By Jake Tiernan: Eddie Hearn feels that a fight between Canelo Alvarez & Conor McGregor would be a good product to help the sport’s longevity.
Canelo has been indulging McGregor, trading insults on Twitter this week, making it clear to some that the Mexican star is setting the table to put together a fight with the former UFC champion.
It seems very obvious that Canelo is interested in fighting McGregor and putting time into creating interest with fans by going back & forth with him on social media.
If the fight does happen, perhaps the 33-year-old Canelo doesn’t care that fans would get zero value from watching a mismatch like this because the 35-year-old McGregor would stand no chance of winning.
Canelo would get a massive payday to add to his estimated $200 million net worth, but it would have a slash & burn effect on fans.
“Look, Canelo obviously deals with all of those guys from very different worlds. One thing I’ll say about Conor McGregor. He can box,” said Eddie Hearn to iFL TV when asked about his thoughts on the back & fourth trash talk between Conor McGregor and Canelo Alvarez on social media this week.
“Don’t forget, he [McGregor] was an amateur boxer, he’s got boxing pedigree, and let’s be honest, although Floyd Mayweather did, with all due respect, play with him at times, he still held his own in there. He didn’t look like another MMA fighter just out of his depth,” Hearn said.
Fans would be turned off from purchasing future boxing events on PPV after watching that mismatch.
Canelo-McGregor would be far worse than the circus fight this month between heavyweight Tyson Fury & Francis Ngannou.
As horrible as that fight is, Ngannou at least has a puncher’s chance. You can’t say that with McGregor against Canelo because the Irish fighter isn’t a big puncher. He’s just old & unskilled in boxing skills.
In other words, boxing fans would walk away feeling ripped off, as many did when they dished out $100 to watch Floyd Mayweather Jr. fight Conor McGregor on PPV in 2017 in a fight that looked like a glorified half-speed sparring match.
Many fans were furious afterward, feeling they’d gotten a bad deal for the money they spent. To top it off, the undercard was just as lackluster, filled with uncompetitive fights involving A-side fighters wiping out overmatched opposition.
It looked like all the money the promoters had went to Mayweather & McGregor, and not much thought was put into putting together a good undercard to give the fans their money’s worth.
It’s not surprising that PPV buys began dropping off for the events that happened afterward, and you can argue that fans were turned off to boxing after the poor Mayweather-McGregor event.
Those two made a massive fortune, raking in tens of millions to become super rich, but the downside is the sport took a big hit, thanks to that dreadful fight and abysmal fight card.
“So I think he could fight again, and I think he would actually be in a decent boxing match, Conor McGregor, but it just goes back to the product. It’s like Fury & Ngannou,” said Hearn.
“An amazing event, with amazing hype, but you’ll, it’s a mismatch, and we got to move away from mismatches because what happens is you build the hype, and then they get in the ring, and everyone goes, ‘What a load of rubbish,’ and then you’re let down and then you move away from it,” said Hearn about boxing fans being turned off from purchasing future PPV events after they’re ripped off from a poor show, like the Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Conor McGregor event in 2017.
Fans would be irate after paying an arm & a leg to watch Canelo obliterate McGregor, and they would not be happy with the results of the contest. Even if Alvarez takes it easy on McGregor like Mayweather did, fans will know, and they won’t feel entertained. Either way, Canelo would be vilified by the boxing public if he fights McGregor.
“That will enable you to ensure that the longevity suffers. We know we’ve got the product,’ said Hearn. “We just got to make the right fights, and it’s not even just about making Crawford-Spence. It’s about top to bottom, making sure that it’s a great night of boxing.
“When you tune into DAZN, or you buy a ticket, you walk away and say, ‘I got value for money, that was a great night,’ and we’re going to be doing more and more on that,” said Hearn.
