Comments Thread For: Arum: White Admits Boxing is More Popular, Needs it To Save UFC

[deanrw]

If he does get into boxing, I am wondering how many fighters would actually sign under that umbrella. Lower tier fighters might jump at it. Higher class fighters will not want that pay cut.

[USMCer]

The problem with the UFC is their audience is maturing while boxing's is getting younger. This is mostly due to Top Rank being on ESPN. Everytime they competed directly against the UFC, Top Rank would kill them in the younger demos and get a higher rating despite not always having the larger overall audience. This is because old people are irrelevant when it comes to ratings on commercial television.

Top Rank on ESPN, how long has that been?

Quite honestly, I'm a bit surprised about the demo-ratings, but hey ESPN is ESPN.

[gdub27]

The problem I see with the ufc is over saturation. Too many fights and too many fighters.

[TheBigLug]

Boxing as a sport can survive by itself in a way. UFC needs stars like McGregor, Rousey etc..to remain popular with the general public. Although MMA has picked up a lot in recent years, without it's big stars, it's still a bit of a niche sport with very little history.

of course it helps if boxing has it's stars that attracts the casual market, but it's a sport with a massive history, past stars that are ingrained in worldwide sporting (not just boxing) history and still remains a very lucrative sport for fighters that can make that crossover...so it's always going to be around and kids are always going to be walking into boxing gyms.