By CARLO L. PAMINTUAN
A list of the top 10 pay-per-views for 2010 was recently released and it is no surprise that Manny Pacquiao’s two fights last year both made it to the list. His fight against Antonio Margarito was in the second spot with 1,150,000 buys and the one against Joshua Clottey sold 700,000, good enough for the eighth spot.
The top seller for 2010 was the fight between Floyd Mayweather and Shane Mosley, which gained 1.4 million buys.
The biggest reason for Mayweather outselling Pacquiao is that Mayweather had a better dance partner in Molsey, who at that time was fresh from a dominant knockout victory over Margarito. Pacquiao, on the other hand, faced a relative unknown in Clottey and a disgraced fighter in Margarito, who, after losing to Mosley, was suspended for a year because his trainer was caught trying to load his gloves.
Another factor was HBO’s 24/7 series. HBO produced the four-part documentary for both Mayweather-Mosley and Pacquiao-Margarito but they didn’t bother to do it for Pacquiao-Clottey. In the Mayweather-Mosley 24/7 series, Mayweather played the villain’s role perfectly. He was portrayed as an egotistical fighter who had wads of cash in his bedroom. A lot of people bought the pay-per-view solely for the chance to see Mayweather get beaten up.
The fact that both Mayweather and Mosley are Americans also affected the PPV buys. Both are native English speakers, so they were able to promote their fight well. Pacquiao takes learning English seriously and he tries his best to promote his fights, but Margarito barely speaks any English.
Pacquiao knows that a fight with Mayweather will sell the most PPVs, but because Mayweather is not interested in fighting him, Pacquiao chose the next best option by fighting Mosley in May.
After those three fights, the list was dominated by the UFC. The top seller for the MMA company was a card that was bannered by a heavyweight championship match between then-champion Brock Lesnar and Shane Carwin. Lesnar also holds the fifth spot with his fight against current champion Cain Velasquez.
Rounding out the top ten are Rampage Jackson versus Rashad Evans (fourth), Georges St. Pierre versus Josh Koscheck (sixth), St. Pierre versus Dan Hardy (seventh), Anderson Silva versus Chael Sonnen (ninth), and Frank Edgar versus B.J. Penn/Randy Couture versus James Toney (10th).
Lesnar, a former WWE superstar, crowned himself PPV king as he also sold a total of 2.1 million PPVs in his two fights. He outsold Pacquiao by 150,000 buys.
Mayweather would have had the chance to be the top seller but he chose not to fight for the rest of the year.
As the legendary Joe Frazier said, “boxing is the only sport you can get your brain shook, your money took, and your name in the undertaker book" yet a few brave men choose to fight for a living. Fighting, in their minds, is the best way to live a better life.
From the moment they throw their first punch, Filipino boxers are already heavy underdogs. They have to make do with rice sacks filled with sand for a punching bags and shirts wrapped around their hands for gloves. They fight for meager pay and, after they fight, they’d have to run back to their jobs in the construction site because they need to feed their families.
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