BoxRec

I wonder if this is it for the next 30 years ? Eddie Hearn acting big mates with the other kid, whilst giving out information on possible match ups, pushing ppv cards and giving out smug grins when a certain contemporary is mentioned. There is something slightly nauseating about the whole thing. No, i haven't watched the latest video, but i would imagine that it's the same script everytime. No amount of intenet videos can by the likes of ifilm can save boxing. Overall it lacks the exposure come fight night, is too expensive to watch, either venue wise or ppv and in some cases subscription and doesn't have enough quality fighters worldwide. These ifilm videos and similar incarnations are popular to a degree because they are free to watch online and Eddie is quite happy to use that outlet when it suits him. You can almost smell his eagerness to get shows on to ppv and get people used to the fact that paying a ppv fee on top of an already sunscribed channel is normal. His ruse is that if people pay more ppv, then other fights can be financed.

Boxing has many issues, but the main issue is that it has lost ground with the ordinary casual sports fan, many of whom would follow the sport if it was less expensive and and not exclusively linked a subscripion channel and ppv shows. Boxing has too many governing bodies, too many world champions, too many world title belts, ie, silver blah de blah. The top 20 lists for the different organisations don't even reflect each other. How can you be in the top 10 of one organisation and not be in the top 20 of another ? There is a limited amount of top quality fighters around, the best matches don't get made, whilst the decisions given by judges at fights and accepted by the audience, would be investigated in other sports. Particular divisions are almost bypassed these days, it's gotten so bad. The cruiserweight division is just ignored, the heavyweight division is in a permanent joke state, as a Ukranian robot and his a elder brother dominate over fighters that look hopelessly out of their depth. The middleweight division is very weak and so on and so forth.

Some of the fights that are billed and have been billed as being possible pay ppv are actually a joke. I am not sure if Haye - Harrison was ppv, but as a supposed "big" fight, it ended up as a complete embaressment to the sport. Haye vs Fury will be ppv i guess and look at that in reality. It's a complete miss-match. It took Fury all he had to defeat Cunningham, a not particulalry big cruiswerweight in his day, nevermind at heavyweight, yet he was floored and and was in trouble a few times. The guy is a poor boxer up against someone on a different level quality wise. Who are the real big names is boxing ? Mayweather, sure, Pcquaio, sure, Broner ? really ? Who else ? How many of the so called top boxers in the world could be named by casual fight fans, nevermind the general public ? Not many. With all due respect to our boxers, how many people will know Burns, Macklin, Murray, Barker, Groves, Froch, etc etc ? They possibly know Khan and Haye at best. This is because they lack exposure and that is because of being soley on subscription channels and ppv shows. Your casual sports fan will watch Mayweather, possibly even Haye, but not the rest. Groves, Macklin etc, doesn't light his fire at all.

Boxing needs to have more than just average fights on channel 5 to survive. It needs some quality fights to be shown free to air. Subscription and ppv is here to stay in boxing, but i feel that unless boxing takes the financial blinkers off and re thinks it's approach in terms of fighter profile, how people watch fights, how much they pay, plus other issues that have been mentioned earlier, then the writing is on the wall. It was already become a niche sport over the last 20 years of so. It hardly gets any column inches in the main newspapers and is losing ground with a potentially large audience. Eddie Hearn has said that people like ifilm are used by him to talk to the die hard boxing fan, the internet forum anoraks, not the casual sports / fight fan. But no amount of Eddie talking in his mansion with shades on to Kugan cassius will alter the current state of boxing. It needs a radical re-think, right across the board. Fighters come and go and quality gets replaced with quality in the main, yes, but there isn't as much out there today that compares with 15 to 30 years ago. However, boxing needs to reconnect with it's audience, because being a nich sport isn't where it should be in modern sport.

Rant over. Some will nid in agreement, some will disagree, but you would have to be plain naive or stupid to not see that boxing is in terminal decline and it needs more than half cocked internet interviews with a slick salesman to change it.

MachoMan09 wrote:How many mpg are you getting out of the Berlinetta?

Quite a lot............

I don't waste my money on boxing, so i can afford a full tank

I heard fast car eddie and kuggie bear go dogging together in eddie's Bentley..

agree with most of that terrestrial TV is the only hope for boxing to recover its lost constituency.

rm1 wrote:agree with most of that terrestrial TV is the only hope for boxing to recover its lost constituency.

X2

The ol' terrestrial solution is over, dead....broadcast is fragmented beyond...digital is here...laptops, tablets, apps....sports need to be omni-channel and that's a fact...broadcast, digital and social...

People need to move with the times, I actually enjoy Eddie Hearn on iFilm London he answers near enough every question and has given us some very good fights.

WelshJack wrote:People need to move with the times, I actually enjoy Eddie Hearn on iFilm London he answers near enough every question and has given us some very good fights.

