Tag: Al Haymon

Shawn Porter ready for Errol Spence Jr.-Danny Garcia winner

Shawn Porter believes that he will get a chance to challenge for a title in his next fight.

Shawn Porter believes that he will get a chance to challenge for a title in his next fight.

Speaking to boxingscene.com, Porter said that Al Haymon, Premier Boxing Champions’ head, told him that he will be entitled to face the winner of the Nov. 21 fight between welterweight titleholder Errol Spence Jr. and Danny Garcia.

“I think the conversation remains the same,” Porter said. “The conversation is me fighting the winner of Errol Spence Jr. and Danny Garcia. I don’t think that’s something Al Haymon is looking to change and or looking forward to changing.

“That’s what I’m being told, that I get the winner.”

Porter has already faced both fighters. He defeated Garcia in September 2018 in New York to win a 147-pound title. He lost his belt to Spence by a split decision a year later in Los Angeles.

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Shawn Porter ready for Errol Spence Jr.-Danny Garcia winner

Shawn Porter believes that he will get a chance to challenge for a title in his next fight.

Shawn Porter believes that he will get a chance to challenge for a title in his next fight.

Speaking to boxingscene.com, Porter said that Al Haymon, Premier Boxing Champions’ head, told him that he will be entitled to face the winner of the Nov. 21 fight between welterweight titleholder Errol Spence Jr. and Danny Garcia.

“I think the conversation remains the same,” Porter said. “The conversation is me fighting the winner of Errol Spence Jr. and Danny Garcia. I don’t think that’s something Al Haymon is looking to change and or looking forward to changing.

“That’s what I’m being told, that I get the winner.”

Porter has already faced both fighters. He defeated Garcia in September 2018 in New York to win a 147-pound title. He lost his belt to Spence by a split decision a year later in Los Angeles.

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Adrien Broner, who can’t get his $10 million to fight, says ‘I’m a rapper now’

Adrien Broner says he’ll focus on rapping if he can’t get the $10 million he is demanding to get back into the ring.

Have we seen the last of Adrien Broner in the ring?

“The Problem” is demanding that Showtime and Premier Boxing Champions pay him $10 million for his next fight or he’s finished with boxing. He said on Instagram that he’ll be content to give up the sport and focus full time on his music career.

“OK, look. I ain’t heard from Stephen Espinoza [of Showtime]. Me and Al [Haymon of PBC], we talk every day. Ain’t nobody talking about that $10 million. So I’ll take that as I’m still retired and do what I’m going to do. I’m going to focus on my album. And I’m just a rapper. I’m a rapper now.

“… Until they talk about my $10 million, I ain’t going to be in the f—ing ring. I’m going to be in the studio. So my album dropping. It is what it is.”

Is he bluffing?

Broner seemed to imply on another Instagram post that he’ll show everyone what he’s capable of.

“I’m not f—ing playing no games y’all put me up against the best in the world and I never turned down a fight now it’s time to come correct or leave me the f— alone but I will become champion again and I promise I’m go make y’all pay double the PRICE!!!!!!!”

The reality is that Broner doesn’t command that kind of money, particularly in an economy that has been devastated by the coronavirus pandemic. He still commands attention because of his mouth, which sells his fights. But $10 million? No way.

Broner (33-4-1, 24 KOs) has had a lot of success in his career, winning titles in four divisions by the time he was 26.

That’s the past, though. Broner, now 30, is 0-2-1 in his last three fights. He lost a wide decision to Mikey Garcia in 2017, a majority decision to Jessie Vargas the following year and another one-sided decision to Manny Pacquiao in 2019.

A boxer who hasn’t won a fight in more than three years might want to consider another career.

Dana White expresses doubts about boxing venture

Dana White expressed some reservations and doubts about the boxing business in a recent interview…

Dana White has long teased that he was going to dive headlong into the deep waters of the boxing business. The UFC head promised a press conference last October to unveil his boxing operation. Yet October came and went. Then November, December, January … still nothing.

