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Barclays Center CEO Yormark Explains How A Non Golden Boy Show Landed in Brooklyn

Published

11 years ago

April 17, 2014

It was strange being at Barclays Center in Brooklyn on Wednesday for a boxing press conference, and not seeing most of the usual suspects there.

The Swanson people, the Golden Boy crew, nowhere to be found. The Showtime gang, MIA. Instead, other folks manned the media desk, and reps from HBO and other promotional companies, Banner and Star Boxing, held court.

It seemed an unthinkable tableau, sort of, being that Golden Boy has been the sole purveyor of fight fare at Barclays since the building opened, with Showtime being the TV platform for the fights, aside from one Fox entry. But the unthinkable often occurs in this red light district of the sports world, which is one reason it is an interesting beat. There are no shortage of questions for a curious journalist to ask. Such as the one I posed to Brett Yormark, the CEO of Barclays Center and the primary backer of boxing at Barclays. The Barclays honcho explained how the forthcoming June 14 card, topped by a Ruslan Provodnikov title defense against Chris Algieri of nearby Long Island landed at Barclays, despite the fact that Golden Boy is NOT the promoter. I was under the impression that only Golden Boy cards could run here, so what gives?

“Golden Boy does have an exclusive deal with us,” Yormark (pictured above in Oct. 2012 shot, between Danny Garcia, left, and Erik Morales, right) explained, “but they accomodated this card. It is kind of a one fight exemption. We were contacted by (the Brooklyn Nets) team owner, Mikhail Prokhorov, who is also a 45% owner of the arena, he was very interested in us hosting this fight, for obvious reasons.” Mainly, because the Russian native Prokhorov is keen to see “The Siberian Rocky” defend his WBO 140 pound crown up close and personal.

We’d heard the whole card, a co-promotion with Banner (run by Art Pelullo) and Star (run by Joe DeGuardia) with some input from Top Rank (who holds a piece of Provodnikov’s contract), would land in Long Island, at the Nassau Coliseum, which was bought by the Barclays bunch. Yormark said that to his understanding, Pelullo was negotiating with Nassau, but he switched gears when the interest from Prokhorov popped up. “So we had to go to Richard Schaefer, and Richard wanted to accomodate us. He’s a great partner. So it’s a one fight exemption.” Yormark said yes, this is a one off, but he made clear he wants what’s best overall for boxing in Brooklyn, and if Provodnikov can activate a massive potential customer base in Brooklyn, packed with Russian emigres, then the benefit can trickle down to a wider array of people. He said he could maybe be “opportunistic” again in the future. More than 100,000 Russians call Brighton Beach home, Yormark said, and he’d love to have more of them discover Barclays.

One rumor kicking around is that Golden Boy HAS to do a certain number of boxing shows a year at the arena, and since they have not hit that number, they were essentially forced to cooperate. Yormark said that in fact when they hashed a deal three-plus years ago, they targeted 12 fights a year. He soon realized 12 would be a lot, and that six or seven cards annually might be more doable. “The program is working, from the standpoint of the Eddie Gomez’, the Peter Quillins, the Luis Collazos’ of the world.” Yormark said Collazo came up to him recently and thanked him profusely, for resurrecting his career. He choked up Yormark by presenting him with a jewelled boxing glove medallion as he said “thank you.”

Golden Boy will bring a card to Barclays in July, the dealmaker told me. Danny Jacobs, who has received some decent buzz in the region the last two years, could appear on that card, which is likely to be July 26. I also asked Yormark if any of the recent hubbub, such as the beefing between Bob Arum and MGM, which hosted Pacquiao-Bradley II, and inspired the Top Rank chief’s ire when they put up promo material for the May 3 Mayweather-Maidana card while still promoting the Pacman event, could leave him an opening to snag a “Super Bowl” type card.

“We continue to tell everyone we want a big fight here,” he said, “and who knows what happens in the next month or two. But Collazo is convinced if he beats Amir Khan (on the May 3 Floyd undercard), I think there will be a big push for that to be here in Brooklyn. To me that would be a storybook chapter to what were doing here.”

Fair to say Yormark will be rooting for Luis Collazo against Khan, then?

“Absolutely,” he said, with a wide grin. “Absolutely.”

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Michael Woods

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2015 Fight of the Year – Francisco Vargas vs Takashi Miura

Published

9 years ago

January 4, 2016

The Sweet Science

The WBC World Super Featherweight title bout between Francisco Vargas and Takashi Miura came on one of the biggest boxing stages of 2015, as the bout served as the HBO pay-per-view’s co-main event on November 21st, in support of Miguel Cotto vs Saul Alvarez.

Miura entered the fight with a (29-2-2) record and he was making the fifth defense of his world title, while Vargas entered the fight with an undefeated mark of (22-0-1) in what was his first world title fight. Both men had a reputation for all-out fighting, with Miura especially earning high praise for his title defense in Mexico where he defeated Sergio Thompson in a fiercely contested battle.

