De La Hoya, Mosley Are TV Bonanza
Saturday night’s rematch between Oscar De La Hoya and Shane Mosley drew 975,000 pay-per-view buys, translating into $50.2 million, making it the second-richest nonheavyweight bout.
The fight may reach a million buys when digital cable numbers are figured in, according to HBO Vice President Mark Taffet. Those numbers won’t be available for about 30 days.
The pay-per-view record is approximately 2 million for the Mike Tyson-Evander Holyfield rematch in 1997. The largest nonheavyweight bout was the 1999 De La Hoya-Felix Trinidad fight, which attracted 1.4 million buys.
De La Hoya-Mosley II surpassed last year’s De La Hoya-Fernando Vargas fight (935,000) and far exceeded the first meeting between De La Hoya and Mosley in 2000 (588,000).
Saturday’s fight was also seen in 2,000 closed-circuit locations and drew a sellout crowd of 16,268 to Las Vegas’ MGM Grand Garden Arena.
HBO is expecting a big rating for Saturday’s replay (6:45 p.m.) of the super-welterweight title fight, won by Mosley on a unanimous decision.
-- Steve Springer
Get our high school sports newsletter
Prep Rally is devoted to the SoCal high school sports experience, bringing you scores, stories and a behind-the-scenes look at what makes prep sports so popular.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
