I used to love pro wresting. I had the t-shirts, the video games, the replica belts; everything a little geeky kid would need to feel included in the spectacle that graced my television twice weekly, with all of my heroes going to war with one and other for my enjoyment. I was obsessed, buying all of the books and magazines, and watching every single show as the big monthly pay-per-view approached, where I would stay awake until stupid o’clock in the morning to see the best of the best beat each other up for those cherished championship belts. Sound familiar? As I grew from a child to a teenager my interest started to wane as I learned more about wrestling, mainly that what I was watching wasn’t a competitive sporting contest. Even knowing this I continued to watch for a number of years, developing a sense of appreciation that I maintain to this day for the athleticism and skill required to perform such spectacular feats, but I just felt a bit silly as the pantomime became more and more obvious to me. Then I found boxing.
If pro wrestling and boxing are compared next to one and other they are remarkably similar; the ring, the belts, the pageantry, the muscular and sweaty half-naked men, the stadiums and arenas filled with die-hard fans. When I first started to watch boxing it all felt very familiar. The first big event I stayed up late to watch was Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs Ricky Hatton. I didn’t know anything about boxing really, and based my prediction of a Hatton victory on the wave of optimism that spilled forth from every UK media outlet covering the fight, daring to hope that Hatton’s will and tenacity would be enough to fill the huge gulf in technical ability that existed between the pair. Well, we all know that Mayweather took Hatton to school that night, handing him his first ever defeat by stopping him in the tenth with a masterful display of timing and accurate punching. I was hooked from then on in.
That was almost seven years ago and in that time I have pursued the sweet science in exactly the same way as I did when watching wrestling as a little kid, and in all that time I can honestly say that the event billed as ‘Mayhem,’ the rematch between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Marcos Maidana, was the first boxing pay-per-view I have seen that left me feeling utterly disappointed.
I believe it was a number of undesirable factors that combined to make me feel this way. Firstly the fights themselves, on the main card at least, were not very entertaining. Now I understand that it is easy to pour scorn on fighters from the comfort of one’s own home, halfway through a bag of weed with a pizza due to arrive in the next half an hour. I am not condemning their athletic ability or the bravery the fighters show just by stepping through those ropes. The whole card just wasn’t compelling to watch. The main event was too dominant a display to get excited about, as was Leo Santa Cruz’s early knockout win just before it, which was further undermined by the lack of quality opposition that had been chosen for Cruz to defend against. I will not deign to go in to much detail about the match between Miguel Vasquez and Micky Bey, where the former lost his IBF lightweight title in a twelve-rounder that had a more sedative effect than a truckload of heroin. The most action-packed fight of the evening was the first one, and even that was ruined by a feeling of sadness. A once undeterrable warrior in Alfredo Angulo was treated like a punching bag for most of the ten rounds he shared with James De La Rosa in his first step up to middleweight, and I just couldn’t enjoy that in light of what ‘El Perro’ once was.
So, by the time the last scores of the evening had been read out it was after four in the morning in the UK and I was more than ready for my bed. I wish I hadn’t bothered in all honesty, I could have just caught the replay that would begin at ten the next morning or at any of the numerous times it would be repeated after that. Good value really considering that Boxnation TV is under twenty pounds each month (I am not an employee of theirs, though if any executives are reading this hook me up any time). I would have been extremely angry, however, if I had paid over seventy dollars for it, as my trans-atlantic cousins were required to should they wish to legally watch the fight. Seventy dollars. Don’t the people running this realize that not everybody gets paid forty million dollars for thirty-six minutes work? Outrageous.
By overpricing the event in the first place the suits leave fans feeling cheated anyway. Charging people to be bored is a crazy way to make millions. Then that feeling is compounded by the fact that many of those tuning in, myself included, become invested in these fights in the build up to them. Every big fight has an ‘All Access’ or ’24/7’ documentary series that chronicles events in the training camps, so fans get to know the fighters more and get a different perspective on things. I love them. I think for the most part they are entertaining and almost always teach the viewer something new about whatever fighter is featured. They have become an integral part of the promotional process and when a match lives up to the expectation, or comes somewhere near, it all comes together in a neat little crescendo and the bigwigs look like genius’s. When the fight fails to capture the imagination, though, fans are left deflated, cursing the wasted hours spent looking forward to this drivel. That is how I felt as I got in to bed afterwards the show had closed.
Ultimately, I didn’t enjoy the event for the same reason I stopped following pro wrestling; the lack of substance. I am aware that Mayweather boxed Maidana’s ears off, and I appreciate the skill and discipline that was required for him to pull off such a performance, against a much younger man whom he had already struggled with a little the last time they met. The fact that he shut Maidana down utterly this time is a testament to his ability and dedication, I am not ignoring that for one moment. There was just nothing I could sink my teeth in to, nothing that had me shouting at my T.V screen and waking the whole house up because of a heated exchange going down. Just bemusement at the snooze-fest unfolding before me. I prefer to steer away from criticising a card just as it is announced because you never know when a classic can come out of nowhere, and will try to continue in this way despite the ‘Mayhem’ debacle, which I actually didn’t have a problem with when it was made. I don’t want wars every time either, I just don’t want to be bored to death watching fights, that’s all.
