When Dana White\u2019s Zuffa Boxing promotion stages its March 8 event, Jai Opetaia and Brandon Glanton will compete for the inaugural Zuffa Boxing World Cruiserweight Championship the first belt created under White\u2019s fledgling boxing banner. White has already pushed two Zuffa Boxing events across the finish line, with two more on the calendar. But while the UFC CEO is accelerating into boxing with characteristic force, critics question whether a promotional \u201cworld title\u201d carries meaningful weight in a sport steeped in sanctioning-body history.<\/p>\n
Enter Eddie Hearn, chairman of Matchroom Boxing, who didn\u2019t mince words in an interview with iFL TV. \u201cThat is the cringiest sh*t I\u2019ve ever seen,\u201d Hearn said. \u201cWhenever it is, Jai Opetaia fighting Brandon Glanton for the Zuffa championship of the world, and I was thinking, \u2018Do you know what? I could just do that.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Hearn sarcastically floated the idea of launching a \u201cMatchroom Boxing World Championship,\u201d highlighting what he views as the absurdity of creating a belt outside the established sanctioning framework.<\/p>\n
Matchroom founded in 1982 by Hearn\u2019s father, Barry has promoted some of boxing\u2019s biggest stars, including Anthony Joshua, and current world champions such as Dmitry Bivol, Jesse Rodriguez, Shakur Stevenson, and Katie Taylor.<\/p>\n
For Eddie Hearn, championship legitimacy is rooted in history. \u201cDo you think I would disrespect boxing that much where I would say, we are going to bring out the \u2018Matchroom Boxing World Championship?\u2019\u201d Hearn said. \u201cThe history and legacy of the sport governs that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When Dana White\u2019s Zuffa Boxing promotion stages its March 8 event, Jai Opetaia and Brandon Glanton will compete…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":471622,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[447],"tags":[703,49,48,82],"class_list":["post-471621","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-boxing","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471621","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=471621"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471621\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/471622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=471621"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=471621"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=471621"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}