The ifilm video's in themselves were a secondary point. People don't need to move with the times if those new times will see the demise of the sport. Overall lack of quality, too expensive to watch and and an almost complete diss-interest from casual sports fans, means a major overhall is needed otherwise boxing will become worse that the niche sport it has become. My point was that no amount of ifilm London videoes will rectify that, because Eddie Hearn doesn't want to or can't see the major failings of the sport that surrounds him. When the money dries up, he will pull out. I don't feel he is a man of real ideas addresssing the issues that are apparent in boxing, he is an opportunist with good media skills in presentation.

jizzle wrote:The ol' terrestrial solution is over, dead....broadcast is fragmented beyond...digital is here...laptops, tablets, apps....sports need to be omni-channel and that's a fact...broadcast, digital and social...

The debate over putting out poor quality and paying too much for it isn't over and that is the crux of ther matter. It's about how you generate other revenue streams through these new media assets that is key. In actual fact, the idea of subscription based sport and an extra payment on top for particular events is very narrow minded and rather antiquated. It's major problem is that it disenfranchises a whole load of casual sports fans who aren't prepared to pay a subscription fee, a ppv fee for a fight that will invariably be of poor quality, involving fighters they know very little about. Ask the general public about Barker vs Geale and they will say " who ??". Ask them about Malignaggi and Broner and they will say "Who ??". They will have only heard of the big names and that can be put down to two on the international stage and two on the domestic stage. They would be Mayweather and Pacquaio, possibly Klitschko for the international names plus Haye and Khan for the domestic names with an outside chance that they may have heard of Froch, but i doubt it. That is the main problem. People will not pay to watch people they know nothing about.

rm1 wrote:agree with most of that terrestrial TV is the only hope for boxing to recover its lost constituency.

Yeah, it's a major problem that could be addressed but isn't being addressed at all

355 Berlinetta wrote:

jizzle wrote:The ol' terrestrial solution is over, dead....broadcast is fragmented beyond...digital is here...laptops, tablets, apps....sports need to be omni-channel and that's a fact...broadcast, digital and social...

The debate over putting out poor quality and paying too much for it isn't over and that is the crux of ther matter. It's about how you generate other revenue streams through these new media assets that is key. In actual fact, the idea of subscription based sport and an extra payment on top for particular events is very narrow minded and rather antiquated. It's major problem is that it disenfranchises a whole load of casual sports fans who aren't prepared to pay a subscription fee, a ppv fee for a fight that will invariably be of poor quality, involving fighters they know very little about. Ask the general public about Barker vs Geale and they will say " who ??". Ask them about Malignaggi and Broner and they will say "Who ??". They will have only heard of the big names and that can be put down to two on the international stage and two on the domestic stage. They would be Mayweather and Pacquaio, possibly Klitschko for the international names plus Haye and Khan for the domestic names with an outside chance that they may have heard of Froch, but i doubt it. That is the main problem. People will not pay to watch people they know nothing about.

My Dad asked me who Barker was today, didn't have a clue about him. He knows a few fighters like Burns, Haye, Khan, Mayweather, Pacquaio, Klitschko's, Chisora, Cock(Froch) and maybe a few others, but he's your typical casual fan and he doesn't know many fighters. 99% of people have no clue who Saul Alvarez is and he's fighting Mayweather.

jizzle wrote:The ol' terrestrial solution is over, dead....broadcast is fragmented beyond...digital is here...laptops, tablets, apps....sports need to be omni-channel and that's a fact...broadcast, digital and social...

I agree. And how many people could name five darts players except Phil Taylor? I bet more people know more boxers yet darts is held up as a shining example. When its done right, boxing is huge. Haye-Fury will have the nation gripped next month whereas the month after, at the same venue, Bisping-Munoz will not even be mentioned in the mainstream media. Boxing is doing fine.

355 Berlinetta wrote:I wonder if this is it for the next 30 years ? Eddie Hearn acting big mates with the other kid, whilst giving out information on possible match ups, pushing ppv cards and giving out smug grins when a certain contemporary is mentioned. There is something slightly nauseating about the whole thing. No, i haven't watched the latest video, but i would imagine that it's the same script everytime. No amount of intenet videos can by the likes of ifilm can save boxing. Overall it lacks the exposure come fight night, is too expensive to watch, either venue wise or ppv and in some cases subscription and doesn't have enough quality fighters worldwide. These ifilm videos and similar incarnations are popular to a degree because they are free to watch online and Eddie is quite happy to use that outlet when it suits him. You can almost smell his eagerness to get shows on to ppv and get people used to the fact that paying a ppv fee on top of an already sunscribed channel is normal. His ruse is that if people pay more ppv, then other fights can be financed.

