The last 18 mnths, Arum has made many non-PPV fights with other promoters. Has Al?

[Boxing Logic]

In the last 18 months, Bob Arum has put his biggest stars, like Vasyl Lomachenko, in risky, non-PPV fights vs top, A-side fighters from other promoter's stables like Jorge Linares and Guillermo Rigondeaux. Now, he just met with Robert Garcia to discuss making Mikey vs Loma next, but Mikey and Haymon have planned a fight between two Haymon fighters instead, despite Robert saying he knows Arum and Team Loma all want the Mikey fight.

I'm sort of new to boxing and I always see people commenting that Arum is bad and only makes "in house fights" to protect his "great white hopes hypes" from the real elite fighters in the sport (Haymon fighters), so I was wondering, what are the best examples of non-PPV, non-in-house fights that Al Haymon has made between his biggest stars, the way Lomachenko is for Arum, and elite A-side fighters from other promoters stables?

[N/A]

In the last 18 months, Bob Arum has put his biggest stars, like Vasyl Lomachenko, in risky, non-PPV fights vs top, A-side fighters from other promoter's stables like Jorge Linares and Guillermo Rigondeaux.

Rigondeaux was with a low level promoter and moving up two weight classes. There was no risk to Arum. Loma was definitely going to win.

The Linares fight only happened because Linares pressured his promoter and demanded the fight. Arum only allowed it if it would be a TR show on ESPN.

So the real question is, when has Arum allowed his A-sides to go fight on another promoter's show? I'm sure Arum would allow Mikey to come fight on TR show on ESPN against Loma, but would Arum allow Loma to go fight on Fox on a PBC show? No.

So just because Roc Nation & Top Rank were desperate enough to send their fighters to ESPN doesn't mean Haymon is going to make a weak move like that.

[OctoberRed]

In the last 18 months, Bob Arum has put his biggest stars, like Vasyl Lomachenko, in risky, non-PPV fights vs top, A-side fighters from other promoter's stables like Jorge Linares and Guillermo Rigondeaux. Now, he just met with Robert Garcia to discuss making Mikey vs Loma next, but Mikey and Haymon have planned a fight between two Haymon fighters instead, despite Robert saying he knows Arum and Team Loma all want the Mikey fight.

I'm sort of new to boxing and I always see people commenting that Arum is bad and only makes "in house fights" to protect his "great white hopes hypes" from the real elite fighters in the sport (Haymon fighters), so I was wondering, what are the best examples of non-PPV, non-in-house fights that Al Haymon has made between his biggest stars, the way Lomachenko is for Arum, and elite A-side fighters from other promoters stables?

He has no choice. Who else could Loma fight? Arum doesn't have the stable to fight him. He's forced to look elsewhere. Now he has that problem with Crawford.

The big problem with Arum, is he has this "it has to happen on ESPN or it don't happen."

That's BS, it should go to whoever is paying the most for the fight. If ESPN is paying more, they should get it. But if Showtime offers up more Loma-Garcia, then it should go there.

For years, people complained that Haymon doesn't allow his boxers to fight each other and now they complain he doesn't let them fight others.

Keep in mind that Daniel Jacobs, Emmanuel Rodriguez, Eleider Alvarez, Artur Beterbiev are Haymon fighters who are fighting on other networks, doing their own thing and facing non-PBC fighters.

[Boxing Logic]

Rigondeaux was with a low level promoter and moving up two weight classes. There was no risk to Arum. Loma was definitely going to win.

Is that why Santa Cruz and GRJ, Haymon's two best boxers Lomachenko's size, refused to ever fight Rigondeaux? (even though they haven't been good enough to move up as far as Loma has doesn't mean they're not the same size, they are). Is that why Arum offered Rigondeaux the Loma fight years ago, when Loma and Rigo were only one weight class apart? If you're not going to tell the whole story, please don't tell any of it. Don't just present the parts of the story that make things seem how you want them to be, please.

moving up two weight classes

I thought fights like that were legitimate? Because Arum and Loma want to make Mikey vs Loma next but Haymon as usual came up with a clever way to make himself money instead of make the best fight for the sport and for his fighters. He is doing what's best for Spence and himself, at the expense of Mikey, Loma, and the sport. How can you defend that? And if you do, then how can you trash the Loma-Rigo fight? I'm getting dizzy from all the double standards in your post.

The Linares fight only happened because Linares pressured his promoter and demanded the fight. Arum only allowed it if it would be a TR show on ESPN.

