Let’s call a spade a spade… Is Bivol “ducking” Benavidez?

[LarryMerchant'sBottle]

There's no way Bud only earned $2.5mil to fight Madrimov. Only $1mil more than Pitbull Cruz lol

Whatever his guarantee from Turki was, we can assume it was higher than what PBC were willing to pay for a Fundora or Charlo fight, and I imagine after doing 700k buys against Spence and winning in the fashion which Bud did, that PBC would offer significantly more than $2.5mil

Bro, his guarantee against Madrimov was $2.5 million dollars, but he was promised the same upend on PPV sales that PBC offered him against Spence, which is a high % once the sales reach 750k. The fight did poor PPV numbers as well as tickets sales for the live event. Tickets were given for free to try and fill up the place and it still had empty sections.

The reason Pitbull made $1.5 million was because the fight was held in LA a county that has a high number of Mexican people. Who do you think sold most of the seats in LA? Listen to the crowd while Pitbull is fighting as opposed to when Bud is fighting. Pitbull had the large crowd of Mexicans cheering while the Bud scrap was getting good by the 2nd round. I'm trying to diminish Bud, I think he's a terrific boxer and has always conducted himself for the most part, there's nothing to hate him, in my opinion.

You think because Bud beat the snot out of Spence and because the fight sold well he would automatically get more money, that's not the pay model that is being used. Bud messed up by not taking advantage of his win over Spence by not fighting 3 or 4 months after to keep the buzz around him going. Instead of staying active and keeping his name out there he went silent and didn't fight for a while.

As an example, Ryan, who is a much bigger draw than Bud was guaranteed less than $2 million for the Haney fight, but was promised a big PPV upend if the fight sold well. The fight did just a bit over 300K PPV buys so neither him nor Haney ever received the 30 to 50 million dollars they thought they were gonna get.

Buds filed earnings for that LA fight are Public Record in CA, go look it up and you will see for yourself. If you wanna believe that Bud must have received more money that the State doesn't know about, that's fine, I won't argue that, but that is unreported income that he didn't file taxes on, so that would only be a speculation that can't be proven. What can be proven, is what was reported to the State of California.

You're having a hard time accepting the actual money that was reported because you can't imagine that Bud made less money than what you think he deserves or has earned, but when your fight contract is arranged in a manner that is built on a high PPV % but a low guarantee, you always risk not making as much as you think you're gonna make. Just like DJ or a Band that is guaranteed a certain amount but promised a huge percentage of the ticket sales.. The pay system in boxing isn't like a Football contract where your guaranteed $60 million for 3 season regardless if the team makes money selling out the stadium or not.

The reason fights are getting made with Turki is because he is providing the extra money that the promoter can't afford to guarantee or is unwilling to risk. A perfect example is the Boots vs Norman that fell through all because Eddie wouldn't guarantee Norman the extra $500k he was asking for...

I encourage you guys to get some actual numbers from the folks who write the checks and not from articles that don't include quotes from real sources. Eddie has gone on record talking about fights that make money and lose money, he's gone on record with real numbers. There's a reason why he didn't bid on the Haney vs Martin purse bid while Arum won the bid at only $2.7 million. Eddie nor Arum thought the fight would sell well and they were almost certainly correct.

[Grandma Lover]

because thats how boxing works!

u are talking about top boxers getting low pay for them off a guy who has the rep of the highest pay and yet they are happy to say i will do rematches and go to saudi keep working with him etc and we all know boxers value one thing the most...... CASH!

Give it a rest lol that dude is an idiot.

From his logic the sinking ship that is pbc has more money than turki

[Oracle01]

u say most of the money is upfront so are u saying that there is some money not upfront then?

Maybe. I don't like to speculate like you.

[crimsonfalcon07]

Maybe. I don't like to speculate like you.

Trusting Sulaiman is just as much speculation as trusting Boxing Kingdom, truthfully worse, because he has something to gain by under-representing the numbers (just ask the IRS), while it doesn't matter at all to the reporters what the numbers are. They just say what they get from their sources. Which you're perfectly happy to trust with other contract details, but apparently not this time because you'd rather believe Sulaiman.

And neither of you can understand the concept that if Turki wasn't paying career high money, he wouldn't be taking over the sport. And 2.7 million for undisputed isn't even close to a career high payday. There's literally dozens of details that don't make sense about that number, but you and Larry want to believe the guy who's one of the most dishonest out there, rather than the preponderance of evidence. It's an awfully weird hill to die on, but if you two want to believe liars, well, you're certainly not unique these days.

