Will boxing ever rise again in the USA???

[Bilbo's Mom]

I saw a poll on ESPN...or some sports outlet a few weeks back, so pretty recently, and they had Boxing as the 2nd most popular sport worldwide and that poll had about 800,000 people vote.

lol an ESPN poll like the viewers of that American Channel make up the whole world

The whole world is a big place my friend and you'll suprised what some of these countries like to watch.

The most popular sport hands down is football (soccer).

Then follows Cricket, Hockey (field hockey suprisingly), tennis and I believe volleyball.

Also increibly popular are Formula One, Table Tennis, Basketball, Horse Racing, Rugby etc.

I imagine every single one of those sports has far higher viewing figures around the world than boxing, Formula One aside more people play those sports too, and most of these will gross more money annually as well.

Judo is I believe the second most popular sport in terms of participation as well.

Soccer I do agree with, it was number 1 in that poll and Soccer is number 1 around the world. Cricket, Field Hockey, Tennis, and Volleyball I can't see.

I see Cricket like Baseball it's very popular, but around the world I don't think it really is. Field Hockey I doubt because I've never even heard of it and it doesn't sound like a year around sport and some countries couldn't play it because of weather and other circumstances, same with Volleyball.

Horse Racing isn't popular like it once was, F1 is very popular around the world, but I think Boxing is more popular...F1 was 5th most popular in the poll, Rugby is like American Football here in the States...it's not really worldwide, but Rugby is more worldwide than Football though. Basketball I would say is more popular than Boxing, but in the poll Basketball was 3rd, shockingly.

The sports I listed wern't my opinon, they are simply the facts if you check out statistical websites.

You're only thinking about US but we are talking the whole world.

I have never seen a field hockey match, its not even played in the UK but around the world its tremendously popular, I guess in Asia.

A poll on ESPN doesn't mean anything, the results arn't down to individual opinion they are tested by hard data in three areas.


Global Viewing figures and match attendance More people watch cricket, tennis, rugby, golf, table tennis and field hockey around the world than watch boxing maybe suprisingly.


Revenue, those sports turnover more annually.


Participation, Virtually all of those sports have more actual people who play them.


Boxing is way dow the list according to all those criteria.


I do imagine though that boxing IS more popular than a lot of these sports in terms of what people would LIKE to see. I mean given the choice of table tennis and field hockey or live free screenings of all Manny Pacquaio's fights I'm guessing the Asian's would rather have boxing.

And in the UK sports like cricket, rugby and snooker are watched by more people probably because thats all our tv companies have the rights to.

Unfortunaley PPV has marginalised boxing to a massive degree. A large majority of casual fans simply don't watch it or get opportunity to. And being a full contact, dangerous contact sport particpation in it is never going to high either.

I mean Judo for example I think is one of the world's most popular sports according to participation, millions take part around the world in it. It's not watched on telly in the Western World though, but how do you determine popularity, what people watch or what people actually take part in?

[Nameless]

To be honest, HW is not a real problem: in Quebec, boxing is HUGE, really, more entrance at the gate for some matches than in NY or Las Vegas for some of the big events and we have absolutely no good Canadian HW, at least, nothing that really flashes. Why does it work? There is a few little shows that you can watch for free on T.V and the sports network are covering it nicely, the sport restaurants (like la Cage aux sports) sponsors big time boxing, especially as Eric lucas owns 2 of it and as he did a partnership with Jean Bedard, one of the owner of la Cage aux sports. There is a couple of matches broadcasted for free and the covering is good.
The lack of big HW in the US is easily explained by the fact that it is easier to be financed at school doing some basketball or football so athletes chose that path instead of boxing but as for the interest, the problem is not in the HW, I really don't think so. Make a few more free matches, talk about it in the medias (not only the specialised ones), spark the interest and it will raise up in a matter of months.

[Beanz]

[quote="The L.A. Earthquake";756273][quote=Bilbo;755849][quote="The L.A. Earthquake";755843]


"I see Cricket like Baseball it's very popular, but around the world I don't think it really is. "

India loves Cricket they have a population of about 1 Billion, add to that England & Wales, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Australia, The West Indies, South Africa, Bangladesh, New Zealand and Zimbabwe where Cricket is huge and then about 30 odd other countries where the game is widely played and i think it's fair to say that cricket is very popular around the world.

[Youngblood]

quote : "The L.A. Earthquake"
"I see Cricket like Baseball it's very popular, but around the world I don't think it really is. "


India loves Cricket they have a population of about 1 Billion, add to that England & Wales, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Australia, The West Indies, South Africa, Bangladesh, New Zealand and Zimbabwe where Cricket is huge and then about 30 odd other countries where the game is widely played and i think it's fair to say that cricket is very popular around the world.

Good point.

Yea, I tend to think as most of us generally don't get to see the world, and spend any time in it's many corners, we often see things through our own personal prisms of understanding. Hockey is huge here where I live, so it is fairly easy for me to see it that way, and wonder what the silly game I occasionally see on tv with the weird sticks, and running back and forth called "Cricket" is about, and just assume it is obscure. Meanwhile, you can be fairly sure most anyone from Sri Lanka, or Zimbabwe, when happening to randomly catch some highlight, is also wondering, what sort of obscure game that is, with the weird sticks, and skating about, and so on called, what was it again, oh yea, "Hockey".