Danny Garcia, Lucas Matthysse to meet Sept. 14 on Floyd Mayweather-Canelo Alvarez undercard
Put Golden Boy Promotions CEO Richard Schaefer at the top of the Man of the Year lists.
Schaefer delivered the news Thursday that boxing fans have been desperate to hear, announcing that Danny Garcia will meet Lucas Matthysse in a highly anticipated super lightweight title bout.
Even better, Schaefer confirmed during a conference call that the bout will be the primary undercard match on the mega-Sept. 14 Showtime pay-per-view card that features Floyd Mayweather and Canelo Alvarez in a super welterweight title bout at the MGM Grand Garden in Las Vegas.
The top two fights are outstanding and make it on paper one of the most compelling 1-2 punches at the top of a pay-per-view card in a very long time. It should boost the Mayweather-Alvarez card's sales, but by how much will be the question. The Mayweather-Alvarez bout is already expected to be the largest-selling match of the year.
No matter, though, Sept. 14 has become a can't miss date on the schedule. If you're a boxing fan, there are no legitimate excuses to miss this one. I suspect that even Bob Arum, the CEO of Top Rank and Schaefer's bitter rival, will plunk down his $75 to catch this card.
Schaefer had been desperate to make the fight for the last several months and said he gets more questions about the Garcia-Matthysse bout than any other. Garcia, 25, is 26-0 with 16 knockouts. He holds the WBA and WBC super lightweight belts. Matthysse, 30, is one of boxing's hardest hitters. He's 34-2 with 32 knockouts.
Schaefer and Leonard Ellerbe, the CEO of Mayweather Promotions, said Mayweather was the driving force being getting the Garcia-Matthysse fight done and putting it on the Sept. 14 undercard.
"[Mayweather's] fights are the Super Bowl of boxing and we all know his nickname is 'Money,' " Schaefer said. "Well, Floyd is putting his money where his mouth is, creating the single biggest pay-per-view event of all-time by adding, after Mayweather versus Canelo, the next most anticipated fight in the sport of boxing on the Sept. 14 pay-per-view. Yes, it's done. Yes, Danny 'Swift' Garcia versus Lucas 'The Machine' Matthysse will happen, and yes it will happen on Sept. 14 as part of 'The One.' The One just got another one."
Ellerbe said Mayweather was determined to bring more fans to boxing and said that by adding an action-packed bout like Garcia-Matthysse to a show which will attract a lot of first-time buyers, he's doing that.
The Garcia-Matthysse fight is expensive -- No one said how much the fighters are making, but it's a good bet it's in excess of $3 million -- and that type of fight has rarely wound up as a co-main event on pay-per-view.
Schaefer said if it were a standalone main event at the Barclays Center in New York, it could have done a $1 million live gate.
"Floyd made it clear to us that he wanted to give his fans the biggest and best fights possible on his cards," Ellerbe said. "With this fight being made, Garcia versus Matthysse, this is going to be a tremendous card. This fight is a main event alone and has Fight of the Year written all over it. It's another example of how Floyd has put the sport on his back. He's trying to bring awareness to the sport, and with this fight getting the worldwide platform it truly deserves and in my eyes, this is another step in the right direction of making boxing a mainstream sport."
Schaefer said the gate has surpassed $19.5 million, which is a Nevada record. He said 12,000 closes circuit seats in Las Vegas out of the original allotment of 18,000 have already sold, and he's looking to add another 20,000 seats. Normally, closed circuit seats sell best on the day before and the day of the fight.
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