Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis’ promoter Eddie Hearn has given up on his attempts to negotiate a unification fight against WBO welterweight champion Brian Norman Jr. after balking at their requests to increase the offer by $500K to $2.2 million.
It’s hard to believe that Hearn is choosing to end negotiations over $500K, but it shows that he’s not interested in making the Norman fight for Ennis. If Hearn wanted that fight, he’d come up with the money to get it over the finish line.
Boots (32-0, 29 KOs) will defend against his IBF mandatory Karen Chukhadzhian or vacate to move up to 154. If Hearn is stubborn and unyielding about Boots Ennis wanting a little more money, we’ll likely see the same thing from the promoter when he moves up to 154. Coming events cast their shadows before.
Eddie Blames Norman’s Team for Failed Negotiations
“They know that [it’s too late to salvage negotiations]. These people are clueless,” said Eddie Hearn to Thaboxingvoice’s YouTube channel, talking about his failed negotiations for the Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis vs. Brian Norman Jr. welterweight unification fight.
“They have no understanding of the boxing business. They have no understanding of the boxing market. We’ve made three offers to these guys. Even the first offer was well North of a million dollars, and people coming back, ‘Wow, Eddie Hearn offered Brian Norman $1.5 million.’ Guess what? It was a lot more than that.”
Hearn is being disingenuous here. His offer of $1.7 million isn’t much more than the $1.5 million that fans believe it to be. Norman Jr. is a world champion at 147 and has the WBO belt that Boots needs. Hearn doesn’t understand the boxing business because he’s failing his fighter Boots, and he won’t be able to raise his value due to his reluctance to pay what the champions are asking.
Hearn’s Track Record
Norman Jr. isn’t the first champion Hearn has failed to negotiate a deal with for Ennis. He couldn’t deliver a fight against WBA champion Eimantas Stanionis as well.
“Now they come back because they know the IBF has set a purse bid date [for Boots vs. Karen Chukhadzhian], and under their rules, we can no longer ask for an exception for a unification. So, these guys [Team Norman] dropped the ball,” said Hearn.
Team Norman Jr. hasn’t dropped the ball. Hearn doesn’t want the fight because if he did, he’d agree to the $2.2 million they’re asking for. They want the $1.7 million to be bumped up to $2.2 million. That’s not a huge increase.
“Let them go back and make what they made in their last fight [against Giovani Santillan on May 18th in San Diego], a hundred thousand dollars. This time, they’re going to make two hundred or three hundred thousand dollars to fight someone [#7 WBO Derreick Cuevas] that no one has ever heard of.”
Things are different now. When Norman fought Santillan, he wasn’t a world champion. He was just a guy fighting for the WBO interim welterweight title. But now, Norman Jr. is the full WBO champion, so his purses have gone up, and what he made before doesn’t apply.
Hearn doesn’t understand that, and neither do the naive fans who keep talking about what Norman used to make before he was a champion. It would be like bringing up Boots Ennis’ purses before he was a champion and then expecting him to make similar money now. Things have changed.
Hearn’s Dismissive Attitude Towards Norman Jr.
“I’m not wasting my energy with these guys. All they’re trying to do is get clout of Boots Ennis’ name. Good luck to them. Mr. Norman, or whatever his name is, you’ve dropped the ball. You’re too late. If you really did want the fight, you dropped the ball big time, but I don’t believe you did,” said Hearn.
Notice Hearn’s attitude? He doesn’t negotiate with Norman Jr. and shows zero interest in true negotiations. He just wants them to accept his lowball offer, and he’s furious that they won’t.
“Adrian Clark, I’m not aware of this guy,” said Hearn, talking about Brian Norman Jr’s manager. “If they want 1.2 [million], who on earth are they paying to give up that much about of money? Well, over half a million dollars for somebody else [Cuevas] to take the fight [on November 8th]?” said Hearn about Norman Jr’s plan B option Cuevas if the Boots fight fails to happen.
Eddie sounds like he doesn’t respect Norman Jr. or his management and comes across as someone above them, like some king. Hearn’s attitude sounds like he views Norman’s team beneath him.
Ennis and Hearn Not on The Same Page
Hearn and his fighter, Boots Ennis, aren’t on the same page because he needs and wants this fight against WBO champion Norman Jr to accomplish his goal of becoming undisputed champion at 147.
If Hearn is going to make a big deal about fighters wanting a little bit more money during negotiations, he will come up empty in all of the talks against the champions at 147. If Hearn doesn’t change his attitude, this will carry over when Boots moves up to 154. Boots needs a better promoter, someone who can give and talk of talks and won’t fumble their attempts to negotiate important fights to further his career.
“This is not my problem, the bad contract these people have done. I know the offer we made was well over $1.5 million for these people. They’ve never seen money like that before. They’ve never gotten an opportunity like that before,” said Hearn.
The offer that Hearn reportedly made to Norman Jr. was $1.7 million, which was not “well over $1.5 million.” That’s only $200K above the $1.5 million and well short of the $2.2 million that they wanted.
Norman Sr. said all he wanted was Hearn to sweeten the deal by $500K from $1.7 million to $2.2M, and that should have been easy for him to do if he really wanted to make this fight. Fans believe Hearn never wanted this fight with Norman and had already made up his mind that he wanted Karen Chukhadzhian because it was a fight that would leave more of a bigger profit margin.
It would be a much easier one with the victory guaranteed for Ennis, where he would look like gold. If Ennis fought Norman, there was an excellent chance he would lose the fight, take a beating, and look bad. In other words, Norman Jr. would expose Boots Ennis and put him in the same position as Giovani Santillan.
All the money Hearn paid Boots to sign him to Matchroon would be down the drain, and he’d be stuck with a worthless, devalued fighter, who he could ever cash out against Terence Crawford, Sebastian Fundora, Vergil Ortiz Jr. or Tim Tszyu.
Hearn’s Lack of Negotiation Skills
“They come back and say, ‘We’ll do it in neutral territory.’ Philadelphia is where it’s at for the gate to pay these guys the maximum amount of money. The conversation is now irrelevant. These people live on another planet, in another stratosphere. I wish them all the best,” said Hearn.
It sounds like Hearn was never truly interested in actual negotiations. He went into these talks looking at Brian Norman Jr. like a contender instead of a world champion and felt that he would accept the lowball offer he made to him for the unification fight against Boots Ennis.
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