Boxing Wire

Tag: Conor Benn

  • Ryan Garcia Calls Out Conor Benn For September Fight During Live Stream

    Ryan Garcia Calls Out Conor Benn For September Fight During Live Stream

    Ryan Garcia has suggested his next fight will take place on September 12 in Las Vegas and strongly hinted his opponent will be Conor Benn of England.

    Garcia made the declaration during a live stream with rapper 6ix9ine, stopping short of a formal announcement but leaving little ambiguity.

    “My next fight is September 12. I can’t announce it yet, but there are some people from the UK that need an ass-whooping. The guy I might fight next is from the UK. It’s gonna be in Vegas at T-Mobile. You hear that, Conor Bum? My guy is gonna walk me out. Go get a goofy from England to walk you out.”

    Benn’s manager Keith Connelly confirmed to Boxing News that negotiations between the two camps are ongoing, while stopping short of calling the fight done.

    “We’re in the middle of negotiating, along with some other big fights. I could see it happening, I could see it falling apart, but we’re targeting that fight right now. I think that’s a great fight for both guys. It’ll be a massive fight if it’s over here and it’ll be a massive fight if it’s in Vegas. It’s a sellout wherever it goes. I think we’ll know in the next couple of weeks where we’re headed, but that’s definitely the fight that we want.”

    Garcia, 25-2, won the WBC welterweight title in February by outpointing Mario Barrios over 12 rounds. Benn, who recently signed an extension with Zuffa Boxing, sits first in the WBC’s 147-pound rankings despite not having competed at welterweight since 2022. He last fought in April, outpointing Regis Prograis. September 12 is the same date as Canelo Alvarez’s fight with Christian Mbilli in Riyadh, suggesting Turki Alalshikh may be orchestrating another split international event.

  • Conor Benn Makes Priority Clear After Zuffa Signing

    Conor Benn Makes Priority Clear After Zuffa Signing

    Conor Benn did not need much time to answer when Stephen A. Smith pressed him on which fight he wants next.

    “Garcia.”

    Sitting alongside Dana White on ESPN’s First Take on Friday, Benn cut through the diplomatic preamble and made his priority clear. The newly signed Zuffa Boxing fighter had walked through the procedural path toward a WBC welterweight title shot before Smith cornered him on a name, and the answer was immediate.

    “We’re going to try to get the WBC world title. I’m mandatory for that shot. I’ve worked hard to get there,” Benn said. “But I’m open to options. There’s plenty of fighters calling me out. Whatever fight the public wants, they can get.”

    He also explained the broader motivation behind signing with Zuffa and pursuing the biggest available matchups. “I’m here because I want to make the biggest fights possible. I want to make the most memorable nights in boxing, the ones where people go, ‘What a fight. What a night.’ Something to remember. History made, legacy made. That’s why I’m here.”

    Benn sits as the WBC mandatory challenger at welterweight, putting him in direct line for a shot at Ryan Garcia, who holds the WBC welterweight title after his victory over Mario Barrios earlier this year. With Benn now signed to Zuffa and Oscar De La Hoya pushing Garcia toward a world champion opponent next, both fighters are under promotions aligned on making the bout happen. Early reporting has pointed toward an August date on Netflix, though nothing has been officially announced.

    Benn’s Zuffa deal runs five fights over 2.5 years, meaning Garcia would be the first of multiple marquee outings. With Shakur Stevenson and Devin Haney also circling at welterweight, Benn made clear on Friday which name sits at the top of his list.

  • Dana White: Boxing Is ‘Way More Broken’ Than I Thought

    Dana White: Boxing Is ‘Way More Broken’ Than I Thought

    Dana White has spent six months running a boxing promotion and his verdict on the sport he entered is blunt: it is far more broken than he anticipated.

    Appearing on ESPN’s First Take on Friday alongside newly signed Zuffa Boxing fighter Conor Benn, White delivered a pointed critique of how traditional boxing promoters operate, arguing the industry is structurally designed to extract money rather than build lasting careers or a sustainable product.

    “This sport is way more broken than I even thought it was,” White said. “Now that I’m involved, how rinky dink the sport really is.”

    His central complaint was volume, or the lack of it. White argued that boxing promoters run their rosters like distressed assets, staging infrequent events and disappearing between them rather than developing fighters into genuine stars.

    “Every time you watch a boxing match, it’s like a going out of business sale. They’re trying to grab up as much money as they can and then they run away and hide for two years, then they pop up again and put on another fight,” White said. “I’ve already done more fights this year, my first year, than all the promoters combined.”

    He also pushed back on the industry tendency to blame fighters for being uncommercial, flipping responsibility onto the promoters themselves.

