With the economy in a nose dive, how many people will pay $54.95 to buy Saturday's telecast of the Oscar De La Hoya-Manny Pacquiao fight?
It's an intriguing matchup. De La Hoya, the sport's most popular fighter, against Pacquiao, the current lightweight champion who's the world's top-ranked boxer pound for pound, in a bout set at the welterweight limit of 147 pounds.
De La Hoya will make his first return to Las Vegas since his epic fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr. in May 2007 (Mayweather won a split decision), which drew 2.4 million pay-per-view buys worth $134.4 million -- both records for a De La Hoya fight.
But given the severity of the economic downturn, executives at Top Rank, the Las Vegas-based boxing promotion company that handles Pacquiao, are projecting the De La Hoya fight will attract only 1.5 million pay-per-view buys. That still would be the second-highest pay-per-view sales for any De La Hoya fight.
HBO is working hard to sell the fight. As it did for De La Hoya-Mayweather, HBO has rolled out its "24/7" four-part reality series promoting De La Hoya's and Pacquiao's life stories. The social-networking site Facebook has created a "Dream Fight" promotion to attract a younger fan base to the bout.
However, because of concerns about the economy, fight sponsors Coca-Cola, Tecate beer and Full Throttle energy drink are each offering pay-per-view rebate coupons worth $10 to $20 that, when combined, can reduce the $54.95 pay-per-view price to $4.95.
"This is the first time we've had rebates like this," said Mark Taffet, HBO's pay-per-view chief. "There's no doubt we need to be more sensitive than ever to value, and we believe De La Hoya-Pacquiao provides it with a capital V."
Other fight promotions showed how the worsening economy has forced boxing fans to cut back on their spending, as is the case with virtually all consumer groups.
Richard Schaefer, a Swiss former banker who is chief executive of De La Hoya's Golden Boy Promotions boxing company, had expected Golden Boy's fight between former middleweight champion Bernard Hopkins and current middleweight champ Kelly Pavlik in October to generate about 350,000 pay-per-view buys. The fight had solid selling points: age and wisdom versus youth and power, gifted defense versus a knockout punch.
But the Hopkins-Pavlik telecast was purchased by only 190,000 homes.
