“Well, he couldn’t get that fight because everyone knew how good he was. And by the way, Crawford knows how good Boots is. He never would think that Boots can beat him. But Crawford would be looking at going, ‘Why would I fight a guy so good that doesn’t quite have the profile, and it’s not that big a fight now? It would be a monster fight, but Crawford’s retired,’” Hearn said on the Mr. Verzace channel.
“So, you know, for a long time, it was very difficult to land Boots the big fights. We need to build him. We needed to build him commercially to be able to get the dollars together, pay the guys. I had to pay Stanis a fortune. Right then, now Xander.”
Hearn believes Ennis is now positioned to reach another level of stardom as he prepares for one of the biggest fights of his career.
“This is the fight, the breakout fight to really announce the next superstar, particularly in US boxing, but world boxing in Boots. I rate this guy so highly. I think if he’s going to do what I think he’s going to do to Xander, he’s going to come out as a superstar,” Hearn said.
Crawford instead moved up to junior middleweight, defeating Israil Madrimov to capture the WBA world title before later shifting his focus elsewhere. The long-discussed showdown with Ennis never progressed beyond speculation, leaving boxing fans to wonder how the former undisputed welterweight champion would have fared against one of the division’s most avoided contenders.
Ennis has since moved to 154 pounds and unified titles at welterweight before making the jump. He is scheduled to face WBA and WBO junior middleweight champion Xander Zayas in a high-profile unification bout on June 27, with Hearn viewing the contest as an opportunity for Ennis to cement himself among boxing’s elite names.
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