Promoter Eddie Hearn has responded to what has been offered to Deontay Wilder for a fight with Anthony Joshua this week with a view to the fight happening this year.
Both heavyweight’s promoters have been locked in negotiations this week in a bid to make a fight that fans want to see this year, not next.
There has been widespread reports that the fight is worth at least $100 million overall.
However Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn doesn’t appear to be convinced of that and has spoken this week of how Wilder has been offered a flat fee to take the fight.
Speaking to Kugan Cassius of IFL TV, Hearn said today:
“We’ve run the numbers to do the fight in September at Wembley. The fee is over five times his highest purse.”
He added:
“So the offer to Deontay I would say in a conservative budget represents 30% of the pot, could be 35%. We don’t know. We’re guessing. We’ve never done a pay per view in the US. Nor has he (Wilder). People telling me, oh, it could do 500,000 buys. Could it? What if it does 200,000? Ward-Kovalev, brilliant fight, pound for pound fight – couldn’t do 200,000 buys. Golovkin in some fights couldn’t do 150,000 buys.”
Hearn also mentioned that he is usually never out by more than 5% in his projections for what a fight does.
When you consider the above, that could mean that he could be 5% wrong with the offer which could be 25% of the overall pot.
Hearn later added in the interview that if the Wilder side are serious about making the fight then:
“Do yourself a favor – don’t bother making the offer unless it’s a guarantee. If there’s a 100 million dollars in the fight and you want 60-40 like you said, no problem – we’ll sign tomorrow. Give us $60 million – you’ve got the fight. The reality is we’re putting the money up for the fight.”
September in Wembley no doubt would set the pulses racing of boxing fans in a fight between the two current heavyweight champions in world boxing today.