Turki triggers turmoil for TKO by cutting Dana White out of Canelo-Crawford

Did TKO get burned even more badly than it appears?

Last week I posted on Saudi Arabia’s General Entertainment Fund Chairman HE Turki Alalshikh’s sudden announcement of a date and venue change for Canelo Alvarez vs Bud Crawford.

It didn’t take long for Turki to complicate things even further by announcing one more change, removing TKO’s Dana White and Nick Khan from a promotional role in the fight.

Sela is “a Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF) company” that Turki used to put on Terence Crawford vs. Israil Madrimov in Los Angeles and Anthony Joshua vs. Daniel Dubois at Wembley Stadium.

The ensuing headlines were as brutal as the “articles” were devoid of content beyond repeating Turki’s tweet and restating obvious facts to answer the who, what, when, where, and why questions about Turki, Riyadh Season, Dana White, and TKO.

One exception was Brian Campbell’s interview with British boxing promoter Eddie Hearn for CBS Sports. Campbell admitted that the information he had about the split between TKO and Turki was “cryptic and minimal” and then went on to feature Hearn essentially dancing on the grave of Turki & TKO’s attempt to monopolize boxing.

"Is [Matchroom Boxing] going to be involved in the [TKO] league? I doubt it. That's not the concept they have in mind," Hearn said. "But I'm also aware of the fighters the league are recruiting and I think it's going to be very different to people's immediate perception of how this is going to look. I don't think this is going to be the big names and Dana paying significant, overrated purses to get these guys because then there is going to be a war between UFC talent and boxers.

"In boxing, which is quite bizarre, the revenue around UFC events is more than the revenue around boxing events yet the [boxers] are paid 3-to-4 times more than the UFC guys. At some point, the UFC talent is going to look at it and go, 'Alright Dana, you are now paying these fighters $3 or $4 million dollars for some defense of their world title and we are getting half a million to have a war in a sold-out arena with massive pay-per-view numbers.' So, it's going to be very interesting."

I think Hearn is over-estimating the organizational abilities of UFC fighters, but he may be correct to not worry overmuch about the Turki Alalshikh-TKO alliance (don’t call it TKO Boxing!) will mean for a boxing promoter such as himself.

Campbell also speculates that the split between Turki and TKO arose from Dana White’s negative comments about holding fights in stadiums, as per Turki’s original announcement of the fight taking place at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas.

Zach and I recently talked about the stadium shell game with TKO Boxing on our latest podcast:

But there’s another rumor swirling that strikes me as the more likely culprit, and a much more significant explanation for whatever split that currently exists with Turki and TKO.

Given that only one boxing pundit has discussed this story on social media and no one has published it on a “legitimate” news site, I’m going to put it behind the paywall so as not to alarm and confuse any of our free readers and maintain the highest journalistic standards.