The brand new boxing promotion, headed up by the UFC’s house owners at TKO Group Holdings, has bold plans for the long run with the primary card set to launch in September when Canelo Alvarez takes on Terence Crawford in a superfight happening in Las Vegas.
UFC CEO Dana White has already been introduced because the promoter for the occasion with WWE president Nick Khan additionally concerned within the newly shaped boxing league, which is financially backed by Saudi Arabia and Turki Alalshikh, the chairman of the Common Leisure Authority within the nation. Whereas some particulars have been revealed for the reason that boxing promotion was first introduced, the brand new league has bold plans with regards to the total schedule that kicks off with the cardboard on Sept. 12.
“I’d simply let you know that we’re anticipating with the boxing group that we’re placing on a mean of name it 12 fights a yr, 12 playing cards a yr for every of the following 5 years,” TKO president and chief working officer Mark Shapiro mentioned throughout a quarterly monetary name with traders. “Nonetheless placing that plan collectively and clearly working hand in hand with our pals from Saudi.”
Along with the 12 playing cards on common per yr, the brand new Saudi-backed boxing league can also be plotting a number of “superfight” occasions much like the one with Canelo vs. Crawford in September.
“No matter these, we are going to look to do anyplace from one to 4 kind of superfights per yr, we’ll see how that performs out,” Shapiro mentioned. “However clearly we might time period the Canelo/Crawford September matchup as a type of. After which on that undercard, we might have various these undercard fights that might seemingly air on the tv associate/media associate we might have for our newly shaped boxing organizations.”
As of now, the brand new TKO boxing league doesn’t have a broadcast associate however these particulars will seemingly get sorted out forward of the particular launch in September.
Whereas TKO is working the present, Shapiro was fast to level out once more that the corporate is definitely assuming no monetary legal responsibility for the boxing promotion with Saudi Arabia offering all the funding.
Add to that, the 12 particular person battle playing cards are additionally going to be saved separate from the “superfights” that might doubtlessly contain among the greatest names within the sport.
“These are two separate companies,” Shapiro revealed. “The Saudis are funding what could be these superfight playing cards. We’ll work with them on media rights offers and take a fee. We’ll work with them clearly on international partnerships. We’ll work with them on ticketing. We’ll deal with the manufacturing.
“We’ll look to doubtlessly promote all of them with Dana White and Nick Khan driving a lot of that however then individually, we’ll have our boxing group, our [promotion] with them the place we’re going out and doing as I discussed 12 playing cards a yr on common and getting a separate media rights payment, promoting international partnerships to these playing cards and naturally selling and producing these playing cards on no matter media platform we select to tie with. That’s the state of boxing.”
So far, the brand new promotion has solely been referenced as TKO Boxing however Shapiro guarantees that’s not really going to be the title used as soon as the promotion formally launches later this yr. He didn’t present any perception on the brand new title however promised that’s already within the works.
“I ought to point out it’s not going to be known as TKO boxing,” Shapiro mentioned. “That looks like the soup of the day. We’ll be unveiling our title for our enterprise pretty quickly right here. However it won’t be TKO boxing.”