[LarryMerchant'sBottle]

Trusting Sulaiman is just as much speculation as trusting Boxing Kingdom, truthfully worse, because he has something to gain by under-representing the numbers (just ask the IRS), while it doesn't matter at all to the reporters what the numbers are. They just say what they get from their sources. Which you're perfectly happy to trust with other contract details, but apparently not this time because you'd rather believe Sulaiman.

And neither of you can understand the concept that if Turki wasn't paying career high money, he wouldn't be taking over the sport. And 2.7 million for undisputed isn't even close to a career high payday. There's literally dozens of details that don't make sense about that number, but you and Larry want to believe the guy who's one of the most dishonest out there, rather than the preponderance of evidence. It's an awfully weird hill to die on, but if you two want to believe liars, well, you're certainly not unique these days.

Crimson, let me be clear. I'm not arguing that I believe Sulaiman because I think he's an honorable and trustworthy man. My point is that those dollar figures came from the mouth of somebody who would know actual reported figures because his organization profits from those figures. You guys claim that because he fears Turki's plan to diminish or to replace the sanctioning bodies with the Ring Belt, Sulaiman's agenda is to spit talk that would reflect negative on Turki.

I'm not sure if you even viewed the podcast, but the only reason the topic of money was brought forward by Sulaiman was because a fan asked a question regarding the WBC LHW, Bivol, the possibility of him getting stripped and who Benavidez would have to fight if Bivol was stripped. Had the question not been asked by the caller, the topic wouldn't have been brought up.

You first claimed that he's lying about the numbers because of his beef with Turki. You've just now implied that he has something to gain by under-representing the numbers because of the IRS. Neither the WBC nor Sulaiman need to worry about the IRS because the WBC/Sulaiman's cut cannot be touched by the IRS because the fight did not take place in the US, Sulaiman is not a US citizen nor permanent resident and the WBC is not based in the US or any US territory.

I'm not trying to defend Sulaiman, I couldn't care less about Sulaiman, but if you're going to argue that the figures he mentioned are wrong and you believe Bivol made more, at the very least show a quote from an actual source with privy to Bivol's fight purse. I'm willing to believe another source, unfortunately no other source has spoken about it for me to believe them. You and the other cats would rather believe articles that list no actual source but say "well the rumor is", instead of a guy who actually gets a cut of the purse because you hate the guy so therefore won't believe anything he says. Come on man, that isn't reasonable...

For the record, I know that Turki is paying more than promoters are paying, I've never denied that. Ginger wouldn't have passed on the Jake fight had Turki not overpaid for a 4 fight deal. But I've been saying on this board since late last year that I wasn't so sure just how much more he is actually paying. To me, it seemed as he might be paying about 30% above market value. That was my guess after I learned how much Bud's guarantee was for the Madrimov fight, which wasn't this astronomical amount that some folks here were thinking.

Turki offered Bud money to fight Virgil, he also offered Boots money to fight Virgil. Although those offered might have been good, the amount was obviously not enough to get them to accept the offers, unless you're one of those that believe Boots and Bud are afraid to fight Virgil. I certainly am not of that opinion. There isn't any doubt that Turki is willing to break the bank to sign a fight or fighter that he believes will do good financially and I think Turki has proven that with fighters who are the biggest financial stars. Ginger is one of them as well as some of the UK fighters that he's singed.

Bivol, is not one of them, neither is Bud unfortunately. There is no doubt that Bud will get good money, but not because Turki wants to pay him whatever Bud wants, but because Ginger's fights make enough to where if there is a loss, it won't be a heavy loss. Turki isn't just handing out blank checks, he's signing fights that might not be making money but he is also conducting business in a manner that will mitigate losses. Just because Turki is rich doesn't mean he is throwing away money s-tupidly...

With all that being said, although we might disagree, I appreciate your respectful replies. I respect your maturity in discussions without having to resort to childish name calling or insults. In my opinion, you're one of the best posters on this board and it's always a pleasure discussing with you, whether I agree with you or not....

[Grimmer]

Bro, his guarantee against Madrimov was $2.5 million dollars, but he was promised the same upend on PPV sales that PBC offered him against Spence, which is a high % once the sales reach 750k. The fight did poor PPV numbers as well as tickets sales for the live event. Tickets were given for free to try and fill up the place and it still had empty sections.