Are you serious with this? Loma was not even in Linares weight class, so Loma was under zero pressure to fight Linares. Moreover, it was Linares promoter that tried to cancel the fight, not Arum. They had already agreed, but then the date ESPN gave Arum conflicted with the Canelo-GGG replay, so GBP said the fight could not happen unless the date was moved. If Arum had wanted to kill the fight, he would not have negotiated it in the first place, and he definitely would have taken that golden opportunity to move on to another fight, but he didn't! Because he wanted that fight. Team Loma, Jorge Linares himself, and Bob Arum all fought for that fight.

So the real question is, when has Arum allowed his A-sides to go fight on another promoter's show?

Loma vs GRJ, off PPV. When has Haymon let his A-sides go fight on another promoter's non-PPV show? I'm curious why fans always ask these questions of Arum, but never Haymon. Arum has done it a lot more than Haymon has, because Haymon NEVER does it. And I'm sure Arum would do it even more except what star does Haymon have in Loma's weight range that Loma could fight off PPV? None, because every Haymon fighter has such high salary demands even if they have no fanbase, that they refuse to fight top guys like Loma unless it's on PPV anyway.

I'm sure Arum would allow Mikey to come fight on TR show on ESPN against Loma, but would Arum allow Loma to go fight on Fox on a PBC show? No

Already did, Loma vs GRJ. When has Haymon EVER? Even if you say it was a mandatory, Arum could have easily withdrew, but he didn't. But I remember Peter Quillin vs Korobov, Haymon got Quillin to drop the belt rather than fight Korobov on HBO, and Quillin's once hot career has NEVER recovered. Once again, Haymon did what was best for himself, not for his fighters, and definitely not for the sport, you can tell he doesn't even give a second's thoughts to the health of the sport, in fact he seems to despise the sport because his brother had a bad experience in the sport. I'm surprised more of you plugged in fans don't ever talk about that because it seems to be maybe the biggest factor in how Haymon manages the sport of boxing, to the extent he has control over it, which is a significant extent.

So just because Roc Nation & Top Rank were desperate enough to send their fighters to ESPN doesn't mean Haymon is going to make a weak move like that.

You must mean GBP. So first you say Arum was forced into making Loma-Linares by GBP, but now you're saying GBP was desperate? How could a desperate promoter force a power house like TR, fresh off making a huge ESPN deal, into making their star fighter move up and change divisions, fight their fighter Linares, and change the start time of the telecast to help GBP? Arum did all that against his will, really? He had twenty different outs to move on from the fight against a fighter from a less powerful, "desperate" promoter, yet he took none because of "pressure," not because Loma, Loma's team, and Arum all wanted the fight. That's the point of this topic, it's starting to seem like Arum believes in his top fighters, but Haymon never does. It's like the only way Haymon stays relevant in the sport is by hiding his fighters from all the top ones with other promoters, because Haymon knows if he keeps them totally separate, he can maintain the illusion that they are top fighters and that therefore he manages all these top fighters, but if he actually matched them up vs the top fighters of every other promoter, his fighters would lose 9 out of 10 of those matchups, and then the value of all his contracts would not be worth ****.

Like, remember when Pacquiao tried to fight Danny Garcia 4 years ago? Imagine if prime Pacquiao had had access to fighting Thurman, Garcia, Porter, etc. He would have dominated all those guys in his prime, and then Haymon's current "hot welterweight division" would not even exist today. Likewise, if Haymon let Santa Cruz and Mares and Tank fight Loma, on top of GRJ which Haymon only did by mistake and because it was mandated, Haymon would no longer have a PBC featherweight division or 130.

Likewise, if Haymon had let Quillin fight Korobov, and Jacobs and/or Quillin fight GGG in GGG's prime, Haymon would have no middleweight division right now. If he let Jermall Charlo fight at his natural division this whole time, and he let Jermall Charlo at age 24 let's say fight prime GGG, Charlo would also be a KO victim of GGG in his prime, and Haymon would not have his next middleweight star either.

At 175, if Haymon let Badou Jack fight Bivol right now, his former mandatory, Haymon's second best 175 would be knocked out. If Haymon had let Stevenson fight the top guys (Kovalev in his prime, Beterbiev, Alvarez, etc), Stevenson would have been knocked out years ago, and Haymon would have no champions at 175. Even Alvarez, while good enough to beat old Kovalev, probably would lose if Haymon ever matched him vs a top prime opponent.

