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Eddie Hearn talks Canelo turning down Spence, potential fight against Usyk, and the success of Taylor vs Serrano

The Matchroom promoter explains why Canelo turned down a catchweight Errol Spence fight and why it was important to gloat about the success of Taylor-Serrano.

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Hearn dishes on some hot topics around boxing.

Matchroom promoter Eddie Hearn took some time to chat with Fight Hub TV and touched on a few topic in the boxing world, including the news that Canelo had been offered big money to face Errol Spence at a catchweight before instead opting to move up to take on Dmitry Bivol.

Hearn also says if Canelo were to fight any heavyweight, Oleksandr Usyk would probably make the most sense, and then touches on the massive success that was Katie Taylor vs Amanda Serrano.

On Canelo rejecting a 164 lb catchweight fight against Errol Spence

“I mean, one, I don’t think Canelo would ever box under 168. Two, you have to understand what Canelo Alvarez is all about, which is fighting champions, dethroning champions, fights that posses challenges for him, fights that create history. And that’s the thing with a Charlo fight, with a Spence fight — he’d fight them all but I know him and it really doesn’t do anything for him.”

On the thought of Canelo fighting someone like Oleksandr Usyk in the future

“I don’t think Canelo thinks he’d lose to anyone, probably across any weight class. The only way I actually see him getting beat, as tough as this fight is this weekend, is coming outside of his comfort zone in terms of weight classes, and he’s already doing that at light heavyweight. If he goes to cruiserweight and fights for the championship there he would be doing it again, but if he does it at heavyweight it’s crazy.

“But, Usyk, say he’s not a heavyweight — of course he’s a heavyweight, he’s unified champion — but he’s the smallest heavyweight out there who’s got a belt. So I think if you’re gonna fight anyone, he’d be the guy to do it.”

On DAZN revealing Taylor vs Serrano drew an audience of 1.5 million viewers

“DAZN don’t release viewing figures, I pushed them into doing that because we needed to show the significance and the success of how big that fight was commercially. I always want them to release numbers because when I see the Showtime numbers I’m like, ‘We’re much bigger than that, release your numbers,’ and they never want to do it.

“So hopefully this might be a thing of the future because their subscriber numbers in the U.S. and U.K. are huge now, especially off the back of that fight, especially off the back of this weekend as well (Canelo-Bivol). So I would like to see more gloating, quite honestly. It’s not really their style, but it’s definitely my style.

“So huge fight, rematch is a possibility, Croke Park could be a possibility, but let’s let them rest and we’ll see what happens over the next couple of weeks.”

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