And welcome into a special edition of the Fight Freaks Unite podcast. It's not
a recap, but it's something going on midweek because it is Jervonte Davis and
Ryan Garcia Week in Las Vegas. Our insider Dan Raphael arrived on Wednesday in
Las Vegas and it did not take him very long at all to score a
big Time interview. The president of Showtime Sports Entertainment is Stephen Espinoza, and
Dan had the opportunity to speak with him about how this Davis Garcia deal came
about. Showtime is obviously the producer of this pay per view at the Forefront,
with Premiere Boxing Champions for televising this. It will obviously be available on
other outlets liked The Zone that has a deal with Ryan Garcia and Oscar daal
Lehoy and Golden Boy Promotions. It will also be available on PPV dot Com.
But make no mistakes, Showtime at the Forefront got this deal done.
Put the money up to get this deal done. Stephen will take you through
that, and most interestingly too, he's got comments and updates on the potential
World welterweight undisputed title clash between Errol Spence. Don't laugh and Terrence Crawford,
will that fight potentially be happening later this year. Steven Espinoza is actually optimistic
and he's on the inside negotiating and Dan's trying to get it out of him.
You'll hear that in this interview. He's not going to be that forthcoming,
but he's at least optimistic. You'll hear it in his voice. So,
again, without further delay, thank you for finding us here on the
Big Fight Weekend podcast feed. This is why you follow or subscribe to the
feed because special things like this come up. When Dan was there in Vegas,
he got the chance to speak with Steven Esponosa, so we wanted to
bring you that without any further delay. So let's hear that conversation that they
had on Wednesday. They tape this on Wednesday, a fight week for Davis
and Garcia. So now here we are in the press room the media center
at the MGM Grant. I'm with Steven Esponosa from Showtime Sports, the Big
Boss Man, have yourself a very event for Showtime and for all of boxing
fans. I'm gonna we're gonna talk about that fight and a few other of
your Showtime related things. But just to start off, so far as we
talk here, it's a Wednesday. Thursday will be the press conference, Friday
the way and Saturday of course the big fight. How how have you seen
this going so far? If you could maybe compared to some of the other
major events that you've been involved with, and of course the folks know what
you've done. Yeoman's work involved with many of the bigger fights with Floyd and
with plenty of other fighters Oscar over the years when you were with the Golden
Boy, etcetera. So stack it up if you could in that round in
that respect. Well, first, in terms of the negotiation, I would
say this is one of the most difficult, challenging negotiations I've been involved in,
probably number two beyond only Mayweather pack out. And so when you go
through that, you hope that it's worth it. And clearly, sitting here
Wednesday, fight week, it has been worth it. I think it's it's
a bigger fight than than we realistically expected, you know, it's we hoped
it would get this big. So let me stop you there for a quick
second. I have yet to hear anybody articulate when the fight was in its
infancy, when it was being put together. What are the expectations. I
know you're saying it's it's bettering them, but what were they? I mean,
when you make expectations, is it what's the gate going to be,
what's the pay per view going to be? What's the Yeah, I think
it's it's all of those things. And a lot of it is anecdotal because
you know, um, you know, pay per view ninety eight percent comes
in, you know, right about the start of the fight. But it's
you know, the reaction again anecdotally, the reaction of celebrities in the general
public. You know, we we we hear a lot when we start getting
a request from people we've never heard of him before. When you know,
Patrick Maholmes says I want to come to the fight. You know, that's
does Patrick pay for the ticket or do you give him a ticket? He's
more hundreds of millions. Does he have to pay? He to his credit,
he contacted Ryan and asked to pay. He cannot buy tickets now,
you know, they but they'll pay for them, yes, yes, um,
absolutely, and and you know, and that's another indicator of a big
fight. Very few celebrities have contacted, you know, Saint comps only.
They all have said, and that's not always the case. Most of them
have said, can I can I buy some tickets to the fight? So
who else the giving some other names besides Mahomes, that's a pretty big sports
Well. Lebron was absolutely going to be here, and then the Lakers had
a playoff game scheduled and you know on that day, Um, we've got
a lot of NFL guys, um, you know from let me say,
you know Odell who's you know, a big tank guy you know is coming.
