BoxRec

KBB wrote:

Purse Bid Shakedown wrote:Well the Floyd fight is way more money and exposure, no contest. Hell Ward cant even produce an offer. What kind of A sider is that?

Where's the offer from Golovkin???

Why would you expect a B sider to make an offer? Especially in light of their purses. Guys like Chavez, Froch, if they were interested in fighting GGG, they send an offer. Being the A-siders, you know.

Purse Bid Shakedown wrote:

KBB wrote:

Purse Bid Shakedown wrote:Well the Floyd fight is way more money and exposure, no contest. Hell Ward cant even produce an offer. What kind of A sider is that?

Where's the offer from Golovkin???

Why would you expect a B sider to make an offer? Especially in light of their purses. Guys like Chavez, Froch, if they were interested in fighting GGG, they send an offer. Being the A-siders, you know.

I didn't say anything about "expecting" him to make an offer, I don't expect it but it has happened (Pacquiao still thinks he's the A side to Floyd and makes offers on a regular basis however unrealistic his offers are).

The bottom line is that if Golovkin really feels he's all what the media and his fans are making him out to be and none of the scared chickens at 60 wants to man up and take that challenge then he should move up and seek out his own challenges instead of seeking downward (where no one will really consider any fighter below him a challenge).

We always expect smaller men to move up and challenge themselves to be considered great, then I say that three G doesn't deserve an exception/pass either especially since all of the guys at 60 are running scared of him.

Move up and take on Ward even if he knows he's the B-side and has to accept whatever it is that Ward will offer him, he beats him then he gets to be the A side in a rematch.

KBB wrote: I didn't say anything about "expecting" him to make an offer, I don't expect it but it has happened (Pacquiao still thinks he's the A side to Floyd and makes offers on a regular basis however unrealistic his offers are).

The bottom line is that if Golovkin really feels he's all what the media and his fans are making him out to be and none of the scared chickens at 60 wants to man up and take that challenge then he should move up and seek out his own challenges instead of seeking downward (where no one will really consider any fighter below him a challenge).

We always expect smaller men to move up and challenge themselves to be considered great, then I say that three G doesn't deserve an exception/pass either especially since all of the guys at 60 are running scared of him.

Move up and take on Ward even if he knows he's the B-side and has to accept whatever it is that Ward will offer him, he beats him then he gets to be the A side in a rematch.

Again, I don't see how he can be expected to make an offer to a guy that just made 2m for a tuneup, when his career high is 900k. It's not realistic. Maybe for a fight in Kazakhstan, if they have oil millionaires there. That's why guys like Canelo, Cotto, especially Floyd are attractive, they bring the money, lots of it. Froch and Chavez as well, they all make offers if they want a fight.

https://twitter.com/danrafaelespn

Dan Rafael @danrafaelespn
Golovkin-Rubio: SRO crowd of 9,323. Ward-Abraham: 5,311 in same arena for arguably bigger fight in Ward's home state & Super Six.

Dan Rafael @danrafaelespn
Attendance for Golovkin-Rubio last night was 9,323 -- over capacity and largest attendance in the history of the stadium, according to AEG.

Yeah, GGG's a bigger draw. Ward has done the unthinkable and completely killed what momentum he had from the Super 6. He is just about as known as a commentator as a fighter nowadays. Makes no sense.

SaadOffTheDeck wrote:

Riddick Blowe wrote:

SaadOffTheDeck wrote:Are you guys mixing up Ward with Dirrell? No question GGG would make Dirrell soil his panties in a matter of seconds. When has Ward fought running backwards? I missed it.

I don't mean he runs backwards in all his fights, but he would be on the retreat in this one for sure. GGG would be the general in there and it's him who dictates the fight.

I think he would try to smother Golovkin and use his size. He's too smart to let GGG just plow him down. I'd favor Ward, but I'd be more surprised by Diddy's comprehensive shutout than a Golovkin KO. Andre has never tasted that kind of power.

I definitely see Ward trying to spoil and smother. It's going to work to an extent, I just don't see it working all night. He's going to get caught at some point. GGG won't stop punching and Ward at some point has to stop holding. A Ward shutout is a ludicrous prediction. I can't even begin to imagine what it would take to win comfortably against a guy like GGG. Everyone is going to go through hell with him. And this is from someone who originally thought the guy was just an overhyped plodder.

fergusg wrote:

Purse Bid Shakedown wrote:Youre undermining your own point. So is Rodriuez now a better draw cause he got a higher career purse? Thats what youre implying.

