In a few hours, reigning champion Tyson Fury will meet Derek Chisora at the Tottenham Hotspurs stadium. The Gypsy King can royally stake claims to the lion’s share (80%) of the Pay-Per-View revenue. But the man on the street will have to shell out a whooping £26.95 to watch the bout. That is more than what he kicked in for the Dillian Whyte fight (£24.95). For a match accused as diversionary and Mickey Mouse by many, the lopsided criticism is a needless liability the bookkeepers will have to look after.
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Perhaps, the gentry needs a reminder that boxing was a commercial endeavor even before its Golden era got underway in the 60s and 70s.
It is a reasonable expectation for Matchroom Sports’ Eddie Hearn to look at every boxing fight from a business angle.
Eddie took over the reins of Matchroom Sports from his father, Barry Hearn, OBE. The journey in boxing promotion commenced with the Frank Bruno – Joe Bugner fight in 1987. Based out of Brentwood, Essex, Matchroom currently has over eighty boxers under its wings, of which sixteen hold titles across divisions.
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For a person responsible for the careers of boxers like Canelo Alvarez, Katie Taylor, Devin Haney, and Anthony Joshua, to name a few, every match is a potential tie-breaker that could make or break a boxer’s journey.
Enter Eddie Hearn; shares his hunch on the Fury – Chisora PPV
During an interview with IFL TV, the reporter wanted to understand his estimates on the number of pay-per-views the Fury-Chisora match would receive.
Hearn opined that despite Fury’s market value and Derek expected to give out his all in the trilogy, a tardy and smear-laden media coverage of the fight married to not-so-reasonably rated pay-per-view will make it difficult to go anywhere above 250 to 300k, “…the fight hasn’t gone down very well two is a tough time you’re asking a customer to pay 26.95 for a fight but Fury is a big star and Del Boy will always give it everything so I think that as always you have the option to buy… but yeah 200 would be the number that I would put a guarantee against I think it can do 250 can it do 300 with a push maybe..”
Quickly getting back to the bone of contention between two rival promoters, when asked whether he is afraid of Top Rank’s Bob Arum, Eddie Hearn responded, “…so it’s how long you want to do it; that’s why I look at Arum and people like that; I’ve got massive respect for him. He’s 90 f*****g two or something. I mean if I’m alive at 72 I’ll be over the moon; I won’t be in boxing; no way, no way…”
Top Rank’s Bob Arum speaks out
In a general way, commercial expectations often land a promoter in the crosshairs of other impresarios operating inside the familiar den.
For his discerning views on the trilogy fight between Top Rank’s Tyson Fury and 258 MGT’s Derek Chisora, Bob Arum recently flayed Eddie Hearn. Incidentally, 258 MGT is a boxing venture of former heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua, managed by Hearn’s Matchroom Sport.
Learning that Hearn guesstimated the fight to generate less than 400k PPV purchases, Arum said, “Eddie Hearn doesn’t know crap. Eddie Hearn is like a joke in the United States. He puts his nose in everybody’s business, and he doesn’t know what he’s talking about. He should spend his time promoting his fighters in the United States and in the UK, instead of worrying about everybody else.”
Hearn built a reputation for himself on the domestic scene. Now he has partnered with live stream platform DAZN to organize events worldwide. For Matchroom, the US is a crucial market. In fact, Hearn’s major American ventures include Canelo’s fixtures against Billy Joe Saunders and Dmitry Bivol, besides the Gennady Golovkin trilogy.
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It remains to be seen whether Hearn’s speculated PPV numbers stay true or break expectations.
