I was speaking to a colleague the other day (one of the few who will still converse with me!) and we were talking about the moral, ethical, economic crisis brought on by the Saudi Arabian takeover of boxing.
Most of us “in the know” can see the perils and pitfalls of signing over full control to the whims of the Saudi Royal Family and their Royal Court (Specifically, Chairman of Saudi Arabia’s General Entertainment Authority, Turki Alalshikh). So, really, those “in the know” who still choose to take the money to aid and abet Saudi control are giving a gigantic “fuck you” to the sports they claim to love and the athletes they claim to respect.
But is it seriously any surprise whatsoever that boxing people on any level-- promoters, boxers, managers, and even media-- are only about “getting that bag?”
It’s obviously why the boxers are like that. They have just a limited amount of time to earn a lifetime’s income. For promoters and managers, the money grab is a “cash-out now” business decision. Media choosing to sell out, well, that’s just them being who they’ve shown themselves to be, being piggies at the Saudi trough like they’ve been piggies at promoters’ troughs.
But I digress…
The point my colleague made was that we-- the balls-intact, non-whorish few left-- need to find a better way to explain why selling the sport over to the Saudis is like leasing out your girl’s boarding school to Jeffrey Epstein.
I’m usually a “figure this shit out on your own while I smash heads with a baseball bat” kind of guy, but I’ll pull back a bit this week and try to make my case why all of this is just a really, really bad and harmful idea.
A Monopoly is Bad
Make no mistake about it, what Turki Alalshikh and the Saudis are trying to do is create a boxing monopoly where they own Boardwalk, Park Place, all the railroads, all the utilities, and all of the fancy properties to the right of St. James Place.
In a shockingly short period of time, they’ve been able to buy full compliance from promoters, management, sanctioning bodies, broadcasters, and media.
As I wrote in the virtual pages of the reborn Boxing Tribune:
“Alalshikh has leveraged himself into a position of supreme power in the sport, with firm control of a still-growing boxing endeavor that oversees promotion, matchmaking, management, event hosting, broadcasting, sanctioning, and now media– with every tentacle of that multi-armed beast referring back to him and executed according to his whims, even if technically managed by intermediaries.”
As for why monopolies are bad-- specifically so in boxing?
That’s a hard argument to make to those fans watching some of the big fights being signed in the present tense. It gets even tougher when bought-off media loudly sings the praises of “His Excellency” Turki Alalshikh for making “the fights we want to see,” especially when juxtaposed against a boxing business dynamic that is (rightly) viewed as muddled and inefficient in delivering a consistent quality product to fans.
It sure does seem that having all control under one keffiyeh would make for a better product.
“Seem” would be the operable word there. Rating perception versus reality, though, would tell you that the Saudi boxing run hasn’t really made any fights “we want to see” that wouldn’t/couldn’t have been made by boxing’s regular bossmen under normal business conditions. The only difference in all of this is that the Saudis subsidizing these fights makes for more money in the promoters’ pockets. So, yeah, the promoters are tickled pink and they’re singing the praises of those making them all this extra money. Media then picks up on that praise and helps sell the fandom on the narrative.
In most monopolies, the consumer does see some short term benefit to the collusion. In the long term, however, such situations are never good for the consumer or labor (in this case, boxers) because, once someone has total power over an industry, they also have total power over setting prices, setting quality control, paying labor, establishing working conditions, etc. And power doesn’t seek power to wield it magnanimously for the benefit of all.
How Fighters Will Be Hurt
A windfall for fighters now will likely be a bust later as they find themselves negotiating open market deals in very much a closed market where, in reality, one entity controls purse strings for all parties involved in talks.
That would be an illegal business setup in any industry in any open-market, industrialized country. With all boxing dealings coming out of Saudi Arabia, though, this is outside of any Western jurisdiction.
The Saudis aren’t in this to build boxing to universal glory or because Turki just really, really loves the sport. They’re in this for their own benefit and if their boxing efforts follow their efforts in other sporting projects (soccer, golf) their goal is to own the sport, bring it home as their own plaything, and use it as a tool to enrich their country in any number of ways.
The bossmen controlling boxing have done a terrible job in delivering fights to fans in a timely fashion, but the only way to fix that for the long-term good of the sport is through the free market.
A monopoly on boxing will see many fighters in the here and now benefit from higher purses as they are lured into compliance with the takeover. Then, fighters will see those purses steadily drop as caps are put in place to control earnings. Nobody will be able to say no because there would be nowhere else to go for a big fight and/or shots at certain titles.
In terms of the sport, itself, there are serious doubts as to whether Turki and the Saudis-- with control over everything, zero accountability, and a desire to force plans into fruition-- would choose to, more-than-occasionally, tip the scales in favor of one fighter or another. Corruption is real in boxing, but the Saudi-run boxing model would invite and practically demand rotten dealings.
In their short time at the near-top, we’ve already seen drug testing conveniently forgotten for a specific fight, Turki circumventing legality by arranging for fights outside of the fighter’s legally binding promotional contract, and rumored intervention in free agents signing to Saudi-friendly promoters. We’ve also seen a surly and aggressively dismissive attitude from the Saudi figurehead when fighters and other boxing-related entities aren’t properly deferential to him and to his ideas.
