Lomachenko-Sosa Peaked at 886K Viewers on HBO; Averaged 832K

[Ruthless-RKO]

An increasing amount of viewers want to watch Vasyl Lomachenko, even in one-sided fights.

The Ukrainian star’s nine-round domination of Jason Sosa generated the highest rating for a boxing match on premium cable thus far in 2017. According to ratings released by Nielsen Media Research on Tuesday morning, a peak audience of 886,000 viewers tuned in to HBO on Saturday night to watch another superb performance from Lomachenko (8-1, 6 KOs).

An average of 832,000 viewers watched the uniquely skilled southpaw defend his WBO world super featherweight title against Sosa (20-2-4, 15 KOs) in the main event of HBO’s “World Championship Boxing” tripleheader. Raul Rivas, Sosa’s trainer, stopped their fight following nine rounds.

The highest-rated fight to air on premium cable this year before Lomachenko-Sosa was Showtime’s broadcast of Adrien Broner-Adrian Granados. Broner’s 10-round, split-decision win against Granados peaked at 859,000 viewers and averaged 779,000 on February 18 from Cincinnati.

Lomachenko-Sosa also was by far the most-watched live bout HBO has televised this year. The previous high for the four live fights HBO televised this year was the peak viewership for David Lemieux’s spectacular third-round knockout of Curtis Stevens (672,000) on March 11 from Verona, New York.

The 29-year-old Lomachenko’s last fight on HBO, another dominant performance against former featherweight champion Nicholas Walters, drew a peak audience of 761,000 on November 26 from Las Vegas.

The opener of HBO’s three-fight telecast, Aleksandr Usyk’s unanimous-decision defeat of Las Vegas’ Michael Hunter (12-1, 8 KOs), was watched by an average of 679,000 viewers. Peak viewership was 774,000 at one point as the unbeaten Usyk (12-0, 10 KOs) defended his WBO world cruiserweight championship in a 12-rounder.

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Quick question, soon or later, he's going to be hitting over a million views.. How well does he do as a PPV fighter? Is there legit any boxer he can fight that is worthy PPV fight?

[Enlightened-One]

Quick question, soon or later, he's going to be hitting over a million views.. How well does he do as a PPV fighter? Is there legit any boxer he can fight that is worthy PPV fight?

I can’t see how Vasyl Lomachenko could ever become a major PPV star, but sooner or later, as a HBO fighter, with that TV network struggling to fund fights, he’ll inevitably headline a pay-per-view event at some point (much akin to Crawford-Postol).

Vasyl Lomachenko facing the likes of Mikey Garcia or Terence Crawford may excite the hard-core boxing fraternity, but probably not the casual mainstream masses quite so much.

Another problem, regardless as to whether this claim offends anyone or not, relates to a combination of Vasyl Lomachenko’s age and his lack of fluency and pronunciation of the English language.

He has to be able to “sell” himself (as a person) and the bouts that he competes in. He has to find a way to endear himself to casual fight fans and also persuade them to watch his bouts, by convincing them that he’s engaging in a grudge match, the fight is significant from a sporting perspective, the fight will be action-packed, make the audience hate him enough to be willing to pay to watch him lose etc.

Despite being a remarkable fighter, with his in-ring performances being highly-impressive, that’s not enough to market his brand name, since he needs to do more to become a legitimate PPV star.

If Lomachenko can somehow become as proficient at English as the Klitschko brothers, who are always interviewed by the UK media because of their charming nature, then Vasyl could become a major star.

The alternative is that he remains in relative obscurity, spending the next five years trying to sell his fights using a combination of his in-ring performances and other tactics we've seen elsewhere, such as, constantly repeating the same catchphrases over-and-over again and allowing his promoter to perpetuate myths like “everyone is too scared to fight him”, and “no fighter from 122lbs to 147lbs is capable of beating him”.

