Victor Ortiz has finally outdone himself in the worst way possible.
- Ortiz Charges – Victor Ortiz will not be competing Sunday night on FS1 as scheduled for absolutely terrible reasons. The former titleholder has been arrested on multiple charges of sexual violence including forcible rape. I prefer to let cases play out in court and to withhold personal judgment until then, but obviously Premier Boxing Champions was not going to let him continue. Nor should they. Almost any job would let him go anyway for the public image aspect of it and boxing is as extreme of a case as they come. Not only is there that element to worry about, but there is also safety. A fighter could not be focused under these circumstances. The sport is dangerous enough without factoring in one combatant not being mentally there. Plus, if Ortiz is found guilty, he’ll spend the rest of what could have been his fighting years in prison so there is little reason to build him up for another fight anyway. The show will go on without him and PBC is looking for a last second replacement to fight John Molina Jr.
- Early Christmas – December 1st looks like boxing Christmas this year. Not only is the major heavyweight title fight between Deontay Wilder and Tyson Fury on Showtime PPV that night, but Showtime has also picked up longtime light heavyweight titleholder Adonis Stevenson’s excellent defense against Oleksandr Gvozdyk for the same day. To accommodate both shows, the premium network will put on the light heavyweight title headlined card on at 7 PM Eastern in order for it to conclude by the 9 PM start of the PPV. A two hour slot indicates an undercard fight on that show too. A traditional PPV broadcast is four fights, so we are looking at a massive six fight night from Showtime in all likelihood with both shows headlined by truly fascinating matchups.
- GGG-Canelo 2 #s – This has been well reported elsewhere by now, but the numbers are in for the recent major PPV and it did quite well. 1.1 million buys is the loose final count. While that is down from 1.3 million buys the first go around, the show was more expensive for the sequel so it ended up grossing more PPV revenue anyway. The live gate was down a couple million too, but it still brought in almost $24,000,000 from tickets alone. None of this factors in what the show did with its movie theater showings or the money it generated in Mexico where an astonishing number of people tuned in for the television broadcast. About 33 million Mexicans watched the fight live on either TV Azteca or Televisa. I can’t even imagine the ad revenue generated there, or the rights fee those two networks must have coughed up to get it at all. Even if the core numbers were slightly down, it is clear that there is an absurd amount of money at the table for a third fight between the sport’s two top middleweights. I’m sure it will happen next year as long as neither of them lose or do something else to endanger it.
- DAZN Canada – Good news, Canadian readers! DAZN Canada has signed on to broadcast the same Eddie Hearn shows as DAZN USA has in the form of 16 American shows and 16 British shows a year. The first of which comes on October 6th from Chicago and is headlined by Jessie Vargas in against Thomas Dulorme. Artur Beterbiev, Daniel Roman, and Jarrell Miller also compete on the same card. Streaming services are not physically limited to one country like lineal television channels always have been. As international rights come up for bidding, we could see more things like this in which a consistent service ends up serving up events globally rather than different channels doing it regionally. It is an interesting possibility to consider.
- Garcia-Commey? – The IBF purse bid for Mikey Garcia’s hypothetical defense against mandatory challenger Richard Commey has been pushed back to October 2nd at the request of both camps. To be honest, I don’t really know what to make of it either. No one has believed that Mikey ever intended to defend against Commey. The pound for pound elite has made it very clear that he wants to make the huge jump to welterweight to fight Errol Spence Jr instead. He’s chasing money fights, whether they make sense or not, and Richard Commey is not a money fight. Yet, if he wasn’t considering it as an option, then why would Commey’s camp want this pushed back? It would be in their interest to force the bid so Garcia has to withdraw and a vacant title fight can be ordered. The only reason for them to agree for it to be delayed would be if they think they can actually reach a deal with Garcia’s team. That would be counter to expectations, but probably a pretty good fight. The Ghanaian has done well against other top fighters. We’ll have to wait and see how this one plays out.