I’m claiming that the opponents of the highest profile fighters in the sport gain career high paydays… and in order to fund such paydays, these bouts have to be economically viable.

Here are some examples to illustrate my point:

• The Froch-Groves rematch generated $34m in revenue, which allowed Carl Froch to receive a $13m payday, with George Groves earning more than $3m.
• Coincidentally, Froch and Groves respectively earned a $2.5m and an $800K payday for their first fight.
• The original figures (before Edwin was fined) that Andre Ward earned when he fought Rodriguez was $2.15m, with Rodriguez earning $1m.
• Andre Ward was paid $1,367,500 and Chad Dawson earned $600K for their fight.
• Carl Froch and Mikkel Kessler both earned slightly more than $4m for their rematch.
• Second tier fighters, such as Sakio Bika (58%) and Anthony Dirrell (42%) shared a $1.2m fight purse for their rematch, which meant that the total pot was pretty much on a par with the combined paydays of Golovkin & Rubio for their fight (i.e. $900K + $350K = $1.25m).
• Brian Vera’s was reportedly paid $400K for his first fight against Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. was the same that GGG earned to face Curtis Stevens.
• Darren Barker earned $1.3m for his fight against Felix Sturm, which was more than the combined purses of Golovkin & Rubio for their fight.
• Edwin Rodriguez was paid $600K and Denis Grachev was paid $400K when they fought.
• Anthony Joshua and James DeGale split an $800K pot to appear on the undercard of the Froch-Groves rematch, which was more than the $750K GGG pocketed when he faced Daniel Geale.

ikorolev wrote:To me it just says that Ward's late promoter was doing much better job getting money from HBO than Loefler does for GGG or GGG's promoter is pocketing more money.

Have you noticed a trend yet? All of these guys that I’ve just mentioned have earned paydays that were either far greater or surprisingly comparable to the $900K fight purse that Golovkin was paid to face Rubio.

And the reason why this was the case was due to fact that market demand generated a lot of revenue, which consequently resulted in the TV networks and promoters being capable of awarding such high paydays, because it was economically viable to do so.

Are everybody’s promoters far better than Tom Leoffler?

I’ll concede one important point, it’s undeniable that Gennday Golovkin's popularity is rapidly growing and he may one day become one of the biggest draws in the sport of boxing, but at this point in time, he doesn’t hold mass market appeal, which may be because his fights have only been televised by HBO since 2012, his command of the English language is particularly poor and the calibre of opposition he has faced is merely mediocre (in the context of GGG being ESPN’s 7th rated pound-for-pounder).

Berto was getting more than GGG, must have been a bigger draw, right? Brought in much revenue

KBB wrote:

Purse Bid Shakedown wrote:Well the Floyd fight is way more money and exposure, no contest. Hell Ward cant even produce an offer. What kind of A sider is that?

Where's the offer from Golovkin???

Offers begin with promoters talking to each other first. Either they talked and couldn't agree or Ward spoilt his relationships with late Goossen so badly, that there wasn't even point to talk.

fergusg wrote:

ikorolev wrote:To me it just says that Ward's late promoter was doing much better job getting money from HBO than Loefler does for GGG or GGG's promoter is pocketing more money.

Have you noticed a trend yet? All of these guys that I’ve just mentioned have earned paydays that were either far greater or surprisingly comparable to the $900K fight purse that Golovkin was paid to face Rubio.

And the reason why this was the case was due to fact that market demand generated a lot of revenue, which consequently resulted in the TV networks and promoters being capable of awarding such high paydays, because it was economically viable to do so.

Are everybody’s promoters far better than Tom Leoffler?

I’ll concede one important point, it’s undeniable that Gennday Golovkin's popularity is rapidly growing and he may one day become one of the biggest draws in the sport of boxing, but at this point in time, he doesn’t hold mass market appeal, which may be because his fights have only been televised by HBO since 2012, his command of the English language is particularly poor and the calibre of opposition he has faced is merely mediocre (in the context of GGG being ESPN’s 7th rated pound-for-pounder).

We don't know about that. There may be a reason why K2 is not promoting any big names beside their owners, Klitchkos, and GGG. We don't know what kind of contract Loefler had Golovkin sign with HBO two years ago. Maybe HBO doesn't have to pay much, so GGG has to fight for lower purses than Ward who is definitely not a better draw at this time.

fergusg wrote:

ikorolev wrote: We don't know about that. There may be a reason why K2 is not promoting any big names beside their owners, Klitchkos, and GGG. We don't know what kind of contract Loefler had Golovkin sign with HBO two years ago. Maybe HBO doesn't have to pay much, so GGG has to fight for lower purses than Ward who is definitely not a better draw at this time.