Well, we've got a lot of the Ravens coming also because of relationships
with him, Um, you know some of the you know, Hall of
Famer types, Um, you know, uh, Michael Strahan, Uh,
you know, we've got I think Travis Kelsey is actually coming with Patrick Mahomes.
So it's a big it's you know, it's not the usual names,
you know. So I've been trying to articulate this myself, and I have
not quite figured out a way to explain this yet because I don't I get
it myself. I know I'm excited for the fight. I know I'm interested
in the fight. I know a lot of people of boxing fans are interested
I'm not quite sure why it's that big of a fight. It's not a
world championship fight, it's at an unusual catchweight. Neither guy has a track
record of being in big fights. And I'm trying to understand. I'm not
mad that it's a big fight, but I'm trying to articulate and understand why
can you give me your take? Why is this such a big fight.
Look, that's a little bit of the mystery, or call it luck or
whatever it is, but there's it's definitely gotten to the point where you know,
there are others. I'll give you one example, and I've heard this
from a couple of people. People said, look, I'm really excited about
this fight, Like, tell me about the fighters. Like those two things
don't go together. Yeah, it's not like I don't know anything about the
fighters, but I'm excited about this fight. That is just a product of
sort of reverberation. Like at some point, if the boxing corps is excited
enough, then it spreads to the boxing casuals, and if they're excited enough,
it spreads beyond just a general sports fans in general culture. And I
think we're at that point where somehow it has spread. The excitement the two
ends has spread far beyond just the boxing hardcore. So if you back up
you mentioned at the beginning about the complicated nature of making the deal. You
said you've been involved in dozens and dozens of major fight deals, that this
was maybe number two behind me with a packet. We don't have to rehash
the chaos of that one. What was it about this one that made that
much put on the list on part with that? Is it because of the
zone element? Was it the personalities involved? Was working with Golden Boy?
What was it? Was all of that, not the Golden Boy there was
it had all of the same elements that may with a Packel like animosity between
the promoters, animosity between the fighters, dueling networks or platforms. I don't
see Tank and Ryan having that much animosity between them. I actually kind of
think they sort of like each other a little bit. I think they've gotten
to the point. Yes, I would say, you know, it's funny,
that's it's a really good point, because I think they like each other
now. I wouldn't like each other, you know, yeah, but they
tolerate each other now and have more respect for each other now than they did
ten weeks ago, eight twelve weeks ago, certainly more than the night that
they ran into each other in the club, you know, and in that
didn't turn out well, Okay, these similarities to it had all those elements,
and it had the contractual you know problems, it had you know,
all of the all of that stuff. So it was it's one thing to
work out all these obstacles when you have a clean slate. But when you
are trying to work out this these obstacles with people who already don't like each
other, or don't trust each other, or in this case, who have
sued each other repeatedly multiple times, there's you know, you're coming in already
with a lot of baggage. Who was suing who? Well, Golden Boy
originally sued PBC and Hayman, okay you know a while back, you know,
and there have been you know, different legal skirmishes along the way,
but that that's a big one. And I'm not saying anybody held grudges,
but you know, that's water under the bridge. It's context. So all
of that and yes, and the networks, you know that part of it.
Look, you know, we've got a lot invested in tank. I
think we're on their thirteenth, fourteenth fight with him, and we didn't want
to see the biggest fight go somewhere else, you know, and not sure
the zone. A similar way about Ryan, But at the end of the
day, it was very apparent like, of course we wanted all of course
the zone once at all. If that's where we ended up, there was
no fight. So then the next step is, Okay, what's really important,
what's really important to us, what's really important to them. Let's lay
the cards on the table. What are you really trying to get out?
Is it that you want the revenue, Is it that you want the branding
and you want to be, you know, known as a distributor? What
is it that you went there? And how can we get to that in
a different way? And what was the What was the answer? I think
it was a little bit of both. They want revenue and they want the
branding, and they're getting both. I apparently Yeah, yeah, it's the
showtime, yes, and you know, and that's it, and it's it's
split the baby, it's it's sort of it's a little bit it's not the
perfect result, but there's also an element of it that I think, you
know that not a lot of people realize because it's not just the distribution.
