Should Controversial Boxer Adrien Broner Be on PBC's 1st Network TV Card?
Adrien Broner is the worst that boxing has to offer. He’s obnoxious and crude and hasn’t nearly come close to maximizing his full potential as a professional prizefighter.
Yet boxing manager Al Haymon, the supposed savior of boxing, has slotted Broner as a featured attraction on the inaugural edition of his much-ballyhooed prime-time NBC card this Saturday night in Las Vegas.
Haymon is a brilliant businessman. He was successful in promoting musical acts such as MC Hammer, Whitney Houston and Mary J. Blige and was equally adept at doing the same for entertainers such as Eddie Murphy.
.jpg?w=256 "Colts Jaguars Football")
In boxing, Haymon has parlayed his expertise to become the most powerful manager in the sport.
In January 2015, he introduced Premier Boxing Champions, a series that will air on multiple networks including NBC, NBC Sports, CBS and Spike TV.
As much of a mastermind as Haymon must be for accomplishing such a feat, he’s done something really dumb here.
Putting Broner in front of the mainstream sporting audience to kick off a new enterprise is akin to reminding all those people you hope to attract back to the sport why they don’t watch boxing in the first place.
Harsh criticism? You be the judge.
In July 2012, Broner was stripped of a lightweight alphabet title after he did not come close to making weight for a scheduled title defense against Vicente Escobedo.
He posted pictures of junk food on Twitter for several weeks in a row prior to the fight, did not appear concerned that he didn’t meet his contract weight and then proceeded to come in overweight again for the renegotiated and agreed-upon fight-day limit of 140 pounds.
Broner easily knocked out the clearly smaller Escobedo in five rounds.
In 2013, Broner recorded and released a video in which he flushed $20 bills down the toilet. A few months later, he released another video (NSFW) of himself, this time supposedly defecating into a toilet, and proceeded to flush more wads of money along with it.
Perhaps feeling the call of the camera again, Broner followed that up by posting a sex video showing the fighter having intercourse with two women.
That very same year, the buildup to the Broner vs. Paulie Malignaggi bout on Showtime largely consisted of Broner's taunting Malignaggi with a former girlfriend who was now supposedly with Broner.
Broner’s ego was inflated to Goodyear Blimp proportions before he was humbled against Marcos Maidana in December 2013. At the pre-fight press conference, I witnessed Broner refuse several autograph requests from children. After being stunned early in the bout against Maidana, Broner mimicked mounting Maidana from behind to show he was in control of the situation.
The Sweet Science’s Tom Hauser documented this and other egregious in-fight shenanigans in his post-fight column:
"Ten seconds into round one, Maidana tagged Broner with a left hook that propelled Adrien into the ropes. Suddenly Broner had a bad case of the wobbles, and Marcos was all over him. Later in the round, Adrien spun out of the corner and thrust his hips against Maidana’s rear end, simulating anal intercourse. Showtime (the network that prides itself on the mini-series Masters of Sex) chose not to replay the moment in the sixty seconds between rounds. More significantly, referee Laurence Cole let it pass, which was a prelude to his losing control of the fight. Broner led with his head, raked his gloves across Maidana’s face, and used his forearms and elbows as offensive weapons throughout the bout.
"
Maidana defeated Broner by unanimous decision. The latter had to be carried back to his dressing room after the fight, something those of us present within the tunnel at the Alamodome witnessed after the announcement was read.
In 2014, the WBC suspended Broner after he used an ethnic slur in post-fight comments following his defeat of Carlos Molina. After a forced apology, Broner was reinstated a few months later.
Earlier this year, Broner went on a curse-riddled diatribe against music moguls Jay Z and Rihanna after being offered $5 million dollars to sign with Jay Z’s Roc Nation agency.
These are just some of Broner’s ridiculous and irresponsible behaviors, all of which he seems generally unrepentant.
In fact, Broner recently told The Ring Magazine’s Andreas Hale that “entertainment is everything.” Maybe that's why he acts like such an insufferable goofball.
But what sports fans truly care about is what happens within the confines of the game, and what could really make boxing marketable again to the general public has nothing to do with tired so-called "promotional" antics or disgusting videos.
Boxing is a worthwhile product on its own. It’s the purest of combat sports with a long, celebrated history that’s already firmly entrenched within American culture. It isn’t augmented by Broner’s nonsense; it’s hurt by it.
Haymon is right to try to put boxing back in front of the general public. Good fights will bring more eyeballs to the sport, and getting boxing back on network television in front of mainstream Saturday audiences can only help the once-lauded cultural institution make a sorely needed comeback in America.
But kicking things off with perhaps the vilest villain in a sport chock full of them? That’s not just a wrong move.
It’s a profoundly dumb one.
Wanna see @KelseyMcCarson get beat up? Check out this link and donate to help a kid named Corbin Glasscock fight bone cancer.
.jpg?w=480 "Colts Jaguars Football")