There’s absolutely no point in making excuses or assuming the reasons for Golovkin’s relatively low paydays until we’ve analysed the revenue that his bouts have generated. However, we do know that money from the networks accounts to around 65% to 70% of the cash used to fund these events.

According to Nielsen Media Research, Golovkin-Geale averaged 984,000 viewers on HBO for the live airing. Whereas Andre Ward-Edwin Rodriguez did 1.2 million on HBO.

I’m guessing is that Golovkin’s bout against Rubio will achieve more than 1.4m views, because the undercard was really quite strong. However, HBO cannot authorise a big payday for Golovkin (despite increased viewing figures), because the views for his previous bout was relatively low… and they also had to fund a better undercard.

Golovkin fought against an Aussie not known in the U.S. except to hardcore boxing fans. Ward fought a young undefeated hot Latino boxer who has fought in the U.S. for his whole career and had a 1st round KO win in his previous bout against a very decent opponent. That makes a difference.

It will be interesting to see the TV figures for GGG-Rubio. There's been all this discussion about who the bigger draw is and how purses reflect that, but what will the numbers say about current drawing power?

GGG's fight with Geale didn't do very good TV numbers, but his fight with Stevens did 1.4 million on average and peaked at 1.5 million. If ratings for GGG's last fight surpass ratings for Ward's last fight, how much evidence is there that Ward is the bigger draw (and vice-versa)? Additionally, if purses so closely reflect drawing power, why was GGG paid only $750k to fight Geale, less than half of Ward's purse against Rodriguez, when his previous HBO fight drew more viewers than each of Ward's recent HBO fights and why did he get a pay raise when the viewership for the Geale fight dropped?

Looking at a possible evidence of ratings/purses not always being commensurate, you can see that Timothy Bradley received multiple $1+ million purses prior to the Pacquiao bout. His two best available ratings at the time, which occurred in consecutive bouts, looked this this:

vs Casamayor= unknown viewers but relevant if purses are based on past numbers ($1 million purse for an undercard bout)
vs Alexander= 1.3m viewers ($1.1 million purse despite not even hitting 900k the fight before)
vs Abregu= 897k viewers ($230k purse)

GGG's last four HBO fights

vs Rubio= unknown viewers ($900k purse--so his purse went up despite a drop in viewing numbers)
vs Geale= 984k viewers ($750k purse)
vs Stevens= 1.4m viewers ($400k purse)
vs Macklin= 1.1m viewers ($350k purse)

Several of Bradley's Showtime don't have ratings that are available online, but it seems quite unlikely that he'd do better numbers there given the network's smaller platform and his weaker profile at the time. You can see that Bradley broke the $1m mark multiple times in these fights while GGG didn't, despite drawing better numbers overall. It's also apparent that GGG's purse went up for the Rubio bout despite a drop in the viewership for the Geale bout, something you wouldn't expect if purses and evidenced drawing power were as strongly tied as some seem to suggest.

fergusg wrote: You may realise that the strength of the undercard, which consequently plays an important part of the financial aspect of staging such events, were seemingly stronger on the dates whereby the HBO viewership figures were high. This wasn't a mere coincidence, because this costs money.

The undercard for Golovkin-Stevens, a bout which drew more viewers than any Andre Ward fight, wasn't strong. Perez and Abdusalmov weren't high profile fighters and each of them were arguably outside the top 15 of the HW division. Likewise, the undercard for GGG-Macklin was unspectacular, featuring Willie Nelson, Luciano Cuello, Thomas Oosthuizen, and Brandon Gonzales, none of whom are popular or considered especially good. GGG-Geale, which had the lowest ratings of any GGG fight I listed, had in my opinion the best undercard with Jennings-Perez, as Jennings was coming off an impressive win on HBO and Perez was more established than he was when he first appeared on the network.

fergusg wrote: You’ll also notice something else that’s really interesting, the “planned” overall fight purses for both Golovkin-Geale ($750K + $600K) and Golovkin-Rubio ($900K + $450K) were both $1.35m. This wasn’t a coincidence, because this figure was budgeted and ultimately based on realistic expectations to generate income using anticipated market demand.

The problem is… if Golovkin’s popularity is increasing, with bigger gate receipts and better viewing figures, which could reach 1.4m HBO views for the Rubio bout, then why isn’t Gennady being paid more than $1m?

Well, the answer is simple… in order to help generate good viewing figures, they had to put together a stronger undercard for the Golovkin-Rubio fight, because the financials and HBO viewing figures for the Golovkin-Geale event was underwhelming.