Boxing has many issues, but the main issue is that it has lost ground with the ordinary casual sports fan, many of whom would follow the sport if it was less expensive and and not exclusively linked a subscripion channel and ppv shows. Boxing has too many governing bodies, too many world champions, too many world title belts, ie, silver blah de blah. The top 20 lists for the different organisations don't even reflect each other. How can you be in the top 10 of one organisation and not be in the top 20 of another ? There is a limited amount of top quality fighters around, the best matches don't get made, whilst the decisions given by judges at fights and accepted by the audience, would be investigated in other sports. Particular divisions are almost bypassed these days, it's gotten so bad. The cruiserweight division is just ignored, the heavyweight division is in a permanent joke state, as a Ukranian robot and his a elder brother dominate over fighters that look hopelessly out of their depth. The middleweight division is very weak and so on and so forth.

Some of the fights that are billed and have been billed as being possible pay ppv are actually a joke. I am not sure if Haye - Harrison was ppv, but as a supposed "big" fight, it ended up as a complete embaressment to the sport. Haye vs Fury will be ppv i guess and look at that in reality. It's a complete miss-match. It took Fury all he had to defeat Cunningham, a not particulalry big cruiswerweight in his day, nevermind at heavyweight, yet he was floored and and was in trouble a few times. The guy is a poor boxer up against someone on a different level quality wise. Who are the real big names is boxing ? Mayweather, sure, Pcquaio, sure, Broner ? really ? Who else ? How many of the so called top boxers in the world could be named by casual fight fans, nevermind the general public ? Not many. With all due respect to our boxers, how many people will know Burns, Macklin, Murray, Barker, Groves, Froch, etc etc ? They possibly know Khan and Haye at best. This is because they lack exposure and that is because of being soley on subscription channels and ppv shows. Your casual sports fan will watch Mayweather, possibly even Haye, but not the rest. Groves, Macklin etc, doesn't light his fire at all.

Boxing needs to have more than just average fights on channel 5 to survive. It needs some quality fights to be shown free to air. Subscription and ppv is here to stay in boxing, but i feel that unless boxing takes the financial blinkers off and re thinks it's approach in terms of fighter profile, how people watch fights, how much they pay, plus other issues that have been mentioned earlier, then the writing is on the wall. It was already become a niche sport over the last 20 years of so. It hardly gets any column inches in the main newspapers and is losing ground with a potentially large audience. Eddie Hearn has said that people like ifilm are used by him to talk to the die hard boxing fan, the internet forum anoraks, not the casual sports / fight fan. But no amount of Eddie talking in his mansion with shades on to Kugan cassius will alter the current state of boxing. It needs a radical re-think, right across the board. Fighters come and go and quality gets replaced with quality in the main, yes, but there isn't as much out there today that compares with 15 to 30 years ago. However, boxing needs to reconnect with it's audience, because being a nich sport isn't where it should be in modern sport.

Rant over. Some will nid in agreement, some will disagree, but you would have to be plain naive or stupid to not see that boxing is in terminal decline and it needs more than half cocked internet interviews with a slick salesman to change it.

I agree with alot of your post but not re Eddie an Ifilm.
Matchroom have the Tv deal because FW went his own way and noone else could compete against them.Its by no means ideal and a broadcaster who could be arsed should rotate promoters bills.Sky for one its cheaper to stick to one secondly Eddie convinced Adam Smith he is the second coming do you blame Hearn for seeing a gap and filling it What Eddie does is bring his brand of promoting he is young and is doing whatever he can to promote his current crop of fighters . The way he goes about it will not suit everyone but he has improved Ifilm by helping them become more professional and entertaining. Fighters now appreciate the little exposure they can get and respond well to Kugan and James.More so Kugan you often get the feeling your listening in on an informal chat between mates.Its part of the charm and as long as the correct information is relayed I'd rather have it in a funny banter filled way .
Boxing has changed there is less interest and a lack of investment from anything other than Ppv.So why would you think that a boxing promoter who though smug compared to some of the characters we have had over the years is tame in that department wouldnt be trying to get money from the only revenue stream available. Its not great but Matchroom are the best outhere at present and watching ifilm gives me sonething to do when im bored at work...and its free.
The sport is fucked because of all the reasons you listed but Eddie abd Kugan are doing alright for the fans at present IMO

TJ77 wrote:

355 Berlinetta wrote:I wonder if this is it for the next 30 years ? Eddie Hearn acting big mates with the other kid, whilst giving out information on possible match ups, pushing ppv cards and giving out smug grins when a certain contemporary is mentioned. There is something slightly nauseating about the whole thing. No, i haven't watched the latest video, but i would imagine that it's the same script everytime. No amount of intenet videos can by the likes of ifilm can save boxing. Overall it lacks the exposure come fight night, is too expensive to watch, either venue wise or ppv and in some cases subscription and doesn't have enough quality fighters worldwide. These ifilm videos and similar incarnations are popular to a degree because they are free to watch online and Eddie is quite happy to use that outlet when it suits him. You can almost smell his eagerness to get shows on to ppv and get people used to the fact that paying a ppv fee on top of an already sunscribed channel is normal. His ruse is that if people pay more ppv, then other fights can be financed.

