Jake Paul-Anderson Silva PPV Bout Already Massive Financial Win

There is certainly some “buzz” surrounding the 2022 boxing return of Jake Paul, as he gets set to battle former UFC champ Anderson Silva in an eight round fight in Glendale, AZ Saturday night. And, the promoters of the PPV card have already announced a huge financial success in terms of live gate revenue.

Showtime, who will televise/stream the five fight card culminating with Paul vs. Silva touted Monday night how well the box office is doing,

“The blockbuster event headlined by international superstar Jake “The Problem Child” Paul and UFC legend Anderson “The Spider” Silva has established itself as the highest grossing boxing event for ticket revenue in the history of Desert Diamond Arena (formerly Gila River Arena) and the second highest-grossing ticket event across all combat sports with six days to go until fight night. The eight-round cruiserweight match takes place on Saturday, October 29 in a Most Valuable Promotions (MVP) event live on SHOWTIME PPV® at 9 p.m. ET/6 p.m. PT from the arena, just outside of Phoenix, Ariz.”

PAUL VS. SILVA LANDS BOX OFFICE HAYMAKER

“As fight week gets underway, the event’s total ticket revenue currently ranks ahead of all prior boxing events in the arena and sits between a pair of UFC events, trailing only UFC 263 for the highest grossing combat sports event in arena history. UFC 263 was headlined by the rematch between middleweight champion Israel Adesanya and Marvin Vettori, and featured MMA superstar Nate Diaz. Paul vs. Silva has already surpassed the only other UFC event there – UFC on Fox 29, which was headlined by a lightweight bout featuring future champion Dustin Poirier and Justin Gaethje and featured the initial match between Israel Adesanya and Marvin Vettori.”

Paul, who is 5-0, 4 KOs, but all against non-boxers, was to have fought unbeaten heavyweight Hasim Rahman, Jr. at Madison Square Garden back on August 6th. However, the Youtube/social media star turned fighter called off their bout after Rahman continued to miss weight cut deadline trying to get closer to the agreed “catch weight” of 205 lbs.

Our Dan Rafael reported that two sources with the promotion of Paul-Rahman Jr. and within Madison Square Garden had confirmed that the presale of tickets, etc for that proposed PPV headliner was already going to be the highest grossing live gate for boxing at the Garden in over a decade. Still, the plug was pulled on the entire event just a week before it was to have happened.

To further prove Paul’s pop-culture popularity and having it translate to boxing, he sold out the downtown Amalie Arena in Tampa with more than 18,000 in attendance for his one punch rematch KO of Tyron Woodley last December.

Silva, the former UFC middleweight champ for 16 consecutive title defenses, will be the closest thing Paul has faced to a boxer. This, as Silva followed up his surprising domination of Julio Caesar Chavez, Jr. by decision with a first round, boxing KO of former MMA champ Tito Ortiz in Hollywood, FL, last September.

There is also real optimism with Sliva’s highly successful MMA career and notoriety that the Paul bout will succeed at lower levels in PPV sales as well.