Australian cable television channel ‘Main Event’ continues to make broadcast fights which aren’t appealing enough to committed boxing fans.
This weekend in the boxing world the focus will be on the grudge match between heavyweight contenders Dereck Chisora and David Haye, two British fighters who recently challenged for the heavyweight title.
It is a rematch of sorts after the two traded bare knuckle blows at the post fight press conference after Chisora lost a decision to WBC titleist Vitali Klitschko earlier in the year.
The other big fight this weekend is the junior welterweight unification fight between Amir Khan and Danny Garcia, two top ten ranked junior welterweights.
Also in action is Australian Anthony Mundine, who makes his US debut as the co-feature in a smaller show in Las Vegas against Bronco McKart, a former contender who is in his mid 40s and hasn’t fought in a meaningful fight since he was stopped by former middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik in 2006.
Yet, live on Main Event is the Mundine vs McKart mismatch.
They are showing the second best fight on delay (Khan-Garcia) while the heavyweight grudge match between two men who like to trade heavy leather (providing their opponent isn’t named Klitschko) gets nothing.
Now this isn’t an attack on Anthony Mundine, if I was going to do that I’d bring up the fact that despite claiming to be a four time world champion he’s never defeated a legitimate reigning world titleist, the fact that he has vacated his WBA super middleweight title in order to avoid a rematch with Mikkel Kessler, vacated his mandatory challenger spot at middleweight to get out of facing Gennady Golovkin and just recently vacated his WBA interim title to avoid fighting Austin Trout.
On all three occasions, he stated it was in order to chase big fights in other weight divisions only to take on a variety of domestic contenders and imported trial horses.
This piece is imploring Main Event to stop broadcasting the “champions” and pay attention to the quality match-ups on offer and the chance to actually produce quality fighters through these match-ups.
Now what should happen is the Mundine farce be shown for free, and I know this would reduce Mr Mundine’s purse significantly, but really if he wants to be paid the salary of a top quality boxer, he should be facing top quality opponents!
If any fight is worthy of PPV this weekend, it’s the Chisora-Haye clash. Sure their press conference melee was bad for the sport, but when two fighters hate each other it makes it that much more fun to watch them settle it.
We just had one of the more successful UFC pay per views in recent times last weekend with the rematch between Anderson Silva and Chael Sonnen, a fight that reportedly did more than one million pay per view buys world wide, which was built on the back of the hatred of the two men.
This is one of the few heavyweight fights that has the potential to be exciting. Instead Main Event broadcasts poor fights like Wladimir Klitschko’s recent title defences against 40-year-old ex-Cruiserweight Jean Marc Mormeck and his rematch with fringe contender Tony Thompson (a fighter Klitschko knocked out a few years ago in a fight that was shown on ONE for free). They expect people to pay for the rematch?
If Main Event wishes to show Khan-Garcia on delay, they shouldn’t be asking the public to pay for it. By the time the fight is on, it’s often six hours after it took place. In Khan’s last fight, when he was upset by 6-1 underdog Lamont Peterson, Main Event again showed the fight in delay only for the Fox Sports News channel to be broadcasting the result three hours before the bout even took place!
A lot of it comes down to lack of knowledge by casual boxing fans and I think the solution would be for Main Event to try and educate its market.
If they put a free weekly hour long show outlining the current news in the world of boxing instead of running 24 hour adverts for the often overpriced attractions they show once a week, it would appeal more to the boxing community.
Issa
Guest
Best boxer in australia is mundine. Now he will go beat mayweather then pacman. Go get em champ. You are the best boxer. Take they belts bring em home.
Issa
Guest
Cant wait for mundine 2 beat geale again
Ryan D
Guest
I think you summed it up in your first line, Charles - 'Australian cable television channel'; given that Main Event is an Australian channel surely it shouldn't be berated for championing an Australian in his first overseas fight. Granted the fight may not be on the same scale as Khan/Garcia but we should be all about supporting Australia's boxers first and foremost. Khan/Garcia was shown on-delay, so where is the real issue here? You could choose to watch Mundine or choose not to and then choose to watch Khan/Garcia or choose not to? Though I'm sure even if the schedule had been reversed you'd be here complaining that Mundine wasn't live and that the Australian channel was championing overseas guys.
Scott
Guest
Howard can you please honestly say if you watched the fight? The scorecard aside, he was let get away with repeated stalling tactics with his glove tape. This should never have gone un punished. When he was ordered to give Geale a Mandatory rematch he dropped the belt because he knew he couldn't pull off the same thing again.
