Showtime and HBO have set the price for their upcoming pay-per-view coverage of the hotly anticipated Floyd Mayweather Jr.-Manny Pacquiao bout. Deadline.com reports that the event, which many observers are calling the fight of the century, will have the highest-ever PPV price point, $89.95.
“That $89.95 is 40% more than the previous PPV high-water mark of $64.95 for Floyd Mayweather Jr.’s fight against Canelo Alverez in September 2013 and the undefeated champ’s two subsequent bouts against Marcos Maidana,” Deadline notes.
The big fight, set for May 2, is being put on by both HBO and Showtime because Showtime has a contract with Mayweather while Pacquiao has a deal with HBO.
Deadline has reported: “This will mark only the second time the premium nets have worked together on a PPV bout. The other was in 2002 when then-heavyweight champ Lennox Lewis, who had an exclusive deal with HBO, knocked out ex-champ Mike Tyson, who was with Showtime.”
The fight has little competition in scrapping for the title of “Fight of the Century” when it comes to the 21st century. But insiders have long duked it out over applying the label to one of the many epic bouts of the 20th century. Most modern analysts seem to have settled on Joe Frazier’s victory over Muhammad Ali in 1971.
Among the other contenders for “Fight of the (20th) Century”: the Jim Jeffries-Jack Johnson bout in 1910, dominated by Johnson, and two fights between Joe Louis and Max Schmeling, in 1936 and 1938, with each fighter claiming one victory.
Seriously? $89.95 to watch a fight on your own TV set? A fight that’s already subsidized by no less than 14 corporate logos on the poster (not even counting Showtime and HBO? A fight that could be over in 30 seconds?
Er, no thanks.
The event is supposed to make money, not play as a charity. Gather your friends into your house, everyone chips in 10 bucks and you get 3-4 hours of entertainment without having to drive to an arena to watch dodgy closed circuit on a big screen as we did up until the 1990’s..
The funny thing is about 10 years ago they had one of these fights at at 9pm they were supposed to switch away from it and go to pay per view. The fight started a few minutes early and by the time the PPV window was to happen the fight had been won by a knockout. LOL
Wish you could remember the names as I dont have that fight in my collection. PPV starts at 9pm (generally). But main event fighters are under contract to not begin their bout before 11pm, 11:30pm etc.
That way. early knock outs do not have any bearing on them being rushed to the ring and they get to do a full warm-up with the mitts etc.
My posters relating to Ali-Frazier I usually refer to it as The Fight. Other posters I have call it Battle of the Champions and my most iconic poster calls it Battle of the Champions. Fight of the Millennium goes to De La Hoya vs Trinidad.