[darkstar81]

Quick question, soon or later, he's going to be hitting over a million views.. How well does he do as a PPV fighter? Is there legit any boxer he can fight that is worthy PPV fight?

I can’t see how Vasyl Lomachenko could ever become a major PPV star, but sooner or later, as a HBO fighter, with that TV network struggling to fund fights, he’ll inevitably headline a pay-per-view event at some point (much akin to Crawford-Postol).

Vasyl Lomachenko facing the likes of Mikey Garcia or Terence Crawford may excite the hard-core boxing fraternity, but probably not the casual mainstream masses quite so much.

Another problem, regardless as to whether this claim offends anyone or not, relates to a combination of Vasyl Lomachenko’s age and his lack of fluency and pronunciation of the English language.

He has to be able to “sell” himself (as a person) and the bouts that he competes in. He has to find a way to endear himself to casual fight fans and also persuade them to watch his bouts, by convincing them that he’s engaging in a grudge match, the fight is significant from a sporting perspective, the fight will be action-packed, make the audience hate him enough to be willing to pay to watch him lose etc.

Despite being a remarkable fighter, with his in-ring performances being highly-impressive, that’s not enough to market his brand name, since he needs to do more to become a legitimate PPV star.

If Lomachenko can somehow become as proficient at English as the Klitschko brothers, who are always interviewed by the UK media because of their charming nature, then Vasyl could become a major star.

The alternative is that he remains in relative obscurity, spending the next five years trying to sell his fights using a combination of his in-ring performances and other tactics we've seen elsewhere, such as, constantly repeating the same catchphrases over-and-over again and allowing his promoter to perpetuate myths like “everyone is too scared to fight him”, and “no fighter from 122lbs to 147lbs is capable of beating him”.

Makes perfect sense. However, he can be talked up by others.. I bought the GGG v Brook PPV simply because i wanted to watch GGG live - that was due to the hype built up by promoters, commentators and fans backed up with a KO highlight reel. So if Lomachenko keeps adding to his reel and continues to be talked up then he will sell PPVs.

I'm more than a casual boxing fan but nowhere near a hardcore fan so Lomachenko will reach people like me. In terms of the casuals? Well there's very few fighters out there who will sell 750k+ PPV if recent fights are anything to go by. So i guess the question is, how do you define 'STAR'?!

[Mexi-Box]

That's not a lot of viewers. IIRC, Kovalev and Golovkin were doing 1 million+ and their PPVs still shit the bed.

[SaadOffTheDeck]

Speaking English isn't crucial to being a boxing star here. That's simply not true. The fact that Americans don't care about boxing is the issue with anyone trying to be a ppv star.

[boxing_rocks]

PPV buyers want to see evenly matched fights, so at 130 Loma won't be able to sell PPV. Loma vs Mikey at 135-138 could sell.

[SaadOffTheDeck]

That wouldn't sell shit.

[Ossyrules]

I voted no. Star quality fighter, but Americans, from an outsiders POV seem pretty loyal to there own. Appreciate quality, but the big following for there own

[SaadOffTheDeck]

I voted no. Star quality fighter, but Americans, from an outsiders POV seem pretty loyal to there own. Appreciate quality, but the big following for there own

Agreed on no, certainly not because Americans favor their own. That isn't remotely true. It doesn't hurt, but far from a requirement. Not sure what you've observed to draw that conclusion.

[Ossyrules]

I voted no. Star quality fighter, but Americans, from an outsiders POV seem pretty loyal to there own. Appreciate quality, but the big following for there own

Agreed on no, certainly not because Americans favor their own. That isn't remotely true. It doesn't hurt, but far from a requirement. Not sure what you've observed to draw that conclusion.

just general observation really. Happy to be put wrong. It's no slight though the English are patriotic too. There's always the exception, ie Amir Khan, who has fan base but isn't that popular imo, but overall I think the English like to back their guys.

I think to do it as a foreigner you have to be a fantastic fighter. But also have the bonus of some great fights vs countryman of the nation you're trying to win over. A bit like roberto Duran I guess.

