC since, I believe the results would be largely similar.
Finally, I am sure I may have made some mistake in the results, so please let me know and I will correct them. Likewise, let me know if you think there are problems any with my method, or if you have a different take on the results. I'm interested to hear your views!
As it has been a big debate, and there is bias on both sides, I wanted to come up with an objective way of determining whether PBC or HBO have been putting on better fights. My idea is this: if the "A-side" going into a fight doesn't win as often under one brand, their fights are less predictable and more even, making their matchmaking better.
Of course, there are other criteria that make fights interesting (such as rivalries, whether fight is for the no. 1 position, high action fights etc.), but these are harder to measure and compare objectively. Plus, top fighters not being put in enough close match ups is probably the biggest complaint of boxing fans today (too many tune-ups, fights against bums etc.), so I thought this would be the most important criteria to compare.
I plan to compare the same number of HBO and PBC shows and to use the HBO and PBC boxing schedules on their websites to determine whose name was first in the billing and so who was the "A-side" (This is normally the same order as on fight posters and other promotional material. For example HBO's website lists Floyd Mayweather vs. Manny Pacquiao, the same as the promotional material, even though Pacquiao was an HBO fighter and also a world champion).
Feel free to skip ahead to the results and analysis if you like, but first I'm going to outline my methodology for those of you that are interested.
Methodology
I'm using bouts from the beginning of March 2015, the month when PBC debuted, to the end of 2015, as after this point, HBO's budget cuts make a comparison unfair.
HBO put on fewer cards than PBC in 2015, so below I have compared all of the HBO cards that were shown to the biggest PBC events (in my view). I am only comparing the main events and co-main of each card because life's too short, and I think comparing these events are the most important thing and will give the overall trend anyway.
Sometimes co-main events are not listed on the websites (I'm not sure why - possibly because they weren't shown on TV) so it is impossible to include these. This means I might be comparing a different number of bouts for PBC and HBO. However, it is the percentage of "upsets" that we are interested in so this shouldn't matter.
To make a fair comparison, I am only going to compare bouts that take place in North America, as HBO, being a TV network, sometimes buys rights for fights from other countries, but I believe are not involved in putting those fights together (e.g. for Wladimir Klitschko vs. Tyson Fury their branding was not on the ring apron). PBC, of course, are not a TV network, so their branding is not involved in fights that they don't help to organise.
I have not included HBO PPV cards because I thought comparing "regular" HBO (World Championship Boxing and Boxing After Dark) with the top rated PBC network shows was comparing like for like. There were some Showtime shows that were not described as PBC cards during this time e.g. (Molina vs Providnikov) and I haven't included these in my comparison or any cards on any network not branded HBO Boxing or PBC.
PBC have a habit of listing an "A-side" by who the title holder is, not who the bigger name is when the bigger name is the challenger (e.g. ZLATICANIN vs GARCIA). HBO do this the other way around in the same circumstances (e.g. Canelo Alvarez vs. Liam Smith, not included in the results as it was a PPV). I swapped the order for PBC bouts where the "B-side" was obviously the bigger name before the bout. I denoted bouts where I have swapped the billing by an asterix (*). Of course this is done subjectively, but I have tried to err on the side of caution (The only change I made was for the Lee vs Quillin bout).
Some bouts are, of course, 50/50s and it may have been a toss up who was chosen to be the "A-side". Fortunately (for this study, anyway) such bouts are rare in non-PPV boxing main and co-main events, so they shouldn't effect results too much.
I am using the official results but, of course, some of these will be robberies/ incorrect based on subjective views. There is no way around this, but I assume bad decisions will average out the same over both schedules.
Finally, I am counting whether the "A-side" won rather than whether the "B-side" lost as the "B-side" acheiveing a draw is still an upset in my view.
Results
HBO 14 Cards - 24 Bouts
Bout - Did "A-side" win?
Zou Shiming vs. Amnet Ruenroeng - N
Sergey Kovalev vs. Jean Pascal - Y
Vyacheslav Glazkov vs. Steve Cunningham - Y
Lucas Matthysse vs. Ruslan Provodnikov - Y
Terence Crawford vs. Thomas Dulorme - Y
Wladimir Klitschko vs. Bryant Jennings - Y
Sadam Ali vs. Francisco Santana - Y
Canelo Alvarez vs. James Kirkland - Y
Gennady Golovkin vs. Willie Monroe Jr. - Y
Roman Gonzalez vs. Edgar Sosa - Y
Miguel Cotto vs. Daniel Geale - Y
Nicholas Walters vs. Miguel Marriaga - Y
Felix Verdejo vs. Ivan Najera - Y
Timothy Bradley Jr. vs. Jessie Vargas - Y
Oscar Valdez vs. Ruben Tamayo - Y
Sergey Kovalev vs. Nadjib Mohammedi - Y
Jean Pascal vs. Yuniesky Gonzalez - Y
Lucas Matthysse vs. Viktor Postol - N
Humberto Soto vs. Antonio Orozco - N
Terence Crawford vs. Dierry Jean - Y
Timothy Bradley vs. Brandon Rios - Y
Vasyl Lomachenko vs. Romulo Koasicha - Y
Bryant Jennings vs. Luis Ortiz - N
Nicholas Walters vs. Jason Sosa - N
5/ 24 - 20.8 % "upsets"
PBC 14 Cards - 28 Bouts
Bout - Did "A-side" win?
THURMAN vs GUERRERO - Y
BRONER vs MOLINA JR - Y
BERTO vs LOPEZ - Y
PORTER vs BONE - Y
STEVENSON vs BIKA - Y
GARCIA vs PETERSON - Y
QUILLIN vs LEE * - N
DIRRELL vs JACK - N
JACOBS vs TRUAX - Y
FIGUEROA vs BURNS - Y
KAMEDA vs MCDONNELL - N
DIRRELL vs DEGALE - N
RODRIGUEZ vs BAKER - Y
KHAN vs ALGIERI - Y
FORTUNA vs VASQUEZ - Y
GUERRERO vs MARTINEZ - Y
BRONER vs PORTER - N
SPENCE vs LO GRECO - Y
THURMAN vs COLLAZO - Y
HARRISON vs NELSON - N
GARCIA vs MALIGNAGGI - Y
JACOBS vs MORA - Y
TARVER vs CUNNINGHAM - N
HUCK vs GLOWACKI - N
SANTA CRUZ vs MARES - Y
RUIZ vs CEJA - N
WILDER vs DUHAUPAS - Y
BREAZEALE vs KASSI - Y
9/ 28 - 32.1 % "upsets"
Analysis
The results of the study show that there is around a 10% higher chance of a PBC bout ending in an upset than an HBO bout. Considering that the chances of upset can never exceed 50%, this is a significantly better for PBC. It is also significant because PBC is generally criticised for having more predictable match ups than HBO.
Although the study was only done for 2015, due to budget cuts for both HBO and PBC since, I believe the results would be largely similar.
Finally, I am sure I may have made some mistake in the results, so please let me know and I will correct them. Likewise, let me know if you think there are problems any with my method, or if you have a different take on the results. I'm interested to hear your views!
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