By Jim Dower: In response to the intense criticism he received for posting on social media the 3-fight money $6.75 offer from Matchroom Boxing USA promoter Eddie Hearn on Wednesday, Adrien Broner addressed the criticism today in telling fans that he’s loyal to Showtime Sports Stephen Espinoza and his management adviser Al Haymon. Moreover, Broner said he’s handled more money than people can imagine.
It appears from what Broner is saying, he’s making a lot more money than purses he’s been receiving from his latest fights against Jessie Vargas and Mikey Garcia. Broner’s purse for the Vargas fight was $1 million, and his purse for the Garcia was $1.5M.
”My loyalty is with Showtime Boxing Steve Espinoza and Al Haymon,” Broner said on his Instagram on Thursday.
Broner’s rejection of Hearn’s initial offer doesn’t mean a deal can’t be done between them. It just means that Hearn is going to need to sweeten the pot considerably until he comes up with the right figure that can agreed upon by Broner. The only question is how high is Hearn willing to go to pay for someone who isn’t a world champion. Hearn can overpay Broner to get him to sign with him, but if he matches him against the good light welterweights and welterweights, he’ll likely lose to them.
With each loss, Broner’s popularity will probably drop. By the third fight of the 3-fight deal, Broner might not be bringing in enough subcribers to DAZN to make it worthwhile in signing him in the first place.
Hearn has the money to hire Broner away from Haymon and Espinoza if he was willing to make him a huge offer, but it might not be worth it. Broner’s recent ring record in losses to Shawn Porter and Mikey Garcia isn’t good. Broner almost lost to Jessie Vargas and Adrian Granados. The 28-year-old Broner (33-3-1, 24 KOs) has shown a real decline in his game in his last six fights that is hard to ignore. For that reason, it’s quite understandable why Hearn didn’t elect to throw massive amounts of dough at the Cincinnati native. Broner’s recent ring record of 3-2-1 in his last six fights suggests a fighter that is no longer a top fighter, especially when you factor in that he arguably deserved losses against Granados and Vargas. You add those two fights in the loss column for Broner and you’re talking about a fighter with a 2-4 record in his last six fights. How do you justify paying Broner more than $2 million per fight with that kind of record?
”Only if people knew how much money I’ve really touched. LOL! F—k hat deal. I got Al Haymon,” Broner said in rejecting the $6.75 million offer from Hearn.
Hearn has a lot of things going against him in trying to sign fighters like Broner to his Matchroom Boxing USA stable. Broner has obviously heard about Hearn’s $1 billion deal with DAZN, and he when he sees that he’s only being offered $6.75 million, he has to feel like he’s being underpaid. Hearn’s offer to Broner was likely done by him going off his recent purses for his fights against Mikey Garcia, Jessie Vargas, Adrian Granados and Ashley Theophane. Hearn doesn’t see what other money Broner is getting behind the scenes. If Hearn saw that, then he would either have raised the offer or more likely looked in another direction towards fighters whose careers are still looking strong rather than going downhill like Broner’s.
”It was silly of him to think that AB isn’t already making more than $2.5m a fight,” Showtime vice president of sports Stephen Espinoza said via Michael Benson.
Here is Hearn’s 3-fight offer for Broner:
• Purse 1 – $2 million for September 2018
• Purse 2 – $2.25 million for March 2019
• Purse 3 – $2.5 million for September 2019
The $2.5 million from Hearn is better than the stated official purses Broner has been receiving. What’s unclear is why Broner is being paid so much money when he’s no longer succeeding? Is he being paid a lot because of his ability to sell fights with his trash talking or is this a contract deal that was made many years ago when Broner’s career was still going well?
“Further to our recent conversations, you may have seen our announcement last week for our new deal for 16 shows per year in the US. I would be very interested to offer Adrien a 3 fight promotional agreement,” Hearn said in the posted offer on Broner’s Instagram. “This will give AB security and also a concrete schedule to work from. 3 fights in 12 months! I will await your feedback and am here to answer any questions you have.”
Four years ago, Broner turned down a $40 million, 5-year deal from Roc Nation. That deal averaged out to $8 million per year for Broner, who usually fights two times per year, which would come out to $4 million per fight. Hearn’s 1-year offer of $6.75 million is less than the $8 million per year offer made by Roc Nation, and considerably less than the $4 million per fight. If Broner were to be paid $4 million per fight, he’d get $12 million per year for a 3-fight deal. But even that figure likely wouldn’t be enough, because Broner fight doesn’t fight 3 times per year.
“I’m sorry Eddie Hearn you a good guy and all but you tried to give me a worst (sic) deal than Roc Nation offered me,” Broner said on social media, and concluding with #ThisS—IsOVA and #SlaveDeal.”
Hearn is trying to sign as many American fighters as possible due to his new deal with DAZN. It’s enough that Hearn has a ton of UK fighters in his Matchroom Sport stable. He needs to sign American fighters in order to sell their fights on DAZN. There are better fighters than Broner obviously, but what he has is name recognition among the casual boxing fans. Broner still has that name recognition. What he doesn’t have any longer is enough talent to find success at the upper tiers of the light welterweight and welterweight divisions. He’s not been successful lately when fighting the best. Broner was beaten by Marcos Maidana at welterweight in 2013, Shawn Porter in 2015 and Mikey Garcia in 2017. Hearn needs to sign a lot of top American fighters to fill his 16 cards in the U.S on DAZB, and those guys need to be high quality talents. Broner is no longer high quality, but he’s one of the best trash talkers.
Hearn wants to sign these top American fighters:
– Deontay Wilder
– Jermell Charlo
– Jermall Charlo
– Adrien Broner
– Mikey Garcia
– Errol Spence Jr.
– Gary Russell Jr.
– Leo Santa Cruz
– Abner Mares
– Deontay Wilder
– Jarrett Hurd
– Keith Thurman
– Shawn Porter
It’s not looking good right now for Hearn. He’s said to have signed Julio Cesar Chavez Jr., Gabriel Rosado and Vanes Martirosyan. Chavez Jr. vs. Rosado or Martirosyan would be decent fights, but hardly the type that attract boxing fans to purchase the fights on DAZN. A lot of these fighters are loyal to Al Haymon. It’s going to be hard for Hearn to learn them away. With Hearn being a foreigner and not well-known to these fighters, it’s going to be doubly hard for him to sign them away. There’s also the belief by some that Hearn doesn’t know what he’s doing, and that’s going to ultimately fail. When the top American fighters hear this, it makes them less likely to want to sign with Hearn. Why would they want to sign with a guy whose deal with DAZN might fizzle out in a couple of years?
Hearn recently said that he’s had 12 to 20 superstar fighters contact him about wanting to know about his new streaming deal with DAZB. He’s hopeful in signing these fighters. However, the only names that he has signed are guys that are long in the tooth and no longer at the top of their games. If Hearn signs Broner, he would be a guy that is still young, but who is no longer at the top.