Then there's a whole separate conversation about how do you market and message this because
it's you know, we're not calling it saying it's on Showtime pay per view.
They're not saying it's on to Zone pay per view like a lot of
it. If you pay real close attention, it says live on pay per
view. Right. But I actually while you were saying that, and I'll
tell people, we're sitting in the media so that I'm looking at the giant
step and repeat banner with the pictures and the advertisements I do see on there,
the zone logo and the Showtime pay per view logo, so it is
branded on both. It is branded on both, but the overall message is
live on pay per view. I will say this though, in my experience
of twenty plus years, most pay per view fights, whatever the broadcast or
is, it will say on that major advertisements and say the network, it
says live on pay per view. Sometimes, like we've gone back and forth,
depending on the research, sometimes we will say live on Showtime pay per
view. But then sometimes that's confusing. But you know, for example,
it comes down to even stuff as simple as it's not the most important thing.
It's just one example, search marketing, you know Google, Google.
Search marketing is an auction. So if we are both bidding to say we
want the number one result when you search Davis versus Garcia to be Showtime pay
per view, and de Zone is bidding up the same thing, then we're
making it more difficult and more expensive for each other. We're cannibalizing each other,
and you multiply that across twenty different things. In which way, if
we don't articulate in a contract, this is what you can say on social
media, this is what you can say off So this is how you can
market it on to Zone, because we're not expecting them on the Zone platform
to say buy it on Showtime pay per view and in vice versa. So
I mean we're getting real inside baseball. I think the diehard fans kind of
love this kind of deal making. Back around, you're saying that when you
make a contract in this particular case, because you do have a relationship with
the Zone, in this agreement, that there's literal language of what you're allowed
as a broadcaster to stay on your social platforms, on your error and vice
versa, all the way down to what is the caption when you do a
social media post, like, you know, because there's a buy link,
you know, is like are you sending people to the Showtime page or do
Zone page or a generic page like all of these things, you know,
And there's part of it is like being fair to the tutor strippers, but
part of it is also confusion because and there have been some you know,
there's some in some things that they came to us and say, look,
we don't think that's fair. There's some calls that I made and I said,
look, I don't think this is accurate. It's sort of confusing and
makes it looks like this is on the Zone and not do Zone pay per
view and vice versa. So like I'll just interject and say when I get
their marketing emails and telling me like it's fight season and they advertise it and
they put Canello and Ryan in front and center and tell me it's part of
the Zone and when reality it's going to cost me extra money. Yeah,
I'm a Those are all the types of things, and it's not perfect.
You can't cover everything. But there's the part about the Zone, Showtime marketing
and messaging was almost as long as the fighter promoter part because it's also you
know what, you know, what are the financial arrangements? You know who
pays who, who collects who? Like? What are what's the disclosure to
each side? All all of that. If I go buy it on the
Zone pay per view, they're gonna the revenue is gonna go to them,
might applekay? If they come on Showtime's app? How do you keep each
other us? And and you know, keep your mind that there's a different
business structure you know they have. You know, they when you pay your
eighty five dollars, you know you're getting a subscription. You're you're they break
it up into two pieces. You know you're paying technically you're paying the same
amount, but you're getting twenty five dollars that goes to the Zone and sixty
dollars goes to the pay per view. So you're gonna say, Okay,
well, we don't want them out their marketing that it's a sixty dollars pay
per view because it's not. You can't buy it for sixty I can buy
it for sixty bucks because I just still but I subscribe for the whole year
so when I go on the Zone homepage, it literally says, you know,
yea, you know, paper View Davis sixty dollars. That's something that
we had to become comfortable with because you know, candidly, if you're DOE
subscriber, of course you're going to buy it there because it is cheaper because
you've already paid your twenty bucks or whatever you're paying a month. So that's
something we had to get comfortable with. How do you get comfortable with that?
