By Larry Goldberg
I get it. A fight like this, in its prime, belongs in a giant stadium in the UK. Seventy thousand people. Everyone singing Sweet Caroline. You have not experienced boxing until you have been to one of those shows. If ever a fight deserved that treatment, it is this one.
And yet. New York, New York. If you can make it here.
I am partial, and I will admit it up front. I have promoted eleven club shows in New York City, around the corner from Madison Square Garden. I know what a big fight does to this town. I also know the issues of going to a big fight at the Garden. It is going to be expensive. Tickets, drinks, everything. Nobody is pretending otherwise.
Everyone is bitching about the venue. Fine. Let us break down what actually happened, with receipts.
Turki Alalshikh wants this fight. Netflix wants it in New York. The end.
That is the whole story. The Wembley push stalled because the money behind this fight wants a main event that lands in American prime time, which means ring walks around 2am in London, which Wembley’s curfew does not allow. Chris Mannix reported the fight is almost certain to land in the U.S. with the Garden as the frontrunner and Netflix targeting Friday nights, and his follow-up reporting points to Friday, November 20 at MSG as the targeted date, a Friday chosen specifically so Netflix does not have to compete with college football on Saturday. That is not a rumor anymore. That is the shape of the deal.
And if you still doubted whose deal it is, Dana White ended the suspense on Friday. “We’re the ones that have done all the deals for this fight. I did the deal for the venue, that’s why I know where the venue is. I did the deal. We at TKO did the deal for television and we did everything,” White told Sky Sports. Asked where it lands: “At the end of the day, here’s the truth, you’re going to go where the money is.” And whose money: “It’s definitely not about the money. The Saudis are paying for this fight. So they’re making [a lot] of money.” The man is not hinting anymore. He is reading the deal sheet out loud.
Now, in fairness, the resistance is real. Hearn says Joshua made him insert a clause into the contract requiring the fight to happen in the UK, and by his own account on Sky this week, the room has emptied around him: “We’re up against it. It seems like everybody else has agreed but Anthony Joshua. He feels a little bit of responsibility to UK fight fans as well, and he’s doing everything he can to give them what they want.” So there is a renegotiation coming, and Joshua will extract a serious premium for waiving that clause, which only proves the point. The clause exists because everyone knew from day one whose money this was and where it might pull the fight. They signed knowing the money came with strings. Now the strings are being pulled.
Eddie and Frank can cry over the UK. Maybe they are even right. But they took the money. They let the fox into the henhouse, and one man named Turki is the boss. While they both made a fortune, they lost control. That is not an insult. It is a transaction. Warren is now openly deferring to Alalshikh on the venue and the date, saying it is not his call to make.
They can cry that Zuffa cannot formally promote this fight, and contractually that may be true. But let us talk about how Tyson Fury is even able to fight in New York. Fury spent five and a half years unable to set foot in America, from the Wilder trilogy in October 2021 until this past June, with the restriction widely attributed to his past links to Daniel Kinahan. Then in June he miraculously appears at UFC Freedom 250 at the White House, shakes hands with the President with Dana White standing right there, and posts a video crediting one man for his return: “Big shout out to Turki Alalshikh for making this happen.” Turki, who has confirmed publicly that he owns 60 percent of Zuffa Boxing and chairs its board. The same Turki who, at the last Garcia and Benn press conference, stood on stage and called Dana the boss. So when people ask who is really promoting this fight, follow the cap table, not the bout agreement. The people who got Fury back into the country are the people deciding where he fights.
And Dana knows it. He has been saying the whole time that he knows exactly when and where this fight is happening, with that smirk that says I won the fight game war. He is the only outsider in on the secret, and he wants you to know it.
Here is the part nobody is talking about. The UFC has made Madison Square Garden its annual November showcase every year since 2016, when Conor McGregor headlined UFC 205 the moment New York legalized MMA. Which means the entire TKO production infrastructure, the crews, the trucks, the building relationships, the whole machine, will already be humming in that arena days before this fight. That production team knows every loading dock and lighting rig in the building. You could not design a softer landing for the biggest boxing event of the decade. What a fight week that is going to be. UFC at the Garden one weekend, Joshua and Fury the next, and Midtown absolutely electric for ten straight days.
Let me be honest about the trade-off too. Wembley holds 90,000. The Garden holds about 20,000 for boxing. That is 70,000 British fans who do not get a seat, and no amount of New York romance changes that math. It stings. But the people funding this fight decided that American prime time on the world’s biggest streaming platform is worth more than a stadium singalong, and they are the ones writing the checks.
Bottom line. Frank and Eddie, two men who spent their entire careers being the boss, will collect massive sums for this fight. Booking agent is the term. And White said the quiet part on Sky, aiming at nobody and everybody: “What I’ve noticed is in the boxing business since I’ve been in it for a very short period of time, six months, the promoters’ egos are actually more important than the fights themselves and giving the fight fans the fights they want to see. It’s all about ego with the promoters. It’s fascinating. These guys are all really weak.” Eddie Hearn, who is quite qualified to promote an event like this himself, has been reduced, much like Oscar before him, to a glorified booking agent for Joshua. Dana White is going to be the Don King of this fight.
And for the lucky few who make it inside the Garden that night, it will feel like Game 5 of the Knicks winning the championship. There is no building in boxing with more ghosts in the rafters. Ali and Frazier. Lennox. Tyson. If this fight cannot happen at Wembley on Wembley’s terms, there is exactly one building on earth that can carry its weight.
So I am here to use an overused phrase. It is New York or nowhere.
Are these two past their primes? Sure. Tyson and Joshua will have full NY medicals, and the eyes of the world will be on boxing. And yes, most of us New York boxing fans will admittedly be watching it at Diamonte’s across the street (ask for SaraFina), at Legends, at Jimmy’s Corner, and at every other bar in this city that shows boxing, complaining about the ticket prices, exactly the way it should be.
