Did the big fight under-perform?

[kewlJ]

Big event weekends, like a fight weekend are great for me, betting and spreading bigger than usual...playing in the shadows of the bigger bettors. And the last 24 hours was no exception. But I don't want to talk about my performance, but rather the big fight itself from a business stand point.

I didn't see the fight, as I was working, but all reports indicate the new arena was about 1/3 filled and likely many of those seats were comped. Did they price themselves right out of the market with tickets starting at $1500 in the nose bleed section? Yes, I know the real money comes from pay-per-view. I will be interested to see those numbers compared to projections.

But with the arena only 30% filled, doesn't that mean that all those Vegas hotel rooms which were going for $600 for a standard room at the lower end casinos, on up...remained unsold and empty? I think they priced themselves right out of the huge crowds expected, both at the arena and filling the hotel rooms. Any thoughts?

[redietz]

Big event weekends, like a fight weekend are great for me, betting and spreading bigger than usual...playing in the shadows of the bigger bettors. And the last 24 hours was no exception. But I don't want to talk about my performance, but rather the big fight itself from a business stand point.

I didn't see the fight, as I was working, but all reports indicate the new arena was about 1/3 filled and likely many of those seats were comped. Did they price themselves right out of the market with tickets starting at $1500 in the nose bleed section? Yes, I know the real money comes from pay-per-view. I will be interested to see those numbers compared to projections.

But with the arena only 30% filled, doesn't that mean that all those Vegas hotel rooms which were going for $600 for a standard room at the lower end casinos, on up...remained unsold and empty? I think they priced themselves right out of the huge crowds expected, both at the arena and filling the hotel rooms. Any thoughts?

The sports books were happy, that I know, as the fight broke records for action and the books won with Mayweather and Over 9 1/2 rounds for the distance. That means, brace yourselves, that the sports books have collectively won money on every one of Mayweather's Las Vegas fights. Hard to believe.

Who the hell would want to see last night's fight, really? Alvarez/Golovkin is in three weeks. Actual boxing fans should show up for that one. I'm not surprised if LV in general didn't make the amount they thought they would last night, but the books had a killer day. A lot of people with a lot of wishful thinking. I couldn't believe the number came down to where it was, and I really was stunned that at the very end it was McGregor money. I expected big action on Mayweather the last 24 hours, and it didn't come nearly as hard as I anticipated.

[mickeycrimm]

I think the real fight fans already knew what was going to happen in the fight so stayed away and might have watched it on pay per view at home. I can't believe so much money came in on McGregor that Mayweather went off at -350. I should have payed more attention. I could have bet it online.

One thing that peeves me is the media is continuing to push the myth that Mayweather holds the record for most wins without a loss or tie. Willie Pepp was a featherweight champion that won his first 62 professional fights back in the forties.

[redietz]

The thing that peeves me is that football is about to kick off, and I didn't really have a boatload of money to throw around. If you monitored all books, both in LV and offshore, you had multiple auto-profit (arbitrage for you stock market addicts) opportunities in the last 24 hours. It was easy to lay -400 and get +450 at one juncture, mixing offshore versus LV. Just with offshores, and not even using UK legal books, one could find small auto-profits. But you had to have a big wad of money already in place at 20 different locations to do it. I saw easy -445/+475 just lying around, but I didn't have enough money at the proper locations.

Plus, to be honest, I would have to have gotten up to speed on disqualification rules at each and every sports book before doing that. There was a concern that disqualification could happen, and I learned back in the Tyson "cocoon of horror" fight that different books had different rules, and you have to have all of that squared away before launching large amounts of money. The people at the MGM that night went nuts when they learned the hard way that some books had one set of rules and other books in Las Vegas had different rules.

[kewlJ]

The sports books were happy, that I know, as the fight broke records for action and the books won with Mayweather and Over 9 1/2 rounds for the distance. That means, brace yourselves, that the sports books have collectively won money on every one of Mayweather's Las Vegas fights. Hard to believe.

There were a number of million dollar bets on Mayweather and even more that were broken up because the books wouldn't allow a million dollar wager (The Maloof's had to break their million dollar wager into several parts). The "books" didn't win those bets. It would have taken an awful lot of McGregor money to offset that.

The high roller crowd showed up. We know this because their was no more parking available for private jets at McCarron, as of Saturday afternoon. But this 1% got comped suites and comped ringside tickets. I am wondering about the thousands of $1500-$5000 tickets that apparently went unsold and all the $600 and $800 standard rooms that weren't sold or filled (as projected)? That is where I think this draw was a failure.

[redietz]

The books didn't have to win those bets, KJ. Mayweather drew the big wagers; McGregor, however, drew more than 85% of the tickets. The sheer volume of McGregor tickets way more than offset those million dollar wagers. You have to remember -- a million dollar bet on Mayweather was returning 200K most of the time.

I was actually baffled by the ticket percentages. There must be a large number of really dumb white blokes who think wishing makes it so.

[kewlJ]

There must be a large number of really dumb white blokes who think wishing makes it so.