No, I mean, honestly, that's it isn't fair, it's not
you know, it is. It's advantage for his zone. That's one of
the things that we swallowed in order to make this fight happen, because you
you know, you took everything else. I'm just choking, all right,
So I'm not of thatout the business for a quick minute. So well back
a little bit of the business. So apparently there is a remash clause and
that it is Is it true that if if Tank is the winner and Ryan
exercises, you guys get the rematch, and if it's the other way around,
they get the rematch. No, it's um, it's it's it's not
that clear, and it's not quite set. Is it a two way rematch?
Um, I don't think I'm at liberty to discuss discuss that. It's
supposed to be confidential. I know everybody else is talking about it, but
I'm not gonna like as the former lawyer, I actually read contracts, so
I'm not I'm not. But you know, in terms of generally, you
know, there are there are parameters on how decisions get made, you know,
and a process for decision making going forward, including who the network will
be. So maybe dozonne it, maybe us if we have to go through
the process. All right, Now, as far as the actual fight goes,
just I mean not that you're a trainer or you know you've been you
know, been an executive, but you've watched a lot of fights. Just
give me your impression of the matchup, you know just how I mean,
I can see both ways guys can win. I know who does what well,
but uh, clearly as an intriguing fight it Um, you can't just
say tank as you're rooting for him to go. No, no, no,
no. I look, I like Ryan, you know, I got
to know him. He's a good kid and very good boxer. Like I
generally, you know, like him. Um and as my as my wife
says, like, you know, Tank is who's Mexican. Um, you
know, born and raised in Mexico. Tanks the only fighter who can make
her root against a Mexican fighter. Um, you know. And she was,
you know, going for I believe Canello in the Mayweather fight. So
she holds that, you know, very true. Um. So look,
there's there's a lot of passionate fans on both sides. In this particular case,
I don't think anybody can really tell you how this is going to go
because neither guy has faced anything that approximates the other. The resume. There's
nobody on Ryan's resume that presents the challenges the Tank does. In the same
for Ryan, you can't say, oh, Mario Brios was a tall fighter,
so we know how this fight is gonna go. No, Mario Bios,
as good a fighter as he is, doesn't have the same strength that
Ryan has. So how it is Tank going to deal with the speed and
the power because it's not. You can't oversimplify this into speed versus power.
It's not because that undersells Ryan's power and it undersells tanks boxing ability. One
thing I've been seeing headlines about and it's I'll be honest, it's just irritating
this shit out of him. I think I know what exactly you're saying when
I see and I love Oscar. Okays, my Oscar is my man.
I've known Oscar for twenty five years. Almost. When I see anybody say
this is the fight to save boxing, I want to fucking strangle somebody your
thoughts. I couldn't I have the conversation within earlier today. Um, and
I get it. It's a it's an interesting catchphrase, and you know,
but it doesn't serve the sport well and it's not accurate, like we're not
nobody's a The sport doesn't need saving. It can be improved and there it
always can, but be even if he did this, one fight isn't going
to save it, you know. And to say, look, okay,
and if this fight doesn't save it, then what And we're all we're on
Monday. Let's just say this fight isn't everything everyone expects it to be.
So we're all going to wake up on Monday and say it's not saved.
So let's all go find another hobby which has black Has there been more black
eyes? And boxing or more fights that have been meant to save boxing well
and and and to say, you know, the boxing is dying, I
mean he literally go back to the nineteen twenties and people have been literally writing
that the boxing is dying. And I think I think it is undervalued.
Like you don't want to get me on my soapbox here, um, but
I think it's under undervalued significantly. Um. I think there's a lot of
interesting reasons by that. And you know, it's a it's a it's a
different podcast. We can go into it. So on another topic related to
this fight, then, I've heard some people suggest our good friend Leonard ler
Reefer one who's is he working with Tank for this fight? But I've seen
it from other people that Canello is still the biggest star it seems, at
least in North America anyway. But you know, he's getting on there,
he's got on He's got like what sixty fights or so, and he's still
a great fighter about you know, we don't know how much longer he's gonna
be around. This is the next generation. And the point that they've been
making is that the winner of this fight, especially if it's a great fight,
is the quote unquote face of boxing. That's another one of the cliches
I here surrounding this particular matchup. What are your thoughts about that notion?
