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While the super fight between Floyd Mayweather and Conor McGregor is over and there’s been a full day or two of reactions around how it played out, apparently the drama isn’t over just yet. While Showtime had some issues with their stream of the fight originally, Ashley Cullins of the Hollywood Reporter broke the news that they are actually being sued for “unlawful trade practices and unjust enrichment.”
Cullins reported that attorney Michael Fuller has submitted to the federal court (courtesy of Bleacher Report):
“Instead of being upfront with consumers about its new, untested, underpowered service, defendant caused likelihood of confusion and misunderstanding as to the source and quality of the HD video consumers would see on fight night.
“Defendant intentionally misrepresented the quality and grade of video consumers would see using its app, and knowingly failed to disclose that its system was defective with respect to the amount of bandwidth available, and that defendant’s service would materially fail to conform to the quality of HD video defendant promised.”
The stream was said to feature “grainy video, error screens, buffer events, and stalls,” as one boxing fan told Cullins.
It seems as though Showtime is getting out in front of this, though. Cullins reported that Showtime SVP of sports communications Chris DeBlasio said the company will handle complaints from anyone who purchased through Showtimeppv.com and the Showtime PPV app.
“We have received a very limited number of complaints and will issue a full refund for any customer who purchased the event directly from Showtime and were unable to receive the telecast,” he says.
The fight was purchased for $99.99, but the complaint is seeking for each member of the class actual damages or $200 in statutory damages, whichever is greater.
The fight between Mayweather and McGregor was one of the most talked about fights in history, and as Kevin Iole of Yahoo Sports reported, UFC president Dana White was confident it would break the record sales number of 4.6 million. That number was originally set by the 2015 Mayweather vs. Manny Pacquiao bout.