Canelo-Plant Showtime PPV On Track To Reach 800,000 Buys

[Ruthless-RKO]

Canelo-Plant Showtime PPV Show On Track To Reach 800,000 Buys

Canelo Alvarez’s return to boxing’s traditional pay-per-view platform Saturday night was a bigger success than anticipated.

BS.com has learned that the total buy rate for the Showtime Pay-Per-View event headlined by Alvarez’s 11th-round knockout of Caleb Plant is on track to reach 800,000. That total includes only domestic buys in the United States through cable and satellite operators, as well as digital sales that have consistently accounted for an increasing number of buys in 2021.

The total buy rate for pay-per-view events often takes many months to tabulate.

Numerous industry insiders indicated to Boxing Scene before Alvarez fought Plant on Saturday night at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas that their fight would draw somewhere between 500,000 and 600,000 buys, in part because Showtime’s four-fight telecast directly competed with UFC 268 on pay-per-view.

The 31-year-old Alvarez is boxing’s biggest star in the U.S., but he hadn’t competed exclusively on pay-per-view since his 12-round, majority-decision victory over rival Gennadiy Golovkin in their middleweight championship rematch in September 2018 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. The second Alvarez-Golovkin battle reportedly produced approximately 1.1 million buys.

Each of Alvarez’s three bouts before he topped Plant – successive victories over Callum Smith, Avni Yildirim and Billy Joe Saunders – were offered on pay-per-view through cable and satellite operators in the U.S., but were primarily streamed by DAZN, a much cheaper option than traditional pay-per-view.

The Mexican superstar’s showdown with Plant marked Alvarez’s first fight in affiliation with Al Haymon’s Premier Boxing Champions. It also was his first pay-per-view fight distributed by Showtime since his controversial 12-round, split-decision defeat of Cuban southpaw Erislandy Lara in July 2014 at MGM Grand Garden Arena.

Alvarez (57-1-2, 39 KOs), who became boxing’s first fully unified super middleweight champion by beating Plant, remains a promotional and network free agent.

The four-division champion said during his post-fight press conference Saturday night that he probably won’t return to the ring until early in May of 2022. His victory over Plant (21-1, 12 KOs) was his fourth fight in less than 11 months, an unusually high rate of activity for an elite-level boxer who makes eight figures per fight.

Alvarez added that he won’t decide at least until January on who he’ll fight next. He’ll also take his time to choose whether to realign himself with Haymon and Showtime or FOX, or if he’ll head back to DAZN and work with promoter Eddie Hearn’s Matchroom Boxing.

[Enlightened-One]

I wrongly predicted the event would only achieve 450K buys, so the estimated "on track" figure massively exceeds my own expectations.

The commercial success of the Plant PPV will surely tempt the likes of Showtime/Fox, ESPN and DAZN to engage in bidding wars to secure the rights to broadcast future Canelo PPV’s.

It provides both intriguing and frustrating future scenarios, because Canelo will likely choose to work with the broadcasters with the deepest pockets.

Ultimately, Canelo will inevitably be matched against fighters associated with the highest bidder, basically in-house bouts, because they're easier and more profitable to make.

So we may see Canelo facing the likes of David Benavidez or someone of his ilk, before considering opponents like Joe Smith Jr. or Artur Beterbiev, because Showtime usually invest more money in their events than ESPN does.

So even if there are a couple of decent light heavyweights aligned with Top Rank, Canelo will likely prefer to work with the PBC and Matchroom instead.

We could end up in a situation whereby Canelo won’t be facing the very best available opposition, with all the Mexican’s future bouts being PPV events.

[Cent0089]

That number is brutal, considering Caleb Plant is not very popular. Plus that total trash in undercard. Staying with PBC and Showtime, fighting Benavidez and Charlo via PPV is logical step for Canelo.

[bobcatbox]

Canelo, King of Boxing.

[JxhDel.]

Dead sport my posterior

[Jeff_lacy_ko]

Impressive

[Ruthless-RKO]

Impressive

His last PPV was GGG rematch. did over million 3-4 years ago.

Canelo has been on OTT since then until now.

This is o par with what he did against Cotto.

[Enlightened-One]

It’s clear Canelo is capable of achieving seven-digit PPV buys against better opposition than Plant on fight-dates aligned with the weekends of Cinco de Mayo and Mexican Independence Day… cue the bidding wars involving the various broadcasters to acquire Alvarez's services.

[Ruthless-RKO]

It’s clear Canelo is capable of achieving seven-digit PPV buys against better opposition than Plant on fight-dates aligned with the weekends of Cinco de Mayo and Mexican Independence Day… cue the bidding wars involving the various broadcasters to acquire Alvarez's services.

Yeh, he's definitely gonna remain contract-free from any broadcasters.

Work on a fight-by-fight basis.. Depending on who he fights.

I now wonder what figures would have produced has he fought PPV against the likes of Cal Smith and Saunders.. Although they are UK based and US boxers.

He did 500k+ against Khan, but less than 300k with Liam Smith.

[Ruthless-RKO]

Dan Rafael - The source also said that the fight, which drew an announced sold-out crowd of 16,586, generated a live gate of around $18 million, which would put it in the top 10 boxing gates in Nevada boxing history. Additional revenue for the fight came from international television, sponsorships, and merchandise.

[gregregegg]

Undisputed is always a good selling point, especially the fight making undisputed rather than defending undisputed. But yes canelo is king, doing probably over 100 million in toatal revenue against a guy who had never made a million bucks…

Going to be hard for dazn to get him back without them going to ppv. And I think dazn ppv will struggle, can’t tell your customers somthing is dead for years then try sell it to them.

Charlo needs to take a big fight at 168 ASAP, have canelo fight benevidez next, then charlo (but only if he has a legit 168 win by then which is unlikely), then it’s 175 undisputed time.

If I’m a contender at 175 I am over paying for a title shot now, then ticking over waiting for payyyyday.