Yeah, I'm not crazy about it either. I think the way you articulated
is better than I think most people have, which is, you know,
no one's gonna wake up and say, look, the winner of this fight
is automatically the biggest draw, you know, bigger than Canelo after this fight.
Now, having said that, like this, this gate will stack up
against any gate that Canelo has done, you know, short of the Mayweather
fight where Cannelo is the B side. But but you'd be that as is
may I don't think anybody's saying that. I think what is if you want
to have more accurate cliche? Yeah, who who is going to be the
rainmaker? The rainmaker? Maybe the head of the next generation. Like there's
there's a category of guys, you know, is it Boots, is it
Ryan? Is a Tank? Is it you know other people? Yes,
you know Shakur in the future, those types of guys. Yeah, so
I think, you know, will this be the you know, this will
go a long way to determining that. And I think part of inherent in
that is the realization that if you look in bocking history for the true superstars,
there's always usually been at least one and sometimes two fights that catapulted them.
You know, Floyd was obviously the Dela Royle fight who put him over
the top. So I think, whoever, whoever, both of these guys
are going to get a huge boost from this. But whoever wins it definitely
is catapulted to a whole different level. All right, So whoever wins,
if there if there is no rematch, obviously we know there's the possibility that
whatever happens or might be a rematch, even though you don't want to tell
me all the dirty details. Barring a rematch, what is the Let's take
Tank for example, he's the guy you work with, and you can chime
in on Ryan also, since you certainly know the landscape, what is the
next big fight? Is it a shakuor down the road? Is it a
Haney if he wins, is it somebody in the PBC universe? What do
you view as like the next significant fight? I mean, Tank may stay
on pay per view, Ryan may stay on pay per view, but what's
the next one where the world will descend. That's a That's an interesting one
because I think it's been clear from Ryan's perspective that you know, he's it'll
be one forty and above, you know, going forward, and that opens
up a whole lot of doors for tank Um. Tank at one forty above
is still a tweener. You know, he's a little bit like Broner.
You know, Brono is fantastic at one thirty five, struggled more at one
forty and at one forty seven just wasn't able to compete at the highest level.
So you know, for Tank, you're right, the question is,
Okay, who's who's at one thirty five? Who who can do that?
And maybe it is Shakur. I think that's a megafight. But the challenge
here, or the benefit here, is you're bringing in two fighters with completely
different fan bases. And I'm not saying that Tank in Shakur is not as
big because it's two black fighters. It's not that simple. But they're East
Coast similar, you know, Baltimore New Work. It's it's they're more in
common, let's say, than what Ryan and Tank has. Yeah, and
in the thing that I think has made this a case of two plus two
equally far more than four. Is that both Tank and Wine have casual fans.
I'm not sure that Shakur has gotten to that point. You know,
nothing against him as a boxer. He's a fantastic boxer. I just think
in terms of his popularity, I'm stating facts. You know, he isn't
as broadly popular as Tank or Ryan the Fen for a second, and his
defense, since he's not here to say so. His last fight, which
was a new work that was a couple of weeks ago, not a title
fight against an unknown Japanese on the PWI, they did about a million dollar
gay in New York. They sold the most tickets that ever been sold for
a boxing match in that building. So he has the ability to grow that
could perhaps transfer to New York City, not you know, a very close
tend in a train ride from New York. So he has a chance.
Yeah, he's still young, um and and I'm just saying that he won't
develop into that. But you know, at this point, you know,
is that is that a mega fight? You don't know. But look there's
not there's not an obvious one. But if you look at look when when
de la Hoya or when Mayweather beat De la Hoya. Was there? I
mean, I guess, you know, I'm not even sure that pak Yowe
was Pacyowe. You know, did you see him as a foil for him
at that point? You know? Not? He never thought this is going
to be the biggest fight in history, not right after. So I think
the future that will have to have to develop opponents, you know, for
Tank going forward at one thirty five and maybe one forty on occasion. The
conversation continues in a moment, but first a word for our friends at tickets
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All right, now we've spent this entire conversation about Tank Davis and Ryan Garcia,
as we should. It's the big fight. It's the week of the
fight. But we're here in Las Vegas. I have to ask you.
