Is Top Rank setting Crawford up for failure?

[Cheek busting]

Making someone a millionaire is always good-unless they should've been a multi, multi millionaire. I guess it's cool Jordan is a billionaire, until you realize Phil Knight is a billionaire 25 time over. get my point?

I can't deny that Arum has made Crawford more recognizable, has helped him monetize his god given talent, and has helped him get out of poverty. In that sense he has helped his career, no question.

From a boxing perspective, there are moves he made that don't look to me like he is positioning Crawford as his top dawg. If he doesn't, then Crawford, as I pointed out earlier, could fins himself in the same position Cotto did relative to Manny.

I don't think that is in his best interest.

All of these points are risks the promoter has to take! You do realize that, right? Crawford gets paid regardless if Arum makes any money.

Who was willing to put up the money demanded by both fighters (Postol and Crawford) for it to be on regular television?

The fight was likely brought to Vegas, because a Vegas location paid guaranteed upfront money to bring the fight there. Im sure if Arum thought he could have made more money in Nebraska than Vegas, he would have. Moreover, he was already a sellout star in Omaha, Vegas is the boxing mecca of the world. Why not try to sell him there as a star in what was by purist standards, a great fight with Postol and him.. Usually those type of fights don't get made because each guy demands too much money, and doesn't want to risk their brand by taking an L..

Arum has been in this business for like 5-decades, I'm sure he is the best there is at maximizing revenue, and profit.

What if Manny didn't want to fight Crawford, and opted for Horn?

These are all very petty points of contention. Crawford is LITERALLY one of only a handful of fighters from America blessed to be afforded the situation he is in.

Of course he's the one putting in the handwork in the gym, and putting his body and health on the line come fight night, but if it wasn't for Arum, Crawford wouldn't have been fighting for million dollar purses against Hank Lundy's, and Felix Diaz's of the boxing world.

[Thraxox]

Hahah so much this.

Bradley a feather-fisted dude who NEVER would have gotten a tenth of the wealth he has today if not for Top Rank.

Bradley is likely worth close to 15 million dollars easily.

And now has a cushy six-figure job as a commentator.

lol set up for failure. hahahahah

People seemed to forget how Bradley talked about Bob Arum the most generous promoter if you have talent because he keeps you active with paydays.

[The Big Dunn]

All of these points are risks the promoter has to take! You do realize that, right? Crawford gets paid regardless if Arum makes any money.

Who was willing to put up the money demanded by both fighters (Postol and Crawford) for it to be on regular television?

The fight was likely brought to Vegas, because a Vegas location paid guaranteed upfront money to bring the fight there. Im sure if Arum thought he could have made more money in Nebraska than Vegas, he would have. Moreover, he was already a sellout star in Omaha, Vegas is the boxing mecca of the world. Why not try to sell him there as a star in what was by purist standards, a great fight with Postol and him.. Usually those type of fights don't get made because each guy demands too much money, and doesn't want to risk their brand by taking an L..

Arum has been in this business for like 5-decades, I'm sure he is the best there is at maximizing revenue, and profit.

What if Manny didn't want to fight Crawford, and opted for Horn?

These are all very petty points of contention. Crawford is LITERALLY one of only a handful of fighters from America blessed to be afforded the situation he is in.

Of course he's the one putting in the handwork in the gym, and putting his body and health on the line come fight night, but if it wasn't for Arum, Crawford wouldn't have been fighting for million dollar purses against Hank Lundy's, and Felix Diaz's of the boxing world.

Of course I am aware.

I posted Bob could take a short term loss and make it up the next fight to ensure maximum amount of viewers.

I am sure Nebraska offered money as well since all of Crawford's fights are packed and profitable. The optics for Postol/Crawford were bad and the viewership incredibly low because it was on PPV. Long term that didn't seem IMO to be about maximizing Crawford's career but keeping his value low.

My 1st sentence in my initial post in this thread credited Bob with building careers.

Use financial pressure, positive or negative, to make the fight happened as has been done. Bob hasn't been successful by not using underhanded tactics when needed.

Again, blessed is relative. We are talking about something else. That was my point about Michael Jordan. yeah, he got rich, but he also got exploited by someone who got far richer.

If Crawford wasn't blessed with talent and worked hard he wouldn't be getting those paydays. With all due respect to Bob and the work he has done to elevate Crawford-I think Dibella, Floyd, GBP, Schaeffer, Hearn or K2 would be getting Crafword million dollar paydays as well.

[The Big Dunn]

Hahah so much this.

Bradley a feather-fisted dude who NEVER would have gotten a tenth of the wealth he has today if not for Top Rank.

Bradley is likely worth close to 15 million dollars easily.

And now has a cushy six-figure job as a commentator.

lol set up for failure. hahahahah

Bradley made $1.3 mil for the Alexander fight before he signed with TR. He also could've signed with Floyd. You never know where his career would be had he done that.

In fairness, Bob overpaid him for the Casamayor and 1st Manny fight and he took the payday and rightfully so.

[WesternChamp]

Bradley made $1.3 mil for the Alexander fight before he signed with TR. He also could've signed with Floyd. You never know where his career would be had he done that.