Glenn Peters
Guest
So this is Mundine's big show in the USA, fighting a guy in his mid 40s? Yet again, Mundine fights guys not on anyone's radar and making huge claims for himself. What a clown he is!
Ty Allen
Guest
A very nicely written article Charles Paisley. You have articulated what a joke Main Event has become. I remember when our own Kostya Tszyu was to fight Miguel Gonzalez. Gonzalez pulled out of the fight at Diobelys Hurtado (I am not sure of the spelling) was brought in as a late replacment days before the fight. Foxtel played the fight on regular Fox Sports free of charge. What a great fight it was. Back then foxtel also played the reply replay of the Main Event fee of charge. Now they even what to charge for the reply. I am glad today that I have found a website where I can watch all the pay-per-view fights. And I will be very happy the day that everybody does the same and foxtel becomes a thing of the past. It's just a matter of time. Today I am very excited about watching the Haye-Chisora and the later Garcia-Khan fights. As for the Mundine-McKart farce, I just don't care. So good on you Charles for such a well written article. I am looking forward to reading you articles for you. Especially about boxing, being the tragic that I am.
peeeko
Roar Guru
Main event is a money making business?
howard
Guest
Thanks brother appreciate it.
howard
Guest
Charles they counted the punches, Mundine landed more punches landed better punches and dropped Geale to the canvas in the second, probably should have been UD to Mundine. Geale himself admitted Mundine was a deserved winner on a Mundine bio aired on fox sport recently, pretty sure he's embarressed by guys like you claiming he was robbed. Mundine beat quality boxers in their prime Geale is yet yo do that.
Dave
Guest
exactly Howard
Dave
Guest
Australian tv showing an Australian boxer. I don't have a problem with that. I'd rather watch this than two boring heavyweights that will be puffed after 2 rounds and clinging to their opponent for life for the next 10 rounds. The heavyweight division is long dead with no forseeable future.
Issa ali shane
Guest
Well said howard god bless strait from the heart
Charles Paisley
Roar Pro
Geale's IBO title was just a glorified national title, he won it by beating another Australian in Daniel Dawson. Anyone counting that as a world title for Mundine is just trying to bolster his resume. What's your point about Golovkin and Trout? It's not like Mundine gave up his ranking to go after the better belt holder, he just ducked out because he'd be in a competitive fight for a change! As for Mundine beating Geale, anyone who can honestly say they sat down and watched that fight without the sound of the biased pro Mundine commentary and scored it for Mundine does not know how to score a fight.
Charles Paisley
Roar Pro
Peterson hasn't had the win stripped yet (although I think it's a matter of time before it happens), they took his title but it's still counted as a win. I'm not really interested in Mayweather-Khan, Khan has shown he's plenty vulnerable in his last few fights, Mayweather is on a different level.
steve
Guest
Have you acheived more than mundine charles??? get a real job u bum
howard
Guest
Firstly McKart is 41y 3 mths hardly mid-forties. Mundine has never claimed to be a 4 time world champ he doesn't count the interim title like other Aussie boxers do, so give him some credit there. Also Geale was reigning IBO middleweight champ when Mundine defeated him and took his world title. Are these articles proof read? Golovkin and Trout only hold the regular WBA title i.e. there is a better WBA champ above them. Mundines been widely criticised over the years for only having regular titles, now he's being criticised for not chasing them, it's hypocrisy. It's not Mundines fault if belts become vacant and who did he beat for those vacant titles, world #3 Echols and Solomin who's been a top 10 boxer for years and still is. He also beat Green and Geale who went on to be world champions. Geale hasn't beaten one boxer of note who's gone on to record a win, yet he's hailed as a hero. Main Event Australia give the Mundine fight priority because he has a huge following in this country when the foreign boxers fighting do not.
Blaze
Guest
Great article Charles... Spot on. Yet another reason why boxing in Australia is dying.. Lucky we still have geale.. -- Comment left via The Roar's iPhone app. Download The Roar's iPhone App in the App Store here.
sam
Guest
Please don’t do the…. “this isn’t an attack…. then attack the person” routine…. it detracts from your very valid point about Main Event. However the Haye fight will just be freak show, something along the lines of both corner people involved in a riot.. etc… The Amir Khan fight is the most interesting, hopefully Khan can prove he doesn’t have a glass chin – then a Mayweather Khan is definetely possible. Also you should note that Lamont had his win stripped due to PEDs…. so it wasn’t really a genuine loss for Khan last time out.