You know, you're smiling, and you know what I'm gonna ask you about.
And by the way, when this post sometime Thursday night, early Friday,
we already might have an answer. Yeah, you're na whatever. I
gotta ask you, what in the world is going on with Errol Spence and
Terence Scrawford. The rumors abound tell me everything. You know, people like
people are gonna hear this, and they're gonna like, I'm gonna get backlash.
I'm gonna I'm gonna not gonna change what I say because they think I
like I take joy in like throwing cold water on things. They think I'm
happy to know I'm not. It irritates me as much as it does you
when people start just running with wild shit that isn't true. But first of
all, you didn't ask me about this. June seventeenth was never a date
for Spence Crawford. It never has been, ever will be. That's not
the date. It never was the date. That's people trying to connect dots
that shouldn't be connected. You know, TGB and PBC had June seventeenth preserved
in Texas and in Vegas. People saw that and said, oh, it
must be Spence Crawford. Well, Crawford probably isn't going to Texas, so
that was silly anyway, But the date doesn't make sense. This one is
a similar situation. You know this rumor about oh, you know there's a
press conference scheduled for Saturday. I'm telling you definitively, like you and I
have texted many times or last week, there's as of you know, what
time is it five twenty five on Wednesday Pacific time? Yes, Pacific time.
There is zero schedule. There is no Spence Crawford press conference schedule this
weekend? Does that mean you know that when you post this and I'm going
to be proven an idiot. Maybe. I mean, we could stay up
until four am tonight, get everything resolved signed and everyone's coming on the plane.
But keep in mind else coming to the fight anyway. So were the
Charlo, so as Wilder sous Ruis, so as Ben a Videz. That's
how you know. One of the ways you know it's a really big fight
is when you get that turnout. But when you see Errol Spence walking through,
I mean not you personally, but when people see Errol Spence walking through
the Mjam lobby, I feel like it's going to trigger another avalanche. There's
definitely a press conference because Errol Spence is in Vegas press conference aside, are
you at least I mean characterized? Are you making progress? Let's use the
vernacular. Is it close? Is it is? One side agree on this
and there's one thing holding it up, Like can you characterize where we're at
with this and what's going on? So there's definitely progress. There's been active
discussions for about the last couple of months. We're definitely closer now than we
were last fall, which is a great thing because I thought we were going
to reach an agreement last fall and we didn't. Fell apart but it also
means like we're not done until we're done, you know, and we're not
done. So given the history of this negotiation, no one should get too
excited that we're on the one yard line because we're on the two yard line
before and it fell upon we. You still got to get two yards But
you're right, and so them possitive thing. We're on the one yard line,
on whatever five yard line, whatever analogy you want. Things are moving,
there's progress being made. I'm optimistic that it will in fact get made.
There's news right there. Nobody has said that. I am optimistic,
and if it does, I'm optimistic it will be this year. Will not
be June seventeen, will be June twenty fourth. It will not be June
twenty fourth. We have what we have something that date already this summer.
I believe this summer. I think this summer, this summer, early fall.
And you know, I also think that if we don't get it done
relatively quickly, then it probably doesn't happen, because that means we will be
at it for the better part. You know, of a year actively like
hard or negotiating for a year, what could possibly take a year to negotiating.
I mean, what can asily take that long. I understand there's percentages,
and there's there's who all the all the ancillary stuff, who's going in
the ring first, who's getting all that stuff? Who controls the undercard,
who controls the accounting. There's a ton of different things. But those don't
take a year. No, it's much more philosophical, and um, the
best way I could do it without sort of uncovering everything, there's there has
been a fundamental disagreement about a the value, you know, what each side
believes they should be getting, and what the fight is worth. Are you
talking about as a guarantee. Are you talking about as a split of revenue?
