By Sean Jones: Triller won today’s purse bid for the lightweight clash between undisputed champion Teofimo Lopez and George Kambosos Jr with a high bid of $6.02 million, and there are now talks of them placing the fight on the undercard of the exhibition match between Mike Tyson and Evander Holyfield on pay-per-view.
Teofimo, 23, will be getting a career-high purse of $3, 911,700. However, Teo will wind up with roughly $3, 129,360 due to Top Rank getting a 20 percent cut at $782,340 from the $3, 911,700, according to Dan Rafael.
It’s still a good figure for Teofimo for a fight that is expected to be a mismatch against Kamboso, who looked horrible in his recent IBF title eliminator against Lee Selby.
When it was first learned that Triller had put in a ridiculously high winning bid of $6 million for the Teofimo-Kambosos fight, it sounded like an insane thing to do, given that the next highest bid was $3.51 million from Matchroom Boxing.
But now that we’re hearing that Triller is planning on adding the Teofimo vs. Kambososo fight to the Tyson vs. Holyfield exhibition match card, it makes sense that they paid so much to win the bid.
For the boxing fans are celebrating Triller winning today’s Teofimo – Kamboso purse bid with their $6 million bid, they need to see the big picture for what this will mean to them.
If Triller does place Teofimo’s fight with Kambosos on the Tyson-Holyfield pay-per-view card, it means you’ll have to pay to see the fight.
“An emerging potential landing spot for Lopez-Kambosos: On the undercard of a discussed exhibition match between Mike Tyson and Evander Holyfield,” said Chris Mannix on Twitter.
“That is a staggering number for Triller to bid. Expectation coming in was that Matchroom would bid in the $3 million range, and they did.
“Top Rank a little below. Triller just opened the vault. Now we see how Lopez performs on pay per view.”
Paying to see Teofimo (16-0, 12 KOs) fight the over-matched Kamboso (19-0, 10 KOs) on PPV might not be the cup of tea for a lot of boxing fans. It’s one thing to pay to see Teofimo face someone like Vasily Lomachenko, Ryan Garcia, Gervonta Davis, or Devin Haney, but quite another for him to make a simple title defense against the no-name Kambosos.
If you’re like the average fan that has no interest in watching 54-year-old Mike Tyson face 58-year-old Evander Holyfield in an exhibition, you’re not going to be excited at having to pay whatever Triller is charging for the card just to watch Teofimo face Kambosos.
If that’s the only fight you want to see, it’s cost a heck of a lot more than it would have if the match had been shown on ESPN+. Let’s say, for example, Triller charges $60 or $70 for the Holyfield vs. Tyson card on PPV, that’s a lot of money for fans that are only interested in seeing Teofimo fight.
It’s not interesting for a lot of boxing fans to see two older fighters in Tyson and Holyfield fight an exhibition. If you were one of the ones that paid to see Mike Tyson’s last exhibition match against Roy Jones Jr on November 28th last year, you probably weren’t happy with the results.
The fight was scored an 8-round draw, and it looked like both were pulling their punches. In other words, it was like watching a soft sparring match between friends.
DiBella celebrates Kambosos becoming a millionaire
“Lou DiBella, promoter for George Kambosos, with a succinct response to Triller’s $6 million bid, of which Kambosos gets 35%. “George is going to be a millionaire,” Mannix said.
It’s nice that Kambosos is a millionaire, but how does that benefit the after fan? Where’s the gain for the average fan?
Top Rank promoter Bob Arum doesn’t need to worry about putting on the Teofimo vs. Kambosos fight now that he’s been outbid. Top Rank put in a bid of $2.32 million for the Teofimo-Kambosos bid on Thursday, but they didn’t have any reason to try and compete with the huge bid by Triller.
Arum had no plans on placing Teofimo’s fight with an old-timer fight like Tyson-Holyfield. Even had the option, it’s unlikely Arum would go that route. It’s not an added gain for Teofimo because fewer boxing fans will see him because they’re not going to purchase the Tyson vs. Holyfield
Teofimo to get $3, 129,360
“LopezKambosos purse bid results: Triller wins at $6.018M, Matchroom $3.506M, Top Rank 2.315M. Lopez gets 65% of winning bid:
$3,911,700 but minus TR’s 20% cut ($782,340). Kambosos gets $2,106,300 minus whatever his deal is with DiBella. Both fighters make BY FAR biggest purses,” said Dan Rafael on Twitter.