Boxing has many issues, but the main issue is that it has lost ground with the ordinary casual sports fan, many of whom would follow the sport if it was less expensive and and not exclusively linked a subscripion channel and ppv shows. Boxing has too many governing bodies, too many world champions, too many world title belts, ie, silver blah de blah. The top 20 lists for the different organisations don't even reflect each other. How can you be in the top 10 of one organisation and not be in the top 20 of another ? There is a limited amount of top quality fighters around, the best matches don't get made, whilst the decisions given by judges at fights and accepted by the audience, would be investigated in other sports. Particular divisions are almost bypassed these days, it's gotten so bad. The cruiserweight division is just ignored, the heavyweight division is in a permanent joke state, as a Ukranian robot and his a elder brother dominate over fighters that look hopelessly out of their depth. The middleweight division is very weak and so on and so forth.

Some of the fights that are billed and have been billed as being possible pay ppv are actually a joke. I am not sure if Haye - Harrison was ppv, but as a supposed "big" fight, it ended up as a complete embaressment to the sport. Haye vs Fury will be ppv i guess and look at that in reality. It's a complete miss-match. It took Fury all he had to defeat Cunningham, a not particulalry big cruiswerweight in his day, nevermind at heavyweight, yet he was floored and and was in trouble a few times. The guy is a poor boxer up against someone on a different level quality wise. Who are the real big names is boxing ? Mayweather, sure, Pcquaio, sure, Broner ? really ? Who else ? How many of the so called top boxers in the world could be named by casual fight fans, nevermind the general public ? Not many. With all due respect to our boxers, how many people will know Burns, Macklin, Murray, Barker, Groves, Froch, etc etc ? They possibly know Khan and Haye at best. This is because they lack exposure and that is because of being soley on subscription channels and ppv shows. Your casual sports fan will watch Mayweather, possibly even Haye, but not the rest. Groves, Macklin etc, doesn't light his fire at all.

Boxing needs to have more than just average fights on channel 5 to survive. It needs some quality fights to be shown free to air. Subscription and ppv is here to stay in boxing, but i feel that unless boxing takes the financial blinkers off and re thinks it's approach in terms of fighter profile, how people watch fights, how much they pay, plus other issues that have been mentioned earlier, then the writing is on the wall. It was already become a niche sport over the last 20 years of so. It hardly gets any column inches in the main newspapers and is losing ground with a potentially large audience. Eddie Hearn has said that people like ifilm are used by him to talk to the die hard boxing fan, the internet forum anoraks, not the casual sports / fight fan. But no amount of Eddie talking in his mansion with shades on to Kugan cassius will alter the current state of boxing. It needs a radical re-think, right across the board. Fighters come and go and quality gets replaced with quality in the main, yes, but there isn't as much out there today that compares with 15 to 30 years ago. However, boxing needs to reconnect with it's audience, because being a nich sport isn't where it should be in modern sport.

Rant over. Some will nid in agreement, some will disagree, but you would have to be plain naive or stupid to not see that boxing is in terminal decline and it needs more than half cocked internet interviews with a slick salesman to change it.

I agree with alot of your post but not re Eddie an Ifilm.
Matchroom have the Tv deal because FW went his own way and noone else could compete against them.Its by no means ideal and a broadcaster who could be arsed should rotate promoters bills.Sky for one its cheaper to stick to one secondly Eddie convinced Adam Smith he is the second coming do you blame Hearn for seeing a gap and filling it What Eddie does is bring his brand of promoting he is young and is doing whatever he can to promote his current crop of fighters . The way he goes about it will not suit everyone but he has improved Ifilm by helping them become more professional and entertaining. Fighters now appreciate the little exposure they can get and respond well to Kugan and James.More so Kugan you often get the feeling your listening in on an informal chat between mates.Its part of the charm and as long as the correct information is relayed I'd rather have it in a funny banter filled way .
Boxing has changed there is less interest and a lack of investment from anything other than Ppv.So why would you think that a boxing promoter who though smug compared to some of the characters we have had over the years is tame in that department wouldnt be trying to get money from the only revenue stream available. Its not great but Matchroom are the best outhere at present and watching ifilm gives me sonething to do when im bored at work...and its free.
The sport is fucked because of all the reasons you listed but Eddie abd Kugan are doing alright for the fans at present IMO

I would actually say iFilm are less professional, one of the most important things in journalism is impartiality and iFilm clearly aren't impartial.

expe wrote:

TJ77 wrote:

355 Berlinetta wrote:I wonder if this is it for the next 30 years ? Eddie Hearn acting big mates with the other kid, whilst giving out information on possible match ups, pushing ppv cards and giving out smug grins when a certain contemporary is mentioned. There is something slightly nauseating about the whole thing. No, i haven't watched the latest video, but i would imagine that it's the same script everytime. No amount of intenet videos can by the likes of ifilm can save boxing. Overall it lacks the exposure come fight night, is too expensive to watch, either venue wise or ppv and in some cases subscription and doesn't have enough quality fighters worldwide. These ifilm videos and similar incarnations are popular to a degree because they are free to watch online and Eddie is quite happy to use that outlet when it suits him. You can almost smell his eagerness to get shows on to ppv and get people used to the fact that paying a ppv fee on top of an already sunscribed channel is normal. His ruse is that if people pay more ppv, then other fights can be financed.

