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Add FightsATW on GoogleAs the world continues its transition from Web 2.0 to Web 3.0, with artificial intelligence playing an increasingly prominent role, sports have largely shifted to streaming platforms. In some cases, following an individual sport requires subscribing to more than one app. Boxing was among the last sports to make the transition, and DAZN and Paramount+ now stand as the major players in the streaming landscape. Over the past few years, ProBox TV, led by CEO Garry Jonas, has steadily established itself as a destination for hardcore fans seeking more competitive matchups.
Over the past two years, ProBox TV’s product has been available for free on YouTube. However, on Saturday in Los Angeles, California, the platform will debut a $5 subscription plan to stream a fight card headlined by interim WBC super-middleweight titleholder Lester Martinez (20-0-1, 16 KOs) against Luka Plantic (13-0, 10 KOs). To better understand how the product began and where it is headed, Jonas discussed its origins, the transition to a paywall, and the future of ProBox TV.
ProBox Promotions was announced in February 2021, followed by ProBox TV in April 2022. The channel launched as an app with a $1.99 monthly subscription, and its first card featured Jean Pascal vs. Fanlong Meng on May 20, 2022. At the time, apps were becoming a staple of everyday life, but with so many competing for attention, standing out was difficult—much like trying to sell a book in today’s Amazon-dominated market. It was a challenging proposition, but Jonas had an idea and was determined to see it through.
“The primary issue was that we wanted to build a boxing channel exclusively for direct-to-consumer access,” Jonas told FightsATW. “We felt boxing needed its own channel. It’s not a fun ride or experience to be dependent on the networks. In fact, look at the experience they’ve had over the past five years—it hasn’t been easy. If you can achieve direct-to-the-fan or direct-to-consumer freedom, you can put out a better product with far fewer challenges. We really felt that was the most important thing to try to achieve.”
Jonas continued, “If you remember, we started it with Fanlong Meng and Jean Pascal, and it was on an app. It was hard to access and difficult to sign up. There were a couple of challenges. Most of all, I realized early on that we had about 7,000 subscribers, but nobody knew who we were. So, we decided to open it up and make it free. It has always been about affordability—not necessarily about being free—but we had to make it free so people could discover the brand, become comfortable with what we do, and gain confidence in the product. That’s exactly what we did, and four years later, it’s gone well. The fans have approved of the product. They like it, and our base has continued to grow.”
“Now our fighters have come of age. Many of the guys we recruited back then are now top prospects. Naturally, they’re ready for big fights and bigger money. That’s why we’re turning it up a notch. At this point, it’s only logical to ask the fans to contribute a little bit.”
Jonas quickly realized that launching an app in 2022 was challenging, and he eventually put the subscription model on hold. That experience, however, taught him an important lesson and led him to take the company in a direction that made more sense—not only for him but also for the people who mattered most: the fans.
“I just think that apps are difficult,” said Jonas. “They’re like islands. They’re not easy to access, and they don’t get much distribution, so consumers have to go out of their way to find them, interact with them, and sign up. From our perspective, that was one challenge. The other was realizing that distribution is everything.”
“YouTube is a very powerful distributor, and it’s preinstalled on every device around the world. I’ve walked up to so many people and asked them to show me the ProBox app. They’d say, ‘Well, I don’t have it,’ but then I’d remind them, ‘You just said you watch it.’ They’d reply, ‘I watch it on YouTube.’ I’d say, ‘Watch it on the big screen.’ Then they’d say, ‘I watch it on YouTube on the big screen.’ That’s when I realized, ‘What am I doing?’ With all the headaches that come with a separate app, we could simply give fans easy access worldwide. So we moved to YouTube as our distribution model, and here we are.”
While Jonas found the right distribution model, the personnel involved in his shows—including the commentary crew and the way news was delivered—continued to evolve. The average tenure at ProBox was about 12 months as he searched for the right mix. The original commentary team consisted of Roy Jones Jr., Antonio Tarver, Juan Manuel Márquez, and Paulie Malignaggi. Over time, coordinating Jones’ and Márquez’s schedules became increasingly difficult, and it became clear that Malignaggi and Chris Algieri were the best fit.