The supporting bout for Golovkin-Geale was Jennings-Perez, who split a $190K fight purse. Whereas the Donaire-Walters contest, which was on the Golovkin-Rubio undercard, cost nearer the $500K mark.

I'm not sure how this supports your argument about the strength between a fighter's drawing power and their purses. I believe roughly $3 million was initially put forward for Ward-Rodriguez when Ward's previous bout drew 1.3 million viewers if I remember correctly, but if we look at GGG-Stevens we'll see that for the televised portion only about $1 million was paid in purses, yet the fight attracted 1.5 million viewers. Since the latter card pulled in more viewers for significantly less money, it seems like HBO either overpaid for Ward-Rod or underpaid for GGG-Stevens, especially considering that their next expenditure for a GGG card was significantly less than the $3 million they shelled out for Ward-Rod when the former's previous bout only did 1.3 million.

In the case of GGG-Rubio/Donaire-Walters there was only about $2 million paid out total. If the latter card pulls in higher or even similar ratings to the Ward bout, wouldn't that suggest that HBO again either overpaid for that Ward's last fight or underpaid for the GGG-Rubio card, since it attracted similar or better viewership numbers but less money was paid? And if HBO overpaid or underpaid, doesn't that mean that purses don't necessarily equate to drawing power?

You also mention 'expectations', but it's possible for those to be incorrect, and this thread was directed towards the fighters' actual and current drawing power and not what someone previously predicted it to be.

fergusg wrote: It seems to be a rather silly notion to refuse to believe that economics does not influence the size of a fighters’ payday, especially considering the finances are ultimately funded by market demand.

Boxing is a business, which means that TV networks and promoters won’t fund massive paydays out of the goodness of their own hearts. They will only stage such costly events when there’s a realistic prospect of earning a profit. I really don’t know why you won’t acknowledge this fact!

Why do I need to acknowledge something that is so obvious? The issue here isn't whether networks and promoters stage events to eventually make a profit, but their more specific thinking behind that. For example, one may pay a fighter a lofty purse because they want to secure them for their network and reap longer term returns rather than being narrowly focused on the returns they'll get from one card. Or, as was the case with Bradley-Casamayor, they may also promise a fighter a large purse for a future bout to persuade that fighter into taking a certain fight--whose viewership is yet to be determined--before that. Moreover, all of these decisions are made by error-prone humans who could by flawed reasoning, inaccurate expectations or other reasons make poor business decisions that result in a fighter being overpaid and therefore less than optimal returns. You do know that people can make flawed decisions?

So, Ward may be earning twice the amount that GGG is earning but there are many factors which could explain that other than his actual drawing power (i.e. ability to attract viewers). I think the best evidence as to how much of a draw someone is in this case are TV viewership, gate figures, and attendance if the latter is not available. Looking at that GGG and Ward have done similar numbers with GGG's generally rising and his highest rated fight doing better numbers than Ward's, and I see nothing to suggest that Ward earning so much more is a reflection of a commensurate advantage in drawing power.

SaadOffTheDeck wrote:Are you guys mixing up Ward with Dirrell? No question GGG would make Dirrell soil his panties in a matter of seconds. When has Ward fought running backwards? I missed it.

Dirrell actually beat Golovkin in the amateurs. He lost to him at the olympics but he also had a win over him.

GGG has had one major fight in LA and now he's this amazing draw ... conveniently forgetting they were giving tons of tickets away for his last fight.

Let GGG prove himself a few more time before ANY Ward comparison. You guys are type of idiots who think they've dominated something after "beating it" once.

Get the double meaning?

fergusg wrote:

ikorolev wrote:Froch and Ward are on two different levels in terms of demand and fan base. GGG already surpassed Ward in these areas but has ways to go to Froch level.

Quantify this statement by supplying evidence to support your claims? Golovkin's purse alone suggests that this is not the case.

For example: Edwin Rodriguez's original purse for his bout with Andre Ward was $1m, which is $100K more than what GGG was paid to face Rubio.

The money has to come from somewhere...

Representation plays a big part aswell though. Ward happens to be represented by James Price who is one of the most influential guys in the boxing industry and feared to an extent aswell. I remember when Berto who certainly wasnt a big draw was getting big pay days on HBO fighting pretty hopelessly outmatched opponents. I'm not sure if Haymon was involved at that point or not but he earning more in relative terms to the attendances at his fights and the ratings they were generating.