The reason Pitbull made $1.5 million was because the fight was held in LA a county that has a high number of Mexican people. Who do you think sold most of the seats in LA? Listen to the crowd while Pitbull is fighting as opposed to when Bud is fighting. Pitbull had the large crowd of Mexicans cheering while the Bud scrap was getting good by the 2nd round. I'm trying to diminish Bud, I think he's a terrific boxer and has always conducted himself for the most part, there's nothing to hate him, in my opinion.

You think because Bud beat the snot out of Spence and because the fight sold well he would automatically get more money, that's not the pay model that is being used. Bud messed up by not taking advantage of his win over Spence by not fighting 3 or 4 months after to keep the buzz around him going. Instead of staying active and keeping his name out there he went silent and didn't fight for a while.

As an example, Ryan, who is a much bigger draw than Bud was guaranteed less than $2 million for the Haney fight, but was promised a big PPV upend if the fight sold well. The fight did just a bit over 300K PPV buys so neither him nor Haney ever received the 30 to 50 million dollars they thought they were gonna get.

Buds filed earnings for that LA fight are Public Record in CA, go look it up and you will see for yourself. If you wanna believe that Bud must have received more money that the State doesn't know about, that's fine, I won't argue that, but that is unreported income that he didn't file taxes on, so that would only be a speculation that can't be proven. What can be proven, is what was reported to the State of California.

You're having a hard time accepting the actual money that was reported because you can't imagine that Bud made less money than what you think he deserves or has earned, but when your fight contract is arranged in a manner that is built on a high PPV % but a low guarantee, you always risk not making as much as you think you're gonna make. Just like DJ or a Band that is guaranteed a certain amount but promised a huge percentage of the ticket sales.. The pay system in boxing isn't like a Football contract where your guaranteed $60 million for 3 season regardless if the team makes money selling out the stadium or not.

The reason fights are getting made with Turki is because he is providing the extra money that the promoter can't afford to guarantee or is unwilling to risk. A perfect example is the Boots vs Norman that fell through all because Eddie wouldn't guarantee Norman the extra $500k he was asking for...

I encourage you guys to get some actual numbers from the folks who write the checks and not from articles that don't include quotes from real sources. Eddie has gone on record talking about fights that make money and lose money, he's gone on record with real numbers. There's a reason why he didn't bid on the Haney vs Martin purse bid while Arum won the bid at only $2.7 million. Eddie nor Arum thought the fight would sell well and they were almost certainly correct.

Indeed you are correct that my assertions Bud got a higher guarantee is just speculation. I cannot speak to it as a fact even though I think's it's highly unlikely he wasn't paid up in some other manner (signing on fee, sponsorship, media appearances). However that is just my speculation. I cannot provide evidence.

Can we be clear though, when you talk about the type of contract Bud had for that fight, with the PPV upside and structure of the deal. Is that speculation from you? Is it best guess? Assumption? Hearsay? Or do you know it to be a fact based of either yourself or a credible source being privy to those contract details?

[crimsonfalcon07]

Crimson, let me be clear. I'm not arguing that I believe Sulaiman because I think he's an honorable and trustworthy man. My point is that those dollar figures came from the mouth of somebody who would know actual reported figures because his organization profits from those figures. You guys claim that because he fears Turki's plan to diminish or to replace the sanctioning bodies with the Ring Belt, Sulaiman's agenda is to spit talk that would reflect negative on Turki.

I'm not sure if you even viewed the podcast, but the only reason the topic of money was brought forward by Sulaiman was because a fan asked a question regarding the WBC LHW, Bivol, the possibility of him getting stripped and who Benavidez would have to fight if Bivol was stripped. Had the question not been asked by the caller, the topic wouldn't have been bought up.

You first claimed that he's lying about the numbers because of his beef with Turki. You've just now implied that he has something to gain by under-representing the numbers because of the IRS. Neither the WBC nor Sulaiman need to worry about the IRS because the WBC/Sulaiman's cut cannot be touched by the IRS because the fight did not take place in the US, Sulaiman is not a US citizen nor permanent resident and the WBC is not based in the US or any US territory.

