Floyd Mayweather CEO Leonard Ellerbe continued his beef with Eddie Hearn with an extraordinary back and forth between the pair.
Ellerbe and Hearn hold serious grudges against each other as the former berates the Matchroom Boxing boss’s job on United States soil.
However, the hate hit a new low on Thursday, with UK fans accusing the head of Mayweather’s team of playing the race card.
Floyd Mayweather CEO
The man who has worked with boxing legend Floyd Mayweather during his rise to the top didn’t hold anything back. Ellerbe was clearly in the mood to gloat after Hearn’s participation in Canelo vs GGG 3 brought about lower than expected Pay Per View figures.
Canelo Alvarez’s WBC, WBO, WBA, and IBF super-middleweight title defense against Gennadiy Golovkin reportedly sold only half a million buys in the United States.
If this information is correct, which DAZN didn’t deny, then the T-Mobile Arena battle in Las Vegas had bombed by Canelo’s standards.
DAZN put out a statement pointing to over one million worldwide sales of the DAZN PPV. However, those sales included all 200 plus territories and subscriptions.
World Boxing News reported that those numbers amount to a mere 1500 average per region outside the United States, the UK, and Canada.
Ellerbe vs Hearn
Jumping straight in to offer his condolences to Hearn, Ellerbe stated: “He might need a little cheering up, so let’s sing him a song, “Ain’t No Sunshine At DAZN!”
The experienced businessman was trolling Hearn over the same song when the Essex native sang, “Ain’t No Sunshine when Tank’s Gone,” in reference to Gervonta Davis considering leaving Mayweather Promotions.
Hearn soon responded to begin the insults: “Blimey Lenny, we just did one million buys. When was the last time you were involved in a fight that did more than 100k?
“Don’t count Floyd because you were just packing his jockstrap.”
Ellerbe had no problem countering with mud-slinging of his own.
“Stop it, Edward. I thought I’d send you a little song to cheer you up. Let me know if you need me, Floyd, Stephen [Espinoza, Showtime Head of Boxing], or Al [Haymon, Premier Boxing Champions promoter] to show you how to do the big boy stuff.
“For your information, every major player over here is laughing at you. You don’t know what the f*** you are doing in the US.”
Offering advice to Ellerbe, Hearn stated: “Delete Twitter, mate. You’ve had an absolute stinker!”
Ellerbe fired back: “No time to go back and forth with you. I’m trying to get big boy s*** done.
“You know that record-breaking stuff you know nothing about. Hope you cheer up, mate!”
After a period of quiet between the pair, Ellerbe faced criticism for what fans of Hearn described as a “race card” move.
“In my opinion, his issue with me, Stephen, and Al all along has been one thing and one thing only,” revealed Ellerbe.
“You have the best network exec in sports and entertainment, who’s Hispanic. You have three brothers that have broken every record in this business.
“He’s failed to take over the US market. As he said he was [going to with DAZN in 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021].”
“Race Card”
Reaction from Hearn supporters was swift on social media. They took offense to Ellerbe aiming those kinds of remarks at a British promoter who has worked with all races of fighters his entire career in many contests, winner or loser.
Hearn’s first ever signing after taking over from his father, Barry, was Olympic boxer, Audley Harrison.
One said: “Hearn puts 80m in AJ’s pocket after a loss, but yet it’s about race, have a day off.”
“Ellerbe crying and playing the race card again, how original,” added another.
A third stated: Eddie Hearn is winding you up. It is absolutely nothing to do with race. Why are you bringing that into it?
“You’ve had your fun, and there’s a back and forth. It shows how rattled you are to say something like that.”
Temperatures continue to rise between Ellerbe and Hearn following previous offers of an exhibition or charity bout between the two promoters.
In this day and age, you could never rule it out. British bookmakers had already put out odds on a battle, with Hearn the slight favorite over his US nemesis.
The views expressed in this article are the opinions of Phil Jay.
WBN Editor Phil Jay has over ten years of boxing news experience. Follow WBN on Facebook @officialworldboxingnews, Instagram, and Twitter @worldboxingnews.
