WBA super featherweight champion Leo Santa Cruz (37-1-1, 19 KOs) and WBA lightweight champion Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis (23-0, 22 KOs) will now be fighting on October 31 rather than October 24 so that they can fight in front of a crowd at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas.
In a normal year, placing any fights on Halloween is a questionable move because fans want to go to parties or out on that night. The last thing they want to do is sit home on Halloween. Of course, this year is different due to the pandemic. A lot of boxing fans are going to be chilling out, trying not to get sick.
Mike Coppinger broke the news of the Santa Cruz vs. Tank Davis fight getting moved to October 31. The fight is still being shown on Showtime pay-per-view.
That’s one reason why the Santa Cruz vs. Davis fight has been moved from October 24th. The other reason is they needed to move off the same date that UFC star Khabib is fighting on with UFC 254, which will be shown on pay-per-view on October 24th.
It would be too much of a hardship for boxing fans to purchase both the Santa Cruz-Davis fight card and the UFC 254 event on PPV on the same day. That would leave the fans with a bill of around $150. That price would be high even before the pandemic, but right now, it would be poison.
You can definitely second guess the wisdom of placing Santa Cruz vs. Davis on PPV on Showtime. Santa Cruz hasn’t faced a good opponent in years, and he’s still look faded at 32. Boxing fans wouldn’t mind paying to see Tank Davis fight a prime fighter like Vasily Lomachenko or Teofimo Lopez, but it doesn’t make a lot of sense to putting Davis-Santa Cruz on PPV.
It’s too much a mismatch on paper, and that’s not what the boxing public needs right now. They need value for their money, and you can argue that they won’t get that with the much younger, stronger, and faster 25-year-old Tank Davis facing Santa Cruz.
“SOURCES: Gervonta Davis vs. Leo Santa Cruz is moving from Oct. 24 to Oct. 31 and SHO PPV will be held with fans at San Antonio’s Alamodome. Shrewd move by PBC finding a way to generate gate revenue and also moving off date occupied by UFC 254 with Khabib,” said @MikeCoppinger.
Besides the Davis vs. Santa Cruz contest, some other great boxing matches will be taking place on October 31. Here’s what fans can pick from on that date:
- Naoya Inoue vs. Jason Moloney
- Oleksandr Usyk vs. Dereck Chisora
- Leo Santa Cruz vs. Gervonta Davis
Moving the Davis vs. Santa Cruz fight to a week later probably won’t make much difference. The fans will still be stuck with two expensive pay-per-view charges for the same money wit Khabib on October 24th and Davis-Santa Cruz on October 31st.
It’s going to come down to which fight card do the fans want to see more. The UFC card coming first on October 24 could result in the fans purchasing that event and then ignoring the Davis vs. Santa Cruz card on October 31st.