Mayweather to fight YouTuber Logan Paul in ‘exhibition’

[Ruthless-RKO]

Eddie Hearn on Floyd Mayweather vs Logan Paul – ‘There has to be a narrative’

Logan Paul had his first professional fight against fellow YouTuber KSI last year, in a fight that arguably ushered in a new era of exhibition fights.

Speaking on the Ak&Barak Boxing show on Dazn Promoter Eddie Hearn underlined the importance of not ‘bastardising the sport’ and retaining a significant focus on making the big fights like AJ vs Fury and Spence vs Crawford.

Hearn shared with the show his thoughts on the upcoming exhibition between pound-for-pound great Floyd Mayweather and YouTuber Logan Paul.

He said: “I just think that every time you make a fight, it doesn’t matter whether it is a freak show or a great pound-for-pound fight, there has to be a narrative. So, when Conor McGregor boxed Mayweather, it’s like the two greatest from their respective codes meet and two of the biggest superstars and characters in the world.

“When KSI boxed Logan Paul, it’s the two biggest YouTubers in the world and they’re off the same standard, Mike Tyson against Roy Jones – it’s two legends at a similar weight. I struggle to see with Floyd Mayweather against Logan Paul, what the narrative is, it’s one of the greatest fighters of our generation against a YouTuber who is 0-1.

“We can’t be hypocritical, myself or boxing because if it makes dollars it makes sense, but we can’t bastardise the sport. Even Tyson vs Jones, I wasn’t mad about it, but when I watched it back it wasn’t too bad, we got away with it. My worry is we can’t get away with things like this forever.”

[CaptainSpacerod]

I doubt that will happen because it would mean an end to these sort of spectacles and there is a lot of money to be made. Boxing is always about risk vs reward. FMM is getting millions for little risk, I don't blame him to be honest. The issue I have isn't with FMM, it's with these "celebs" earning more money than 99.9% of fighters who dedicate their lives to the sport and in the main retire without a pot to piss in. That I think is unfair and a kick in the teeth to the pros out there. Lets face it, who in their right mind would turn down millions if people are prepared to pay for it.

I largely agree with you but can we even blame the “celebs”. It’s a selfish world, floyd wants his money, the celeb wants his, the shameless broadcasters and pundits want theirs. Sad to say it but only a tiny minority of boxing purists see anything wrong with it

No I don't blame them for wanting to earn big money, let's face it, most peoples moralistic views would go out the window if they were suddenly offered a way to earn millions. My issue is these 'celebs' don't deserve life changing money and fame when most top tier fighters couldn't generate the same money. They should have to give 90% of it to charity, maybe towards helping injured fighters or ones that have hit hard times. That should be the trade off.

These types of exhibitions have always happened though, just not making the same amount of money. Ali was having exhibitions when he was still fighting so in reality it's nothing new, just more well known today and bigger events because of the internet.

The charity angle is a good idea but the best we could hope for would be some kind of token gesture.
As to whether the celebs deserve the megabucks or not, as don king famously said you get what you negotiate not what you deserve. The bitter pill for boxing fans to swallow here is that on these cards it’s the celebs who are the A side. When KSI fought Logan they had Saunders world title defence on the undercard, many of the ppv buyers wouldn’t have had a scooby who Bill was and no doubt the purses reflected that fact.