As the title states really . Ben Shalom has cost his fighter a fortune turning down the Jay Opetaia fight to fight Zurdo. Credit to Billiam Smith in a hell of a performance , but Shalom and the McGuigans pride have cost him millions .
Hes currently about to board a flight home with a big fat cheque from a Saudi show which comes off the back of 2 UK football stadium shows as a World champion, 1 of which was a sell out. Shocking promotion! Many things to Criticise Shalom on and I think most on here will agree with you, but his promotion of CBS isn't one of them
I'm sure he got well paid to fight Ramirez, and without the benefit of hindsight Ramirez was a much more winnable fight on paper. There is no quit in CBS so I'm sure he will come again, whether at cruiser or heavyweight.
I would argue that CBS has had a very good career to date, earned well and Boxxer have done a very good job with him. Not many World Champions from Bournemouth and he simply came up against a better man in the ring tonight. The fight with Zurdo was a big unification fight and he would have made good money tonight on the same level as Opetaia.
Chris actually proposed and chased the fight directly with Zurdo, so it was his choice. And headlining a card in Saudi in a unification fight meant that he was very well looked after. He must have been, given that his two prior fights were in stadiums - so the Saudi offer would clearly have to be superior than a domestic setting.
Unless we know the offers made, we'll never know However I suspect your wrong on this one as I'd imagine he was paid very well last night And will be used again
There are plenty of things to criticize Ben Shalom and Boxxer for but they have done a really good job for CBS. Most people knew that he didn't have much of a chance of victory last night - on the other hand, he got paid really well and that's what professional boxing is all about.
Quite a few on here had CBS beating Zurdo before the fight started mainly due to his size advantage, Bivol defeat and Zurdo's appearance at the weigh-in. After the first round along with the usual bias from the Sky commentary team, those numbers swelled considerably.
https://www.sportysalaries.com/2024/11/how-much-chris-billam-smith-purse-for.html?m=1 Found this regarding the supposed purses of the fighters.
Odd how they say his earnings increased due to PPV revenue on the Riakpore fight That wasn't PPV was it?
I doubt it sold many PPVs if that report is correct (I’m not sold on that) and I was expecting CBS to earn more than $850k guaranteed. I was thinking circa £2 million as it was in KSA.