Comments Thread For: Andre Ward's Coach: There Was No Money in Facing Stevenson

[Madison Boxing]

i dont think its stevenson whos the sole issue, more likely theres no money in an andre ward fight. ward wasnt so concerned about money when he fought smith barrera rodriguez and brand. didnt think devout christians were meant to be money hungry either...

[Sadiqkingofko]

Hunter is saying this lol, not ward

[TheThirdEye]

Exactly. When you make that much money from 2 fights, why defend those belts against opposition just as hard if not harder and not be compensated accordingly?

You just fought Kovalev for 6 million and you're going to fight Beterbiev for 1.5 max? Doesn't make financial sense. No one in the light heavyweight division was going to get him that kind of payday again.

His only option is move up to cruiser and fight Bellew in the UK for the WBC title for like 4 mil maybe. Bellew's got a fight lined up against Haye, Ward will be inactive and by the time that deal is done he'll have been off a year maybe more. No one in the UK would fight him (for a tuneup and build his UK star power up) at light heavyweight or Cruiser without asking for a bunch of money that his promoter was not willing to pay.

He decided "Hey, I'm getting older now, my body doesn't train the same and I'm not getting the compensation for this, I'm the #1 p4p fighter in the world I'm on top right now why continue? I've unified and beat the best fighters 168 and 175 had to offer, everyone knows I'm the best. Let me go out like that."

You talking about an UNDISPUTED matchup against Stevenson. Look, when big names show up in Canada, they are well paid. Ward would have made minimum 10 million alone, for 1 single matchup against Stevenson. Maybe more in Barclays center NY. Stevenson value was always higher than Kovalev.

Hunter - Well, Stevenson can only fight in Canada:
That's a lie, Stevenson can fight everywhere and would have fought in the states for the Undisputed title.
Hunter - There was really no money in that fight:
That's a lie, Stevenson made 3 million against Bika, since, his minimum purse was an average of 3 million per fight, not for superfights, only per fights.
Hunter - Nobody put up the money for that fight:
That's a lie, they didn't even try to communicate with Stevenson, they were carefully avoiding every questions about Adonis Stevenson or the Undisputed subject.
Hunter - Once you make a certain amount of money, it’s only right that you continue to stay on that pay scale:
That's true, but Ward made 2 million against Smith, 1.85 million against Barrera and 850k to fight Brand, while Stevenson minimum pay scale was already locked at 3 million per fights, US currency. Stevenson purse value would have been much more for Superfights.
Hunter - Stevenson was not going to bring in that kind of money to the table because he only fights in Canada:
That's a lie, Stevenson purse average was higher than Kovalev, not to mention Kovalev biggest payday ever was against Jean Pascal in Canada "US Currency", not to mention, sometimes Stevenson training camps were located in Traverse City Michigan, which mean Stevenson has no limitation to fight out of Canada, if the purse & the title are right.
Why no body try to communicate with Stevenson to get his version, I guess no one wants to hear it.
Initially, Ward moved up to 175Lbs, after being called by Kovalev, to bypass the Stevenson threat.
Ward started to joke about Stevenson, like: "He will have to ask Al to come out & play".
Stevenson congratulate & Challenge Ward after his victory over Kovalev, but Ward says: "why now, I'm not even thinking about this guy right now". In a UK conference, Ward says: "no disrespect to Stevenson, but he is a step back", Ward also says he would rather fight in a big UK stadium, and maybe meet guys like "Cleverly".
In the meantime, Ward says between him and Stevenson it has to make sense.
After Ward second victory over Kovalev, Stevenson congratulate Ward again and says lets fight for the Undisputed title, but Ward repeated: "it has to make sense".
After Badou Jack easy victory over Cleverly, Stevenson congratulate Jack and challenge him to fight before the Undisputed matchup come to fruition, saying: "Ward is wasting time beating around the bushes, Ward is acting like a princess".
Ward sounds off til the Crawford Undisputed fight. After the insistence of a reporter, Ward says he fought Kovalev twice while Stevenson didn't fight him once, just seconds after feinting his own interest to become Undisputed too.
Just 4 weeks ago, Ward attempted to settle a fight with an Eddie Hearn guy "Frank Buglioni" in UK, which was turned down by Buglioni & HBO. RocNation's choice was to fight Stevenson next, HBO's choice was to fight Stevenson or challenging heavier opponents. But Ward/Hunter plan was well calculated, Bellew & Joshua belongs to promoter Eddie Hearn, therefore it was fairly easy for Ward to show some appearance of negotiations while maintaining his lie about going up in weight. I mean, while maintaining discussion with promoter Eddie Hearn, Ward was not really planning to change weight, he was only preparing himself to milk his titles with the lesser opponents Hearn has in his stable, from the LHW division.
But when ROC & HBO rejected the softer "Buglioni" choice, Ward didn't want to take the risk of fighting Stevenson even if the reward was to become Undisputed; Ward retired instead.
If old Stevenson was that easy & cheap, why the #1 pound-for-pound didn't fight him just to pick his WBC Lineal belt, just to become Undisputed? I guess Virgil Hunter didn't like what he saw, when he felt Stevenson strength in Canada. I mean, when Virgil literally jumped in the ring to stopped the Fonfara's destruction.