Not not not as split so much. Although that did take some time,
you know, and it took some time lest fall, and it took
some more time again this spring, but just in terms of, you know,
what what the overall deal was worth and how the fight operates. I
know there's been a lot of talk about a guarantee. Um, it's not
that unusual to not have a gar artee. And in fact, a lot
of times it's the fighters and the promoters that come to us and say we
don't want to guarantee because as you know, when if we're paying a guarantee,
then my slice of the pie is going to be bigger, you know.
And it depends what do you want. You want to bet on yourself,
you want to you want some security. You know, if you want
to bet on yourself, you don't take the guarantee and say I want the
revenues. And you know that's the way you want to go. Now,
Having you said that, like, you know, there are things, there's
some baggage. Everybody brings baggage into a negotiation. You know. Crawford brought
some baggage in from some things he didn't like apparently, from how things worked
under the top rank, you know. And there's some things that he's seen
that apparently he doesn't like about how things work under this structure, you know,
and ironing those out has been difficult, you know. So look,
I'm not trying to be you know, vague, but it's not as simple
as hey, one guy wants fifty one forty nine, the other guy wants
fifty two forty eight. I think at this stage of the game, though,
and again not that aneth to defend him. Can we exonerate Bob Aram
as being the person that was not holding this up since he's not been involved
with Terrence Crawford for more than a year and the fight still hasn't been made.
Um, No, both things can be true, you know. Aram
can can be have held it up in the past because he refused to engage
in conversations, you know. But it can also be true that had the
conversations gotten to the point where Crawford was had to sign off, that he
wouldn't have because of whatever concerns he had. So, you know, but
clearly there's no promoter issue, there's no network issue. This is fundamentally how
is this deal going to work? And the parties are not yet in alignment.
Now we're making progress. It has been glacially slow, like this has
now risen to in my pound for pound most difficult negotiations. This is is
this gonna go ahead of Mayweather packets? Think this is number three, number
four? You know, depending now, if you want to talk about the
whole process, talk to me after the event and we'll see. I mean,
isn't it time for this fight that just happened already? I mean there's
not a single boxing match in the world that means that damn for Errol Spence
right now, and the same goes for Terrence Crawford. They are and we've
texted about this. They are the last men standing. I went through the
linney, you know, God bless Keith Thurman. He's still doing this thing,
hasn't fought, been inactive. Danny Garcia is pretty much playing out the
string. He's at one fifty four. Seawan Porter is retired, kell Brook
has retired, Amir Khan has retired, Lamont Peterson has retired. There there
natural rivals, they've all you know, Spence fought a lot of those guys,
and Crawford didn't have a chance to fight a lot of those guys for
different reasons. But all of those that great welterweight ear that we were in
Danny and Porter and Thurman and all those guys, they're not at the forefront
at this moment. These two guys are still at the top of the pound
for poundless and they're the only ones that having fought. It reminds me in
a way of me whether pack and when they says that they're the last man
standing of their generation, uh Lewis Tyson, where the last guys left that
hadn't fought as the big names and their day, you know, and you
can go on and on, so do we This doesn't have to happen at
some point before they're forty years old. Well, look, there's there's one
thing. And again, I don't want to I don't want to point fingers.
Like I know Errol and have done more business with Errol than than I
have with Crawford. Um, but I'm not gonna point fingers one way or
the other. Um, but I way, I'm not pointing fingers either.
I'm just a frustrated you know, journalists and fan that wants to see the
fighter. Yeah, but the same token. Like it's okay, I was
about to point a finger, so let me. I'm not gonna point fingers.
But um, yes, and look I give them credit at this point.
You know, I give Errol in particular credit. He has stayed at
the negotiating table for a year. You know. The only time he scheduled
the fight was after Terrence had already scheduled his fight against Abnecia. You know.
But for that, you know, God bless him, because you know,
in the last four or five months, I would have scheduled the fight
fight all right, just if you look at the calendar, we've literally,
in the last few days past the one year mark of when Arrow's last fight
was U you know, and he's been out a long time now, Yeah,
three hundred and sixty seven days according to your text, I believe.