    “If you’re not putting on fights, how the hell are you making money? It doesn’t make any sense. I heard some of the other promoters when I started to sign some of the guys, they were like, ‘We could never make any money with him anyway.’ Well, that’s not his job. That’s your job. My job is to figure out how to pay him and pay me. His job is to be a badass,” White said.

    White also stated his five-year goal publicly for the first time, framing it as a return to boxing’s cultural peak when world champions were household names and major fights drew global audiences.

    “When your father was fighting, everybody all over the world knew who the champion was. When big fights happened anywhere in the world, everybody watched. Boxing was big in America back then. That is my goal: to make it that way again over the next five years,” White said, gesturing to Benn, the son of British boxing legend Nigel Benn.

    Stephen A. Smith, who has long criticized boxing’s promotional structure on the same platform, backed White’s diagnosis on air. “The promoters have ruined it, not the fighters. And now we’ve got somebody that’s gonna make sure we’re getting the fights we want to see,” Smith said.

  • Conor Benn Says Floyd Mayweather’s Undefeated Obsession Broke Boxing’s Relationship With Losing

    Conor Benn Says Floyd Mayweather’s Undefeated Obsession Broke Boxing’s Relationship With Losing

    Boxing’s cultural fear of losing was the dominant topic when Conor Benn and Dana White sat down with Stephen A. Smith on ESPN’s First Take on Friday, and all three had something pointed to say about how the sport arrived at this problem and what it would take to fix it.

    Smith set the stage by comparing boxing’s modern attitude toward losses with the generation that built the sport into a mainstream institution. “Unlike the UFC, where you could be great and have three or four losses, in boxing you have two, everybody’s having a heart attack and acting like you ain’t a top fighter in the world. Sugar Ray had losses. Tommy Hearns had losses. Mike Tyson had losses. But it didn’t stop them from being great.”

    Benn, whose lone career defeat came against Chris Eubank Jr. in their first meeting before he won the rematch, traced the shift to one fighter who fundamentally changed how the sport was marketed.

    “I feel like it changed with Mayweather when he came along and it was the undefeated record. Everyone was scared of losing,” Benn said. “Ultimately, I’d rather lose an exciting fight than win a boring fight, because then it’s like, did you even win?”

    He framed his own commitment in terms that put fan value ahead of personal record preservation. “I just want to give people value for money. I want people to want to tune into a Conor Benn fight, win, lose, or draw. I fight with my heart on my sleeve and they’re getting everything I’ve got. I pour my soul into my fights and I give them every shot I have.”

    White’s structural answer to the problem is the model he built in MMA: roster depth. The UFC framework allows fans to invest in a card rather than a single fight, making one loss a chapter rather than a career-ender.

    “We’re starting to build a roster of guys now. In the UFC, you can have the main event, the co-main. Sometimes the fans are more excited about the undercard fights,” White said. “There hasn’t been a middle class in boxing in a long time, and that’s what we’re going to bring. When the best fight the best, not every fight’s going to be the greatest fight you’ve ever seen, but people want to see good fights. A loss doesn’t mean you’re done.”

    Smith closed the segment with a simple blueprint for what Zuffa Boxing needs to execute on the vision. “Two ingredients to success for Zuffa Boxing: Number one, more guys with his attitude in your stable. Number two, two to three main events a year, mega fights.”

  • Details on Conor Benn’s 5-Fight Deal with Zuffa Boxing

    Details on Conor Benn’s 5-Fight Deal with Zuffa Boxing

    Conor Benn Re-Signs with Zuffa Boxing

    Conor Benn is staying with Zuffa Boxing. Dana White’s promotion announced Friday that Benn has signed a five-fight deal covering the next two and a half years, with the news breaking as both men sat down with Stephen A. Smith on ESPN’s First Take live from Las Vegas.

    The deal ends a week of speculation after Benn’s April 11 unanimous decision over Regis Prograis at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. That fight, the co-feature to Tyson Fury’s Netflix comeback against Arslanbek Makhmudov, was a one-off. Benn (25-1, 14 KOs) emerged from it a free agent with every major promoter circling.

    He picked Zuffa. And his reasoning on First Take pointed straight at the parent company’s track record.

    “You look at what they’ve done with UFC. Look what they’ve done with WWE. They plan on taking over and we all share the same vision,” Benn said. “It’s a different audience, a massive platform, and something I’m really excited about. It wasn’t an easy decision, but I’ve made the right decision and it feels right in my heart.”

    Team Approach and Long-Term Vision

    Benn, who split with long-time promoter Eddie Hearn and Matchroom Boxing earlier this year, framed the signing as a collective decision rather than a solo business move.

