The “War” Between The UFC and Boxing

The boxing world claimed victory over the UFC in the pay-per-view battle between UFC103, and the fight card featuring Floyd Mayweather Jr, and Juan Manuel Marquez. The Mayweather/Marquez card appears to have broken the million buys mark, which is a big achievement for boxing. While UFC pay-per-view buys are not reported, it is believed that they were much lower. However, the “war” is far from over.

The UFC was probably heavily outdrawn in PPV buys despite UFC president Dana White’s prediction that the UFC 103 card would bring more buys than the Mayweather fight. While exact figures have not been released, UFC 103 probably fell well short of 500, 000 buys.

Boxing fans will see this result as a sign that boxing is still bigger than MMA. Realistically, though, the PPV numbers don’t tell the whole story.

Floyd Mayweather Jr. has been involved in most of boxing’s biggest PPV events over the past three years. His fights with Ricky Hatton and Oscar De La Hoya were big PPV successes. Many people have thought that those fights were successful not because of Mayweather, but because of his opponents. While it is true that fans want to see more than one good fighter in the ring, Mayweather is also a large part of the PPV successes of these fights.

Hatton and De La Hoya were never drew bigger than they did against Mayweather, so clearly Mayweather has something to do with their successes.

Marquez also has his own legion of fans, so it should have been no surprise that a fight between Marquez and Mayweather would draw a big number.

Even if the Mayweather was a big favorite heading into the bout, that has never been a problem for him in terms of PPV buys. Most experts agreed that Mayweather was a big favorite before his fights with Hatton and De La Hoya, but that didn’t stop people from buying those fights.

But aside from just those numbers, consider that Mayweather and Marquez are two of the best boxers, pound for pound, and are both highly ranked. They are two of the biggest names in boxing.

In contrast, UFC 103 pitted Rich Franklin, who has never been a huge PPV draw, against Vitor Belfort, who left the UFC before the UFC was as a big a PPV draw as it is now.

Rich Franklin has been a good gap-filler for the UFC, headlining or co-headlining UFC cards when no other main event is available. But his status as a fighter fighter destined never again to hold a title has taken away some of his luster as a drawing power.

Vitor Belfort, though well-known to hardcore MMA fans, hasn’t had the kind of recent success to bring in massive PPV buys. His win over Franklin is his biggest in the last five years.

So here we have a case where two of boxing’s top fighters were able to heavily outdraw two UFC fighters who aren’t even close to being the top draws in the UFC. The result should have been expected.

However, if the UFC did bring its biggest stars head-to-head against boxing’s biggest stars, the result would be a lot closer. UFC 100 did very well because it featured Brock Lesnar and Georges St.Pierre.

Furthermore, the UFC has a lot more big drawing fighters than does boxing. The UFC puts on 13 PPV shows every year, while only a few boxing cards come draw even as big a number as the least successful UFC cards.

I’m not trying to say that the UFC is “winning the war” over boxing. Such an analysis would be too simple. But to claim a victory or defeat over the last so-called battle between the UFC and boxing is like claiming global warming as the cause of any one specific hurricane or drought.

Boxing still has a much larger foothold in Europe and Latin American than the UFC, and I don’t expect the UFC to become more popular than Manny Pacquiao in the Philipines any time soon.

So if you’re an MMA fan, there’s no need to go telling all your boxing fans that “boxing is dead.” It’s not. Instead,be happy with the success of the UFC and MMA without comparing it to boxing.

The true indications of the UFC’s growing popularity and the popularity of mixed martial arts as a whole will come when people stop comparing the UFC to other sports.

By Darren Wong for FightMania.com

Tags: Brock Lesnar, Dana White, Rich Franklin, UFC, Vitor Belfort