PBC and Amazon Prime Video will reportedly kick off with the first show of their multi-year deal on March 30th, followed by a May 4th PPV event involving superstar Canelo Alvarez.
Dan Rafael reports that it’s still unknown if the March 30th card will be on PPV, but he believes it will likely be. Boxing fans will tolerate back-to-back pay-per-view events on Amazon Video Prime if they’re quality fights.
PBC’s last PPV event on Showtime was a disappointment, with David Benavidez beating up on 35-year-old Demetrius Andrade in a mismatch that left fans angry and feeling ripped off for their money.
Marching into March
The March show will be the first of what is reported to be twelve to fourteen events yearly. There’s no word yet whether there will be additional events between those 12 to 14.
If not, PBC will need to place some of their many well-known fighters on undercards just to keep them busy because there won’t be enough events for them to headline their own shows.
Production Particulars and Beyond
Rafael says Amazon Prime needs to create the platform to deal with PPV purchases and assemble the broadcast team.
Hopefully, they don’t drag over the same broadcast team that worked the boxing events on Showtime, as they need new blood. Having the same crew might not be a good thing.
It would be a good idea for Premier Boxing Champions to get off on the right foot, staging a fight between Gervonta Davis and one of the quality fighters, like Shakur Stevenson or Devin Haney, but not Isaac Cruz.
Moving forward, PBC needs to focus on making the best fights, and steer away from some of the events that fans saw last year, like Tank’s wipeout of Ryan Garcia.
Some boxing fans blame PBC on Paramount dumping Showtime’s boxing events due to some of the disappointing cards in recent years. However, the entire sports department was axed by Showtime, so it wasn’t PBC’s events that were the problems.
Amazon Prime’s subscription base is huge, which could bring more attention to PBC’s boxing events if they’re advertised well. This could be a good thing, but, of course, it would be a negative if all or most of the 12 to 14 PBC events on Amazon Prime end up being placed on PPV. Fans will back at the idea of paying $75 per month to watch boxing.