Mayweather-Marquez comes up short at gate, draws $6.8 million
While it remains unknown how well Floyd Mayweather’s return to the ring did on pay-per-view and closed circuit, his easy 12-round decision against a Mexican opponent didn’t sell out despite it being Mexican Independence weekend.
Attendance at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas was announced at 13,116, but Thursday the numbers from the Nevada State Athletic Commission showed that 12,009 tickets were sold at face value, 895 tickets were comps — or giveaways — and 2,645 went unsold.
The total gate: $6,811,300.
The base salary for Mayweather was $10 million while Juan Manuel Marquez cleared $2 million.
Golden Boy Promotions, co-promoter of the event, said after Saturday show that early reports indicated the bout would approach and possibly exceed one million PPV buys which would be a gross of at least $50 million. Richard Schaefer, CEO of GBP, said that the numbers would be released by week’s end.
He also said Mayweather’s next bout would be completely up to the former welterweight champion, though Schaefer is pushing for him to meet 147-pound champion Shane Mosley rather than current pound-for-pound king Manny Pacquiao.
Pacquiao has a Nov. 14 date with Miguel Cotto. Both are promoted by Bob Arum’s Top Rank.
“It’s up to Floyd,” Schaefer said. “Oscar had the choice to pick who he wanted to fight. Now Floyd Mayweather is in that position. He has inherited the vacant throne of pay-per-view king.
“This fight might put his average pay-per-view performance to over a million per fight. Who has done that? Nobody? When you are the pay-per-view king you can pick the dates. The date will be there for you, just like it was for Oscar.”
In May, Pacquiao’s junior welterweight championship bout with Ricky Hatton drew 15,368 with a $8,832,950 gate.
Source: http://www.usatoday.com/sports/boxing/2009-09-24-mayweathergatesales_N.htm
Boxing is just like the WWF, made-up. I saw the fight, yes he won by decision, a cream would have been a clear knockout, did not happen. Floyd Mayweather maybe the best boxer of all time to beat up on washed up fighters. So Floyd Mayweather, did not make the weight for the fight, so he heavier than the weight class that he is fighting in, and his opponent was older, shorter and weigh less. Are we impressed that he won, what a charade. Had we seen him come back and defeat Pacman, Cotto, Mosley or Margarito, then maybe he would deserve our attention, till then, snore, snore. Now we find out that this piece of work owes our government millions of dollars. Why should we believe this guy? I guess the rumors are true that he did everything to avoid fighting Antonio Margarito, before his unexpected first retirement, chicken.