Now it appears he has cold feet.

In a video interview with Yahoo! Sports posted Tuesday, White was asked to comment on how he viewed the economic structure of boxing. He wasn’t so enthused.

“I hate speaking negatively about the sport of boxing,” White said, “other than the fact that it’s a mess – we all knows it’s a mess – and that it needs to be fixed, if it can be fixed.”

White continued: “I told you guys that I would have a press conference last October and announce all these things, but as I dove into this thing and started to look into the sport of boxing, the economics of boxing, that sport’s a mess. It’s a mess and it’s in big trouble. I don’t know. I don’t know if it can be fixed.”

What does White mean by “mess”? He didn’t say during the Yahoo! interview, but it doesn’t take a genius to grasp at least one of his objections.

As the largest mixed martial arts promotional group in the world, with nearly 600 fighters under exclusive contract, the UFC has considerable leverage when it comes to fighter compensation. The outfit signed a $1.5 billion broadcasting deal with ESPN in 2018. A few MMA experts, using publicly available financial documents, have estimated that UFC fighters take home anywhere from 13.6-16.3% of UFC’s total revenue in a given year.

The general consensus is that boxers do much better than that, which might be the reason for White’s reticence to wade in boxing waters. Promoter Bob Arum has been quoted in a recent UFC anti-trust suit as saying that his company Top Rank “pay[s] out 80%” of the revenue to fighters. According to Golden Boy’s financial documents that were brought to light during their anti-trust litigation against Premier Boxing Champions  (which was eventually rejected by the court), their fighter payout was 64% and 62% of total revenue in 2014 and 2015, respectively.

And it’s not a pattern that is likely to change anytime soon. In recent years, new players like the streaming platform DAZN have been doling out mind-numbing purses to fighters from all levels of the talent spectrum in an effort to bolster their presence in the market.

For White, who is accustomed to claiming the biggest piece of the pie, that’s a mess.

Tyson Fury-Deontay Wilder III heading for sometime this fall

Bob Arum said it’s not possible for Tyson Fury-Deontay Wilder III to take place on the target date of July 18 because of coronavirus.

Tyson Fury and Deontay will have to wait a little longer for their third fight.

They were tentatively scheduled to meet on July 18 but, Top Rank Chairman Bob Arum told ESPN, the fight is likely to be moved to sometime in the fall as a result of the uncertainty surrounding the coronavirus pandemic.

The Nevada State Athletic Commission has banned combat sports indefinitely and Las Vegas is more or less shut down.

Arum was asked directly whether the fight would take place on July 18.

“Clearly not,” Arum told ESPN. “We don’t even know if the MGM will even be open by then.”

He went on: “You could not guarantee the fighters that the event would take place on that date. We couldn’t convince them or ourselves. Where were they going to train for it? It just made no sense. You just have to take a step back. How are you going to sell tickets? It’s absolutely ridiculous to say the fight is on when the Brits can’t even get there.”

Arum, who promotes Fury, said Wilder manager Al Haymon of Premier Boxing Champions is on board with the change in schedule.

“Al and his people are in touch with us all the time on this,” Arum said. “We see things the same way. We’ll be very, very cautious moving ahead and pray this will be over at a particular time and we will be able to make smart plans. Nobody has ever experienced anything like this before.”

Fury and Wilder fought to a draw in December 2018. In the rematch, this past Feb. 22, Fury scored a sensational seventh-round knockout.

Bob Arum to explore staging Fury-Wilder III at new stadium in Las Vegas

Promoter Bob Arum told TalkBox Podcast that he would explore the possibility of staging Fury-Wilder III at the new Allegiant Stadium.

Promoter Bob Arum believes a third fight between Tyson Fury and Deontay Wilder would be big. NFL big.

