By Dan Ambrose: Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis vs. Hector Luis Garcia reportedly brought in a respectable 200,000 to 215,000 pay-per-view buys for their January 7th fight on Showtime PPV from the Capitol One Arena in Washington, D.C.
Dan Rafael is reporting the PPV numbers for the Gervonta vs. Hector fight, and he notes that the figures are consistent with three of Tank’s previous fights on Showtime pay-per-view. The numbers are higher than the 61,000 PPV buys reported by Rick Glaser this week for the Tank vs. Garcia fight.
Unfortunately, the numbers that Tank-Hector brought in are considered good for this era of pay-per-view, given how piracy has taken a massive bite out of this method of bringing in revenue. In the past, a successful PPV event would pull in over one million buys, but not anymore.
“Gervonta “Tank” Davis’ ninth-round knockout of Hector Luis Garcia on Jan. 7 generated more than 200,000 buys for the Showtime PPV card,” said Dan Rafael on his Substack site.
“The final tally likely will not exceed 215,000 buys, one of the sources said.”
When Tank Davis fights Ryan Garcia in April on Showtime PPV, that event could bring in over one million buys. Obviously, piracy will be a huge problem for that event as well, but given the interest in that fight, it’ll still do numbers like we used to see during Floyd Mayweather Jr and Manny Pacquiao’s heydays.
“I wanted to continue. I kept telling myself, ‘Should I or shouldn’t it? But I wanted to,” said Hector Luis Garcia to Fight Hub TV, talking about his knockout. “I was halfway done with the fight, so that’s why I wanted to continue.
“My corner made the decision to stop it, but even after they stopped it, my vision was very blurry, and I couldn’t see. It’s normal for me. I have too many years. I know how to deal with the criticism. It doesn’t affect me,” said Hector when asked if he was bothered by the many boxing fans that say he quit against Tank.
“Tank is a good fighter. He didn’t knock me out. He has a record because his opponents fear him. They build his career by their fear and talking about his power. Although I took his power punches, I wanted to continue. He didn’t push me back or buckle me.
“I felt like I could still take all his punches, and as the rounds kept going, I was getting more confident. If the fight had continued, I felt like I could have finished him,” said Garcia.
The #TankDavis–#HectorLuisGarcia PPV number with all platforms in did just 61,000 buys, which is much less than I had thought it would do. Tank is a great ticket seller, but he's not selling PPV, as it's illegally being streamed. Pirating is really killing the #Boxing PPV model.
— Rick Glaser (@RealRickGlaser1) January 18, 2023