In honor of February 14th, Iâm gonna paint some swear words on tiny candy hearts, cram them into a sack of heart-shaped Peeps, with an âIOU One Pearl Necklaceâ coupon, and slam the whole thing into the sweaty face of boxing ignorance and skulduggery. Now, letâs see what youâve sent me this week.
The End of Top Rank on ESPN
Hey Paul.
I was saddened to hear the news that ESPN would be cutting ties with Top Rank. I was really happy when their deal first kicked off as I saw it as a possibility to bring boxing into the mainstream. That never happened and it seemed almost from day one that boxing was an afterthought for the people at ESPN. In my opinion, they never gave it a real shot. They always seemed to putting it off to their app or scheduling it at odd times.
I still remember that line you had when they first started with pushing boxing to ESPN+. You called it a âstreaming pile of crapâ and said that it would be the death blow to keeping boxing on the network as a whole. Boy, were you right!
What do you think went wrong with the partnership? Do you see boxing coming back to ESPN? Where do you think Top Rank will go next?
â Josh Alvarado
Hey Josh.
Top Rank was doomed at ESPN because they could never deliver a pay-per-view star to put the network into the cash-rich pay-per-view market they lusted to be in. And, unfortunately, in boxing, the only real âbigâ money to be had is in pay-per-view. So, when they couldnât push Terence Crawford and Vasiliy Lomachenko into PPV stardom and couldnât get Tyson Fury back into the States, they really served no purpose to ESPN, other than as comparatively costly ESPN+ filler.Â
The Saudi pilfering of their talent and messing with their contract players put the final nails into the TR coffin. From the moment they signed on to their Riyadh Season âpartnership,â assets were pulled and messed with to a point where, as they limped into the last year of their ESPN contract, they had almost nothing. Crawford had left, Shakur Stevenson was nudged into signing with the more Saudi-friendly Eddie Hearn, Teofimo Lopez was being dragged into a Saudi âpartnershipâ of his own, and heavyweight prospect Jared Anderson was wrangled by Turki into a losing step-up fight that Too Rank was against (but had to accept because of their Saudi business entanglement).Â
All they really have left of their own is Keyshawn Davis.Â
With their market value diminished, they probably have no option other than to sign their next TV deal with the Saudi-partnered DAZN. Who else would take them?
Donât think for a second that this wasnât an intentional stripping of resources to facilitate a growing monopoly. Iâd say that the Saudis are playing chess while the rest of boxing is playing checkers, but thatâs giving boxing too much credit. The Saudis are playing chess while boxing is humming a song to itself, with a bishop up each nostril.Â
ESPN may come back to boxing, but only when boxing can guarantee them at least a small handful of bankable stars (which they canât right now and, given where the sport is headed, wonât be able to do in the foreseeable future).
Ring Magazine: Bible of BS
Hey Magno.
I loved your Notes from the Boxing Underground column this past Monday. Nobody goes for the throat like you. You are the roast master general of boxing and your writing really stands out in this generation of bland boxing writing. Keep it up. By the way, you also werenât wrong in your opinions.
Putting out intentional misinformation is a disgrace when youâre running a major media outlet. Turki and his Ring Magazine staff have informed the boxing world that they are not to be trusted and that they are just fine with lying to their readers, just for the kick of misdirecting the public. This should be talked about way more than it has been.
â Mike from Reno
Hey Mike.
I agree that more should be talking about it, but who would be doing the talking? The entire media is currently comprised of whores taking Turkiâs money, wannabe whores looking to one day take Turkiâs money, or weak souls scared into silence for fear of crossing Turki and the Saudis as they create a boxing monopoly. Who else is left to speak truth to power, except me and, well, thatâs all I can see.
Iâve never expected anything from the boxing media beyond compliance, lack of character, and greed. So, Iâm not at all surprised that they folded so quickly and completely. I canât say that Iâm all that surprised, either, by the number of ill-informed fans cheering on what could, ultimately, be the sportâs demise (at least in the US and UK).Â
I do see, however, some fans waking up, looking around, and realizing that the Saudis have strip-mined the sport and that, to a great extent, taken it away from them. And, also, theyâre realizing who in the media has been chop-blocking to assure the Saudis succeed in stealing away the sport.Â
Turki using Ring Magazine as a tool for intentional misinformation is a bigger black eye for the Ringâs credibility than all the previous Ring Magazine black eyes (and thereâve been many). As I wrote in Mondayâs column:Â âTurki actually fancies himself quite clever for having soiled his media acquisition…And he did it for no apparent reason other than to passive-aggressively manipulate âthe sheep,â as he subsequently referred to fans and/or critics on Twitter.
People should care about this more than they apparently do.
By the way, thanks for the kind words.
Got a question (or hate mail) for Magnoâs Bulging Mail Sack? The best of the best gets included in the weekly mailbag segment right here at FightHype. Send your stuff here: paulmagno@theboxingtribune.com.