Getting the picture yet? Haymon's entire stable seems to be built on ducking and avoiding actual top fighters, which is why I pointed out that he never makes out of house fights, but other promoters do. When you have a prime Loma, a prime Pacquiao, a prime GGG, you can make those fights without a lot of risk because you know they'll win. But if your #2 middleweight Quillin is someone who needs to be bailed out to avoid getting KO'd by Gabe Rosado, you can't. When your #1 middleweight got knocked out by Dmitry Pirog and admits he's "not ready" for GGG in GGG's prime, you can't. When your #1 130 pounder says he "was force" to fight Pedraza, and starts stuttering every time Loma's name is mentioned, you can't. When your top two 175 pounders were knocked out by Darnell Boone and Derek Edwards, respectively, at 168 pounds, you can't. When your top welterweights pre-Spence got schooled by Mauricio Herrera at 140, almost knocked out by past prime Collazo and badly hurt vs Diego Chaves and Soto Karass, and drawn against by past prime Julio Diaz, then obviously you can't match them against the likes of prime Pacquiao and expect them to come out ahead.

When your top cruiserweight is Andrew Tabiti, obviously you can't match your top cruiserweight up in the WBSS like other promoters can... oh wait, oops, once Usyk and Gassiev both bow out, THEN suddenly it's okay to do a "weak move" like the WBSS, as you put it. But as long as the actual top fighters in any division are around for the smoke, Haymon keeps his fighters far away. And I don't say this to brag at all, but I think I just did a pretty good job of showing why. And to be clear, I'm not saying Arum has always been better. He hasn't. He even admitted, basically, to not making Gamboa-Juanma at the time because he knew Juanma wasn't ready for prime Gamboa, and he wanted to keep the Puerto Rican star undefeated more than the Cuban one because of the money involved. That's the part he didn't admit to but it was obvious what he meant.

But that's the point. Back then, the fighter Arum wanted to win, the fighter Arum wanted to make money off of, was not good enough to win, he thought, so he didn't make the fight. Now, and really this whole decade, it is usually Haymon who has the fighters who aren't good enough to win, while Arum, or K2, or GBP, does. Haymon is only one promoter, but there are like 10 smaller ones in the game, so all the actual best fighters are usually spread out. Haymon has a couple now, more than he's had the last decade, so maybe we will start to see him be more aggressive in his matchmaking, but I doubt it. Just because we think Spence could beat Crawford doesn't mean Haymon thinks so. I think he takes his boxing advice from Floyd and you know Floyd is the boxer, so he would probably advise that Crawford would beat Spence and to keep Spence away from him.

In any case, the point isn't "who is a better person, Arum or Haymon?" The point is, who has been more willing to make top level fights with other promoters the last decade? Arum. Who believes in his current stars more, based on what fights are being made and discussed? Arum believes in Lomachenko, for one anyway, more than Haymon seems to believe all of his stars. And based on the matchmaking we saw (4 Marquez fights, for one, Marquez being the same size as Pacquiao but way smaller than Floyd so don't get started on that BS), Arum believed in his last star, Manny Pacquiao, way more than Haymon believes in all his stars.

And again, that's logical. Prime Pacquiao was better than any current Haymon fighter, just like Loma is. But my point is, it's time to start speaking facts. If those are the facts, and those facts are the reason that Haymon keeps his star fighters protected from the superior star fighters that other promoters have, then we need to start saying that. If Haymon only makes in house fights with his stars, even more so than Arum does in 2018, then we need to stop throwing around the line that fights won't happen because Arum only makes in house fights. In 2018, with fighters like Lomachenko who Arum believes in, that is clearly not the case. We need to start speaking facts about how Haymon is the one now with a clear pattern of avoiding ever making non-in-house fights off PPV, and rarely even on PPV either, but overall, he is a way worse culprit of that in 2018 than Arum or ANY OTHER CURRENT PROMOTER, and it's time everyone started speaking the truth about that FACT. Disagree freely about opinions, of course, but everyone should at least get on the same page about the facts so that we can actually exchange informed opinions, instead of fantasy land bull****.

[N/A]

Is that why Santa Cruz and GRJ, Haymon's two best boxers Lomachenko's size, refused to ever fight Rigondeaux? (even though they haven't been good enough to move up as far as Loma has doesn't mean they're not the same size, they are). Is that why Arum offered Rigondeaux the Loma fight years ago, when Loma and Rigo were only one weight class apart? If you're not going to tell the whole story, please don't tell any of it. Don't just present the parts of the story that make things seem how you want them to be, please.