Boxing has many issues, but the main issue is that it has lost ground with the ordinary casual sports fan, many of whom would follow the sport if it was less expensive and and not exclusively linked a subscripion channel and ppv shows. Boxing has too many governing bodies, too many world champions, too many world title belts, ie, silver blah de blah. The top 20 lists for the different organisations don't even reflect each other. How can you be in the top 10 of one organisation and not be in the top 20 of another ? There is a limited amount of top quality fighters around, the best matches don't get made, whilst the decisions given by judges at fights and accepted by the audience, would be investigated in other sports. Particular divisions are almost bypassed these days, it's gotten so bad. The cruiserweight division is just ignored, the heavyweight division is in a permanent joke state, as a Ukranian robot and his a elder brother dominate over fighters that look hopelessly out of their depth. The middleweight division is very weak and so on and so forth.

Some of the fights that are billed and have been billed as being possible pay ppv are actually a joke. I am not sure if Haye - Harrison was ppv, but as a supposed "big" fight, it ended up as a complete embaressment to the sport. Haye vs Fury will be ppv i guess and look at that in reality. It's a complete miss-match. It took Fury all he had to defeat Cunningham, a not particulalry big cruiswerweight in his day, nevermind at heavyweight, yet he was floored and and was in trouble a few times. The guy is a poor boxer up against someone on a different level quality wise. Who are the real big names is boxing ? Mayweather, sure, Pcquaio, sure, Broner ? really ? Who else ? How many of the so called top boxers in the world could be named by casual fight fans, nevermind the general public ? Not many. With all due respect to our boxers, how many people will know Burns, Macklin, Murray, Barker, Groves, Froch, etc etc ? They possibly know Khan and Haye at best. This is because they lack exposure and that is because of being soley on subscription channels and ppv shows. Your casual sports fan will watch Mayweather, possibly even Haye, but not the rest. Groves, Macklin etc, doesn't light his fire at all.

Boxing needs to have more than just average fights on channel 5 to survive. It needs some quality fights to be shown free to air. Subscription and ppv is here to stay in boxing, but i feel that unless boxing takes the financial blinkers off and re thinks it's approach in terms of fighter profile, how people watch fights, how much they pay, plus other issues that have been mentioned earlier, then the writing is on the wall. It was already become a niche sport over the last 20 years of so. It hardly gets any column inches in the main newspapers and is losing ground with a potentially large audience. Eddie Hearn has said that people like ifilm are used by him to talk to the die hard boxing fan, the internet forum anoraks, not the casual sports / fight fan. But no amount of Eddie talking in his mansion with shades on to Kugan cassius will alter the current state of boxing. It needs a radical re-think, right across the board. Fighters come and go and quality gets replaced with quality in the main, yes, but there isn't as much out there today that compares with 15 to 30 years ago. However, boxing needs to reconnect with it's audience, because being a nich sport isn't where it should be in modern sport.

Rant over. Some will nid in agreement, some will disagree, but you would have to be plain naive or stupid to not see that boxing is in terminal decline and it needs more than half cocked internet interviews with a slick salesman to change it.

I agree with alot of your post but not re Eddie an Ifilm.
Matchroom have the Tv deal because FW went his own way and noone else could compete against them.Its by no means ideal and a broadcaster who could be arsed should rotate promoters bills.Sky for one its cheaper to stick to one secondly Eddie convinced Adam Smith he is the second coming do you blame Hearn for seeing a gap and filling it What Eddie does is bring his brand of promoting he is young and is doing whatever he can to promote his current crop of fighters . The way he goes about it will not suit everyone but he has improved Ifilm by helping them become more professional and entertaining. Fighters now appreciate the little exposure they can get and respond well to Kugan and James.More so Kugan you often get the feeling your listening in on an informal chat between mates.Its part of the charm and as long as the correct information is relayed I'd rather have it in a funny banter filled way .
Boxing has changed there is less interest and a lack of investment from anything other than Ppv.So why would you think that a boxing promoter who though smug compared to some of the characters we have had over the years is tame in that department wouldnt be trying to get money from the only revenue stream available. Its not great but Matchroom are the best outhere at present and watching ifilm gives me sonething to do when im bored at work...and its free.
The sport is fucked because of all the reasons you listed but Eddie abd Kugan are doing alright for the fans at present IMO

I would actually say iFilm are less professional, one of the most important things in journalism is impartiality and iFilm clearly aren't impartial.

