Comments Thread For: Crawford-Indongo Fight Averaged 965,000 Viewers on ESPN

[Motorcity Cobra]

Didn't Thurman v. Collazo peak at 1.1 million? Garcia v. Paulie was 1.5 million too...

Seems like a boxing issue...

The sport needs more TMZ stars unfortunately

Yea. And LSC-Mares peaked higher. When Al saw ESPN wasn't interested in paying for cards he started putting on less cards and lower quality cards. And soon after that we saw ESPN start cutting. Laying off longtime employees. People think ESPN didn't want PBC but Al saw the writing on the wall and pulled out. As long as you're willing to pay for their air time ESPN will show it.

[Butch.McRae]

I keep saying it...Crawfird is going to start a dispute with Top Rank soon...he hasnt got the Pacquiao fight and he wants to fight those other guys at PBC

He's starting to voice it publicly now

[FinitoxDinamita]

Crawford having no personality might have something to do with it. His eyes look half asleep and he cant talk.

[Boxing Logic]

So the problem is NOT Network, Promoter, Manager, Adviser or anything of that, the problem is THE SPORT OF BOXING ITSELF!

Exactly. On a per-fight basis, on average, boxing is the most non-competitive, boring sport in the world right now. Are hardcore fans so biased towards Crawford or whatever that they actually thought this was a good fight? This was a terrible mismatch where one guy didn't even land a punch and got KO'd with the first solid body shot he took.

99% of the time the matchups are terrible, and the 1% of the time the matchups are good, 99% of those fights still suck because the referee is bought off and allows one fighter to hold and foul and take all the entertaining action out of the fight. Then to make matters worse, after the boring fights, the winner doesn't even win half the time.

Ask yourself, if the average score of an NBA game was 70 - 65, and 80% of the points scored were scored on free throws, would the NBA have good ratings? Of course not. Well guess what, in boxing, holding stops the action just as much as a foul does in basketball, so when the ref allows multiple holds per round without warnings or taking points, that's the exact same as if there was a foul every 30 seconds in an NBA game.

You can put boxing on any channel you like, but until the sport, the rules, the ref, the judges, the matchmaking, and even the commentating is revised, the sport will continue to decline. Just look how many commentators talk badly about Pacquiao, when he is one of the only boxers of the last two decades casual fans actually enjoy watching! But the boxing establishment in America is filled with hipsters like Max Kellerman, Bernard Hopkins, Andre Ward, and Paulie Malignaggi who would rather try to sell the casual fan Rigondeaux, Floyd Mayweather, and Andre Ward, than Manny Pacquiao.

Well guess what, most fans are not buying. Most fans want to see entertaining boxers elevated. If the NBA establishment designed their rules to benefit Dennis Rodman's play style, not Steph Curry's, it wouldn't be popular either, but that is exactly what the sport of boxing has done. Every effort is made by the boxing establishment to elevate the most boring, dirty, low-action boxers in the sport, while making it twice as hard for the entertaining boxers to succeed, get big fights, win big fights, and gain prominence.

The casual sports fan would have loved to jump on board the train of someone like GGG, for example, but since the sport of boxing could not get him a big fight until he was 34 years old, they really couldn't.

This stuff goes on constantly. Kovalev could have been another boxer to make boxing a mainstream sport, a Drago character with spectacular fights, but Stevenson and Beterbiev both ducked him, then boxing robbed him twice against Ward.

In fact, that is the perfect example. The boxing establishment had a choice the night of Kovalev-Ward 1, either to make Kovalev a star, or (try to) make Ward a star. Instead of choosing to elevate the exciting boxer with a mainstream, clean, exciting style, boxing chose to (try to) elevate the most dirty, boring boxer in the sport.

Well, then ****ty ratings is what you should expect. Boxing keeps making choices to keep itself a niché sport, always elevating the most niché, boring boxers, and so this is what happens.

[Kigali]

Crawford having no personality might have something to do with it. His eyes look half asleep and he cant talk.

Dispatch one of your Aztec warriors to rid boxing of him.

[rickJen]

Yea. And LSC-Mares peaked higher. When Al saw ESPN wasn't interested in paying for cards he started putting on less cards and lower quality cards. And soon after that we saw ESPN start cutting. Laying off longtime employees. People think ESPN didn't want PBC but Al saw the writing on the wall and pulled out. As long as you're willing to pay for their air time ESPN will show it.

What does that have to do with the ratings?
If you're comparing Mares/LSC vs Crawford/Indongo,
that's apples and oranges.
Would it make a difference if ESPN covered Mares/LSC?

[Butch.McRae]

What does that have to do with the ratings?
If you're comparing Mares/LSC vs Crawford/Indongo,
that's apples and oranges.
Would it make a difference if ESPN covered Mares/LSC?

Confused by your post? Mares v LSC aired on ESPN and did better numbers without much push from ESPN/Sportscenter. Just curious about your premise

[Motorcity Cobra]

What does that have to do with the ratings?
If you're comparing Mares/LSC vs Crawford/Indongo,
that's apples and oranges.
Would it make a difference if ESPN covered Mares/LSC?

I'm not. I'm saying it shows that ESPN isn't going to pay for fights even if the ratings are good. That's the whole point of my post. Instead of cherry picking a sentence, read the whole thing.

[rickJen]

I'm not. I'm saying it shows that ESPN isn't going to pay for fights even if the ratings are good. That's the whole point of my post. Instead of cherry picking a sentence, read the whole thing.

You lost me man.
You made a thread denigrating TR's ratings in last week's fights.
Now you're saying ratings doesn't even matter.
Okay you're trying to prove ESPN doesn't buy fights.
Promoters do. Okay. Fair enough.
I'm just wondering about your personal concerns as a fan.

[Motorcity Cobra]

You lost me man.
You made a thread denigrating TR's ratings last week.
Now you're saying ratings doesn't even matter.
Okay you're trying to prove ESPN doesn't buy fights.
Promoters do. Okay. Fair enough.
I'm just wondering about your personal concerns as a fan.

That wasn't me. You have me confused with someone else. I've been gone from the site since July 18th and came back on August 17th and haven't written any threads about Top Rank ratings until this one.