Boxing

Eddie Hearn Up For A Fight Amid Dana White And Turki Alalshikh Boxing League Alliance

Matchroom Boxing's Eddie Hearn got honest about the new boxing promotion headed by Dana White and Turki Alalshikh.

Grant Young

Eddie Hearn is seen during a press conference at The Glasshouse in Surfers Paradise on the Gold Coast on January 6, 2025.
Eddie Hearn is seen during a press conference at The Glasshouse in Surfers Paradise on the Gold Coast on January 6, 2025. / IMAGO / AAP

The new boxing promotion that Turki Alalshikh, UFC president Dana White, and TKO Group Holdings (which is the parent company of the UFC and WWE) announced earlier this week means that another major player has entered the sport's community and will almost certainly shake things up considerably.

There are still a lot of unknowns about how this new boxing league will fit in with the top existing promotions. Specifically, it's uncertain whether Turki Alalshikh will continue working with other top promotions like Matchroom Boxing after his own league is off and running.

Regardless, Matchroom chairman Eddie Hearn isn't too concerned about how this league will affect his business, which he conveyed with an interesting message during a March 7 interview with BoxingScene.

ā€œI donā€™t think [itā€™s the end of our relationship], but if he has [moved on], thank you very much,ā€ Hearn is quoted saying in the article. ā€œI've enjoyed it. I've made a lot of money and our fighters have had a great opportunity. My relationship with His Excellency is a very good one. It's a very deep one. We've been extremely loyal to him. He's been extremely loyal to us. You know, there's not just the league.

"We don't rely on Saudi Arabia to run [income] our business. But we enjoy it. And it's also been very productive and fruitful for Matchroom and our fighters. So I think with the job that we've done, I think His Excellency is a smart man. He knows how good I am," Hearn continued.

ā€œBut if we shook hands today and never worked again, we'd go back to doing 35 shows a year globally and still being the biggest in the world. But I believe this is just the beginning. If everybody wants to work together, great. If there's a fight all of a sudden, I'm up for that as well. I'm chilled. I really am."

Regardless of Hearn's sentiment, it will be interesting to see how this new league affects boxing's current landscape.

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Grant Young
GRANT YOUNG

Grant Young covers Boxing, Womenā€™s Basketball, and the New York Mets for On SI. He holds an MFA degree in creative writing from the University of San Francisco, where he also played Division 1 baseball for five years, and he thinks itā€™s time that Canelo Ɓlvarez fights David Benavidez.