My source is good and credible. The same source also told me that pre sale / pre order for Khan vs Brook on Sky Box Office has been amazing.
Team Humble does not need the money, is only one defeat away from being a fringe journeyman and certainly does not want the humiliation of a legacy of 12 defeats like Journeyman Chisora. Team Humble has pride and more accumulated PPV Loot than he can ever spend - Pudding Chisora has no pride and simply collecting as much loot as possible. Can easily see Tony Dosh PPV defeated again by Usyk and retiring - the gravy train of puddings has hit the buffers and he is not going to beat any elite fighter.
Of course it is - and anyone from Hearn downwards who said it wouldn't be, is either deluded or plain jealous. There's zero chance Hearn was getting this fight because he's too close to Brook and wouldn't have given the ground to the Khan side that was needed. This is a good old domestic grudge that would have done proper numbers on prime time terrestrial TV - it's a shame ITV wasn't still in the game as they'd have given this some proper welly in promotion. The fact it's two assholes knocking lumps out of each other makes it even more appealing - like watching a fight in a pub on Saturday night.
Possible a misunderstanding mate. I wasn't saying there would be no fights out there for Joshua post Usyk 2 defeat. I agree with you, he can earn many millions if he wants to fight on, his fanbase and platform are more than big enough for him to make seven figure purses even after another defeat- at least for a while longer. In a weak and stagnant division he is still a big draw, rightly or wrongly. My point is not that he can't get more fights, it's that he WON'T want to carry on fighting beyond the next 12-18 months. AJ and Chisora are two very different scenarios. Chisora is close to 40 and the before this little so called resurgence the majority of his career he has operated in a period of leaner times and less public interest in boxing. His big fights were the best part of 10 years ago (e.g. Klitschko, Haye, Fury) and compared with the money on offer now he did not earn huge money there. AJ has earned more in 12 months than Derek has in his whole career, as his out of ring earning's themselves are in the tens of millions. Chisora is fighting for money which AJ doesn't and never will need. He's commercially the most successful British boxer of all time- by a country mile. I am absolutely certain, he will not hang around to fight the next generation like Dubois or Hrgovic- two young power punchers who would smash him to bits and humiliate him. He won't take losses for the sake of money. If he loses to Usyk which let's face it is highly probably he has the Fury fight as very much the b side and is then staring retirement in the face. If he somehow does a number on Usyk, again his only real option is Fury big money wise. In that scenario he is likely to fight Fury twice, but that still does not take him past 2023. There is the matter of perhaps one more Whyte fight but if/when Whyte gets beaten by Fury I think that fights becomes a 'battle of the losers' and loses a lot of appeal, especially as part 1 was so conclusive there is not much point to it in that scenario. Either way, he is in the final and possibly most lucrative period of his career in my opinion. I want to see the HW scene shaken up personally, it has been controlled by the same few names for too long...
'I think that fights becomes a battle of the losers' - that is exactly what we have tonight on Sky Box Office except both are completely shot tonight. I cannot see Joshua wanting to be humiliated with more than 3 defeats on his record
Good response mate, I think we're pretty much in sync here. It's definitely plausible that he'd throw the towel in if he gets a second lesson from Usyk. Reading back, I'd picked up on the "So his value and relevance to DAZN or Sky as a active boxer is in the short term." sentence from your original post. I think from this perspective, it'll be instructive what length of deal gets announced by his next broadcaster. I know boxing loves the obfuscatory term "multi-fight", but even that would give a thought as to his intentions. Multi-fight would at least suggest he's planning to box on regardless; if he's essentially becoming a bout by bout broadcast freelancer then that leaves every possibility open. Were I in charge of Sky / DAZN and putting a bid to him, I'd look at a 3 fight deal covering Usyk II, one comeback / mandatory defence, and either a unification (if still champion) or a Top 5 ranked British heavyweight (i.e. T Fury, Whyte, Joyce etc). Whatever the outcome of Usyk, I think that could be attractive for Joshua and could be very lucrative for the broadcaster.
Eddie Hearn is probably one of the few people who is not going to watch the fight tonight. All the people I have met at my work all week have not talked about anything but Khan vs Brook and they all want to watch the fight.
Lots of us have to admit that even though the fight is 5 years too late it's bigger than we thought it would be.