In recent years, top content creators have increasingly gone beyond the traditional realm of broadcasts and blogs in an attempt to attract new viewers and sponsors. Participating in various sports competitions, including boxing exhibition matches, has been one popular way to boost media presence. Such matches gather huge crowds of fans and millions of viewers through broadcasts. This Saturday, October 14, in England at the Manchester Arena, two such matches will take place: YouTubers Logan Paul and KSI will compete against professional fighters Dillon Danis and Tommy Fury.
If you have ever checked out the YouTube trends, you have probably seen Logan Paul there. This guy can undoubtedly be called a "content creator" as he is engaged in numerous media projects: creating videos for multiple YouTube channels, posting travel vlogs, reviews of his expensive purchases, sports challenges and pranks on his friends, conducting interviews with guests, and so on. He hosts his own podcast called IMPAULSIVE and appears in commercials, television series, and short films. Logan Paul is also successfully building his media career in sports. In 2018, he participated in his first boxing exhibition match against popular YouTuber KSI (followed by a rematch the following year), and in 2021, he stepped into the ring against Floyd Mayweather himself, a former world champion in five weight classes. Although Logan Paul lost both matches, it seems like he has no plans to give up on boxing. In July 2022, he signed a multi-year contract with the leading American wrestling promotion, WWE.
On October 14, Logan Paul will face off against Dillon Danis, an American mixed martial artist in the welterweight division. The main thing to know about this guy is that his coach is none other than Conor McGregor himself, the former UFC champion in the lightweight and featherweight divisions.
When it comes to KSI, his media activity is no less impressive than Logan Paul's. Initially, KSI gained popularity by posting gameplay videos of various games (most often FIFA) on YouTube, but later transitioned into entertainment content. Nowadays, he usually films reactions and reviews of funny videos from TikTok and other social media platforms. KSI has also made cameo appearances in TV series and movies. Additionally, he is involved in music, rapping, managing the boxing club Misfits Boxing, and a chain of restaurants called Sides. KSI is a member of the British YouTuber collective, The Sidemen, who create collaborative content and host entertaining events. For instance, they recently organized a large charity football exhibition match between The Sidemen team and a team of star streamers.
Also read: Sidemen Charity Match 2023 attracts 2.7 million Peak Viewers, but fails to beat last year's record
KSI has also had multiple appearances in the boxing ring. He started participating in boxing exhibition matches back in 2017 and had his first fight against British YouTuber Joe Weller. After that, he had two matches against Logan Paul, fought against Brazilian YouTuber FaZe Temperrr, and competed against several other boxers. On October 14, he is set to face Tommy Fury, a British boxer and the brother of Tyson Fury, the world champion according to the WBC.
Logan Paul or KSI — who is discussed more by Twitch viewers?
The number of mentions in Twitch chats is another indicator of the media presence of streamers/bloggers. Streams Charts analysts have tracked how often users on the platform discussed Logan Paul and KSI leading up to their boxing matches.
Over a two-month period (from 12 August to 12 October), KSI had approximately 77.5K mentions in Twitch messages. For comparison, Logan Paul had around 16K messages. Overall, it should be noted that KSI was mentioned much more frequently than his Prime Hydration partner throughout the specified time period. This is because KSI is much "closer" to the gaming community on Twitch compared to Logan Paul. He produces more gaming-related content, while Logan Paul is primarily focused on lifestyle vlogs.
KSI outpaces Logan Paul in number of mentions on Twitch
Over the past two months, the number of mentions of Logan Paul's name on Twitch has ranged from 200 to 300 messages per day. For KSI, this range was 1K to 2K messages. Of course, there were some dips and spikes in the graphs, but only one significant spike occurred on September 9, when the number of messages mentioning KSI in Twitch chats reached 7.3K. This anomalous peak was related to the discussion of the Sidemen football exhibition match against YouTube stars. In that match, KSI played as the goalkeeper for the Sidemen team and stood out with several highlights (as well as blunders). For example, he saved iShowSpeed's penalty kick and celebrated it in Ronaldo style.
Interestingly, the number of mentions for Dillon Danis and Tommy Fury was even lower than that of the bloggers. Over the course of two months, they accumulated 2.6K and 2.1K messages, respectively.