By Sean Jones: Last Saturday night’s mega-fight between welterweight champions Errol Spence Jr. and Terence Crawford pulled in 650,000 PPV buys in the U.S., earning them each $25 million.
According to Dan Rafael, the PPV numbers for Spence vs. Crawford could reach as high as 675,000 pay-per-view buys from the domestic audience.
What those numbers mean is that it’s almost a given that we’ll see a rematch between Spence (28-1, 22 KOs) and the undisputed 147-lb champion Crawford (40-0, 31 KOs) later this year in December.
Spence & Crawford won’t make similar money fighting anybody at 147. Although Crawford says he wants to fight undisputed junior middleweight champion Jermell Charlo next, that’s not going to happen.
Jermell is challenging Canelo Alvarez for his undisputed 168-lb championship on September 30th, and as bad as the Mexican star has looked in his last four fights, he’ll lose to Charlo.
That means we’ll see a Canelo-Jermell rematch unless Canelo loses his nerve and avoids Jermell as he did after his defeat against Dmitry Bivol.
In this case, the sting of Canelo’s wounded pride will get the better of him, conquering his fear and making him fight Jermell again to try and save his shattered public image.
Many boxing fans are opposed to seeing a Crawford-Spence rematch take place, considering how one-sided their fight was last weekend, with Crawford knocking Spence down three times before the bout was stopped in the ninth round.
From a business perspective, it makes sense for a Crawford-Spence rematch to take place because many fans will still be willing to pay to see a second fight.
To help improve the buy rate for a rematch, it would be wise for the following things to take place:
- PPV buy price lowered to $65
- Spence takes a tune-up against a quality opponent
- Inventive marketing
- Have Crawford lighten up and joke with the media
Per sources, #SpenceCrawford PPV generated at least 650k domestic buys, grossing $55M with it quite possible to get to 675k range. Add in gate of more than $20M and fight was a huge success. Both fighters will make at least $25M apiece. Spence was entitled to a slightly higher %.
— Dan Rafael (@DanRafael1) August 3, 2023
“I respect the hell out of Errol. This never was personal. I think the fans picking sides tried to make it personal, divide and conquer two fighters going for the same goal. I never had any hatred towards Errol,” said Crawford to HOT97.
Obviously, it wasn’t personal for Crawford because he called Spence up on the phone to talk to him in a friendly way to get the fight done in the first place. If Crawford wasn’t on good terms with Spence, that phone call wouldn’t have happened, and the fight wouldn’t have occurred.
Now, it’s up to Spence to decide whether he wants to proceed with the rematch with Crawford or rest, recover & look to rebuild his career.
If Spence chooses to execute the rematch clause, the second fight must occur at 154, and he must begin training as soon as possible to keep his weight down. Errol showed the classic sign of weight drained fighter last Saturday night with these signs:
1. Muscle weakness
2. Reduced speed
3. Fatigue
4. Absence of power