EDDIE HEARN IS mid-way through another off-the-cuff monologue on stage at Canary Wharf.
The promoter is discussing Matchroom Boxing’s new broadcast deal with DAZN: A five-year extension that will see them put on 30 shows a year until 2031. Hearn insists he can do better and wants 40. That’s 200 shows by the end of the cycle.
But Conor Benn’s image was on the poster used to announce the new deal. By the end of the same week, he was gone.
One moment you’re king of the world, the next, the walls feel like they’re crumbling down around you. The news that Benn — Hearn’s prized asset outside of Anthony Joshua and Katie Taylor — had signed with Dana White and Zuffa Boxing rocked the sport unlike any announcement in recent memory.
Hearn was “devastated” by the move. Benn was their biggest future star.
The move was also personal for Hearn, who had backed the fighter for two years while he fought a doping suspension, loaning him “hundreds of thousands of pounds.”
It was a huge win for White and Zuffa and it’s just the start of what is expected to be a long battle for fighters, money, airtime and control. White and Hearn, who were once considered to be friendly with each other, are now locked in a personal battle which has gripped fans, fighters, and other promoters.
This might be Hearn’s toughest test yet, but it certainly isn’t his first.
AT THE DAZN announcement, Hearn sprinkles in a few historical anecdotes about those who also tried to bring him down.
“[Frank] Warren, [Frank] Maloney, Hatton Promotions, Barry McGuigan, they all had the famous photo on Box Nation saying: ‘We’re going to take on Eddie Hearn,'” he recalled about what happened after he signed an exclusive Sky Sports broadcast deal in 2012 which launched Matchroom onto another level.
Matchroom now market themselves as the world’s only global boxing promoter. Their rivals would likely scoff at that, but Hearn is eager to remind everyone he overcame the same obstacles in America that he did in the U.K.
“I’ve put my absolute heart and soul into it for a long time, and I’ve fought a very hard battle in the U.S. for a long time. It was a losing battle for many years,” the 46-year-old says.
“Lou di Bella, Leonard Ellerbe, Bob Arum, Stephen Espinoza, all these guys that were just firing into me in the States, [saying]: ‘It’s an app, no one watches boxing on streaming … All those promoters that I mention, none of them have a TV deal now … We really put the hard yards in.”
Matchroom’s venture into the American market started in 2017 when they agreed a deal with HBO. A year later, backed with a $1 billion arsenal, they launched on DAZN on both sides of the Atlantic. Hearn, as you might expect, didn’t arrive quietly.
“This is open season for fighters in the U.S. If you’re out there, if you don’t have a promotional contract, if you’re a world-class fighter, we want you,” he said at the time.
Matchroom Boxing CEO Frank Smith says they were jumping straight in the deep end. Or, in his case — as someone who prefers to stay in the background as opposed to Hearn’s braggadocious approach — thrown in.
“I remember when I was 24, and we signed a deal with HBO … Eddie is very much the big picture, outspoken character, and I’m the details,” Smith tells ESPN.
“We signed the deal, announced the deal with HBO and he turned round to me in the car and said: ‘Right, I’m going home, good luck.’
“It was really chancing it to be honest, not that we didn’t know what we were doing, but we jumped in the deep end. We’ve been there nine years in the U.S. and it’s been a great journey.”
WAS THERE A time when Hearn thought it wouldn’t work out in the United States? He answered to ESPN: “Yeah, probably.
“The resistance early on was so fierce. I would have a meeting with [a fighter] … I would leave the meeting and think: ‘He’s signing!’ And then he would call me up and say: ‘I’ve been speaking to Al [Haymon] and he says this DAZN thing is going to ruin my career.’ We just couldn’t get the hook.”
Partnerships with pound-for-pound stars Devin Haney, Jaron “Boots” Ennis, Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez and Shakur Stevenson, as well as the mainstream growth of Dmitry Bivol, have helped establish Matchroom’s credibility in the U.S. Fighters now see them as a viable safe option.
But there’s one fighter who, above everyone, was the catalyst to liftoff in America.
“The Canelo [Alvarez] partnership was massive for us. That really changed not just the profile of Matchroom, but my profile in America,” Hearn explains.
The Brit went from a relative nobody to suddenly being stopped in the streets for his association with Alvarez, with whom he developed a close personal relationship.
“I’d go to Mexico for our smaller shows, I was getting mobbed,” he recalls. “That really helped us grow and get the respect. When we had Canelo, the other fighters were going: ‘Hang on a minute, Canelo went to him, and you told me this guy was a clown.’ Now we have to say we are the No. 1 promotional company in America and I think we don’t get enough credit for that being a British company.”
Smith says they took a measured approach to the business partnership, believing that long-term stability was better than looking for a quick cash grab from boxing’s biggest star, as they tried to ‘crack America.’
He compares the Canelo relationship with the one they have nurtured with Anthony Joshua, who signed with Matchroom after winning Olympic gold in 2012 then signed a “career-long promotional agreement” with them in 2021.
“It was important for our business to get that brand recognition that Eddie’s got in the UK,” Smith says. “Bringing him [Canelo] on board [was important], especially for younger fighters coming through. We promoted nine Canelo fights, broke the record at [the Dallas Cowboys stadium] for a U.S. boxing event. That was an important part, but boxing is also a greedy business.
“I think that was a key part of it, we were sensible, we weren’t greedy. We didn’t look for too much money.”
It wasn’t long before Matchroom had established a solid base in America, but there are, as both Hearn and Smith concede, tougher battles ahead.
TO SURVIVE IN boxing, it’s fair to say you must have skin like a rhino. It can be a brutal, nasty business. The entry of Zuffa — fronted by UFC boss White, co-owned by TKO (who also own UFC and WWE) and Sela (the Saudi Arabia-owned entertainment company) will shake things up further. TKO board member Nick Khan and Turki Alalshikh are also behind Zuffa.
Before the Benn bombshell announcement, Hearn had continued his war of words against White, who had highlighted the fact the Brit “works for his dad.”
“I was surprised by the nature of what he said which was ultimately: ‘Eddie Hearn works for his dad,” Hearn said.
“It’s what you say when you’ve got nothing else to say. Dana’s said it after a month and I thought we were quite pally. I guess the gloves are off, in that respect.
“That’s what I’ve had my whole career when they get really flustered and they’re a bit f—–, to be honest with you. His dad for many years has been the Fertitta brothers. Now he’s got a new daddy called Turki Alalshikh. Dana White works for Turki Alalshikh.”
While the verbal exchanges bring attention to the sport and may be entertaining for fans, Matchroom — and the other established promoters — know White’s move into boxing is no joke; it’s no longer a stunt.
White and Zuffa are backed by a significant cheque book and are showing no signs of slowing down.
Their new recruit Benn will fight Regis Prograis as the co-main event alongside Tyson Fury vs. Arslanbek Makhmudov on April 11 at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London, an event which seems to be a signal of intent.
Hearn may believe he has conquered America once, but a new wave of resistance is here and, with the expectation that more fighters will be lured to Zuffa, he faces perhaps his biggest challenge yet.