“I think it happened organically,” Jonas said regarding the changes in personnel. “Part of it, at the beginning, was putting together a good team. Roy Jones is a superstar, and his schedule isn’t going to sit around waiting for us. So, there were scheduling conflicts with Roy and Marquez. We found that Paulie and Algieri could be more committed to the product and be there when we needed them. That had a lot to do with the shifts and adjustments we made.”
After seeing viewership grow with each ProBox TV show on YouTube, Jonas decided it was time to put the platform behind a paywall so he could deliver bigger shows without taking significant losses. In June, Malignaggi appeared on a podcast and revealed that ProBox TV would move to a $5 subscription model, delivering the news in his typically blunt style. The video made headlines, prompting Jonas to quickly clarify the situation publicly. Jonas later discussed the incident, saying it had been blown out of proportion:
“Obviously, some people tried to make a meal out of it,” said the Canadian-born Jonas. “I didn’t think it was such a big deal. I think people know that, with Paulie, you have to take him with a grain of salt. Sometimes he speaks first and thinks second, but he means well. It was a simple ‘let me clarify.’ Paulie was a little nervous. He meant well, but he characterized some of it the wrong way. When I talk to my people, if I’m going to make a change, I’m going to tell them exactly what I’m doing and why. I think it made him nervous because he was feeling that he was going to get less studio work, which he was, but he saw it a certain way. Overall, it wasn’t a big deal.”
On Saturday night, all eyes—especially Jonas’—will be on the numbers generated by the new paid subscription. Although he wants it to succeed, Jonas has been in the boxing business long enough to know that expectations don’t always match reality.
“Expectations can be so wide-ranging, said Jonas. “When you look at the data, it’s so difficult to predict. Fan behavior is so difficult to predict. Did we do a good job at marketing this? We don’t know. We do know that we have 750,000 regular viewers on YouTube.”
Looking ahead, particularly to the fourth quarter, Jonas has big plans—and they don’t necessarily involve ProBox alone. “We’ve always said that we are a boxing channel that has a promotional license, not a promoter with a boxing channel. I think sometimes people misunderstand that. There were numerous times this year when we put on fights that had nothing to do with ProBox Promotions because we are a channel.”
Jonas added, “Giovanni Santillan and Abass Baraou is a great fight. We have Lester Martinez and Luka Plantić in a championship bout. Next time out, we’ll have a main event featuring two top-ten fighters from Top Rank going head to head. We’re happy to put it on because we just want to give the fans good fights, which further explains that we are a boxing channel first and foremost. That’s what the fans can expect.”
“After that, we are in Phoenix [Arizona] on October 16, which we will be announcing any second now. We’ve got these future-star shows out of Tijuana [Mexico] that we are sending some of our young guys to, and those will be going on every month as well. Then on November 13, another really good card in El Paso [Texas], and then we’ll round out the year with these championship series fights in Orlando [Florida] on December 12.”
With Saturday’s upcoming fight and the fourth-quarter schedule in mind, what would Jonas consider a successful 2026? A smooth transition into the championship series, he says. And continuing to provide fans with what makes them different from other platforms:
“Fans embrace the fact that we are trying to make it affordable. They embrace that we do things differently here, with tougher matchups and a little stricter adherence to action fighters. That’s the key to our brand. We do a pretty solid production. Our commentators keep it real. We don’t talk any nonsense. We have respect for them in that regard. We have a fast-paced show with less talking and more fighting. Those are the things we do differently, and as long as fans recognize that and like the product, we call it a success wherever it lands in terms of how many subscribers.”
As ProBox TV launches its new subscription-based model, the question is whether fans who have grown accustomed to watching the platform for free will now be willing to pay. In its favor, the $5 monthly fee is unlikely to feel as burdensome as the cost of other popular subscriptions, such as Netflix, Paramount+, or ESPN+. We are only days away from learning what the initial fan response will be to the new pay model, but the longer-term test will be whether those viewers become subscribers and continue to see enough value in the product to keep paying.
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