Arum said on the Everlast TalkBox podcast that should Wilder give the green light for another go at Fury, he would look to stage it at the new home of the Las Vegas Raiders, the still-under-construction, $1.9 billion Allegiant Stadium. It is scheduled to be completed by July 31.

“If Deontay Wilder wants a rematch, it’s a big, big fight,” Arum said. “We would look at the new Raiders Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas to host its first boxing match ever. It’s all good. But everybody … all the promoters, whether it’s Al Haymon or myself … we’re hopefully going to be cooperative here and not blow the moment that boxing has clawed its way back to the mainstream.”

Fury-Wilder II, which ended with Fury scoring a seventh-round knockout of Wilder, took place at the MGM Grand Garden, the home for most big-ticket fights in the gambling capital. It seats only around 17,000, however, which a third fight may outgrow. Allegiant Stadium, on the other hand, will have a seating capacity of 65,000, along with state-of-the-art technology, including retractable windows and a translucent roof meant to offer an expansive view of the Las Vegas terrain.

Of course, Wilder would have to exercise his contractual right to a third fight. He has told multiple outlets in the past few days that he has every intention of doing so.

If not, Arum believes there’s another viable fight out there for Fury: A full unification with British compatriot Anthony Joshua. Joshua is slated to take on mandatory challenger Kubrat Pulev, a fight that Top Rank will co-promote, in June. Nevertheless, Arum said he can pull a few strings to make what would easily be the biggest all-British heavyweight fight ever.

“If Wilder decides to delay the fight, I know we can talk to Pulev to step aside — he’s the mandatory for Joshua — and have Joshua fight Fury, which is the fight that is first place of what you want to see in the heavyweight division.”

But Arum added, “That’s all theoretical.”

PBC fighters ‘ducking’ Terence Crawford? Shawn Porter says it’s possible

Shawn Porter believes there’s credence to the claim that PBC welterweights are actively avoiding Top Rank-promoted Terence Crawford.

Last December, during an ESPN/Top Rank broadcast, analyst Tim Bradley fired a broadside toward the elite welterweights aligned with rival outfit Premier Boxing Champions: Stop ducking Top Rank fighter Terence Crawford.

Bradley believes that Crawford can’t land a significant fight because top PBC fighters are avoiding him. That group includes Errol Spence Jr., Keith Thurman and Danny Garcia. Of course, one could accuse Bradley, once a Top Rank fighter, of simply supporting company interests, given both he and Crawford receive paychecks from ESPN.

But it doesn’t appear to be an entirely partisan opinion.

On Friday, Shawn Porter, a top PBC welterweight and Fox analyst, was asked whether he had a chance to speak to Bradley about his comments given that both were on the commentating team for Saturday’s Deontay Wilder-Tyson Fury card.

Porter’s response? He smiled and said “no,” that he had no such plans. In fact, he agreed wholeheartedly with Bradley. But he wanted to make one thing clear: Bradley wasn’t talking about him.

“When Tim called out the PBC stable, he knew who he was talking about and he knew who he wasn’t talking about,” Porter told FightHubTV. “He wasn’t talking about Shawn Porter.

“Tim knows. We’re from the same place. We do whatever it takes, whenever it takes. He knows that about me. He knows that I’m a fighter and that I’ll fight everybody whenever the time is right.”

Why is Porter so confident that Bradley wasn’t talking about him? The proof is on his list of opponents: virtually all of the top welterweight contenders and titleholders of the past half decade can be found there.

Asked whether he felt that Bradley had a legitimate case, Porter replied, “Absolutely, absolutely.”

Then Porter doubled down.

“Even within PBC there’s fighters avoiding fighters within PBC, OK?” he said. “Guys are not fighting with their hearts, they’re fighting with their brains, and what I mean by that is that they’re trying to figure out how much money they can make and who’s the easiest one out there for me to take on.

“And that’s not fair to you guys (the fans). We’re getting to a point now where you can’t duck anybody, even on the PBC side.”

