Mayweather vs Mosley
Anaheim Boxing Examiner | Brent Alderson
Manny Pacquiao's Pay Per View History
1. Erik Morales I 03/19/05 350,000
2. Erik Morales II 01/21/06 360,000
3. Oscar Larios 07/02/06 Unavailible
4. Erik Morales III 11/18/06 350,000
5. Jorge Solis 04/14/07 200,000
6. Marco Antonio Barrera II 10/06/07 350,000
7. Juan Manuel Marquez II 03/15/08 400,000
8. David Diaz 06/28/08 250,000
9. Oscar De La Hoya 12/06/08 1.25 million
10. Ricky Hatton 05/02/09 850,000
11. Miguel Cotto 11/14/09 1.25 million
12. Joshua Clottey 03/13/10 700,000
Floyd Mayweather's Pay Per View History
1. Arturo Gatti 06/25/05 340,000
2. Zab Judah 04/08/06 350,000
3. Carlos Baldomir 11/04/06 320,000
4. Oscar De La Hoya 05/05/07 2.4 million
5. Ricky Hatton 12/08/07 940,000
6. Juan Manuel Marquez 09/19/09 1.05 million
ANALYSIS:
In analyzing Manny Pacquiao’s and Floyd Mayweather’s pay per view numbers it’s apparent that their bouts with Oscar De La Hoya dramatically increased their popularity, which is reflected in the increase of their pay per view numbers. Prior to his fight with De La Hoya, a Mayweather fight had never produced more than four hundred thousand buys and in his two fights since, his bout with Ricky Hatton reportedly generated 940,000 buys and his bout with Juan Manuel Marquez hit the one million mark.
The same thing goes for Manny Pacquiao. Even though his pay per view numbers were considered excellent for a fighter weighing less than 135 pounds, especially since his the second fight with Juan Manuel Marquez was the highest grossing pay per view event ever for a bout involving fighters below the welterweight limit with 400,000 buys, up until the De La Hoya fight, that was the Pacquiao’s most successful pay per view outing. Since his bout with Oscar his pay per view numbers have increased exponentially and his bouts with Ricky Hatton, Miguel Cotto, and Joshua Clottey have generated 850,000, 1.25 million, and 700,000 thousand buys.
And it isn’t so much that Pacquiao and Mayweather beat De La Hoya because both Shane Mosley and Bernard Hopkins defeated Oscar and they were never able to generate the type of numbers that Pacquiao and Mayweather are. The thing is Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao are both very special fighters and their bouts with De La Hoya and the promotion revolving those bouts introduced them to casual sports fans. Mayweather’s undefeated record, his extraordinary skills, and his family’s boxing legacy endured him to casual fans who immediately recognized Floyd’s greatness and embraced it even if some of them wanted to see the flamboyant fighter lose.
With Manny Pacquiao, you had a humble great fighter with a crowd pleasing style who had already established a lasting legacy with wins over Marco Antonio Barrera, Erik Morales, and Juan Manuel Marquez, three of the ten greatest Mexican fighters in the history of the sport. And as soon as the general sporting public was introduced to Pacquiao and became aquainted with him he became a superstar. And the brutal knockout of Ricky Hatton and his war with Cotto which was an exciting slugfest for the first three rounds along with his record setting seventh title increased his superstar status and solidified him not only as one of boxign’s greatest fighters, but also one of its most exciting performers.
Ever since Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather became the faces of boxing and bitter rivals, their fans have compared them and debated their merits from every conceivable angle. And one of the primary debates has been over their revenue generating ability. In looking at the pay per view numbers its obvious that Mayweather generates more pay per view buys. His bout with De La Hoya garnered over two million buys while Pacquiao’s bout with the Golden Boy did over a million. Also, Mayweather’s bout with Ricky Hatton surpassed Pacquiao’s numbers with the tough Englishman. And even though Pacquiao’s bout with Cotto garnered 1.25 million buys in comparison with the million buys that Mayweather did with Marquez, comparatively Mayweather’s bout with Marquez was more successful because the Cotto fight was a much better match up and the Puerto Rican was viewed as an imposing threat while Marquez was moving up two weight classes and had struggled in previous outings against Joel Casamayor and Juan Diaz. So the fact that Mayweather-Marquez generated one million buys in liea of the fact that it wasn’t viewed as a competitive match up is impressive and tantamount to Mayweather’s broad appeal in the United States.
Just because Mayweather bouts have the ability to generate slightly more pay per view revenue than Pacquiao’s that doesn’t necessarily mean that he’s a bigger star or that he generates more revenue because even though Mayweather’s fight with Marquez was a successful on the pay per view side, the bout didn’t sell out the MGM Grand Garden and the live gate only amounted to 6.8 million dollars. In contrast Pacquiao’s bout with Clottey brought in more than fifty thousand fans to the Cowboys Stadium and his bouts with Hatton and and Cotto sold out the MGM and produced live gates that exceeded 8 millions dollars.
Also internationally Pacquiao is probably bigger than Mayweather. He is a huge star in Asia and in Mexico and was recently featured in Time Magazine’s Asian edition. Its difficult to surmise how much money Pacquiao’s fights generate internationally because fights are broadcasted differently in underdeveloped countries. Because per capita income is significantly lower the populace of those nations wouldn’t be able to afford to order expensive pay per view telecasts. As a result international broadcast rights are sold to television companies or an intermediary who buys the rights for a flat fee and then profits off them buy selling them to a network and finds sponsors to attach themselves to the bout in that specific region in order to generated revenue which exceeds the amount that was paid for the international televisin rights.
So even though Mayweather's pay per view generating ability is slightly greater than Pacquiao's other strands of revenue probably compensate for Mayweather's advantage on the pay per view front and the two rivals are probably near equals in their ability to generate revenue. Now the only question is are they equals in the ring?
Source: Examiner.com