I thought fights like that were legitimate? Because Arum and Loma want to make Mikey vs Loma next but Haymon as usual came up with a clever way to make himself money instead of make the best fight for the sport and for his fighters. He is doing what's best for Spence and himself, at the expense of Mikey, Loma, and the sport. How can you defend that? And if you do, then how can you trash the Loma-Rigo fight? I'm getting dizzy from all the double standards in your post.



Are you serious with this? Loma was not even in Linares weight class, so Loma was under zero pressure to fight Linares. Moreover, it was Linares promoter that tried to cancel the fight, not Arum. They had already agreed, but then the date ESPN gave Arum conflicted with the Canelo-GGG replay, so GBP said the fight could not happen unless the date was moved. If Arum had wanted to kill the fight, he would not have negotiated it in the first place, and he definitely would have taken that golden opportunity to move on to another fight, but he didn't! Because he wanted that fight. Team Loma, Jorge Linares himself, and Bob Arum all fought for that fight.



Loma vs GRJ, off PPV. When has Haymon let his A-sides go fight on another promoter's non-PPV show? I'm curious why fans always ask these questions of Arum, but never Haymon. Arum has done it a lot more than Haymon has, because Haymon NEVER does it. And I'm sure Arum would do it even more except what star does Haymon have in Loma's weight range that Loma could fight off PPV? None, because every Haymon fighter has such high salary demands even if they have no fanbase, that they refuse to fight top guys like Loma unless it's on PPV anyway.



Already did, Loma vs GRJ. When has Haymon EVER? Even if you say it was a mandatory, Arum could have easily withdrew, but he didn't. But I remember Peter Quillin vs Korobov, Haymon got Quillin to drop the belt rather than fight Korobov on HBO, and Quillin's once hot career has NEVER recovered. Once again, Haymon did what was best for himself, not for his fighters, and definitely not for the sport, you can tell he doesn't even give a second's thoughts to the health of the sport, in fact he seems to despise the sport because his brother had a bad experience in the sport. I'm surprised more of you plugged in fans don't ever talk about that because it seems to be maybe the biggest factor in how Haymon manages the sport of boxing, to the extent he has control over it, which is a significant extent.



You must mean GBP. So first you say Arum was forced into making Loma-Linares by GBP, but now you're saying GBP was desperate? How could a desperate promoter force a power house like TR, fresh off making a huge ESPN deal, into making their star fighter move up and change divisions, fight their fighter Linares, and change the start time of the telecast to help GBP? Arum did all that against his will, really? He had twenty different outs to move on from the fight against a fighter from a less powerful, "desperate" promoter, yet he took none because of "pressure," not because Loma, Loma's team, and Arum all wanted the fight. That's the point of this topic, it's starting to seem like Arum believes in his top fighters, but Haymon never does. It's like the only way Haymon stays relevant in the sport is by hiding his fighters from all the top ones with other promoters, because Haymon knows if he keeps them totally separate, he can maintain the illusion that they are top fighters and that therefore he manages all these top fighters, but if he actually matched them up vs the top fighters of every other promoter, his fighters would lose 9 out of 10 of those matchups, and then the value of all his contracts would not be worth ****.

Like, remember when Pacquiao tried to fight Danny Garcia 4 years ago? Imagine if prime Pacquiao had had access to fighting Thurman, Garcia, Porter, etc. He would have dominated all those guys in his prime, and then Haymon's current "hot welterweight division" would not even exist today. Likewise, if Haymon let Santa Cruz and Mares and Tank fight Loma, on top of GRJ which Haymon only did by mistake and because it was mandated, Haymon would no longer have a PBC featherweight division or 130.

Likewise, if Haymon had let Quillin fight Korobov, and Jacobs and/or Quillin fight GGG in GGG's prime, Haymon would have no middleweight division right now. If he let Jermall Charlo fight at his natural division this whole time, and he let Jermall Charlo at age 24 let's say fight prime GGG, Charlo would also be a KO victim of GGG in his prime, and Haymon would not have his next middleweight star either.

At 175, if Haymon let Badou Jack fight Bivol right now, his former mandatory, Haymon's second best 175 would be knocked out. If Haymon had let Stevenson fight the top guys (Kovalev in his prime, Beterbiev, Alvarez, etc), Stevenson would have been knocked out years ago, and Haymon would have no champions at 175. Even Alvarez, while good enough to beat old Kovalev, probably would lose if Haymon ever matched him vs a top prime opponent.

