Hearn dropping a few hints about the 'new' Season starting in September

Sky have clearly hit him with a rocket.

July 6th is all but cancelled - I don’t know why he wouldn’t just come out with it. I said on another thread that he was turning into a pre BT Warren...”we will be making an announcement about the show....”

Seems after 8 or 9 years, to a lesser extent, Eddie is now starting to understand what Warren and even fat Mick and others have had to endure to stay afloat when business hasn’t been booming and you’ve suffered knock backs. We will see how he responds.

This could actually be a good thing, if they reduce the shows, and put more money into them.

It might mean that he loses some fighters potentially to MTK, but let’s see.

 

I was hoping for an Allen Price trilogy

 

The Liverpool card sets the benchmark for matchmaking.

Smith vs eggington
Price vs Ali
Fowler vs Fitzgerald
Davis vs Hughes

The headline fight should’ve been Fowler/Fitzgerald, but nonetheless that was a decent Saturday night entertainment.

I don’t know the purses, however wouldn’t imagine it was a bank buster. There’s no excuse for the pony we are currently getting served.

 

How many good cards has that yielded in the past few years?

 

I was just comparing the 2 stables as you said they are both weak!

 

Of which he has just lost Fury and Frampton to America as he couldn’t match the purses and by all accounts Saunders and Warrington are about to follow suit chasing big US fights. All the UK promoters have the same problem.

 

The lack of quality shows (from both) surely proves that.

 

Trouble with that is turning a decent profit. MTK are putting on shows that are great but will be generating minimal income. All of the fighters are expected to sell tickets and only certain level of Matchroom fighters will be willing to do that. Sky will also want viewers a fight with David Price in it will attract more viewers than Ward vs Conroy at the end of the day.

The real problem is the TV arms race taking place in America driving purses. The only way for any fighter to get a £500k+ payday is through PPV or by fighting in America. That at the end of the day is down to Sky.

If I was a boxer and had the option of fighting in the U.S for double the money of the U.K it’s a no brainer and that is where it then becomes a problem for Hearn to manage.

He is having to fast track Okolie, Kelly and Buatsi in the hope one of them runs with it and manages to appease the UK audiences. Warren is having the same issue with Fury and Frampton looking for the US fights. He will soon need to rely on the likes of Dubois, Yarde and Catterall to bring in viewers. Although he has the luxury of starting from scratch on BT whereas Sky have had a high and are now facing declining viewers.

Sky would be better off reducing the amount of cards but keeping the budget the same. That way quality will improve and more title fights will happen. Always clear the rights fees are too low when Lebedev chooses to fight Goulamirian over Okolie for a bigger payday.

 

Never get why promoters don't bid for some area titles where they want to have a card.

That CJ Challenger vs Haywood (?) fight earlier in the year was very entertaining and probably cost £50 to stage. And depending on the quality of the fight you may end up with a new signing.

A lot of people watching on a Saturday like a scrap and the area belts do offer these quite often

 

Their are many good boxers who would improve the quality of standard Friday/Saturday fight nights, both on BT and Sky but are either with a small UK promoter outfit, or are not with a promoter. To name a few that I think are in such a situation. If I was BT and Sky I would be having words with Hearn and Warren about signing some of these.

Lee Selby
Andrew Selby
Liam Walsh
Ryan Walsh
Isaac Lowe
Jazza Dickens
Chris Eubank
Martin Bakole

 

Yeah cos Warren has delivered all those shows he said he would on BT.................... Oh wait

 

Which big fights has he failed to make that you were expecting? He's done a fabulous job. Warrington-Frampton, Catterall-Davies, Gorman-Dubois are three such fights that he has delivered.

 

I don't know about reducing the amount of shows , if you take out PPV and Nextgen, there's barely one a month if that, 10 a year perhaps. How many shows is he going to do a year , 6, 4 ? If so, they really will need to get another promoter in to keep up the momentum cause they'll be so spaced out , the casuals will forget all about boxing and then even the PPVs will be in trouble.

 

Selby/Warrington
Fury/WILDER
Joyce vs Jennings

Even Woodstock vs Barrett/Sharp
Langford vs Richards
Welborn vs JJ

 

Given most people unless they are names want scraps, big prospect when they are 1/20 vs a journeyman holds little appeal to most people.

Could a promoter create a title in a similar mould to UB. Where they are only 4 rounders and you only fight once on a night but you have a few weights on the same evening.

For cards lacking depth I could see this really working. Fills the card, you would have 12 minutes of swinging and stick a couple grand bonus to the winner.