They have cosied up to Hearn as he is the main man of the moment they get on clearly .
They have started a film company from scratch on a shoe string and Eddie has helped them along.
I meant production wise really better opening credits better access and more regular uploads.
They are a cheeky fanzine style interview show I think the bafta for journalism is unlikely but its informative and funny which is winning combo for me anyway.

MachoMan09 wrote:There has never been impartiality in journalism, how can there be?

Im sitting on the fence for this one

WelshJack wrote:People need to move with the times, I actually enjoy Eddie Hearn on iFilm London he answers near enough every question and has given us some very good fights.

X2

I don't see how Eddie Hearn or iFilm London have anything to do with boxing flaws. If anything they are trying to promote themselves and boxing.

As mentioned before not many people unless your a fan of the sport will know hardly any names of the fighters. As long as venues are getting sold out and outlets such as Sky and allegedly are showing people will always watch it.

I would love to go to the Burns vs Beltran fight but cannot afford the travel and ticket costs so I will watch from the comfort of my home. I pay for Sky not just for the boxing which in my eyes is just a bonus.

Boxing needs Sky & allegedly & PPV to generate the money to make the bigger fights. Would Cleverly vs Kovalev been on if HBO TV also wasn't backing the fight this weekend? doubt it.

In the UK we don't have it to bad and have lively divisions mainly lightweight and middleweight at the moment in the USA they have to pay ridiculous fees to watch the likes of Mayweather, Broner etc $80.00 for one fight

mickey1975 wrote:

jizzle wrote:The ol' terrestrial solution is over, dead....broadcast is fragmented beyond...digital is here...laptops, tablets, apps....sports need to be omni-channel and that's a fact...broadcast, digital and social...

I agree. And how many people could name five darts players except Phil Taylor? I bet more people know more boxers yet darts is held up as a shining example. When its done right, boxing is huge. Haye-Fury will have the nation gripped next month whereas the month after, at the same venue, Bisping-Munoz will not even be mentioned in the mainstream media. Boxing is doing fine.

It's not doing fine at all. Haye and Fury won't have the nation "gripped" as you say. Fury is a car park brawler and again, people don't really know who he is at all. It's become a niche sport and it's major personalities are virtually unknown outside of anorak sites like this one. Darts has never been an equilvilent to boxing, perhaps it's major time was with Bristow, Lowe, Jocky Wilson etc, but you should be making comparisons with football, cricket, Tennis and golf, not darts !! It's a sign of how low it has got in the publics imagination that you are comparing it with darts as a hallmark of it's supposed success.

355 Berlinetta wrote:

mickey1975 wrote:

jizzle wrote:The ol' terrestrial solution is over, dead....broadcast is fragmented beyond...digital is here...laptops, tablets, apps....sports need to be omni-channel and that's a fact...broadcast, digital and social...

I agree. And how many people could name five darts players except Phil Taylor? I bet more people know more boxers yet darts is held up as a shining example. When its done right, boxing is huge. Haye-Fury will have the nation gripped next month whereas the month after, at the same venue, Bisping-Munoz will not even be mentioned in the mainstream media. Boxing is doing fine.

It's not doing fine at all. Haye and Fury won't have the nation "gripped" as you say. Fury is a car park brawler and again, people don't really know who he is at all. It's become a niche sport and it's major personalities are virtually unknown outside of anorak sites like this one. Darts has never been an equilvilent to boxing, perhaps it's major time was with Bristow, Lowe, Jocky Wilson etc, but you should be making comparisons with football, cricket, Tennis and golf, not darts !! It's a sign of how low it has got in the publics imagination that you are comparing it with darts as a hallmark of it's supposed success.

There are few bigger names in the country than Fury, some of the fighters we consider to be big names are relative nobodies, if you want exposure, box on terrestrial TV, if you're not then it doesn't really matter what channel you're on.

TJ77 wrote:

355 Berlinetta wrote:I wonder if this is it for the next 30 years ? Eddie Hearn acting big mates with the other kid, whilst giving out information on possible match ups, pushing ppv cards and giving out smug grins when a certain contemporary is mentioned. There is something slightly nauseating about the whole thing. No, i haven't watched the latest video, but i would imagine that it's the same script everytime. No amount of intenet videos can by the likes of ifilm can save boxing. Overall it lacks the exposure come fight night, is too expensive to watch, either venue wise or ppv and in some cases subscription and doesn't have enough quality fighters worldwide. These ifilm videos and similar incarnations are popular to a degree because they are free to watch online and Eddie is quite happy to use that outlet when it suits him. You can almost smell his eagerness to get shows on to ppv and get people used to the fact that paying a ppv fee on top of an already sunscribed channel is normal. His ruse is that if people pay more ppv, then other fights can be financed.