Getting the picture yet? Haymon's entire stable seems to be built on ducking and avoiding actual top fighters, which is why I pointed out that he never makes out of house fights, but other promoters do. When you have a prime Loma, a prime Pacquiao, a prime GGG, you can make those fights without a lot of risk because you know they'll win. But if your #2 middleweight Quillin is someone who needs to be bailed out to avoid getting KO'd by Gabe Rosado, you can't. When your #1 middleweight got knocked out by Dmitry Pirog and admits he's "not ready" for GGG in GGG's prime, you can't. When your #1 130 pounder says he "was force" to fight Pedraza, and starts stuttering every time Loma's name is mentioned, you can't. When your top two 175 pounders were knocked out by Darnell Boone and Derek Edwards, respectively, at 168 pounds, you can't. When your top welterweights pre-Spence got schooled by Mauricio Herrera at 140, almost knocked out by past prime Collazo and badly hurt vs Diego Chaves and Soto Karass, and drawn against by past prime Julio Diaz, then obviously you can't match them against the likes of prime Pacquiao and expect them to come out ahead.

When your top cruiserweight is Andrew Tabiti, obviously you can't match your top cruiserweight up in the WBSS like other promoters can... oh wait, oops, once Usyk and Gassiev both bow out, THEN suddenly it's okay to do a "weak move" like the WBSS, as you put it. But as long as the actual top fighters in any division are around for the smoke, Haymon keeps his fighters far away. And I don't say this to brag at all, but I think I just did a pretty good job of showing why. And to be clear, I'm not saying Arum has always been better. He hasn't. He even admitted, basically, to not making Gamboa-Juanma at the time because he knew Juanma wasn't ready for prime Gamboa, and he wanted to keep the Puerto Rican star undefeated more than the Cuban one because of the money involved. That's the part he didn't admit to but it was obvious what he meant.

But that's the point. Back then, the fighter Arum wanted to win, the fighter Arum wanted to make money off of, was not good enough to win, he thought, so he didn't make the fight. Now, and really this whole decade, it is usually Haymon who has the fighters who aren't good enough to win, while Arum, or K2, or GBP, does. Haymon is only one promoter, but there are like 10 smaller ones in the game, so all the actual best fighters are usually spread out. Haymon has a couple now, more than he's had the last decade, so maybe we will start to see him be more aggressive in his matchmaking, but I doubt it. Just because we think Spence could beat Crawford doesn't mean Haymon thinks so. I think he takes his boxing advice from Floyd and you know Floyd is the boxer, so he would probably advise that Crawford would beat Spence and to keep Spence away from him.

In any case, the point isn't "who is a better person, Arum or Haymon?" The point is, who has been more willing to make top level fights with other promoters the last decade? Arum. Who believes in his current stars more, based on what fights are being made and discussed? Arum believes in Lomachenko, for one anyway, more than Haymon seems to believe all of his stars. And based on the matchmaking we saw (4 Marquez fights, for one, Marquez being the same size as Pacquiao but way smaller than Floyd so don't get started on that BS), Arum believed in his last star, Manny Pacquiao, way more than Haymon believes in all his stars.

And again, that's logical. Prime Pacquiao was better than any current Haymon fighter, just like Loma is. But my point is, it's time to start speaking facts. If those are the facts, and those facts are the reason that Haymon keeps his star fighters protected from the superior star fighters that other promoters have, then we need to start saying that. If Haymon only makes in house fights with his stars, even more so than Arum does in 2018, then we need to stop throwing around the line that fights won't happen because Arum only makes in house fights. In 2018, with fighters like Lomachenko who Arum believes in, that is clearly not the case. We need to start speaking facts about how Haymon is the one now with a clear pattern of avoiding ever making non-in-house fights off PPV, and rarely even on PPV either, but overall, he is a way worse culprit of that in 2018 than Arum or ANY OTHER CURRENT PROMOTER, and it's time everyone started speaking the truth about that FACT. Disagree freely about opinions, of course, but everyone should at least get on the same page about the facts so that we can actually exchange informed opinions, instead of fantasy land bull****.

I think it's really great that you had time to write a book, but I don't have time to read a book. GR vs Loma was a mandatory fight and Arum lost the purse bid. He had to roll the dice to get Loma a belt. No different than Haymon sending Spence to England to fight on a Matchroom show. That's the chance you have to take to get your guy a belt sometimes.