The fight started out hotly contested, and the intensity never let up. Vargas seemed to win the first two rounds, but by the fourth round, Miura seemed to pull ahead, scoring a knock-down and fighting with a lot of confidence. After brawling the first four rounds, Miura appeared to settle into a more technical approach. Rounds 5 and 6 saw the pendulum swing back towards Vargas, as he withstood Miura’s rush to open the fifth round and the sixth round saw both men exchanging hard punches.

The big swinging continued, and though Vargas likely edged Miura in rounds 5 and 6, Vargas’ face was cut in at least two spots and Miura started to assert himself again in rounds 7 and 8. Miura was beginning to grow in confidence while it appeared that Vargas was beginning to slow down, and Miura appeared to hurt Vargas at the end of the 8th round.

Vargas turned the tide again at the start of the ninth round, scoring a knock down with an uppercut and a straight right hand that took Miura’s legs and sent him to the canvas. Purely on instinct, Miura got back up and continued to fight, but Vargas was landing frequently and with force. Referee Tony Weeks stepped in to stop the fight at the halfway point of round 9 as Miura was sustaining a barrage of punches.

Miura still had a minute and a half to survive if he was going to get out of the round, and it was clear that he was not going to stop fighting.

A back and forth battle of wills between two world championship level fighters, Takashi Miura versus “El Bandido” Vargas wins the 2015 Fight of the Year.

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Jan 9 in Germany – Feigenbutz and De Carolis To Settle Score

Published

9 years ago

January 4, 2016

The Sweet Science

This coming Saturday, January 9th, the stage is set at the Baden Arena in Offenburg, Germany for a re-match between Vincent Feigenbutz and Giovanni De Carolis. The highly anticipated re-match is set to air on SAT.1 in Germany, and Feigenbutz will once again be defending his GBU and interim WBA World titles at Super Middleweight.

The first meeting between the two was less than three months ago, on October 17th and that meeting saw Feigenbutz controversially edge De Carolis on the judge’s cards by scores of (115-113, 114-113 and 115-113). De Carolis scored a flash knock down in the opening round, and he appeared to outbox Feigenbutz in the early going, but the 20 year old German champion came on in the later rounds.

The first bout is described as one of the most crowd-pleasing bouts of the year in Germany, and De Carolis and many observers felt that the Italian had done enough to win.

De Carolis told German language website RAN.DE that he was more prepared for the re-match, and that due to the arrogance Feigenbutz displayed in the aftermath of the first fight, he was confident that he had won over some of the audience. Though De Carolis fell short of predicting victory, he promised a re-vamped strategy tailored to what he has learned about Feigenbutz, whom he termed immature and inexperienced.

The stage is set for Feigenbutz vs De Carolis 2, this Saturday January 9th in Offenburg, Germany. If you can get to the live event do it, if not you have SAT.1 in Germany airing the fights, and The Boxing Channel right back here for full results.

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2015 Knock Out of the Year – Saul Alvarez KO’s James Kirkland

Published

9 years ago

December 29, 2015

The Sweet Science

On May 9th of 2015, Saul “Canelo” Alvarez delivered a resonant knock-out of James Kirkland on HBO that wins the 2015 KO of the Year.

The knock-out itself came in the third round, after slightly more than two minutes of action. The end came when Alvarez delivered a single, big right hand that caught Kirkland on the jaw and left him flat on his back after spinning to the canvas.Alvarez was clearly the big star heading into the fight. The fight was telecast by HBO for free just one week after the controversial and disappointing Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao fight, and Alvarez was under pressure to deliver the type of finish that people were going to talk about. Kirkland was happy to oblige Alvarez, taking it right to Alvarez from the start. Kirkland’s aggression saw him appear to land blows that troubled the young Mexican in the early going. Alvarez played good defense, and he floored Kirkland in the first round, displaying his power and his technique in knocking down an aggressive opponent.

However, Kirkland kept coming at Alvarez and the fight entered the third round with both men working hard and the feeling that the fight would not go the distance. Kirkland continued to move forward, keeping “Canelo” against the ropes and scoring points with a barrage of punches while looking for an opening.

At around the two minute mark, Alvarez landed an uppercut that sent Kirkland to the canvas again. Kirkland got up, but it was clear that he did not have his legs under him. Kirkland was going to try to survive the round, but Alvarez had an opportunity to close out the fight. The question was would he take it?

Alvarez closed in on Kirkland, putting his opponent’s back to the ropes. Kirkland was hurt, but he was still dangerous, pawing with punches and loading up for one big shot.

But it was the big shot “Canelo” threw that ended the night. Kirkland never saw it coming, as he was loading up with a huge right hand of his own. The right Alvarez threw cracked Kirkland in the jaw, and his eyes went blank. His big right hand whizzed harmlessly over the head of a ducking Alvarez, providing the momentum for the spin that left Kirkland prone on the canvas.

Saul “Canelo” Alvarez went on to defeat Miguel Cotto in his second fight of 2015 and he is clearly one of boxing’s biggest stars heading into 2016. On May 9th Alvarez added another reel to his highlight film when he knocked out James Kirkland with the 2015 “Knock Out of the Year”.

Photo by naoki fukuda

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