If I was paid what Brook was, I’d get my face smashed in not just once, but a couple of times a year. A small price to pay for me and my family living in luxury for the rest of our lives.
Fair point. I also heard that Eddie Hearn pays all the fighters and they dont have to wait / getting paid late.
Can’t believe I’m sticking up for Hearn here but don’t believe everything you read from Brook’s side on that. He’s done a lot for Brook when he’s had personal troubles. Brook went to Arum without Hearn to make the fight then got the face on that Sky weren’t showing it and blamed Hearn. It was nothing to do with Hearn which overseas fights from other promoters/broadcasters Sky got the rights to.
I dont like him says he wants to grow the sport but constantly belittles it and fighters. Not a person that i would like in the real world. Overated as a matchmaker as well. People say he puts the best fights on but so many are dull. Great talker and he does pay his fighters on time. Saying that i dont like warren arum or de hoya either.
I don’t like him. What he has done is really brilliant. He has marketed himself as the bloke at the pub “gettin the raaands in for the laaads” when in reality he is mugging these people who think of him in that way. He just wants the dough that’s it. All ego with Hearn. I think the “no context Hearn” stuff going mainstream was a catalyst in his ego just getting totally out of control. You have to be careful with these guys. His interest is just creating generational wealth for his family and there’s nothing wrong with that. More fans need to wise up to it and stop contributing to the Hearn family fund with the garbage he puts on PPV.
The welterweight division was red hot at the time. Brook could have been matched well in his own division, earned very well and prolonged his career. Eddie couldn't resist the quick buck.
Hearn has behaved like a baby since. He was throwing more toys out last week because he can longer compete with Sky PPV for the Khan fight and having more digs at his old "mate". I've watched an Eddie interview today where he claims that Canelo is his "mate". What a guy.
First of all - I'm not a massive fan of Hearn and for all his faults, would pick Frank Warren as the more entertaining promoter down the years. Not for the shows he puts on but for his demeanour and attention to detail in boxing. You couldn't imagine Hearn going on Sky with a panel of pundits and holding his own talking about Willie Pep, but at the same time Hearn is younger and grew up with the hyped-up ITV generation of boxing fans, so you can understand why he's what he is. Secondly he's just a businessman as people said; Matchroom is a promotion company selling TV sport and has been for most of its history, and as the recent interview with Frank Smith proved, that he worked all the hours and nearly got fired for sleeping in, is very much all business despite the 'lads in the pub' image Hearn puts out. It's a bit more than that; Matchroom is famous for living on cash and not debts, unlike other promoters who take risks with other peoples' money and skim off the top. Fighters getting their cash on time is a side-effect of a more old-fashioned approach to business. In a way you can see why Hearn is so big on Joshua because he's a cash generator which sets up Matchroom to do a lot more things. In the wake of the Ruiz rematch, the Hearn companies had something like £60m in the bank which meant Covid was pretty straightforward to navigate. That's all very fair but you also have to put it in context of society. The last decade showed that people want to belong to things, however spurious they are; and are happy to part with money to be part of a 'happening'. Technology means that promoters have many more ways to tap into cultural 'happenings' and make their own coin on top. Events like Froch-Groves, Joshua's stadium fights and even at a smaller level, massively expensive Fight Club nights, show that people are happy to pay to be part of those things. You can't blame a promoter for fulfilling it - and if there was no demand there'd be no real attempt at supply. In the mid 2010s I found myself telling my other half "Million Dolla Crolla" was that night's TV viewing, without realising I'd been sucked into it myself, having watched boxing for 40-odd years. I hold nothing against Hearn for generating that. Ultimately I see no real difference with the Hearn decade and the 90s when Sky and Warren put on PPVs for Hatton, Hamed, etc - and swept up casual fans by featuring the fighters in Loaded magazine, or justifying huge ITV rights fees by taking over prime time TV with boxing previews and nonsense. Nowadays it's social media and much bigger scale. One day I hope Barry sues people who go on about his dark secrets, particularly the Epstein case. Epstein was well known to meet people once, get a photo then 'put them in the book', almost like he was building up a network of alibis. Hearn has said this on more than one occasion and to be honest I don't think it bothers him one bit, but one day he might just call someone's bluff. Given how many photos people take on their phones these days, I wonder how far an average punter is from being photographed with a serial killer, and having to explain it ten years later?
I agree with you. But this thread is about Eddie and I believe he did a poor job for Brook. And I don't think he's acted like a good "mate".
Watch his boxing social interview after garcia fight, he was asked if there was a rematch clause...he stood with a straight face & said no title on line so no as other than that only "huge huge names have rematch clauses" such as dillian whyte v Povetkin & wallin and Shannon Courtney. Do me a favour Edward. his side kick frank Smith meanwhile grudgingly reckons furys no.1 but that doesn't matter though because aj's the biggest "star".