How Fans Will Be Hurt
I don’t care which “big” fights they’re getting, there’s no way that the notoriously fickle American boxing fan can be happy to have many of the biggest fights take place overseas, at odd afternoon times, in a sterile setting, on shows that are paced like a long afternoon at the DMV. Frankly, the Saudi shows tend to suck and many fans, whether they admit it or not, either can’t or won’t sit through these cards and their silly musical acts to catch more than a fight or two of their choosing. Most, also, are not paying to sift through the afternoon-long affair as pay-per-view buys have been absolutely feeble for these shows.
Alalshikh's promises of lowered pay-per-view prices have thus far turned out to be suspect as the proposed $20 cap will already move up to $40 (for Usyk-Fury 2), plus be tied into a monthly $20 subscription to his preferred broadcast platform, DAZN. Expect further “adjustments” as his power increases and his shows continue to lose money.
The siphoning off of talent and money has also weakened the US boxing scene and seemingly pulled the fire and resolve from US-based promoters. I pointed this out previously, but in an 8-month span (From June 2024 to February 2025), Jake Paul vs. Mike Tyson will go down as the only major card on US soil by an American promoter. That’s ridiculous and a harbinger of things to come in a boxing world increasingly wrangled into a Saudi corral.
British boxing fans, meanwhile, have literally witnessed their entire scene co-opted by the Saudis as promoters Frank Warren, Eddie Hearn, and Ben Shalom rushed to grovel at the feet of “His Excellency.” In a nauseatingly quick period of time, the keepers of UK boxing rolled over and sold away their self-determination.
Saudi Instability, Lack of Long-term Dedication To Boxing
By it’s very nature, a monarchy like Saudi Arabia is built around the whims of one man. In this case, it’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who seized full power of the “Kingdom” in 2017, with the heavy-handed help of Turki Alalshikh.
I’ve joked about this before, but the one-man rule really does mean that everybody beneath the Crown Prince could pretty much be one cross word or dirty look away from being found chopped up in a duffel bag somewhere. In all seriousness, though, there is a wildly increased instability in a nation where one man calls every shot and can change courses whenever he likes. It also must be noted that bin Salman has ruffled plenty of feathers and has pissed a lot of powerful Saudis off-- including, reportedly, other members of the Royal Family-- in his rise to absolute power.
In terms of business maneuverings, strategies and spending practices of the Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF) have fluctuated over time. The Financial Times recently reported on the Saudis’ restructured investment strategy to move away from investing in foreign businesses and focus on efforts that more directly impact their domestic scene.
For boxing, that could mean continued spending on events in Saudi Arabia with less spending on cards abroad.
The Saudi shows, thus far, have been money-losers. Does anyone expect them to continue to shovel money into fights indefinitely, perpetually operating in the red, just because Turki “loves” boxing?
Alalshikh, for all his bluster and big promises, has not spoken much about the future of the sport beyond the top fighters right now. His boxing league idea, which proposes to match the top versus the top in an expansive loop of matchups, is conspicuously vague about how stars of tomorrow will be built when all of the focus and all of the money is invested in big, showy cards featuring stars of today. Some would say that’s because his only plan for boxing, right now, is centered around seizing control of it. Beyond that, there’s not much of a plan.
Sportswashing and the Ethical Implications
Unfortunately, for fans, media, and boxing businessmen, this is probably the lowest factor on the totem pole list of concerns.
Saudi Arabia is a chronic violator of human rights and has earned its reputation as a murderous monarchy. They are tying themselves to sports and entertainment in an attempt to bury their reputation and “sportswash” the blood from their hands.
They have beheaded people determined to be criminals by their kangaroo courts. They have imprisoned and tortured dissidents, sometimes for as little as a somewhat negative Tweet about the Royal Family. They have “purged” private citizens of wealth and assets. They have imprisoned and murdered journalists, infamously Washington Post reporter Jamal Khashoggi. And the nastiness is still ongoing as lights are shined on their sporting acquisitions.
The willingness of boxing media, specifically, to aid in the sportswashing has been particularly off-putting (although not surprising) as the now Turki-owned Ring Magazine joins Yahoo’s Uncrowned, and DAZN-affiliated reporters (as well as some rumored other media voices) to sell a pro-Saudi narrative and drown out voices of dissent. Hell, the Boxing Writers Association of America (BWAA), which describes itself as a safeguard for “the highest professional and ethical standards in boxing journalism” has also rushed to sell itself off as both the sitting President and Vice President seem set to work for Alalshikh and the Saudis.
Conclusion
Does any of this matter to the average fan just looking for fights to watch? Probably not. But it should. Because the things they’re overlooking today will definitely affect the quality of the product they watch for, maybe, decades to come.
It’s not fair for fans to have to be so mindful of their decisions as consumers, but boxing is a different kind of business. Already lacking safeguards and voices that demand fair play and accountability, boxing is a hustler’s paradise. A Saudi-run sport would operate entirely without guardrails. Outside of any Western jurisdiction and lacking any free press to at least demand a degree of accountability, real, lasting damage could be done to an already-damaged sport. To an extent, this could be a kill shot of sorts for a sport that never could quite kill itself off despite decades of suicidal business practices.
I’m under no illusion that this explanation will even reach all that many fans as the bought-off establishment media will ensure that voices of dissent are buried. There’s definitely a bit of futility in me sitting here, with little-to-no platform, shooting spitballs at battleships. But, as I also explained to my colleague, “futile” is kinda my thing.
Got something for Magno? Send it here: paulmagno@theboxingtribune.com