There’s no ducking with the 32-year-old Porter, who doesn’t plan to change his pattern of taking on the top contenders anytime soon.

“You just saw me get it on with Errol Spence and you’ll see me get it on with somebody else big,” Porter continued. “If it isn’t Terence Crawford, it’ll be somebody else on the PBC side. But I’m not here to fight a No. 6 guy, a No. 10 guy. That’s why you haven’t seen me announce who I’m going to fight, because No. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 won’t fight me.”

So who’s next? Porter ruled out Garcia as a possibility because he “fights almost once a year. He’ll probably get back in the ring in December. I don’t have time for that. June is the latest. I’m gonna force somebody to fight me by June. … By the time you see me in the ring, Showtime Shawn Porter will be mad.”

As for a potential fight with Crawford, Porter says only time will tell.

“I haven’t been able to catch up with Terence Crawford yet,” he said. “We’ve been texting. I know he’s here (at the Wilder-Fury fight) today. We’ll catch up. And you guys will find out something after that.

“But don’t ever say Shawn Porter is ducking anyone, don’t say Shawn Porter is ducking Terence Crawford, and don’t dare say Terence Crawford is ducking Shawn Porter. Until we talk, until we have a conversation that we agreed upon, we’re not going to say nothing about one another … because we owe that respect to one another.”

Jean Pascal and Badou Jack agree to rematch in May

Jean Pascal and Badou Jack have agreed to terms to face each other in a rematch later this spring. Pascal won the first bout in December.

Jean Pascal and Badou Jack are running it back up.

The light heavyweight contenders went tit for tat for 12 rounds on the Dec. 28 Gervonta Davis-Yuriorkis Gamboa card before Pascal prevailed narrowly – and a tad controversially – on the scorecards. Now, they are headed toward a rematch after both parties agreed to terms, according to BoxingScene.

The fight could take place on three possible dates, May 9 or 23 on FOX, or May 16 on Showtime, the website reported. Al Haymon has output deals with both Showtime and Fox to showcase his Premier Boxing Champions cards.

The card could also feature a light heavyweight bout between Sullivan Barrera and Marcus Browne, who fought Jack and Pascal last year. Browne beat Jack but suffered three knockdowns en route to a technical-decision loss to Pascal.

Pascal-Jack stands to reprise what was one of the more entertaining fights in the latter half of 2019. Pascal controlled the early rounds, scoring a knockdown in Round 4, before Jack (22-3-3, 13 KOs) began to take control in the second half of the fight. He put Pascal on the canvas in the final round. Two of the judges scored it 114-112 for Pascal, while the third had it 114-112 for Jack.

Pascal has resurrected his career after flirting with retirement. Aside from a one-sided loss by decision to titleholder Dmitry Bivol, Pascal has looked sharp. He is 4-1 in his last five fights.

Terence Crawford’s quest for top-tier opponent goes on

Terence Crawford’s trainer Brian McIntyre says the welterweight titleholder will likely fight twice this year.

New year, same old question: Who will Terence Crawford fight?

The welterweight titleholder is counted as one of the sport’s finest talents, but his career prospects have noticeably dimmed in recent years because of his inability to land meaningful fights. Blame the sport’s wretched partisan divisions. All of the other titleholders – namely, Manny Pacquiao and Errol Spence Jr. – and most of the top contenders reside under the Premier Boxing Champions banner led by Al Haymon, who doesn’t do much business with Top Rank’s Bob Arum, Crawford’s promoter

Crawford overcome a shaky start to stop little known contender Egidijus Kavaliauskas in the ninth-round at Madison Square Garden on Dec. 14 in New York City. The Nebraskan was in vintage form, but at 32, one figures he needs bigger names and bigger fights to remain a compelling attraction.

How desperate is Crawford and Co.? Arum recently announced he would be interested in offering the UFC’s Conor McGregor a two-fight deal to face Crawford, one fight under boxing rules and the other using mixed martial arts rules.