Hunter - There’s a possibility that if the right fighter comes along, then he would manage:
Hunter or Ward may try to flip it as they wish, making fans turning in circles with lies, like going up in weight for Joshua or coming back to the sport against the right "YOUNG" rising challenger.
That said, Ward may come back, but reporters would have to communicate with RocNation president Michael Yormark first, only to know the actual status of Ward promotional contract.
Anyhow! they just can't erase or bypass actual events, facts such as Andre Ward ducked Adonis Stevenson for the Undisputed matchup. I mean, the duck was so strong, it was a career retirement.

[MisanthropicNY]

Andre "I fought mostly tune-up fights" Ward is concerned about money now LOL...

Dude said he needed like 4 tune ups before fight Kovalev... guess those were big money fights...

[Kcvtr81]

What hunter really ment was, we ducking bellew and no way are we fighting superman outside of Oakland or anywhere

[nycsmooth]

I guess if Ward stays in Oakland and hides out like he didn't through most of his career maybe he won't have to come back I don't think over the course of his career he made a great deal of money not one taxes and expenses were considered I'd say it's 50-50 he comes back , he will need the dollars...

[Flabble Scrote]

That's bull****, a unification fight is always worth it, apart from the prestige, you can cash in after by defending as unified champ
They must have seen something in Stevenson that concerned them, definitely a very dangerous fighter

Ward gayed it up in Oakland then got a gift vs Kovalev and illegally won the rematch vs an out of shape opponent
Ward was a winner but not in the class of some

[Ake-Dawg]

BS

Fighting Stevenson in Canada would be huge....dude fights before packed houses regardless the opponent.

Andre didn't want to get laid-out.

One of the first things Stevenson said when he called out Ward was that he is willing to go to America for the fight. He must have forseen they would use this excuse to justify the duck, and they did it anyway despite Stevenson saying he was willing to travel.

They couldn't use the Showtime excuse either since Ward only signed a three fight contract with HBO and had concluded that contract.

This is a blatant duck. I mean we heard it in the Kovalev 2 post fight interview how Ward already tried to avoid Stevenson questions, and then in the post fight press conference and interviews after he kept trying to swerve those questions and/or downplay Stevenson as a credible opponent (yet he was tryna fight Bellew, a Stevenson KO victim).

Ward ducked Stevenson, and so did Kovalev. There is no two ways about it.

Exactly how many ppv buys was this fight gonna get to justify paying Ward 5 million? We established with Golovkin that filling an arena doesn't necessarily translate to big revenue, so where was the money going to come from? The Stevenson message was consistent. It's was essentially, dude you been sitting around fighting bums not building your revenue base, now all of a sudden you want to unify. How did he help to build such a fight versus Kovalev or Ward? Having a belt doesn't make money. Hell unification don't really make money. Names make money.

[Ake-Dawg]

You talking about an UNDISPUTED matchup against Stevenson. Look, when big names show up in Canada, they are well paid. Ward would have made minimum 10 million alone, for 1 single matchup against Stevenson. Maybe more in Barclays center NY. Stevenson value was always higher than Kovalev.

How was Ward going to make $10 million? Ppv? The numbers just aren't there.

[alexguiness]

Ward retired undefeated at his peak because there was no paydays left?

Makes perfect sense...if you are a ******.