Boxing News – June 27, 2019

http://www.boxingnewsonline.net JUNE 27, 2019 lBOXING NEWSl 5

T’S the
dilemma facing
all ticket-selling
professionals:
Do you keep
on badgering
friends and
relatives to
purchase
another ticket
just to buy
your way onto
a show against
a journeyman
you’ll be
matched
against to
win (although
that’s not
guaranteed, despite some insisting
it to be!) Or do you take the
gamble and go in slightly ambitious
and try to change the course of
your career? Everyone involved in
the professional side of the sport
seems to have an opinion on the
ticket-selling structure of the game

and those opinions are rarely

positive from the ones taking the

actual punches.

The days have gone when a

promoter can put a poster in a

pub/club and hope to get a group

of punters walk up to the venue on

the night. As the licence-holders

who are putting

up the financial

clout needed to

put the show on,

they want some

certainty of at least

getting a chunk of

that money back.

Putting the onus on

the home boxer to

sell the tickets is now the accepted

system.

There is plenty of talent going

to waste through lack of ticket

sales, while popular raw novices

are fed a diet of ‘clean-sweep’ wins

to pad an undercard, only to be

found out when the time comes to

be matched with a live opponent

who soon brings the local hero

back to reality. After some months

of contemplation, the process

is restarted, until they’re found

wanting again.

Unfortunately, most young pros

are striving to get to a place that

probably doesn’t exist for them

• being paid a
  handsome purse
  to headline at a
  prestigious venue.
  But they push
  on regardless,
  training, selling
  tickets, badgering
  friends and family
  (who often say
  they will “go to the next one”) in
  the hope of getting somewhere,
  anywhere, near what they dreamed
  of when signing pro forms. The
  thrill of the fight and the pull of the
  sport is hard to resist, despite the
  frustrations at every turn.
  Failing that, these young pros
  could take a chance against a

talented home boxer and hope to

get recognised and moved on. Very

few do, though!

The journeyman option certainly

isn’t for everyone and although

the physical scars are plain to see,

it’s the mental ones, of dealing

with defeat after defeat, and the

constant BoxRec reminder in years

to come, that can be the hardest to

deal with. A life of informing people

that you were better than that, but

the business wouldn’t allow it!

My advice is to get what you

can out of the sport/business

(financial success is very rare), try

to enjoy the ride and be proud of

what you achieve. Don’t leave too

much of yourself behind when the

time is right to get out. Another

imponderable – once you’ve got

the boxing bug, giving up is often

as hard as starting! Either way, don’t

be sat in the pub 10 years from

now wishing you’d done things

differently. Give it 100 per cent.

The time is now!

‘GET WHAT YOU CAN OUT OF BOXING’

My advice to young pros in what can be a brutal business

Photo: ACTION IMAGES/STEVEN PASTON

TEST OF CHARACTER:

The ring can be an

unforgiving space

GIVE IT 10 0

PER CENT.

THE TIME IS

NOW!

I

Mark

Massow

Manager &

trainer/second

I

GUEST COLUMN