Why is GGG resume SO CRAPPY?

because his manager keeps selling bags of peas to Chinese people.

true story.

stop selling them peas god damn it, they don't need them!

 

His trainer told me it's all part of the plan. He said he's just entering his true PEAK and within 2 years will be P4P #1 and will retire by 36, undefeated.

 

No one really want to fight him, its weird that someone who has been a world champion for this long hasnt had to fight the elite in his division but all the other champions dont want to fight him and contenders want try and fight the other champions instead of him as its the easier option.

 

This is the fight game, and it's all about $$$. Before a fighter can generate real money at the world level, networks need to invest in them.

Promoters and management are vital to opening the doors to the networks. This is where the real competition lies- there is only so much of a boxing budget. In a sense, it's everyone vs everyone. GGG and Rigo will never fight H2H, but HBO has to decide which one to invest in first, and the fighter with the higher priority can afford to fight a more expensive opponent. The competition for network dates is fierce.

This is why the promoters who have better connections to the networks have a distinct competitive advantage over their competition in recruiting fighters: they can offer more dates, get more exposure, and get more money allocated to them to ensure the bigger fights get made.

K2 doesn't get enough credit for getting this guy in the door at HBO in the first place. HBO was never going to invest heavily in an unknown Kazakh: there's no large natural ethnic base here, no history of Kazakh fighters being great pros or big draws professionally, and he speaks very limited English. Fighters with that background, with fringe U.S. promoters (at the top level) and without the strongest connections are typically brought in to be opponents, not feature fighters themselves. They're the guys that get set up to get screwed against the big boys. Sergio Martinez under DiBella is an example. Pirog's another.

HBO is thrilled about their trial investment- GGG now draws higher than Ward at a quarter of the price. Now is the time for K2 to lobby for a bigger chunk of the budget to help make the biggest fights happen - naturally, top opponents want bigger money to compensate for the risk, as well. HBO will give a list of acceptable names and/or a budget to K2, and it goes from there. Case in point: Ward had to change his original comeback opponent to meet HBO's standards, while his high purse demands mean he'll never fight 4 times a year on the network without taking a pay cut.

We'll see bigger fights for GGG as time goes on because he'll have the network support to afford it. He's dramatically outperformed his allocated budget, and HBO Boxing aren't idiots from a business standpoint. They'll invest more money in a fighter growing his ratings than one on a downtrend.

 

Excellent post. Having said all though, last year i heard he had a HBO contract and the bigger fights were coming... we got macklin.. decent fight since then it's back to b/c level fighters. Whens he going to face somebody serious.

 

Elite fighters can't get enough money to take the risk to fight GGG. The risk isn't worth the reward, yet. As GGG increases his ability to generate revenue, that will change, but the answer to your question is: GGG has been ducked by lots of big names because the risk is too high and the money too low for the risk.

When GGG was the #1 WBA contender, and mandatory challenger to then champ Felix Sturm, Sturm refused to fight GGG repetitively. The WBA gave him an ultimatum to fight GGG or be stripped, but Sturm fought Geale instead. Geale beat Sturm and won the WBA belt. Then GGG was Geale's mandatory challenger. The WBA told Geale he must fight GGG next or be stripped because GGG had repetitively been denied his right to fight the champ for the belt. Geale decided to give up the belt rather than fight GGG. Martin Murray has been GGG's mandatory challenger for a while now, but keeps passing on the fight. Martinez has passed on a unification bout with GGG (not enough money for the risk), and a few others have passed on fights with GGG, too.

GGG should get some good fights later in 2014. He had something like the 3rd highest boxing TV ratings in 2013, so he's being watched, which equates to dollars, which equates to drawing the bigger names to the table to take a risk and get in the ring with GGG.

 

To be fair, at least Stevens did bring a top 10 Ring ranking into the fight even if we knew what the outcome of it would be.

I have a gut feeling that we'll see a Kirkland fight after this stay-busy one against Adama. Kirkland-GGG will do monster ratings and is an easier sell to the casuals than Geale (Kirkland's probably cheaper, too). Yes, the writing's on the wall for that fight being a blowout, but it makes too much cents for HBO to ignore it. That showcase should springboard GGG into a Sergio fight in the 2nd half of 2014.

A fight with Quillin makes sense, but with the cold war between HBO-Showtime, good luck getting that one made.

 

Genadys team is moving him along slowly. i know he hasnt really fought anyone but he doesnt go around like he fought anyone. he knows he hasnt fought a top notch fighter.

and i dont want cotto/sergio... i want sergio/gennady!!!!! after gennady beats this bum up hes prolly gunna fight martin murray

 

Bingo. Good job breaking down his pre-HBO issues landing fights. :good

 

if gennady wants a big fight couldnt he get it?? theres fight that would generate money like ggg/sergio... instead hes fightin sum adama dude and then after he knocks adama out he will prolly fight another good fighter in murray a good fighter but not a big fight.

 

Great job breaking down the post-HBO progress. I think we covered all of the bases, and it seems like we agree upon where opportunities are going in the future for GGG. I think we will see him in some good fights later in 2014.

 

Really interesting posts in this thread about the business side of boxing. Thanks, guys.

 

That's not at all true. GGG doesn't just get any fight he wants. Boxing is a business and things have to make monetary sense. Sergio would generate more revenue fighting Cotto with only half the risk, that's why Sergio is fighting Cotto and not GGG. GGG opponents are currently getting around $350,000 to fight him. I'm sure elite fighters would get more, but still, it's simply not enough money, yet, to draw an elite fighter like Martinez into a risky fight.

Adama is the IBO mandatory challenger for GGG's IBO belt (Geale passed on the fight), so GGG has to fight him, why not when no one else wants to fight? That's why he's fighting Adama, to get his mandatory IBO defense out of the way for the year. Sadly, it would have been Geale if he'd have had the stones to sign up... maybe he's holding out for later this year when the purses will be bigger.

 

HBO probably can't believe how well they played K2.