By: Joshua Jaramillo

This first weekend of May, more than other years, has been magical. Inoue-Nakatani and Benavidez-Ramirez adorn our screens, providing matchups that are enjoyable not just to the hardcore fan that actively follows the sport, but are captivating to the most casual of casuals. This weekend has truly contained the best the sport has to offer, with the undercards of these headliners giving top of the line value alongside these well-made matchups.

But, particularly in the case of the Japanese card, something was sorely lacking.

Accessibility.

Now, this card was streamed worldwide on DAZN (or ESPNKO for luckier individuals), and there were no issues in being able to see the main event, thankfully.

However, the worst aspects of DAZN made themselves painfully visible, particularly in the West. The usual mess of audio and technical issues were present, and I will take a particular issue with the commentary. DAZN has been around for far too long to still have audio issues. Their quality commentators, such as Corey Erdman or Chris Algieri are often buried in lower-budget, less interesting shows. Meanwhile, the same crews that spout tired cliches and seem to fabricate narratives rather than follow the action in front of us continue to plague every major broadcast. Be it the British group, such as with this latest card, or the even worse Mannix and Mora combo, the commentary is consistently a detriment to the product. This is not a new issue. This is not an issue that will likely ever be fixed, but it’s an issue that, particularly in the case of this Japanese mega-fight, is made far more evident through the presence of an alternative ESPNKO broadcast. Genuinely engrossed in the action before them and earnestly engaging with the reality of the ring before them, it only further highlights the spurious nature of DAZN’s product.

Perhaps worst still, is the available length of the card. For whatever reason, DAZN found itself unwilling to pick up the entire card (yet another leg up ESPNKO had on it on this night), and omitted two fantastic fights.

Yes, Inoue-Nakatani was an intense super-fight that brought two elite operators on display. Despite that, the card was still missing something.

That something, is two fights in particular. Yes, four total fights were not aired. Despite that, I find the omissions of Jin Sasaki vs. Sora Tanaka and Yuito Moriwaki vs. Deok No Yun particularly egregious. These fights were fantastic, thrilling encounters between phonebooth fighters truly giving their absolute all. But even if they weren’t, why does DAZN feel the need to decide that they’re not worth airing? The boxing is happening regardless, so why not show it? Why not take the chance on having fighters build their profile on your platform, at little if any risk to the platform itself. Why is it up to the western viewer to find alternative ways to access better production, better commentary, or even the fights themselves.

This is not an endorsement of sailing the high seas to seek out more of the sport we love. But it’s hard not to sympathize with those who do. DAZN absolutely cannot charge so much for such an inconvenient, inaccessible, and disingenuous product.

In a time where the sweet science is under siege by forces seeking to undermine fighter profile and pay, DAZN has to be better. It doesn’t take much. I’d even be a little malcontent, but ultimately fine with the commentators if the product wasn’t constantly subject to technical issues and weird fight accessibility issues. Particularly regarding events of this magnitude, the fans deserve better, the fighters deserve better, and frankly, DAZN is less deserving of your hard-earned dollar than ever.

DAZN really needs to be better

Mayweather and Pacquiao are at it again