[SaadOffTheDeck]

I voted no. Star quality fighter, but Americans, from an outsiders POV seem pretty loyal to there own. Appreciate quality, but the big following for there own

Agreed on no, certainly not because Americans favor their own. That isn't remotely true. It doesn't hurt, but far from a requirement. Not sure what you've observed to draw that conclusion.

just general observation really. Happy to be put wrong. It's no slight though the English are patriotic too. There's always the exception, ie Amir Khan, who has fan base but isn't that popular imo, but overall I think the English like to back their guys.

I think to do it as a foreigner you have to be a fantastic fighter. But also have the bonus of some great fights vs countryman of the nation you're trying to win over. A bit like roberto Duran I guess.

The biggest draws here right now are Pacquiao, canelo, cotto & ggg.

[gilgamesh]

I voted no. Star quality fighter, but Americans, from an outsiders POV seem pretty loyal to there own. Appreciate quality, but the big following for there own

Agreed on no, certainly not because Americans favor their own. That isn't remotely true. It doesn't hurt, but far from a requirement. Not sure what you've observed to draw that conclusion.

just general observation really. Happy to be put wrong. It's no slight though the English are patriotic too. There's always the exception, ie Amir Khan, who has fan base but isn't that popular imo, but overall I think the English like to back their guys.

I think to do it as a foreigner you have to be a fantastic fighter. But also have the bonus of some great fights vs countryman of the nation you're trying to win over. A bit like roberto Duran I guess.

America is the land of foreigners. Everybody's a foreigner here basically or their family was if you go back a few generations. Foreign fighters definitely have as good a chance to succeed here as they do anywhere, and the crowds aren't as adamantly against them as they are in England or a lot of other places.

GGG recently fought Danny Jacobs in Danny Jacbos' hometown and had the crowd cheering for him.

[darkstar81]

The next PPV star in the US will be Antony Joshua.

[SaadOffTheDeck]

Not anytime soon, nobody knows who he is.

[Oiky]

The next PPV star in the US will be Antony Joshua.

[Ruthless-RKO]

The next PPV star in the US will be Antony Joshua.

I wouldn't laugh.. He won't be the biggest star.. But he will do what Lennox Lewis did.

[SaadOffTheDeck]

The next PPV star in the US will be Antony Joshua.

I wouldn't laugh.. He won't be the biggest star.. But he will do what Lennox Lewis did.

Lol, you're out of your mind. Lewis was a megastar.

[Oiky]

I wouldn't laugh.. He won't be the biggest star.. But he will do what Lennox Lewis did.

Lol, you're out of your mind. Lewis was a megastar.

He won't do what Lewis did

Lewis was far superior

[SaadOffTheDeck]

I wouldn't laugh.. He won't be the biggest star.. But he will do what Lennox Lewis did.

Lol, you're out of your mind. Lewis was a megastar.

He won't do what Lewis did

Lewis was far superior

I think he'll be champ for a long time, but he won't see million buy ppvs in the states.

[Ruthless-RKO]

Lol, you're out of your mind. Lewis was a megastar.

He won't do what Lewis did

Lewis was far superior

I think he'll be champ for a long time, but he won't see million buy ppvs in the states.

He won't exceed that Lewis did, I didn't mean it like that. He will certainly have ppv fights over there.. he'll definately do well.. and to be fair, Lewis only passed a million buys twice I believe. He only achieved more than 500k buys in both Holyfield fights and Tyson.

He might not see a million tbh. Heavyweight division in the USA right now is very poor.. They've literally got Wilder.. that's it!

[SaadOffTheDeck]

We don't care about boxing. Joshua gets like 200,000 views on Showtime. Wlad would do more, but capturing the American public in boxing I think retired with Floyd. A ridiculously high percentage of old fans have moved on and the Young generation watches the UFC. Joshua/wilder might break 200k buys.