So. Um, look, you can't say that guys that are not trying
to make this fight now. You know, at the end of the day,
you know, there's still there's still some flies in the ointment, um,
you know, and to get those resolved, it would it would take
some unprecedented things and will probably candidly, we behalf the network, will probably
agree to some things which I might regret in the future, you know,
just like there are some things that I had to swallow that I still don't
like about Davis Garcia having said that. You know what, all big boys,
I I have had the opportunity not to do this deal, and we
chose to do this deal. So I'm not going to whine about it.
I'm not going to whine about whatever we have to do to get Spence Crawford
done because it needs to get done and I think it will all right.
So I'm gonna wrap up, and I appreciate your time a lot we spent
a lot of time on Tank and Garcia, and then obviously on this potential
of Spence and Crawford. I know you think that you think it will get
done. Can you give me like your rationale why it will get done briefly
and why it won't get done, and give me like your your your percentage
of it gets done. I think it will get done because there was an
opportunity in a window where it looked like you had gone away completely, and
it would have been very easy for both guys to go their separate ways,
and they didn't, and they came back to the table, and it hasn't
been easy, and no one has left the table yet, So I think,
you know, having you know, Errol Terence coming off of Abanisi and
Errol coming off the cancelation of his fight, they've now consistently been at the
table, which sells me. You know, they probably didn't like the feeling
that they had when it fell apart, so they're here at the table.
I mean, I know they want to fight each other, and I've talked
to both guys and Intro and I believe both of them when they say they
want to fight the other man. Yeah, and and now we've gotten to
the point. And the other thing I think why I'm optimistic is I've seen
guys, both guys make concessions that I didn't think they would ever make.
That they can you give us an example of a concession. I think I
think there were. There's there was. I'm not going to say who did
it. There was a concession on the split within the last few weeks that
I didn't think would ever happened, you know, and that wasn't by any
means the last issue. But when I saw that, I'm saying, look,
these guys are I'm not the only one who's like agreeing to stuff that
makes them uncomfortable in order to get this done. Everybody's uncomfortable. So since
I know you a long time, and I know you of my boxing group
of people I talked too often as one of the more cynical of those people,
I'm proud of that. Yeah, yeah, I'm proud of I'm I'm
upright up there with you. It actually sounds to me like you have optimism.
Yes, so give me the person will end it here. I give
me your percentage that it will get done. And I'm not even a buscher
chops about this weekend necessarily, but just in terms for like in the next
fight for these guys this year, I think it is the percentage that Spence
Quwford gets done, you know, to happen in twenty twenty three, I
believe is seventy five. It's a C plus. I guess that's better than
an F, better than a D. I'll take it. Stephen, Thank
you so much for being on with us today. I appreciate it. Let's
have a great fight week Yeah, absolutely good to see it. And there
you go one more time. Great work by Dan Raphaels is why he's our
insider for Bigfight Weekend dot com and his fight for each Unite substack. He's
out there Oel on location for Davis Garcia the Saturday night pay per view.
There's not a title mistake, but still this is one of the biggest fights
of twenty twenty three because of who these guys are, their unbeaten records,
their popularity. Let's see what happens. And you got some great insight from
Steven Espinoza on how this fight was made, and you just heard him say
he's got some optimism that spine Crawford. It's not going to be announced this
weekend. He was clear they have not agreed yet much less have they agreed
to win it would take place. However, he has optimism that it will
take place. So you got all of that by being here on this podcast
feed. Reminder follow or subscribe. The Big Fight Weekend podcast feed is available
on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you get podcasts. Dan
and I will have a full preview and he may have another great conversation or
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very podcast feed. So this is why you gotta follow or subscribe. We'll
have the full preview with Dan in Vegas for Davis and Garcia and the pay
per view, the undercard, all of it that's going to go on at
the Team Mobile Arena on Saturday night. Dan is there. We're looking forward
to all of that, and once more, we thank Steven Espanosa of Showtime
for making himself available for that amount of time. We're Dan in the media
center for that conversation. For now, We're good until the Big Fight we
can preview comes out here in the next thirty six hours or so. Standby
for that for now, I'm TJ reeves On behalf of Dan right here.
Great job is Dan. We love that here as part of the Fight Preaching Night podcast