    “There’s no ‘I’ in team. I don’t do things on my own, I do things with my team. We all share the same vision; that’s a must,” Benn said. “We’ve got a long-term plan and no doubt we’ll execute it. My job is to stay in the gym, give 100% in training, and let the team allow me to fully focus on being the best fighter I can be and deliver entertainment to the public.”

    Five fights across 30 months works out to roughly one appearance every six months, a cadence consistent with Zuffa’s repeated emphasis on keeping its boxers active rather than letting them disappear between paydays.

    White’s Global Platform Pitch

    White made clear the selling point for Zuffa’s roster is distribution as much as money. TKO’s pending Warner Bros. merger is projected to add 200 million homes. The recently announced Sky deal expands European reach, and Zuffa is already airing in more than 90 countries less than six months into its boxing operation.

    “When you’re a professional fighter, obviously making as much money as you can during your short window of opportunity is important, but you want as many people around the world to see the things that you’ve done, too,” White said. “That’s just as important as the money.”

    Benn now joins a growing Zuffa Boxing roster that already includes Richardson Hitchins and Edgar Berlanga on multi-fight deals. He remains the WBC mandatory challenger at welterweight, with Ryan Garcia the clear target for his next outing.

  • Conor Benn Re-Signs With Zuffa Boxing

    Conor Benn Re-Signs With Zuffa Boxing

    Conor Benn Zuffa Boxing

    Conor Benn is back with Zuffa Boxing.

    Dana White’s boxing promotion announced Friday that the British welterweight has signed a new deal with the company. The announcement was accompanied by a video showing White and Benn shaking hands over a contract.

    “CONOR BENN IS BACK 🥊,” Zuffa Boxing wrote in a post on X. “It’s official! @ConorNigel has signed a NEW deal with Zuffa Boxing! Big things on the horizon‼️”

    Benn had been a free agent since April 11, when he defeated Regis Prograis via unanimous decision (98-92 on all three cards) on the undercard of Tyson Fury vs. Arslanbek Makhmudov at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London. That bout closed out Benn’s original one-fight agreement with Zuffa.

    Benn had signaled earlier this month that a continued partnership with Zuffa was the likely outcome once his initial contract expired.

    “After Saturday, I will be a completely free agent. Clearly, Zuffa is in the driving seat because of the way they’ve looked after me so well,” Benn told the PA News Agency before the Prograis fight.

    Benn originally split from Eddie Hearn’s Matchroom Boxing in February after a decade-long partnership, a move Hearn described as a “dagger in the heart”

    Terms of the new deal were not disclosed in Friday’s announcement.

  • Eddie Hearn Rips Zuffa Boxing: ‘No Strategy,’ Benn Deal ‘Worst Business’

    Eddie Hearn Rips Zuffa Boxing: ‘No Strategy,’ Benn Deal ‘Worst Business’

    Eddie Hearn has delivered his sharpest take yet of Zuffa Boxing, telling The Ariel Helwani Show that five months into Dana White’s boxing venture, the promotion has produced nothing worth pointing to and may have already committed one of the worst deals in recent boxing history.

    “These guys are very powerful and smart, but I actually don’t think they know what they’re doing,” Hearn said. “The more I look at it, I’m not sure there even is a strategy. It’s kind of like ‘sign who you can sign and then go from there.’”

    The centerpiece of Hearn’s criticism was the reported Conor Benn deal. According to reports, Zuffa paid $15 million for Benn’s 10-round fight against Regis Prograis on the Fury-Makhmudov Netflix card, with no future options attached. Matchroom is demanding full financial disclosure to confirm the figure, but Hearn was unsparing in his assessment if the number is accurate.

    “If you want to get sucked into the fact that someone would pay $15 million for a 10-round fight where it’s probably worth a million dollars, and have no future options, no deal in place, you are probably the biggest idiot on the planet,” he said. He called it potentially “one of the worst pieces of business” in boxing and expressed disbelief that no senior Zuffa executives attended the fight or visited the changing room despite the scale of the investment. “You must have some serious money if you’re just willing to spunk 15 million up the wall in a 10-round fight and not even send anybody to try and secure that deal,” Hearn said.

    Beyond the Benn situation, Hearn challenged anyone to name a genuinely impressive Zuffa show since the promotion launched. He pointed to small crowds, inconsistent scheduling, and underwhelming matchups as evidence that the execution has not matched the ambition. He also questioned the status of the boxing league concept Zuffa initially promoted, noting that governing bodies are already calling mandatories that complicate the model. While acknowledging that the roster includes legitimate names like Richardson Hitchins and Edgar Berlanga, Hearn argued the shows themselves have not reflected the promotional firepower behind them.

    “If I did those shows I would get screamed out of town by five fans,” he said. “‘What is this? There’s 150 people here in this room. Who are these people? What are these fights?’”

