The Mexican 154 titlist Jaime Munguia headlined on HBO Saturday night and the viewers responded, as rating from Nielsen showed the highest BOXING AFTER DARK viewership number for the year.
Jaime Munguia vs. Liam Smith, a Brit who some thought would get demolished by the 24 year old Mexican, averaged 777,000 viewers and peaked at 827,000 viewers for the live telecast from the Joint at Hard Rock Hotel & Casino.
Munguia improved on his first HBO appearance, last May, when he averaged 711,000 viewers versus Sadam Ali when the kid showed heavy hands and vicious intent on his Brooklyn-based foe.
The co-feature of Alberto Machado vs. Rafael Mensah averaged 665,000 viewers this past Saturday; peaking at 762,000 viewers.
Machado pretty much had his way with the Ghanian boxer, who drew praise for his toughness more than anything else.
HBO BOXING returns Aug. 4 from Atlantic City with a light heavyweight doubleheader on tap. Sergey Kovalev and Dmitriy Bivol are seeming to be on a collision course.
Kovalev must down Elder Alvarez to retain his WBO strap, and Bivol will be favored to better Issac Chilemba, and retain his WBA 175 strap.
Founder/editor Michael Woods got addicted to boxing in 1990, when Buster Douglas shocked the world with his demolition of the then-impregnable Mike Tyson.
The Brooklyn-based journalist has covered the sport since for ESPN The Magazine, ESPN.com, Bad Left Hook and RING. His journalism career started with NY Newsday in 1999.
Michael Woods is also an accomplished blow by blow and color man, having done work for Top Rank, DiBella Entertainment, EPIX, and for Facebook Fightnight Live, since 2017.