Boxing has many issues, but the main issue is that it has lost ground with the ordinary casual sports fan, many of whom would follow the sport if it was less expensive and and not exclusively linked a subscripion channel and ppv shows. Boxing has too many governing bodies, too many world champions, too many world title belts, ie, silver blah de blah. The top 20 lists for the different organisations don't even reflect each other. How can you be in the top 10 of one organisation and not be in the top 20 of another ? There is a limited amount of top quality fighters around, the best matches don't get made, whilst the decisions given by judges at fights and accepted by the audience, would be investigated in other sports. Particular divisions are almost bypassed these days, it's gotten so bad. The cruiserweight division is just ignored, the heavyweight division is in a permanent joke state, as a Ukranian robot and his a elder brother dominate over fighters that look hopelessly out of their depth. The middleweight division is very weak and so on and so forth.

Some of the fights that are billed and have been billed as being possible pay ppv are actually a joke. I am not sure if Haye - Harrison was ppv, but as a supposed "big" fight, it ended up as a complete embaressment to the sport. Haye vs Fury will be ppv i guess and look at that in reality. It's a complete miss-match. It took Fury all he had to defeat Cunningham, a not particulalry big cruiswerweight in his day, nevermind at heavyweight, yet he was floored and and was in trouble a few times. The guy is a poor boxer up against someone on a different level quality wise. Who are the real big names is boxing ? Mayweather, sure, Pcquaio, sure, Broner ? really ? Who else ? How many of the so called top boxers in the world could be named by casual fight fans, nevermind the general public ? Not many. With all due respect to our boxers, how many people will know Burns, Macklin, Murray, Barker, Groves, Froch, etc etc ? They possibly know Khan and Haye at best. This is because they lack exposure and that is because of being soley on subscription channels and ppv shows. Your casual sports fan will watch Mayweather, possibly even Haye, but not the rest. Groves, Macklin etc, doesn't light his fire at all.

Boxing needs to have more than just average fights on channel 5 to survive. It needs some quality fights to be shown free to air. Subscription and ppv is here to stay in boxing, but i feel that unless boxing takes the financial blinkers off and re thinks it's approach in terms of fighter profile, how people watch fights, how much they pay, plus other issues that have been mentioned earlier, then the writing is on the wall. It was already become a niche sport over the last 20 years of so. It hardly gets any column inches in the main newspapers and is losing ground with a potentially large audience. Eddie Hearn has said that people like ifilm are used by him to talk to the die hard boxing fan, the internet forum anoraks, not the casual sports / fight fan. But no amount of Eddie talking in his mansion with shades on to Kugan cassius will alter the current state of boxing. It needs a radical re-think, right across the board. Fighters come and go and quality gets replaced with quality in the main, yes, but there isn't as much out there today that compares with 15 to 30 years ago. However, boxing needs to reconnect with it's audience, because being a nich sport isn't where it should be in modern sport.

Rant over. Some will nid in agreement, some will disagree, but you would have to be plain naive or stupid to not see that boxing is in terminal decline and it needs more than half cocked internet interviews with a slick salesman to change it.

I agree with alot of your post but not re Eddie an Ifilm.
Matchroom have the Tv deal because FW went his own way and noone else could compete against them.Its by no means ideal and a broadcaster who could be arsed should rotate promoters bills.Sky for one its cheaper to stick to one secondly Eddie convinced Adam Smith he is the second coming do you blame Hearn for seeing a gap and filling it What Eddie does is bring his brand of promoting he is young and is doing whatever he can to promote his current crop of fighters . The way he goes about it will not suit everyone but he has improved Ifilm by helping them become more professional and entertaining. Fighters now appreciate the little exposure they can get and respond well to Kugan and James.More so Kugan you often get the feeling your listening in on an informal chat between mates.Its part of the charm and as long as the correct information is relayed I'd rather have it in a funny banter filled way .
Boxing has changed there is less interest and a lack of investment from anything other than Ppv.So why would you think that a boxing promoter who though smug compared to some of the characters we have had over the years is tame in that department wouldnt be trying to get money from the only revenue stream available. Its not great but Matchroom are the best outhere at present and watching ifilm gives me sonething to do when im bored at work...and its free.
The sport is fucked because of all the reasons you listed but Eddie abd Kugan are doing alright for the fans at present IMO

That is my main point really. Yes, boxing is knackered because of some of the issues i raise and i think it needs a character / businessman who can see the flaws and generate a whole new platform for boxing to operate out of. As i said, Eddie hearn is a slick salesman, an opportinist, he isn't the man to whom boxing should look to change things and yet he is in a position of some prominence with the sport domestically and to a degree internationally. My flippant point was that it's better to give fans what they actually want, which is to have more quality for far less money on different media outlets. These ifilm London videos are ok, but they are just a tool that Eddie uses for his convenince and they won't make much difference to the numbers watching the sport. Talk to the anoraks, fine, but your big business will come from the casuals.