Berto, Alexander, and Bradley all got very big purses despite not being big draws at the time. I gave the Bradley example earlier, but he made over $1 million against Alexander when his previous fight drew only 897k viewers.

crusader wrote:Berto, Alexander, and Bradley all got very big purses despite not being big draws.

Yeah I wouldnt say boxing is run in the same way a lot of other businesses are in terms of profit to sales and so on.

BAD INTENTIONS wrote:GGG has had one major fight in LA and now he's this amazing draw ... conveniently forgetting they were giving tons of tickets away for his last fight.

Let GGG prove himself a few more time before ANY Ward comparison. You guys are type of idiots who think they've dominated something after "beating it" once.

Get the double meaning?

Nobody compares GGG to Floyd, Canelo, Cotto or Froch in terms of drawing power. Ward is not a good draw, so even before the Rubio fight, GGG numbers were sometimes better than Ward's.

People are mentioning Froch as a big draw here aswell but he wasnt always that big of a draw. For a decent amount of his career he fought in front of relatively small crowds and wasnt getting huge tv ratings. I'm guessing a lot of people are looking at the second Groves fight to a large extent before coming to that conclusion. Groves's and the stuff he said played a big part selling that fight. Also because of the way the first fight went it caught on with the public as a whole versus just boxing fans.

crusader wrote:Berto, Alexander, and Bradley all got very big purses despite not being big draws at the time. I gave the Bradley example earlier, but he made over $1 million against Alexander when his previous fight drew only 897k viewers.

There is two different things here though when we are talking about TV fighters. There is the gate & there is also the ratings. I think all the guys mentioned do solid ratings even if their gates may not always be that great. Having said that I think Tim also lucked out by making a good deal with TR just cuz imho Bob wanted to feed a undefeated top p4p type guy to Manny which kinda bit him in the ass cuz $5,000,000 for Joel Casamayor is nutty.

ikorolev wrote:

KBB wrote:

Purse Bid Shakedown wrote:Well the Floyd fight is way more money and exposure, no contest. Hell Ward cant even produce an offer. What kind of A sider is that?

Where's the offer from Golovkin???

Offers begin with promoters talking to each other first. Either they talked and couldn't agree or Ward spoilt his relationships with late Goossen so badly, that there wasn't even point to talk.

Why do you insist on making up BS? They never talked about making the fight between the two of them, if they did then please show us the details!!!

KBB wrote:

ikorolev wrote:

KBB wrote: Where's the offer from Golovkin???

Offers begin with promoters talking to each other first. Either they talked and couldn't agree or Ward spoiled his relationships with late Goossen so badly, that there wasn't even point to talk.

Why do you insist on making up BS? They never talked about making the fight between the two of them, if they did then please show us the details!!!

Are you even capable of reading a whole sentence ?

ikorolev wrote:Are you even capable of reading a whole sentence ?

I read it but you threw that part in there so I thought I'd pull it out to make sure that everyone understands they never talked, besides you sprouted some other BS that was untrue and I called you out on it only to have you come back with some other mess just to try and cover up the fact that you were simply talking out the side of your neck.

You are just too biased when it comes to Kovalev and Golovkin, you show no objectivity whatsoever for someone who calls himself a real "boxing fan".

KBB wrote:

ikorolev wrote:Are you even capable of reading a whole sentence ?

I read it but you threw that part in there so I thought I'd pull it out to make sure that everyone understands they never talked, besides you sprouted some other BS that was untrue and I called you out on it only to have you come back with some other mess just to try and cover up the fact that you were simply talking out the side of your neck.

You are just too biased when it comes to Kovalev and Golovkin, you show no objectivity whatsoever for someone who calls himself a real "boxing fan".

So, when arguments don't work you start talking about a poster ? Welcome back, Brut.

ikorolev wrote:

KBB wrote:

ikorolev wrote:Are you even capable of reading a whole sentence ?

I read it but you threw that part in there so I thought I'd pull it out to make sure that everyone understands they never talked, besides you sprouted some other BS that was untrue and I called you out on it only to have you come back with some other mess just to try and cover up the fact that you were simply talking out the side of your neck.

You are just too biased when it comes to Kovalev and Golovkin, you show no objectivity whatsoever for someone who calls himself a real "boxing fan".

So, when arguments don't work you start talking about a poster ? Welcome back, Brut.

I'm not sure who Brut is but I'm KBB but anyway........I never talked about anyone. There is plenty of evidence to support your biased opinion regarding the aforementioned. I you want I can go and dig up all the favorable and totally biased things you've stated about them to prove it but then you'd only go into denial.