Gennady Golovkin’s sixth-round technical knockout victory over Willie Monroe Jr. continued HBO’s strong run in 2015, according to ratings estimates compiled by Nielsen Media Research. Saturday’s bout, which was held at The Forum in Inglewood, California, had an average audience of 1.338 million viewers, peaking at 1.474 million.
Golovkin’s previous primetime appearance on HBO, a second-round knockout over Marco Antonio Rubio in October 2014, had an average of 1.304 million viewers. Golovkin’s victory over Martin Murray this past February took place in Monte Carlo and was divided between a live HBO broadcast during the day and a replay later that evening, peaking at 938,000.
For HBO, it was the third-highest rated fight of the year, falling short behind Canelo Alvarez v. James Kirkland, which drew an impressive 2.146 million and peaked at 2.296 million – HBO’s highest rating since Bernard Hopkins’s one-sided victory over Antonio Tarver in 2006 – and Alvarez went on to knockout Kirkland in the third. Wladimir Klitschko’s decision victory over Bryant Jennings on April 25, had an average of 1.637 million viewers.
When Gennady Golovkin made his HBO debut in September 2012 vs. Gregorz Proksa, he generated just 685,000 hits. Fast forward to May 2015, the Monroe fight produced numbers that were 195,228.47% higher. If you want to include Golovkin’s seventh-round technical knockout victory over Curtis Stevens in November 2013, that number would be at least 205,000% higher.
With his 20th consecutive knockout in the bag, Gennady Golovkin stands at 33-0 with 30 knockouts, with a 91% knockout rating, which is a better KO rating than Mike Tyson had after 33 fights. He’s one of the most exciting, if not the most exciting fighter to watch in boxing today. If you don’t think he is the next man to take the PPV helms away from Floyd Mayweather Jr., you are dead wrong.
The numbers for the co-feature, Roman ‘Chocolatito’ Gonzalez vs. Edgar Sosa, were also stellar, averaging 961,000 viewers and peaking at 1.018 million.