Expe,

Just my opinion, but few people really know who Tyson Fury is. I have a load of mates who i would describe as casual sport fans, regular football watchers etc and they have seen Fury a few times on channel 5. After a fight, most of them have said " He looks crap and overweight " and whilst that sounds like a typical off teh cuff comment from the unitiated, it kind of sums up what most people think outside of boxing forums and ifilm videos etc.

355 Berlinetta wrote:Expe,

Just my opinion, but few people really know who Tyson Fury is. I have a load of mates who i would describe as casual sport fans, regular football watchers etc and they have seen Fury a few times on channel 5. After a fight, most of them have said " He looks crap and overweight " and whilst that sounds like a typical off teh cuff comment from the unitiated, it kind of sums up what most people think outside of boxing forums and ifilm videos etc.

I agree that no one particularly rates him, in fact some abuse him at every opportunity, but people know who he is, he's one of the best known fighters in the country, there's plenty that know Eubank Jr as well because he's on channel 5.

bigB wrote:I don't see how Eddie Hearn or iFilm London have anything to do with boxing flaws. If anything they are trying to promote themselves and boxing.

As mentioned before not many people unless your a fan of the sport will know hardly any names of the fighters. As long as venues are getting sold out and outlets such as Sky and Allegedly channel are showing people will always watch it.

I would love to go to the Burns vs Beltran fight but cannot afford the travel and ticket costs so I will watch from the comfort of my home. I pay for Sky not just for the boxing which in my eyes is just a bonus.

Boxing needs Sky & Allegedly channel & PPV to generate the money to make the bigger fights. Would Cleverly vs Kovalev been on if HBO TV also wasn't backing the fight this weekend? doubt it.

In the UK we don't have it to bad and have lively divisions mainly lightweight and middleweight at the moment in the USA they have to pay ridiculous fees to watch the likes of Mayweather, Broner etc $80.00 for one fight

My point is that boxing needs to alter dramatically for it to survive. It's become a niche sport in recent years, doesn't get any column inches, lacks personalities, real quality fighters and is too expensive to watch. That needs to change and so people like Eddie Hearn should be in a position to change the sport completly. Instead, we get prizefighter, a competition for washed up pro's and nightclub doormen. Each to their own, but i think it's totally naff and lacks any quality whatsoever. Venue's are only getting sold out for a few fighters. You say that a fight like Cleverley vs Kovalev wouldn't have been set up without ppv money etc, fine, but who the hell is Nathan Cleverly on the world scene ?? He is Euro level at best and that is why he got wiped out so quickly. One of the problems of having four world title belts at a time is that average boxers can get titles and call themselves "world champions" when in reality they aren't in that class.

Cleverley is a clear example of that. So too is Darren Barker. Good luck to the kid, with his life story and all, but the only champion at that weight is Martinez and he lost to him. He takes on Geale, a far less skilled boxer and beats him, suprise suprise, but is he THE middleweight champion of the world ? Not at all. People are paying good money to watch fairly average boxers fight it out for paper-weight alphabet titles that mean very little to anyone outside boxing's little bubble. If people are happy with that, fair enough, even Joe Bugner claims he is an ex heavyweight world champion lol. Not for me, i prefer them to fight for the real titles against the major and obvious champions. PPV to watch Haye vs Fury lol, it's laughable really.

expe wrote:

355 Berlinetta wrote:Expe,

Just my opinion, but few people really know who Tyson Fury is. I have a load of mates who i would describe as casual sport fans, regular football watchers etc and they have seen Fury a few times on channel 5. After a fight, most of them have said " He looks crap and overweight " and whilst that sounds like a typical off teh cuff comment from the unitiated, it kind of sums up what most people think outside of boxing forums and ifilm videos etc.

I agree that no one particularly rates him, in fact some abuse him at every opportunity, but people know who he is, he's one of the best known fighters in the country, there's plenty that know Eubank Jr as well because he's on channel 5.

I beg to differ mate. I think you would be suprised at how many people wouldn't have a clue who Tyson Fury was. Do a little excercise. Ask people you don't know that well if they have heard of Bellew, Froch, Macklin, Murray, Barker, Groves, Mitchell, Chisora. After they have said " Substitues for Oxford united ??? " ask them whether they have heard of Hopkins, Jones, Mosley, Mayweather, Broner, Pacquaio ? Again, you will be suprised at the blank look they give you. Why ? Because people don't watch or pay to watch people they know nothing of and haven't seen fight. It's a problem. Would you pay £15 to go and watch a football team you had never heard of ? Football is subscription AND free to air and shows quality games aswell, like the champions league, Europe league, league cup and the F.A cup, which is a fiar bit of free to air football All free to air boxing is shite and that is a rarity and that is the difference.