I'm not trying to defend Sulaiman, I couldn't care less about Sulaiman, but if you're going to argue that the figures he mentioned are wrong and you believe Bivol made more, at the very least show a quote from an actual source with privy to Bivol's fight purse. I'm willing to believe another source, unfortunately no other source has spoken about it for me to believe them. You and the other cats would rather believe articles that list no actual source but say "well the rumor is", instead of a guy who actually gets a cut of the purse because you hate the guy so therefore won't believe anything he says. Come on man, that isn't reasonable...

For the record, I know that Turki is paying more than promoters are paying, I've never denied that. Ginger wouldn't have passed on the Jake fight had Turki not overpaid for a 4 fight deal. But I've been saying on this board since late last year that I wasn't so sure just how much more he is actually paying. To me, it seemed as he might be paying about 30% above market value. That was my guess after I learned how much Bud's guarantee was for the Madrimov fight, which wasn't this astronomical amount that some folks here were thinking.

Turki offered Bud money to fight Virgil, he also offered Boots money to fight Virgil. Although those offered might have been good, the amount was obviously not enough to get them to accept the offers, unless you're one of those that believe Boots and Bud are afraid to fight Virgil. I certainly am not of that opinion. There isn't any doubt that Turki is willing to break the bank to sign a fight or fighter that he believes will do good financially and I think Turki has proved that with fighters who are the biggest financial stars. Ginger is one of them as well as some of the UK fighters that he's singed.

Bivol, is not one of them, neither is Bud unfortunately. There is no doubt that Bud will get good money, but not because Turki wants to pay him whatever Bud wants, but because Ginger's fights make enough to where if there is a loss, it won't be a heavy loss. Turki isn't just handing out blank checks, he's signing fights that might not be making money but he is also conducting business in a manner that will mitigate losses. Just because Turki is rich doesn't mean he is throwing away money s-tupidly...

With all that being said, although we might disagree, I appreciate your respectful replies. I respect your maturity in discussions without having to resort to childish name calling or insults. In my opinion, you're one of the best posters on this board and it's always a pleasure discussing with you, whether I agree with you or not....

In order. First, I mentioned the IRS because they could explain to Oracle some possible reasons it might benefit someone to underreport their earnings. Nothing else implied.

Second, the original reports about splitting a 20 mill purse came from Boxing Kingdom and Marca, and are from prior to the fight, and they don't have any motive to lie about the numbers. You should know by now that these kinds of reports don't name their sources, because those are confidential, for reasons that ought to be obvious. So what benefit does a boxing news channel get for using one number over another? Where do you think those numbers come from? If their source had told them "2.7 mill with a PPV upside", do you think they'd change that to "10 mill" just randomly? In contrast, all the reports citing the 2-3 million amount are dated after Sulaiman's interview. So that can be traced back to him. So the disconnect here is that you don't seem to think he could be lying about it, even though he's directly financially involved in whether Bivol chooses to fight for the WBC belt, while you categorically disbelieve boxing news sites who have no personal benefit in using one number over another.

Third, you have yet to answer several relevant questions.

1. We know Bivol got 5 million vs Canelo. We know that he got around 2 million for Arthur, and around 2.5 million for Zurdo. Do you have any reason to disbelieve those numbers? Those were for mandatory defenses. So why would he be getting 2.7 vs Beterbiev for undisputed? How does that make sense?

2. Why would boxers be signing up to Riyadh Season in droves if they're not getting big money as advertised?

3. You're relying on these numbers from Sulaiman, but I provided you with another interview from Benavidez' promoter, who said specifically that the fight with Bivol wasn't going to happen because Sampson "would never go to Saudi Arabia" and "Turki said he wasn't going to bid on it". When pressed, he said defensively that PBC could come up with the money, but made zero mention of any offers, let alone an 8 million dollar amount. So if Benavidez' own promoter knows nothing about an 8 million dollar offer, why would Sulaiman? Where did that come from? So, from the exact interview that you are using, he's already potentially lied about one number. Does it stretch credulity to think that a guy who lies regularly, and lied about one number, wouldn't also make up another one, especially when he's got personal financial connections if the fight gets made?

You're simply not being intellectually consistent here. Boxing Kingdom occasionally gets things wrong, but they don't really have a reputation for outright lying about things, and they're usually quite accurate in their reporting. In contrast, Sulaiman regularly lies, and there's evidence he lied about at least one of the numbers he came up with in the same response you're using. You really think that's a more reliable source than an independent news site that has nothing to gain from using one number over another? If so, you're in the minority, as credible news sites, felt like it was reliable enough to publish and attribute.