Oh there were! Friday evening Downtown there was a free concept at that new outdoor venue behind the D that featured an Irish Rock band. You should have seen those "blokes" carrying on. So much so that I pretended I wasn't of Irish decent.

It seems like the McGregor faithful showed up in town anyway. Hell this was their "superbowl". It's the huge following that Mayweather usually brings that seems like maybe they didn't show to both the town and the fight. Did anyone who saw the fight in person or PPV get a feel for who had the larger support in the half empty arena?

[kewlJ]

The books didn't have to win those bets, KJ. Mayweather drew the big wagers; You have to remember -- a million dollar bet on Mayweather was returning 200K most of the time.

Yeah that's true.

[kewlJ]

I am just saying, if you have an event....what is supposed to be a huge must see event, that is supposed to draw 20,000+ people, and the hotel rooms quadruple based on that anticipated draw, and the event only draws 6000 people, doesn't that mean there are one hell of a lot of empty hotel rooms? (rooms that might have been able to have been sold at the usual overpriced weekend rate)

And a 20,000 people event isn't even that big compared to some of the really big events in Vegas, like Nascar weekend, The National Rodeo Finals and the consumer electronics show that all draw 100k.

I am just guessing with the exception of MGM, most of the casino's didn't get the volume they were expected at those quadrupled room rates.

[RS__]

I had money on Mayweather and going into it, knew (or thought) McGregor's pretty much only chance was in the first 3-4 rounds. I saw it on PPV at a friend's house. I remember at least twice, early in the fight, you could hear the crowd roaring for McGregor by chanting, "Olei! Olei Olei Olei!" A little bit later on when Mayweather was stepping it up and McGregor was slowing down, Mayweather got a few nice hits in, and the crowd started booing.

I'm not a huge boxing fan, although I do love watching it. But the fight was a lot better than I had expected and McGregor performed better than I expected.

[Alan Mendelson]

I don't bet sports so I can't comment on the betting.

From my understanding only about 1,500 were not sold and the T Mobile Arena is larger than the MGM Grand Arena where the big fights are traditionally held.

The fight was pretty darn good. May did his rope-a-dope early on and saved his strength. McG was fully exposed the entire bout and could have been knocked out at any minute. (I boxed as a kid.)

We watched at my son's house on PPV via the Internet -- not cable. We bought one feed at $99.95 which failed before the main event and had to buy another feed at $99.95 and Jason filed for a refund via PayPal. Many of our friends told us their PPV feeds failed as well.

Bellagio sent me an invite to a viewing party -- not tickets to the actual fight -- and I didn't want to be there. I also skipped the 7 Stars event at Caesars this weekend in part because of the crowds. I expected that table minimums would be high.

[AxelWolf]

There must be a large number of really dumb white blokes who think wishing makes it so.

Oh there were! Friday evening Downtown there was a free concept at that new outdoor venue behind the D that featured an Irish Rock band. You should have seen those "blokes" carrying on. So much so that I pretended I wasn't of Irish decent.

It seems like the McGregor faithful showed up in town anyway. Hell this was their "superbowl". It's the huge following that Mayweather usually brings that seems like maybe they didn't show to both the town and the fight. Did anyone who saw the fight in person or PPV get a feel for who had the larger support in the half empty arena?

I rented the fight, pepared some food and invited a few people over. IMO it was a good fight. I just wish they didnt call the fight when they did. Maywheather bettors were sweating it untill the last few rounds. Mcgregor seems to have a lot of fans. I was rooting for him to win, but on the other hand I didnt want to see my friends lose a shiton of money.

I hope they do more of this kind of stuff.

[kewlJ]

I don't bet sports so I can't comment on the betting.

From my understanding only about 1,500 were not sold and the T Mobile Arena is larger than the MGM Grand Arena where the big fights are traditionally held.

Not that much bigger. MGM had over 16,000 for the Mayweather-Pacquaio fight in 2015. (If memory serves...possibly they build or added extra seating for that though?)

Yahoo sports says the attendance was announced at 14,000 last night and they could hold 20,000 for boxing (less for hockey). I didn't see pictures of the crown but have heard and read reports that the arena was anywhere from half to 2/3'rds empty. Perhaps that announced attendance includes tickets that were purchased or handed out that were not actually there? Like people and agencies that purchased tickets anticipating resale?

[kewlJ]

I just took a look at some photo's in Britian's The sun newspaper. Several angles looks like the lower level is mostly full, while the second level (which hold more people) much less so, in some shots, mostly empty.

Anyway, I don't want to get into a haggle over actual attendance. In my relatively short time in Vegas (8 years), I have seen some big fight and other event weekends and it just seems like the hype for this may have been bigger than the actual draw and because of that higher anticipated expectations, both the actual event and hotel rooms may have priced themselves into more vacancies.

When you see strip hotel rooms going for (advertised) what they went for this weekend, it is usually wall to wall people everywhere. I just didn't get that feel and I spent 12 hours playing on the strip through early this morning. Crowded...yes....every Saturday night is crowded. I would definitely say more crowded in the casinos than a normal Saturday night, but it just didn't have that 'mega-event' fight night feel to it.

