There’s little doubt Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Conor McGregor‘s fight Saturday will be one of the most lucrative in boxing history. The question is whether it becomes the sport’s richest event ever.
The wait is nearly over, with Mayweather vs. McGregor a little over a day away. The two fighters are already in Las Vegas for Friday’s weigh-in, which is scheduled for 4:30 p.m. ET.
Financially, Mayweather’s victory over Manny Pacquiao in May 2015 set the gold standard in boxing.
According to CNN’s Chris Isidore, the fight earned roughly $500 million in total revenue between ticket and pay-per-view sales. ESPN’s Darren Rovell reported Mayweather earned between $220 million and $230 million for his fight purse, while Pacquiao took home a little more than $150 million—before Top Rank and Top Rank president Bob Arum took their respective cuts of Pacquiao’s purse.
TMZ Sports shared a clip from Showtime’s All Access: Mayweather vs. McGregor series in which Mayweather said he expects to make $300 million from Saturday’s event.
The Independent’s Luke Brown wrote Mayweather may earn 70 to 75 percent of the fight purse with McGregor. Isidore reported Mayweather received 60 percent of the fight purse against Pacquiao.
In terms of pay-per-view revenue, topping Mayweather vs. Pacquiao will be difficult to beat. Isidore reported 4.4 million households purchased the PPV. Mayweather vs. McGregor will need to surpass that figure in order to earn more money since the two events both charged $89.95 for the standard feed and $99.95 for the high-definition feed.
Mayweather and McGregor do, however, have the venue working in their favor. Rather than MGM Grand Garden Arena, where Mayweather fought his last 12 fights, Saturday’s bout is in the T-Mobile Arena.
The Los Angeles Times‘ Lance Pugmire wrote in June that the T-Mobile Arena can seat 4,000 more people than the MGM Grand Garden Arena, which creates the possibility of higher gate revenue.
The strategy may also prove counterproductive in that it could further emphasize fans aren’t as excited for the prospect of Mayweather vs. McGregor as they were for Mayweather vs. Pacquiao, the latter of which had already come a few years too late to truly mean anything.
Pugmire reported Aug. 7 as many as 10,000 tickets—3,000 from the general sale and 7,000 from the secondary market—were still available for Saturday’s fight.
The promotional tour that was supposed to talk fans into either purchasing Mayweather vs. McGregor on PPV or paying for a ticket may have backfired somewhat as well.
Bleacher Report’s Jeremy Botter wrote a critique of the third stop on the world tour in Brooklyn, New York:
“The Brooklyn variation? It was more like Mayweather and McGregor setting all of that money on fire, then dumping the still-hot embers back on the rest of us.
“Yes, it was that bad. In every way imaginable. It is bad enough that Mayweather’s new idea of fight promotion consists of cursing and a whole lot of nothing else. It is bad enough that the whole thing started two hours late, leaving thousands of waiting fans irate.”
That’s along with the fact McGregor is a 13-4 underdog, according to OddsShark. Pacquiao, in comparison, was an 8-5 underdog, per OddsShark.
McGregor is approaching his first professional boxing bout against one of the best defensive boxers of all time.
And it would be one thing if fans could count on a knockout or quick stoppage, such as Mike Tyson or Ronda Rousey fighting in their respective primes. At their peaks, Tyson and Rousey guaranteed excitement, even if their fights only lasted a matter of minutes.
Mayweather, on the other hand, is very methodical and cares little for spectacle in the ring. It’s easy envisioning him running circles around McGregor and landing enough blows to impress the judges. While that would be a winning strategy, it’d offer little in the way of entertainment—one of the biggest criticisms from Mayweather vs. Pacquiao.
Mayweather vs. McGregor may be a unique fight, but star power alone may not be enough for the event to match the revenue generated by Mayweather vs. Pacquiao. The perceived gulf in class between the two fighters may wind up turning some fans away, thereby costing Mayweather and McGregor money.
According to Brown, Mayweather and McGregor signed a confidentiality agreement as part of their contract, which could make it difficult to figure out their exact earnings from the event.
At the very least, though, the fighters stand to gain a payout in the nine figures.
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