In fairness, Bob overpaid him for the Casamayor and 1st Manny fight and he took the payday and rightfully so.

well, who's signed to floyd that is making bank right now??

[Eff Pandas]

2. Yes, but IMO Bob could've made the short term investment in Nebraska and regular TV, took a small loss but maximized viewership for Crawford, then made up for it had he made the Manny/Crawford PPV next.

Neither of us would probably agree with Bob's promotion strategy from my take with this comment & my agreement with it, but lets respect that Bob has his own promotional strategy thats worked for him for like half a century now or w/e that seems to me to be about keeping a balanced budget & being strongly risk averse.

And lets also not ignore that that fight at the time was seem as Bud's biggest challenge. I actually picked Postol to win that fight (embarrassingly now lol), but I wasn't alone in that assessment. And if Bud did lose that fight then it would've been a risk for naught for Bob.

Thats not really Bob's way. He'll gamble on much less risky things with proven en******, but not as often on step up type fights. Remember he was strongly opposed to Loma being fast tracked & even when Loma proved himself Bob took him back a few steps to get some seasoning type of fights.

4. I think you want to maximize the PPV main event appearance of boxers that fans see as the best in the business but maybe have not crossed over to the casual fan. I think putting Crawford's PPV debut against Postol, in vegas undermined Crawford's true value.

Thats not the reasoning for doing a PPV is the problem I've always had with people who say there are PPV fights & there are fights that aren't PPV. If you get an offer for $5M to put a fight on HBO, but feel like you can sell 300k on PPV (at $50 a pop for $15M in revenue with $7.5M coming your way) its a PPV fight.

The whole casual fan vs hardcore fan dynamic is more theory than something you can say if x people watch this guy on TV y times it equals z $'s eventually.

The PPV is usually on the next weeks show anyway. Less appeal cuz its not live, but if I'm THAT casual a fan I mighta not known you were fighting on PPV anyway so idk that it devalues things as much as people think with casuals.

Put that fight in nebraska with a loud crowd (even if it is PPV) and it changes the optics for the viewer. Hot cheering crowd is much better than a passive, luke warm crowd that was hotter for the semi main.

I'm definitely with you here though. The setting of an event is huge & if the people at the event are excited & showing it it has an impact on the people watching.

That said do we even know for sure that Postol didn't have some pull in this fight NOT being in Nebraska? Cuz if I was Postol I'd have likely tried to steer it from my opponents home too.

But yea overall agree with your point here.

5. I guess so. However, if you have the deal from ESPN, allot resources accordingly.

Bob is steering his top draw away from Crawford and toward another fighter. That to me makes it clear he is hurting Crawford's overall value. Now maybe Manny isn't as gung ho about Crawford as he is Loma.

I think Bob probably knows more about what Manny wants & don't want already so he could be steering things that way for a reason, but idk that he is steering things. If he's putting Manny on a CRAWFORD UNDERCARD or trying this hard to that he's postponing the announcement of the fight thats saying something. And to me it says he's trying to setup Crawford vs Manny after this April card.

respect your point but IMO the optics look incredibly bad.TR is steering the #2 WBO ww away from the WBO ww champ and toward a CW fight at a lower weight with a possible LW champ (assuming he beat Beltran which we all think is a formality).

Likewise.

But I don't see so much pull towards Loma over Bud. I'm not even sure what you are seeing that suggests thats a real thing. Loma seems unlikely to be 140 or 147 ready & I don't buy that Manny should be going down in weight at this late stage in his career to fight Loma at 135 or 140. That fight could make sense at some point, but idk that it does anytime soon unless Loma is ready to gain 10lbs & Manny is ready to lose 7lbs & they meet at 140 on this May date in some weird non-title "superfight" or something.

Meanwhile Manny is right in the mix at 147 with Bud & Horn.

[HandsofIron]

LoL.........no. Old man Pac is on his way out so Crawford will most likely be the future of Top Rank.

[turnedup]

Not likely. People want to blame promoters for the success of a fighter which is a very small percentage of it. Personality goes a long way to making you a star especially in this era. It's why you see the youngin's making more of an effort to be in front of the camera. Example, Garcia. Danny has the personality of a stone, his father makes up for it. Broner built a career on personality. Hell even Thurman and his lisp are making an effort. You can be a half decent boxer with a great personality and be a star, even with a shhh promoter.

[Madison Boxing]

People overanalysing on here. Fact is you won't be a star by fighting the likes of Ricky burns, Indongo and John Molina. I don't think any casual has thought 'oh wow I must tune in to see Crawford beat up that b level fighter' (and b level is generous with a lot of them)

[lefthook2daliva]

Truthfully, he is a lawyer. I think he could care less about any other color than green$$$$

Fixed that for you.

On topic; in a few weeks, Horn will be being called a hypejob and a jumped up schoolteacher by many of the same accts bigging him up now and then will promptly be forgotten and 'nuff said.

Imo, the only way this is a competitive fight is a) if Crawford emulates LL and disrespects himself, his opponent and the sport by not taking the fight seriously. Or b) if Crawford makes a conscious decision to fight recklessly as a marketing ploy.

This fight will look like alot like Gatti vs Mayweather. Maybe will last a little longer as Bud usually assesses his opponent for a couple of rounds before lighting them up.