Bob Arum Confirms No Talks with Eddie Hearn Over Tyson Fury vs Anthony Joshua
For quite some time now there have only been two belt-holding champions in the heavyweight division. For a number of years, it was only WBC world champion Deontay “The Bronze Bomber” Wilder (42-1-1, 41 KO’s) and WBO, WBA, IBF and IBO world heavyweight champion Anthony “AJ” Joshua (23-1, 21 KO’s0). Despite losing all his belts to Andy Ruiz Jr, Joshua managed to reclaim them in a must-win immediate rematch.
On the other hand, Wilder recently lost his WBC strap to former unified heavyweight champion Tyson “The Gypsy King” Fury (30-0-1, 21 KO’s). Currently, there is a rematch forthcoming. However, due to the upheaval brought on by the world wide coronavirus epidemic, there is no telling when that bout will take place. This ambiguity has not prevented Matchroom Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn from heavily pushing for a showdown between his fighter Anthony Joshua and Fury.
THE TALK OF TALKS IS FALSE
As stated earlier, Fury and Wilder already have a contract in place that is set in stone. Paying the legally binding contract no heed, Hearn insists that not only can the fight be worked out, but he has had in depth conversations with Top Rank big wig Bob Arum on the matter. After publicly making this claim a number of times Frank Warren, of Queensberry Promotions, came forward to rebuff those statements.
According to Warren, who co-promotes Fury along with Arum, for there to be any meaningful or binding negotiations, all representative parties would have to be present. Warren states that even if Hearn did speak with Arum, he was not there and therefore anything that was said was moot anyway.
After hearing Warren’s input on the subject, Hearn doubled down on his assertion. He stood firm on his insistence that he and Arum had definitely had meaningful talks about specific elements of a Fury v Joshua fight. Now Bob Arum, in an interview with IFL TV, has once again contradicted the persistent Eddie Hearn yet again.
“He said ‘wouldn’t it be great if we could do a Joshua/Fury fight’, but no real discussion. Nothing even as substantive as you and I are talking about.
“I don’t want to contradict Eddie and say that he is a liar, but these conversations really were virtually meaningless you know what I mean?
When asked if they talked about purse splits and other fight details:
“That is absolutely not true, not true about venue, not true about TV, not true about anything.
“And besides, Frank Warren says that he has never talked to Eddie Hearn and I wouldn’t talk about anything with substance without Warren being a part of it because he is co-promotor of Fury.”
It comes off as rather odd that Hearn refuses to relent on his story when the entirety of Team Fury keeps saying its’ all rubbish. Let’s just hope that this COVID-19 episode wraps up soon and boxing can get back to business as usual. Then we all can truly see what is real and what is all smoke and mirrors.
By: Bakari Simpson
Featured Article: Garcia On Haney: “He Has A Lot Of Catching Up To Do!”
