In the heavyweight division’s most important fight for a quarter of a decade, Tyson Fury and Oleksandr Usyk travelled to Riyadh and put their respective world titles on the line to crown a first undisputed four-belt champion of the division. Now, we have a gauge on how well the historic event performed, as the number of pay-per-view buys have been revealed.
It was Oleksandr Usyk who fought through the fire to achieve the coveted goal and etch his name into the history books with a legendary win over ‘The Gypsy King’ despite a near 40lb weight differential, dropping and almost stopping Fury in the ninth-round before pressing the proverbial accelerator and banking the late rounds to edge out a famous split-decision win.
Of all of the recent blockbuster events brought to us by Turki Al-Alshikh and staged in Saudi Arabia, Fury-Usyk was undeniably the largest, eclipsing the hype that surrounded the ‘The Battle of the Baddest’, ‘Day of Reckoning’ and ‘Knockout Chaos’ cards.
ESPN has now reported the number of pay-per-view buys that were racked up from the legendary clash, that also featured a stacked undercard with two further world title bouts taking place before the main-event.
“According to sources, Usyk-Fury generated upward of $50 million in pay-per-view revenue with 1.5-million-plus PPV buys (the vast majority from the U.K., where Fury is a megastar). The event also made $40 million in sponsorship and another $3 million-plus in ticket sales. All in — production, fighter purses, entertainment, travel, etc. — the event cost in the neighbourhood of $120 million.”
With over 1.5 million pay-per-view buys, the Fury-Usyk or ‘Ring of Fire’ show generated the second highest number of purchases of any card headlined by a Brit, being trumped only by Lennox Lewis’ victory over Mike Tyson in 2002. Additionally, the undisputed title showdown was the most purchased pay-per-view bill to not involved either Floyd Mayweather or Mike Tyson, outperforming the trilogy fight between Manny Pacquiao and Juan Manuel Marquez, according to Statista.
Overall, Fury-Usyk achieved the ninth highest pay-per-view purchases of any boxing event, whilst Tyson Fury supposedly netted the fifth highest purse of all-time as he banked around £85 million – the highest a fighter has ever been paid aside from fights involving Mayweather and therefore the biggest payday in heavyweight history.
After a thrilling first encounter, it will be interesting to see how well their rematch performs in comparison, although the attraction of a first undisputed heavyweight title match-up of the millennium will not add to the allure. That meeting will take place on December 21st in Riyadh once again, where pay-per-view sales may also be impacted by the Christmas period.
Once their rematch has been concluded, either Anthony Joshua or Daniel Dubois may well be waiting for the winner, but Oleksandr Usyk has revealed that he has other plans and that he does not intend on sticking around to defend the belts after he has faced Fury for a second time.