Finally, I generally also respect your posts, and also appreciate your disinterest in stooping to add hominem in place of logic. That's part of why I'm disappointed that you are placing such trust in a proven liar like Sulaiman. That guy is scum, and if he had a personal stake in it, I think it would be worth questioning his veracity if he said the sun was going to rise tomorrow. If you want to trust him, that's your right. But don't say you weren't warned.

[Grimmer]

How does PPV upside on a card like that work anyway? Are all the fighters getting a share of the PPV revenue? How do you divide up the PPV revenue among so many fighters where they make still make significantly more than their low guarantee. Isn't this exactly why these cards aren't economical for the traditional promoters. If you're Dubois and Parker and you know you're the main draw in the primary market, you're gonna be asking why money is being spent on Adames, Sheeraz, Ortiz and Madrimov when they're barely accounting for any of the PPV buys. The fact that Bivol v Benavidez was billed as the main event leads me to believe that none of this negotiating PPV upside is going on. Parker and Dubois were happy to be billed as the chief support, 'cause they're getting paid a boatload and their income isn't affected by the PPV sales.

[LarryMerchant'sBottle]

Indeed you are correct that my assertions Bud got a higher guarantee is just speculation. I cannot speak to it as a fact even though I think's it's highly unlikely he wasn't paid up in some other manner (signing on fee, sponsorship, media appearances). However that is just my speculation. I cannot provide evidence.

Can we be clear though, when you talk about the type of contract Bud had for that fight, with the PPV upside and structure of the deal. Is that speculation from you? Is it best guess? Assumption? Hearsay? Or do you know it to be a fact based of either yourself or a credible source being privy to those contract details?

For the record, I can agree that Bud and Turki MIGHT have had a backdoor deal that guaranteed Bud at least $25 million, and as a fan of Bud, I would hope that he made bank on that fight, but I wouldn't try to argue it because the only numbers that can be proven are the numbers that were reported to the State.

Turki is a legitimate business man and he's gonna want to continue to do business in the US, I wouldn't believe he is dumb enough to try and undermine the The US government just to try and pay his boxing crush a few more million dollars without reporting it. I can go with the narrative that Turki promised him lands in SA or golden bouillon to be kept in SA but that would be an assumption on my end and nothing that I could realistically argue.

As for Bud's structured deal: Bud has gone on record and given interviews where he talked about how much he learned from Haymon when working with him to setup the Spence fight. He's been honest about being naive to contracts when he was with Arum and how he didn't know you could actually make more money using the low guarantee amount but high PPV percentage upend. After his fight with Spence, he flat out said that that's the only pay plan he would agree to moving forward.

That's the same formula that most promoters are using nowadays, from Golden Boy to PBC(obviously), Matchroom, etc.. That's the deal that PBC has with all its fighters, Tank being the anchor fighter. PBC has also gone on record and has discussed the pay formula that it has with Tank. $2 million is Tank's current guarantee with PBC.

To be clear though, I do know and have worked with folks in the boxing industry which include promoters, security, sports doctors and ex pro and olympic boxers. You won't see me defending or hating on boxers, because I'm not emotionally invested in any one boxer, I appreciate them all.

[Grimmer]

For the record, I can agree that Bud and Turki MIGHT have had a backdoor deal that guaranteed Bud at least $25 million, and as a fan of Bud, I would hope that he made bank on that fight, but I wouldn't try to argue it because the only numbers that can be proven are the numbers that were reported to the State.

Turki is a legitimate business man and he's gonna want to continue to do business in the US, I wouldn't believe he is dumb enough to try and undermine the The US government just to try and pay his boxing crush a few more million dollars without reporting it. I can go with the narrative that Turki promised him lands in SA or golden bouillon to be kept in SA but that would be an assumption on my end and nothing that I could realistically argue.

But I don't think they would be making off record payments because they wouldn't need to. I'm not an expert in Tax, so correct my assumptions if I've got this wrong. Bud is from Nebraska, so I assume he only need to report earnings to CA state based on any work undertaken in that state such as his last fight? So he can get paid a purse which is directly for his participation in a fight. That gets declared to CA state. Outside of that, he could get offered $5mil to be a brand ambassador for Riyadh Season, for 12 months, in which he is "required" to attend a Riyadh Season show or some other pretend obligation he probably doesn't have to fulfil. That isn't income related to a boxing fight, so that wouldn't need to be reported as part of his fight earnings. But he would still need to declare it on his tax returns, etc as other income