It’s not all doom and gloom in the Crawford camp, however. Brian McIntyre, Crawford’s chief trainer and manager, is confident that things will work out. He told Boxing Junkie that he recently sat down with Top Rank head Bob Arum “to talk about options” for Crawford’s next fight.

A few potential scenarios were broached: A pay-per-view fight distributed either on the ESPN+ app or through the ESPN linear channel, to take place in either Crawford’s hometown or in Las Vegas. McIntyre stayed mum on the potential opponent, but offered a general time table for his charge’s return to the ring. 

“Late May, early June,” he said.

Of course, one of the biggest matches that boxing fans have been clamoring for is between Crawford and Errol Spence Jr., who defeated Shawn Porter last September to unify two welterweight belts. McIntyre insisted that they are still targeting Spence, who survived a horrific car crash in October. (Spence announced at a public appearance in December that he would return in the summer.) 

“A stay busy fight [and then], at the end of the year, a potential fight with Spence,” McIntyre said. 

In the meantime, there have been rumors swirling that contender Josesito Lopez is the running for Crawford’s next fight. McIntyre shut that down, saying, “Who the hell wants to fight him?”

Pressed on why a potential fight with Shawn Porter fell through, McIntyre offered no comment.

Andy Ruiz Jr. splits with trainer Manny Robles

Andy Ruiz Jr. will need a new trainer as he makes moves to resume his heavyweight career.

Andy Ruiz Jr. blamed himself for his poor conditioning and even poorer outing in his Dec. 7 title defense against Anthony Joshua. Turns out he reserved some blame for his trainer, too.

Ruiz (33-2, 22 KOs) has cut ties with trainer Manny Robles, the trainer who guided Ruiz to his historic upset over Joshua last June at Madison Square Garden in New York, according to multiple reports.

Ruiz ended up losing his belts in the rematch six months later in Saudi Arabia. Afterward, he was heavily criticized for showing up out of shape; Ruiz weighed in at 283.5 pounds, nearly 15 pounds more than his weight for the first bout. Ruiz put the blame squarely on himself, even apologizing to Robles for having not shown up to training camp on time.

Still, Robles wasn’t surprised by the news Thursday.

“I’ve seen it coming, I’ll be honest with you,” Robles told ESPN. “I’ve seen it coming during camp. I saw it coming, Andy was just doing whatever the hell he wanted to do. The dad, obviously with him being the manager, he just had no control over his son. None of us had control of him, for that matter.”

According to ESPN, Robles was informed of the news by Ruiz’s father, Andy Ruiz Sr., who said that Al Haymon, Ruiz’s influential adviser, recommended switching trainers. It’s not clear whom Ruiz will train under next.

“They apparently told them that they didn’t want the same thing to repeat itself, again,” Robles said. “It is what it is. I don’t know what to tell you. It’s not the first time it’s happened to me. I’m sure it’s not the first time it’s happened to other coaches. It happens time and time again. We always end up getting the short end of the stick. But it is what it is, you keep moving forward.

“I really believed coming into the second fight that we were going to be able to do it again. But obviously you can’t do that if the fighter isn’t there, if the fighter doesn’t want it. I did everything I could as a coach, as a teacher, as a friend, but again, as I said, if the fighter’s not there, what can I do?”

Robles maintains there are no hard feelings.

“I’ve got to tell you I’m absolutely grateful and blessed to have been able to experience everything that I was able to experience in 2019,” he said. “I mean, we made history, and I have to be thankful for that. I have to be thankful to Andy and his dad for giving me the opportunity to be part of something special, to have made history, for him to become the first Mexican heavyweight champion of the world.”

Ruiz reportedly has been offered a fight by promoter Eddie Hearn to face Dillian Whyte but it appears that Whyte is now expected to face Alexander Povetkin instead.