By Jonathon Fell: Not entirely, while Hearn has developed his Matchroom stable over the past 5 years with the premium of British fighters, eradicating some of the other players and negatives that went with them (unpaid fighters, fighters not progressing etc.) It has come to a point now where people recognize him, the name and what Matchroom are about.
Should Hearn be worried? Possibly, the recent James Degale, Andre Dirrell purse bid situation had me laughing, from Eddie Hearn virtually guaranteeing the fight in the UK for the UK fans through either an agreement with Dirrell and team or via the purse bid route. Hearn practically laughed off his competitors who would potentially lodge bids against him. This week we saw this backfire catastrophically with Hearn losing the bid by a cool $1M. Is Hearn deluded in thinking that he really is a big deal on a global scale? And has this rise seen other promotional parties stand up, take note and begin delivering for their fighters as they should?
Credit to Hearn, the purses he is talking about for some of the UK based fighters for UK shows bringing over foreign imports is great news for fighters and really will set them up for life. This becomes possibly with his exclusive deal with the Sky broadcaster. A deal I was unsure about when it was struck around 5 years ago but one that now sees all the best UK fighters on the biggest, best platform for them, earning a fair crust for it too.
Overall, I expect to see increased competition for Hearn, maybe not in the UK which is of course his primary market, but as he continues to develop fighters towards world honours, I don’t expect to see him having things all his own way. Throw the complex promotional battles and TV rights saga then Hearn may not get the Amir Khan – Kell Brook or the Scott Quigg – Carl Frampton that he is so desperate for and only ever refers to how much money the fighters make, look to see these fights not being made anytime soon and frustrations for Hearn and fans to continue.
Eddie Hearn is undoubtedly great for boxing, the fans win, the fighters win and Matchroom Sport I’m sure do reasonably well out of it to. His passion to both revitalize the sport in the UK is admirable and he has succeeded in achieving it. Now as ears continue to prick up about him and his stable, will he continue to thrive while exploring other markets? I hope so and I expect him to through strong relationship building (point in case with Sauerland recently) tireless work and having a stable of fighters which contains world champions and those on the cusp of it. The other promotional companies will wake up but expect to see him in the premier league of promoters globally in the not too distant future.
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