  • Shakur Stevenson Calls Out Conor Benn Again: “Not on my level”

    Shakur Stevenson Calls Out Conor Benn Again: “Not on my level”

    Shakur Stevenson is not impressed with Conor Benn, and he wants to prove it in the ring.

    After Benn’s unanimous decision victory over Regis Prograis at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Saturday, WBO super lightweight champion Stevenson (25-0, 11 KOs) took aim at the British welterweight in an interview with Ariel Helwani. Stevenson had just dominated Teofimo Lopez on the same Netflix card and used his post-fight platform to call Benn out directly.

    “There’s a fighter in here right now, and he motivated me, too,” Stevenson said from the ring after his win. “Where’s Conor Benn? Hey Conor Benn, we can get it banging, boy.”

    Stevenson continued:

    “I’ve been told y’all I’m better than him. I’ve been told y’all he’s not on my level. I’ve been told y’all that his skills is not up to par with mine. Like I said, if he’s ready to fight, tell him to stop going on social media and making up lies, saying that I said, ‘Oh, I won’t fight that weight class.’ I said I will. I said, with a rehydration clause, because he did it to Eubank. He’s not on my level. I’ve been said this, and I will beat the holy sh*t out of Conor Benn.”

    Benn Fires Back

    Conor Benn has scoffed at the idea that Stevenson at his level.

    Back in January, following Shakur Stevenson’s decisive win over Teofimo Lopez, Stevenson called out Benn, who was ringside. “You’re too small for me, boy,” Benn repelied. “You’re tiny, bro. You can’t punch. You can’t keep me off you. I’ll fuck you up. I’ll put you down.”

    The exchange sets up an intriguing potential matchup between two of boxing’s most prominent young fighters. Stevenson holds the WBO belt at 140 pounds and has been looking for signature fights after his dominant win over Lopez. Benn, now a free agent at 29, is operating at 150 pounds and plans to campaign at welterweight going forward.

    A weight discrepancy could complicate negotiations. Stevenson has fought his career at junior welterweight and below, while Benn’s natural size gives him a clear physical advantage at 147.

    Still, Stevenson’s willingness to call out a bigger man speaks to his confidence after a career-best performance against Lopez.

    For now, Benn appears locked in on Garcia for a September WBC title fight. But if that matchup stalls in negotiations, Stevenson’s name will remain in the conversation as a high-profile alternative.

  • Conor Benn Targets Ryan Garcia for WBC Title

    Conor Benn Targets Ryan Garcia for WBC Title

    Conor Benn is a free agent with one name on his lips: Ryan Garcia.

    Benn (25-1, 14 KOs) defeated former two-time junior welterweight champion Regis Prograis (30-4, 24 KOs) by unanimous decision on Saturday at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London. All three judges scored the bout 98-92 in Benn’s favor in a 10-round catchweight contest at 150 pounds.

    The fight was Benn’s first under the Zuffa Boxing banner after his split from Eddie Hearn and Matchroom Boxing earlier this year. He completed a one-fight deal reportedly worth upwards of $10 million and is now free to negotiate with any promoter, though Zuffa is expected to be the frontrunner moving forward.

    Benn Calls for September Showdown

    Benn wasted no time calling out WBC welterweight champion Garcia after the fight. “Garcia, I want my belt! Keep my belt warm,” Benn said. “September. Let’s go. Any day of the week. Twice on Sundays. 10 rounds, easy. Garcia, you’re next.”

    Garcia, who won the WBC title with a decision over Mario Barrios in February, responded on social media the same night. “I’m down. Garcia vs. Benn. Let’s do it!” Garcia wrote.

    The 29-year-old Benn plans to return to 147 pounds for the fight after competing above the welterweight limit in his last three bouts, including two middleweight fights against Chris Eubank Jr. He was back in the gym by Monday morning, posting a treadmill video with visible swelling around both eyes from accidental head clashes during the Prograis fight. He indicated he would be ready to fight by July or August.

    Prograis Retires After the Loss

    Prograis, 37, announced his retirement in an interview with Ring Magazine after the fight. The loss was his third in four outings since losing the WBC junior welterweight title to Devin Haney in 2023.

    Benn controlled the early rounds with his jab and movement before Prograis found some success in the middle rounds as accidental head clashes opened cuts around both of Benn’s eyes. Benn dug deep with body work in the championship rounds and swept the final five rounds to secure the decision.

    With Benn now positioned as the WBC mandatory challenger at welterweight, the Garcia fight carries both a title and a massive commercial draw on both sides of the Atlantic. Other potential opponents include Devin Haney, Shakur Stevenson, and Rolando Romero, but Benn has made clear that the WBC belt is his only priority.