Comments Thread For: After Deontay Wilder, Zhilei Zhang's Next Target: A China Homecoming

[Boro]

I think the ufc only did 1 event there & it was 5ish yrs ago now + it wasn't a ppv. There are definitely popular Chinese ufc athletes that seem sellable in theory & like Zhang get viewership tho. And I'm not sure if they've sold a Chinese main event ppv to China, but if they did I'd be curious to see the revenue.

100% there is potential there, but the fact we haven't seen it yet says maybe its not ripe. I trust these guys with millions to billions to have more facts & metrics then we would to better see the potential to turn a profit with the Chinese boxing market.

Well they've already sunk 10s of millions into performance centres and the likes in Shanghai, it's just the beer bug throw a spanner in the works for bigger events and the lack of any real male talent, they were planning to do something late last year but something stopped it.

Zhang Weili was the event in 2019 they choose to headline because she was the best they had from China at that point in time and i'm not too sure how s�xist China is but now they have Song Yadong to headline...

I think the issue is Douyin and Wechat and the likes are huge but they don't convert as you'd expect them too...

Twitch found this out in Korea, they might engage with a lot of social media but they don't seem to spend for some reason, seems Asians like to whale on mobile games and stuff like that rather than spend on real life stuff oddly enough.

[Airtioteclint]

I still question if they can have a big fight in China. Zou Shiming had similar viewership as Zhang now & they never seemed to flip viewers into revenue.

From my understanding the avg Chinese citizen is doing better now than when Zou was active. There is also an emerging middle class thats still growing likely leading to more ppl with disposable income. But those same venues that Zou was at haven't really been in business post Zou. So that's probably not a good sign.

Sh^t according to boxrec China as a whole only had 28 fight cards last year. Chinese ppl watching boxing might be like when a regular ass person pays attention to the Olympics here. Lotsa mfers will watch it if its on for free, but if you put any paywall up to view they won't give enough fooks about it to pass that paywall.

That's because they never had a champion before. Give him a shot at the belts and he's an overnight success.

Ufc wasn't big there until weili Zhang got a belt.

[takenotes]

I do not think they would make the same money as they would in SA. SA is really throwing dollars at these guys and putting together amazing fights. I'd love to see DDD vs AJ and Zhang rematch Parker on the next card (or some variation of that). Heck even a Wilder Ngannou on that card would be wild. But would China pay out the same purse? I do not think so.

[PittyPat]

If they can't pay one of the current HWs for this, or if they're too busy, why not bring Taishan Dong – the Big Ding Dong himself – out of retirement for the first ever all-Chinese HW showdown?!

[Boro]

This is the stuff I'm questioning for a guy like Zhang or the next Zhang. Chinese folks just don't seem THAT into boxing rn based on what I'm seeing thus far. And it could take generations to grow it to have a viable big name star/ppv guy.

Yes it's weird in most countries if you engage in social media, forums etc etc you'd be considered part of the hardcore fan base because you're going out of your way to participate in the sport in one way or the other (the applies to other things not just sports) but for some reason it doesn't with Asians, it blows my mind frankly.

Perhaps engaging in social media to such a degree is as normal as breathing is to us and they just click on what's "hot/trending" at the time and move on with their day rather than actually caring about it, just a theory mind you.