Broner-Theophane averages 1.013M viewers on Spike

By Boxing News - 04/04/2016 - Comments

1-LR_FIGHT NIGHT-BRONER vs THEOPHANE-04012016-8752By Dan Ambrose: Adrien “The Problem” Broner (32-2, 24 KOs) proved last Friday night that he can really bring in the ratings in his fight against #9 WBA Ashley “Treasure” Theophane (39-7-1, 11 KOs) on Premier Boxing Champions on Spike TV from the DC Armory in Washington, DC.

The Broner-Theophane fight averaged a whopping 1.013 million viewers on Spike TV, which makes it the most watched PBC fight in the history of Spike. That’s pretty impressive. The card as a whole averaged 873,000 viewers, which also turned out to be a record for Spike.

The Broner vs. Theophane fight may not have been the most competitive match-up, but it did bring in the ratings. You have to imagine that the fans that tuned in to see the fight card were people that watched it due to the highly popular 26-year-old Broner rather than because of Theophane. After the fight, Broner said he wanted to personally thank Theophane’s promoter Floyd Mayweather Jr. for matching him up against him because it was such easy money. It wasn’t an easy fight though for Broner, as Theophane pushed the pace of the fight frpom the 1st round and touched Broner up with his shots.

“Records are made to be broken #AboutBillions I wanna thank all my fans I couldn’t have done it,” said Broner on his Twitter.

It was a competitive fight, and it shouldn’t have been. What Theophane showed in that fight is that Broner isn’t good enough to dominate fringe level 140lb fighters when they’re highly motivated like Theophane was. Broner is now moving up to welterweight for the second time, and it’s going to be interesting to see how he does in this weight class the second time around. Broner will need to fight with more intensity, and throw more punches if he wants to be able to beat guys like Shawn Porter, Keith Thurman, Tim Bradley, Amir Khan, Kell Brook and Errol Spence Jr. If Broner can’t beat these guys then he needs to move back down in weight.

On paper, this was a fight that shouldn’t have brought in big numbers on Spike because Broner had to do the heavy lifting himself due to his opponent Theophane not being a well-known fighter among the casdual boxing fans in America. But it shows that Broner is someone that can pull in the ratings.

If Broner is able to bring in these kinds of ratings fighting a guy like the 35-year-old Theophane, then imagine the kinds of ratings he would get if he were matched up against the likes of Floyd Mayweather Jr., Danny Garcia, Keith Thurman or Tim Bradley. Broner’s adviser Al Haymon needs to start matching him against more notable names again because the last time Broner fought a popular fighter was last year in his loss to Shawn Porter. Since that fight, Broner has beaten Theophane and Khabib Allakhverdiev.

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Broner has some legal problems that he needs to take care of in his hometown of Cincinnati, Ohio for the next three to four months, so it’s likely that we won’t see Broner fight again until later in the year in October or November. I’d be surprised if Broner is back before October. I think his legal issues will take him until the tail end of 2016.

Hopefully, Broner doesn’t have his career halted for five or more years due to his legal issues. That would be a real pity because he’s already won four division world titles, and it’s quite possible that Broner could win a fifth division world title if he were to move up to 154 to take on WBO junior middleweight champion Liam Smith for his title.

Broner says he’d like to fight Floyd Mayweather Jr. next so that he can settle his issues with him, but Mayweather isn’t going to give him the opportunity. Mayweather says he wants to see Broner fight other people like Errol Spence Jr. or Shawn Porter. Mayweather would have included Marcos Maidana’s name to that list, but he’s retired with the money that he made in his last two fights of his career against Mayweather. Broner was beaten by Maidana in 2013, and he never avenged that loss unfortunately.

After the Theophane fight, Broner spoke of wanting to fight WBC welterweight champion Danny Garcia for his title. A fight between those guys would bring good ratings on Spike if it were to be made. Whether the Broner-Garcia fight happens or not will be determined in the near future by Broner’s adviser Haymon, and on whether he can take care of his legal problems.



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