Usyk vs Dubois Rematch Marred by Oversaturated Pay-Per-View Market. 

Saturday is chock-full of fights during the afternoon in London (for us in the States) and in America at night. Unfortunately, if a boxing fan wants to see it live (legally), they will have to buy not just one but two pay-per-views. We’re at the halfway point of the year, and this will be the second time we have 3 PPVs in 7 days. Five out of the six were on the DAZN platform, with the other being on Amazon this weekend. Despite the numerous great matchups the sport has garnered with the influx of Saudi money, all but one event was available on DAZN as part of their subscription.

Oversaturating the product on pay-per-view only takes casual fans and hardcore followers further from the sport. John Einreinhofer and I had a discussion on this week’s episode of The Rope A Dope Podcast about a realistic alternative based on DAZN’s relationship with TNT/HBOMAX for Soccer/Football rights. We can all agree that events like the one last Saturday night in New York need to be showcased on a larger platform. It should be noted that as this article is being finished on Thursday afternoon, on Wednesday, Turki claimed that in November, no more PPVs and that fans will get The Ring/Riyadh Season events as part of the DAZN subscription. Only to see a DAZN press release the very next day stating their will be “The Ring Pass”, a premium global monthly subscription. It goes on to state, “One simple subscription gives you access to every fight. All Pay-Per-Views Included. WTF?

Exhaling after that rant so let’s talk about the rematch between Oleksandr Usyk and Daniel Dubois. After winning the lineal title over Tyson Fury, Usyk made sure it wasn’t a fluke hurting Tyson badly in their first meeting by beating him a second time. In route to this rematch, Usyk’s foe Dubois took a ton of right hands from Filip Hrgovic as he walked through the fire to stop him in the 8th round. Daniel backed up that outing with a spectacular knockout of Anthony Joshua in the fall of last year. Dubois has created momentum and with a bit of luck he could prove the betting books wrong.

The real question is can Dubois prove himself worthy in Saturday’s rematch or was the call of a low blow by the ref the only thing we’ll remember? Well, that and 90,000+ plus screaming and singing fans soaking in the summer event live from Wembley Stadium. Just like in the first go round, Oleksandr’s jab will be a major key as he out landed Dubois 52-13 according to compubox. Crafty defense mixed with a high rate of punches thrown is another key for Usyk to build on his dominant victory over Daniel back in the summer of 2023.

Dubois will need to start fast relatively speaking if he wants to hang with Usyk.

Attacking the body is the only semi-Usyk weakness so Daniel must bring real pressure early and often, really throughout the first half of the bout. This boxing podcaster believes Daniel’s low blow punch landed on the lower part of the waistline. That said we can’t just assume Usyk would’ve stayed down if the punch were ruled clean. What we can say is the punch did seem to severely trouble him, and we’ve also seen in other bouts punches to the body seem to have effect on Usyk. This by no means is a major critic of a great fighter in Usyk as many quality boxers have been hurt or stopped to the body.

Unless Daniel can badly hurt Usyk this boxing junkie doesn’t see any other path to victory for Dubois. Father time can be brutal, so we won’t know if it rears its ugly head as it pertains to Usyk until the opening bell. From a betting perspective, if you believe in Daniel Dubois, he is a live dog sitting around a +250 up to +320. Usyk by KO is around and+111 by Decision +150. Dubois by KO is +480 and +790 by Decision. If you favor Usyk betting both decision and stoppage gives you more bang for your buck than a moneyline bet at –400.

My Official Predictions is Oleksandr Usyk by stoppage.

PODCAST LINK: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-rope-a-dope-radio-podcast/id1794655742?i=1000717455726

Side Note: For better or worse, Manny Pacquiao makes his return versus Mario Barrios on Amazon PPV. Although the main event lacks the sure-fire PPV buzz due to Manny being so old, the undercard features entertaining fights like Fundora vs. Tszyu 2 and Cruz vs Fierro 2.

My Picks: Barrios, Tszyu, and Cruz.

Written by Chris Carlson Host/Producer of The Rope A Dope Radio Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Spreaker, I-Heart Radio, Amazon Podcasts, Google Podcasts & More! Follow on Twitter @RopeADopeRadio