Canelo vs. Kovalev: About that Hour and a Half Wait

By: Sean Crose

It may well have been smart business for the DAZN streaming service to make paying customers wait half an eternity to watch this weekend’s Canelo Alvarez -Sergey Kovalev fight. It might also make sense for restaurants to first serve patrons who pull up in the most expensive looking vehicles, no matter how long less lucrative seeming clientele have been waiting. Business is business, after all, and no one says a business has to pay an ounce of respect to those who purchase its product. People are free to spend their money elsewhere.

Photo Credit: Golden Boy Promotions Twitter Account

Yet it appears DAZN doesn’t believe boxing fans will take their business elsewhere. Either that or the service already feels its foray into boxing is a dud and it’s time to use its resources to appeal to fans of other sports. Regardless, DAZNs decision to wait until a UFC fight ended before airing one of the top boxing events of the year has made clear what it thinks of boxing fans.

And that isn’t much.

Even UFC kingpin Dana White seemed stunned at it all, so blatant was DAZN’s ass kissing of the UFC fans it hoped to lure in to watch a late night boxing match. He was right to seem stunned. It was stunning stuff, so stunning that pictures of Canelo and Kovalev lounging about until the UFC card concluded made their way across the internet.

Not that DAZN had seemed to care. Rather than apologize or make nice with subscribers, the service reportedly boasted afterwards that putting the main event on freeze for ninety minutes paid off. Needles to say, an email to DAZN has yet to be returned (Boxinginsider will notify readers if DAZN responds).

In the meantime, boxing nuts shouldn’t be surprised if DAZN pulls a similar stunt again in the near future. Again, a business isn’t required to respect its customers. And, as things stand, DAZN is apparently feeling its act of what was essentially poor customer service paid off. Besides, sometimes you can see the writing on the wall. It was obvious for a while, for instance, that HBO had tired of boxing.In this case, it certainly doesn’t seem like the folks at DAZN are in love with boxing’s core fanbase.

On the bright side, the Canelo-Kovalev fight proved to be a success. Kovalev, the bigger man and defending WBO light heavyweight champion, flustered Canelo for round after round until the Mexican star caught his man and ended things abruptly late in the fight. Impressive stuff. If only fans got to watch the match sooner.

Much, much sooner.