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Estimates for the pay-per-view buy totals of the August 26 Floyd Mayweather-Conor McGregor fight are massive, with Showtime saying that the fight sold between four and five million, which would threaten the 4.6 million record for the 2015 Mayweather-Pacquiao fight.
ESPN is also going with a weird claim that, if an average of 10 people watched every bought pay-per-view, “the total audience would be in the 50 million range — or about one in six Americans.” That’s perhaps a bit ridiculous, but, well, it’s boxing, and we can’t just leave things at being a huge deal, we have to make them out to be THE HUGEST deal EVER.
Anyway, it was very clear from the get-go that this fight was going to sell in big numbers, and once the press tour started I was pretty sure it would either break or come very close to the all-time record. There was just a lot of interest outside of the normal boxing audience — or even a normal fight audience — in this fight. It was mainstream sports.
Anyway, let’s now see if Manny Pacquiao fights Jose Aldo.