[regnis]

Big event weekends, like a fight weekend are great for me, betting and spreading bigger than usual...playing in the shadows of the bigger bettors. And the last 24 hours was no exception. But I don't want to talk about my performance, but rather the big fight itself from a business stand point.

I didn't see the fight, as I was working, but all reports indicate the new arena was about 1/3 filled and likely many of those seats were comped. Did they price themselves right out of the market with tickets starting at $1500 in the nose bleed section? Yes, I know the real money comes from pay-per-view. I will be interested to see those numbers compared to projections.

But with the arena only 30% filled, doesn't that mean that all those Vegas hotel rooms which were going for $600 for a standard room at the lower end casinos, on up...remained unsold and empty? I think they priced themselves right out of the huge crowds expected, both at the arena and filling the hotel rooms. Any thoughts?

The sports books were happy, that I know, as the fight broke records for action and the books won with Mayweather and Over 9 1/2 rounds for the distance. That means, brace yourselves, that the sports books have collectively won money on every one of Mayweather's Las Vegas fights. Hard to believe.

Who the hell would want to see last night's fight, really? Alvarez/Golovkin is in three weeks. Actual boxing fans should show up for that one. I'm not surprised if LV in general didn't make the amount they thought they would last night, but the books had a killer day. A lot of people with a lot of wishful thinking. I couldn't believe the number came down to where it was, and I really was stunned that at the very end it was McGregor money. I expected big action on Mayweather the last 24 hours, and it didn't come nearly as hard as I anticipated.

I was there for several days last week before the fight. Every time I walked into a sportsbook the lines had moved with action on McGregor. I couldn't believe it as he could not possibly win.

One of my clever friends is able to stream these PPVs for free so I watched with him. There was a technical problem with all the feeds. That is why the fight was delayed. Many of the feeds (showtime, Comcast, on-line streaming) had gone out.

[Dan Druff]

I almost bet Mayweather but the -365 line (the best I could find online, as Bovada has me at "sharp lines") still annoyed me.

Like, I thought it was going to win, but you have to bet so much to make any decent money, and it's hard to load money online without paying 6% or more fees.

While I was pretty sure Mayweather was winning, I decided at the last minute to bet on Mayweather winning by decision (though his "promise" that he would win by knockout bothered me somewhat).

My decision bet was +300.

For 8 rounds, that looked pretty good. However, in the 9th round, Connor ran out of gas, and I knew I was screwed.

The fight was ended a bit too early, but it didn't matter. If they didn't end it, Connor was getting KO'd anyway.

Regarding how the fight performed, the seats sold is immaterial.

Only the Pay Per View numbers matter. Has anyone seen them yet?

The Vegas hotel situation was interesting. They were WAY overpriced, and did not fill up as anticipated. The prices started sharply falling about 5 days before the fight. Anyone watching closely could have gotten their rooms re-rated.

I got to see the fight for free through an internet feed, though I missed some of it because it took some time to set up and get going.

[Alan Mendelson]

Ive been to several concerts in the TMobile Arena. Frankly, I wouldn't buy seats that were up high. They're just too dangerous because of the steep stairs.

Dan maybe you can pull up the thread about this.

[bocce ball]

Link to Alan's thread:

https://vegascasinotalk.com/forum/sh...ghlight=mobile

[redietz]

I almost bet Mayweather but the -365 line (the best I could find online, as Bovada has me at "sharp lines") still annoyed me.

Like, I thought it was going to win, but you have to bet so much to make any decent money, and it's hard to load money online without paying 6% or more fees.

While I was pretty sure Mayweather was winning, I decided at the last minute to bet on Mayweather winning by decision (though his "promise" that he would win by knockout bothered me somewhat).

My decision bet was +300.

For 8 rounds, that looked pretty good. However, in the 9th round, Connor ran out of gas, and I knew I was screwed.

The fight was ended a bit too early, but it didn't matter. If they didn't end it, Connor was getting KO'd anyway.

Regarding how the fight performed, the seats sold is immaterial.

Only the Pay Per View numbers matter. Has anyone seen them yet?

The Vegas hotel situation was interesting. They were WAY overpriced, and did not fill up as anticipated. The prices started sharply falling about 5 days before the fight. Anyone watching closely could have gotten their rooms re-rated.

I got to see the fight for free through an internet feed, though I missed some of it because it took some time to set up and get going.

Dan, you're killing me, man. I was conservative in my explanation of auto-profit opportunities, as I saw -400 myself in the flesh concurrent with +450. I had people tell me about the -365, but I hadn't actually seen that with my own eyes, so I did not use that in my reportage.

With a -365, man, there was money to be made with zero risk.

Breaks my heart.

[Rob.Singer]

Why anyone even bothers to get involved or interested in what they call "boxing" these days is a true mystery. On one side you've got an MMA (which, of course, everyone's infatuated with) guy with no experience in boxing, going against a known thug junglebunny who knows what he's doing in this type of ring.

Complete waste of time. And if you were dumb enuf to order this nonsense on ppv, you need to re-assess your priorities.