Toss remote control at Dawson-Tarver rerun

LAS VEGAS – One of the worst things that ever happened to boxing fans is when rematch clauses gained widespread use in the sport.

If you don't believe that, consider that on Saturday at The Joint in the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, Chad Dawson and Antonio Tarver will meet for the International Boxing Federation light heavyweight title.

This is a rematch of an Oct. 11 bout, one which Dawson won by scores of 117-110, 118-109 and 117-110. It was a non-competitive match with no tangible signs that, short of a mugging with a weapon, Tarver could reverse the outcome.

That first match is, you may have forgotten, the one in which the eye-popping lowly total of 911 tickets were sold, according to Nevada State Athletic Commission records. I suspect that many of those that were reported as sold were, in fact, given away. All a promoter has to do is pay the state tax on a ticket and it is counted as sold, regardless of what it is actually done with it.

The fight was a dud on television, as well. Showtime's broadcast, combined with a delayed showing of the Vitali Klitschko-Samuel Peter fight in Germany, did a 1.4 household rating and attracted just 376,000 viewers.

It was a lousy fight that consumers rejected.

Common sense would dictate moving on to the next project. This being boxing, though, there's a rematch.

There seems to be no way Tarver can win the fight. There seems to be precious little interest in the bout. The television ratings – this time on HBO – again will be dismal. If it weren't for the replay of last weekend's blockbuster Manny Pacquiao-Ricky Hatton fight, which will precede it, Dawson-Tarver II might struggle to gain the rating it did in October.

None of it will come as a surprise to those involved with the promotion.

The public is cheated out of the fight it should rightfully have gotten, a rematch between Dawson and Glen Johnson, who engaged in an entertaining and competitive battle in 2008.

Boxing's run of compelling bouts on television, which began in January when Andre Berto and Luis Collazo made a bid for Fight of the Year, will come to a screeching halt.

Fans were once treated to a plethora of spine-tingling matches. There was the compelling scene on Jan. 24 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, when nearly 21,000 fans turned out to watch Antonio Margarito and Shane Mosley. There was the frenzied crowd at the Toyota Center in Houston on Feb. 28, roaring on hometown heroes Rocky Juarez and Juan Diaz in separate bouts. There was Carl Froch's compelling comeback against Jermain Taylor in Mashantucket, Conn., on April 25, as well as Timothy Bradley's gut check victory over Kendall Holt in Montreal on April 4.

April 4 was the same night in Austin, Texas, when a series of veteran boxing writers were compelled to stand and applaud Carlos Hernandez's courageous effort in a loss to Vicente Escobedo.

Pacquiao's electrifying knockout of Hatton brought the house down in Las Vegas last week, sending a sellout crowd of more than 16,000 that paid a live gate of more than $9 million into a frenzy.

And on Saturday, we get Dawson-Tarver II.

The fun has to end sometime.

Tarver has the more recognizable name and was the more accomplished fighter when the first fight was contemplated. He'd won two of three from Roy Jones Jr., including a devastating second-round knockout.

He used that leverage to force Dawson to sign a contract that included a rematch clause. That meant that, if Dawson won, Tarver had an out. Tarver had the ability to say he wanted a rematch and Dawson had to oblige.

Tarver earned that right with his past accomplishments. But while it is good for him and guarantees him another shot at the title, along with another lucrative payday, it's bad for the fans and for the sport.

For too long, boxing's power brokers have ignored their customers. The result has been, in the U.S., at least, a steady decline in the sport's significance and popularity. But sometime in the last year or so, things began to shift in the consumer's direction. Promoters began to get the idea that if they made the most compelling matches, the fans would respond.

And respond they have. There have been not only great fights on almost a weekly basis in 2009, but overflow crowds have been on hand to witness them.

The best are fighting the best; the most compelling matches are being made.

Dawson has blossomed into one of the elite fighters in the world, ranking ninth in the current Yahoo! Sports poll. No less an authority than Floyd Mayweather Jr. has said he believes Dawson is the finest boxer in the world.

HBO desperately wanted to get into the Chad Dawson business, so it agreed to take the Tarver rematch, even though its executives knew the odds would suggest the fight would be a dud.

Dawson had been a Showtime fighter previously, but HBO should have known that its wide edge in subscribers and budget would have forced Dawson to come to HBO regardless of whether it agreed to broadcast Dawson-Tarver II. It wields more influence than it realizes.

If HBO had turned down Dawson-Tarver II, it likely would not be in the Dawson business at this moment. How long, though, would it have taken for it to get a deal worked out once the rematch with Tarver ended? And with the possibility that no major premium cable network would accept the bout, it likely wouldn't have occurred had HBO not caved and agreed to air it.

Tarver, an HBO staple, has been an entertaining fighter throughout his career. His supporters will argue that he has a history of doing better in rematches and they'll insist that he wasn't all that bad in the first outing against Dawson.

And there was a time not too long ago when these "changing of the guard" type of fights were de rigueur.

The sport has taken a heavy tilt in favor of the consumer, for a change, and hopefully those kinds of fights will become the exception.

Tarver can save the day by fighting like he did in 2005, when he won rematches over Johnson and Jones.

But even if Tarver steps up and makes a compelling fight, let's hope that rematch clauses become the exception rather than the rule.

There's never a problem with a rematch when the first fight is so captivating that the fans demand another.

When it happens because of a contractual obligation, though, it allows a guy two kicks at the can at the expense of his customers.

Rarely do those who run boxing think of their customers.

If they'd start, the sport would be a lot more relevant.