By Sean Jones: Saul Canelo Alvarez’s 11th round knockout victory over WBO light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev on November 2 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas generated a live gate of $8,173,920 from 10,005 tickets purchased. There were 1,643 complimentary tickets given away due to the fight NOT being a sellout.
Canelo’s gate numbers are DOWN
This number is down from Canelo’s fight last May against Daniel Jacobs at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. That fight brought in a live gate of $8,685,750 from 15,740 tickets sold, according to Dan Rafael. If you’re DAZN, you’re probably not too happy at seeing Canelo’s deteriorating numbers, because it suggests that he’s not taking the fights that he need to for him to keep his numbers up.
Fans want to see Canelo fight the BEST, not the WORST champions
The drop off in numbers for Canelo tells you that the fans weren’t excited at seeing him fight an over-the-hill 36-year-old Kovalev rather than a talent like Gennadiy Golovkin. Canelo chose to go soft in moving up to 175 to win his fourth division world title.
Canelo could have fought these champions at 175:
- Artur Beterbiev
- Dmitry Bivol
- Jean Pascal
Kovalev was viewed as the easiest of the three champions at light heavyweight. If Canelo wanted to impress the boxing world, he could have fought IBF/WBC light heavyweight champion Artur Beterbiev, WBA Super World champion Dmitry Bivol or WBA ‘regular’ champion Jean Pascal. Those three champs are all fighting at a higher level than Kovalev, but they’re also infinitely more dangerous.
Yeah, those would have been risky fights for Canelo, but at least his gate numbers wouldn’t be deteriorating like they are now. The problem with Canelo hand-picking the weakest of the champions is it’s off putting.
This is what this writer was afraid of when the Canelo vs Kovalev fight was announced. It had mismatch written all over it. Kovalev was like an old toothless lion, who could no longer hold off the younger lions. It didn’t matter that Canelo isn’t a light heavyweight.
Canelo expected to move down to 168 to face Saunders
According to reports, preliminary talks have started for Canelo to face WBO super middleweight champion Billy Joe Saunders next May. Saunders is considered the weakest of the champions at 168 right now, and he’s not well known with U.S fans.
If Canelo faces Saunders, one can expect to see a further decline in his gate numbers. Whether Canelo cares about that is unknown. He’s got a huge 11-fight, $365 million contract with DAZN. The money is going to roll in for Canelo whether he fights good opponents are not.
Saunders looked dreadfully bad in struggling to beat fringe contender Marcelo Coceres last Saturday. He was able to stop the fringe contender Coceres in round 11 after clipping him with a shot to the back of his head. He then proceeded to drop the Argentinian three times before the contest was halted.
U.S boxing fans want to see Canelo fight Callum Smith, David Benavidez or Caleb Plant at 168. They have NO interest in watching Canelo face Saunders.