I’m going to start 2024 with a whimper. Unlike my usual bashing of my stubborn bullshit speech and stubborn, self-defeating defiance, I now promise to obey boxing’s latest moneymakers: the Saudis. I give up. I’m looking to sell it to the highest bidder while there may still be one or two bidders.
One of the worst kept secrets in the boxing media business is that Saudi Arabia, which has invested money to become players on the global boxing scene, is also looking to buy media presence.
Thomas Hauser, in a summary of the Day or Reckoning event published in The Guardian, touches on this at the end of his article.
“There are credible reports,” Hauser wrote, “that Saudi Arabia’s General Entertainment Authority is laying the groundwork for a new boxing website and sounding out high-profile writers from several countries to come on board for much more. money than they are currently earning. paid. In a world where media coverage of boxing is already limited, such a plan, if it comes to fruition, would go a long way toward allowing the Saudi government to control the sweet science narrative.”
Another veteran boxing writer, Donald McRae, would weigh in via Twitter/X, encouraging his colleagues to stay away from that sketchy Saudi money.
“Just say no, comrades,” McRae urged.
Well, with all due respect… Mind your own business, Donny! I like to shower with warm water. Shit, I like showering with water! And generic Mexican peanut butter with generic Mexican Ritz crackers for dinner gets really old after four days in a row.
I’ve been writing about boxing, full-time, for over ten years (17 in total), but things have never been easier for me. Fight Hype has taken care of me and given me a platform, but the reality of this business requires more than one income stream to make life livable.
I spent 2023 treading water, forcing myself to write brain dead CONTENT on other idiot sites for the first half of the year. I then spent the latter part of the year appealing to editors and site owners (those who weren’t even afraid to acknowledge my existence) for a chance to work. And even though they claim to be “fans” of my work, “loyal” readers, and “supporters” of my “essential voice,” none of them could hire me because “so-and-so on the staff” would be angry if they were hired, probably for a reason. “bad” I said regarding the media. Then there were the intrepid souls of the boxing media, tirelessly seeking quality writing to “change the game” for the boxing media, who flatly rejected my services without even bothering to read any of the clips I sent them.
This lack of man-sized balls and big-picture vision among men covering the cruelest of sports should tell you all you need to know about the current sorry state of the boxing media.
This is not the same universe that gave rise to Hunter S. Thompson. This is not the same BOXING universe that gave rise to AJ Liebling. Hell, it’s not even the same pocket boxing universe that facilitated the presence of Bert Sugar, who at least had the decency to wink, wink and nudge his way through life as a caricature of what a boxing journalist might be, yes so. there was one thing.
It used to be that people in the boxing media simply refrained from saying unpopular things. Now they don’t even think about them. Critical thinking and non-compliance have been completely eliminated from the media. So when fans wonder why they don’t get the boxing product they deserve, they need look no further than the media who are supposed to be the first line of defense between the bosses and the consumer, but instead , they are playing Plants vs. Zombies. on his phone between fights in press row, thinking of jokes for his next podcast.
It would be one thing if I fell short and fought the forces of evil. But who can reach the forces of evil? Today, the daily battle of a right-minded boxing writer is against mediocrity and general boredom and, worst of all, against the growing reality that boxing writing is supposed to be anchored in mediocrity and general boredom. This present tense is a barren wasteland filled with nothing but top 10 lists, select clickable quotes, and “what’s next for so-and-so” articles.
The boxing media is so weak and strategically lobotomized that you can’t even have a good discussion with them. They simply curl up and roll under their desks when hit with the slightest push back. Their first and only defense is to ignore you. And they’ll stick with it because all their colleagues, similarly, are hunkering down, hiding under their desks, ignoring unpleasant truths until the guy telling them (usually just me, really) stops and/or runs out of food in his tribune.
This is not a world that will reward you for your boldness. Shit, they won’t even ACKNOWLEDGE you if you hurt too many feelings or say too much that goes against the grain. This, of course, makes it difficult to make your voice heard in a business where making your voice heard goes hand-in-hand with making a living. It also makes it difficult to accomplish things if your ultimate goal as a writer is reform and/or a push for accountability (which, in these days of industry-sponsored media, is probably the goal of keeping the content enjoyable and empty).
But I give up.
I’m ready to pay some bills. I’m ready to be one of those guys who has nothing to say, but with a lot of people listening. I’m ready to be that guy who doesn’t give a damn about the things that matter. Only an idiot keeps swimming upstream against an overwhelming current when there doesn’t even seem to be a final destination anymore.
How do you rage against a machine when almost everyone desperately wants to be PART of the machine and no one knows how to rage anymore?
So…
Your Excellencies, Your Majesties, Your Majesties, Your Highnesses… back that disgusting profit truck up to Stately Magno Manor here in the hills of central Mexico and unload that shit. Fuck the fight. I will take my unique gifts (which, as one veteran writer observed, make me “the most feared man in boxing writing”) and put them at the service of you, my new masters. And then, as Don Vito Corleone said in ‘The Godfather’: “…if by some chance an honest man like you made enemies, they would become my enemies. And then they would fear you.”
Every good regime needs a skilled and fearless axe. You, my new teachers, know this better than anyone.
I humbly await your response.
PS: I totally reserve the right to change my mind a month into this deal, after paying a few bills and becoming a scorched earth, once again burning a bridge while standing on it. I’m that stupid.
Do you have anything for Magno? Send it here: [email protected]
