Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Logan Paul’s eight-round, unjudged exhibition boxing match sold one million pay-per-view buys, generating an estimated $50 million.
An anonymous source speaking to USA Today confirmed the figure after Sportico first reported the news. The Showtime event also marked the biggest single-day number of new subscription sign-ups since the network launched its streaming service in 2015, Hypebeast reports.
Trading blows in round 4 💥👀 #MayweatherPaul pic.twitter.com/jrAn0Vzo9R
— SHOWTIME Boxing (@ShowtimeBoxing) June 7, 2021
Mayweather has always been a huge draw—three of the four highest-grossing PPV fights featured the retired undefeated champion, with his 2015 bout against Manny Pacquiao generating a record 4.6 million PPV buys.
Mayweather vs. Paul will rank around 25th on the PPV record list, but organizers are happy with that result, given that it took place on a Sunday night and Paul’s 0-1 pro record heading into the bout.
Mayweather was complimentary of Paul’s performance in his post-fight interview, saying “I was surprised by him. Great, young fighter. Strong, tough. He’s better than I thought he was.”
Meanwhile, Paul has attempted to debunk a conspiracy theory that Mayweather held him up when he would’ve been knocked down.
“There’s one part in the fight where Floyd punched me and I kind of like leaned on him a little bit and it looks like I kinda went limp.” the internet sensation said on Instagram.
“People are trying to spin and say that he knocked me out and caught me and kept me up to keep the fight going to the eighth round. Shut the f*ck up. Like just shut the f*ck up. Stop trying to discredit what happened last night.”