Dana White crowns his first boxing champion on March 8, but not everyone is ready to give that title much weight.
Jai Opetaia fights Brandon Glanton for the opportunity to become not only the first Zuffa Boxing World Cruiserweight Champion, but also the first champion crowned in White’s fledgling fight promotion. The UFC CEO has hit the ground running with two Zuffa Boxing events already in the books and two more lined up on the calendar.
In an interview with iFL TV, Matchroom Boxing boss Eddie Hearn joked he might follow White’s lead and introduce his own belts, pointing out the absurdity of the championship situation.
“That is the cringiest shit I’ve ever seen,” Hearn said. “You know I would never do that, but I was just laughing because I was reading about, whenever it is, Jai Opetaia fighting Brandon Glanton for the Zuffa championship of the world, and I was thinking, ‘Do you know what? I could just do that.’ That would be quite amusing. Why don’t we do an iFL one as well?”
Hearn has been involved in boxing for most of his life, with his father Barry founding Matchroom Boxing in 1982. The England-based promotion has had numerous stars on its roster in its lifetime, including heavyweight standout Anthony Joshua, and current champions Dmitry Bivol, Jesse Rodriguez, Shakur Stevenson, and Katie Taylor.
Matchroom’s fighters have captured titles across various organizations and Hearn thinks the idea of establishing a promotional belt is absurd.
“Do you think I would disrespect boxing that much where I would say, we are going to bring out the ‘Matchroom Boxing World championship?’” Hearn said. “My ego’s out of control, that would have to be—That’s beyond anything I could ever fathom or ever bring myself to do.”
For the most part, Hearn has attempted to be respectful when discussing White’s boxing aspirations, though they’ve inevitably traded shots during interviews. White recently said Hearn has become “very confrontational.”
Hearn doubled down on his stance that a promotional championship is meaningless given the extensive history behind the existing belts.
“I’m telling you, we don’t deserve to have a world championship,” Hearn said. “The history and legacy of the sport governs that. Listen, I get what Zuffa are doing because maybe in five or 10 years time, maybe the Zuffa World Championship is something that you younger generations want to win, but it just ain’t for me. It’s not boxing. So I don’t want to just create my own belt and go into amateur gyms and go, ‘Mate, you know what you want to when you grow up, don’t ya? The Matchroom Boxing World Championship.’
“‘Oh do I? Do I, Eddie? Yeah, What’s that?’
“‘It’s my new world championship belt. This is going to be the biggest thing in boxing. If you’re going to be a real champ, you’ve got to win the MBWC—that’s the Matchroom Boxing World Championship.’
“No, no, you haven’t. You’ve got to win the WBC. You’ve got to win the WBA. You know the belt that Muhammad Ali won? Do you know the belt that ‘Sugar’ Ray Leonard won? The belt that Mike Tyson won? Roberto Duran? Larry Holmes? Pernell Whittaker? Shakur Stevenson? Floyd Mayweather? You know what I mean?”
Read the full article here
