Truth Over Comfort - Frank Smith

October Red: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to October Red. Here we are once again with the lovely Frank Smith, Matrim's CEO. Good to see you, always good to see you in the flesh anyway. Andrew, how are you? Alright, Manchester? Correct. Pat Brown, headlining? Gonna be a big, night. John Edges, what was the choice with him? Obviously British and Commonwealth Cruiserweight titles is mandatory fight and both guys taking a test and respect to both guys for stepping up and taking the opportunity because this is the kind of fight that you don't see often where two guys come together at the early stage of their career and take and challenge themselves and what they deserve is a huge amount of respect you know because often this doesn't happen and where we're in such a fickle sport people are written off one of the guys is going to lose on Saturday night right but instead of writing a fighter off it should be respect for taking a challenge and testing themselves. really weird. Obviously John Edge is matchroom fighter. So it's really weird that he's going in. Let's just keep it real. As the underdog. I'm not saying that upsets can't happen. I'm not saying that he's not the better fighter. But when you look at it, obviously your boy, your star boy, your future star boy is Pat Brown. Obviously we promote both guys, right? We promoted both guys since their debut. And for us it's about delivering opportunities and the biggest and best fights and the best opportunities to get to where they want to get to. You know? the winner or the loser. As in, they're to go in there, the best man's going to win all night. And that's what the sport should be about. Seeing the best fights and the best fight the best and not veering away because, is that the right thing to do right now? It should be about making the best fights happen. That's what you're going to see here. Right. One thing I want to ask you now, and we're going to just slightly move away from boxing. You signed Tom Aspinall. Now, he's like an injured horse, isn't he, at the moment? Was that a good investment in signing him as obviously he's a talent agency, doing all that stuff for Because there's no certainty. He's recently relinquished the belt and there's no certainty of when he's actually going to fight again. Yeah, but I think it was also about the commercial side of him and putting him in a position to get big deals done like we've done. You know, he's driven, even when he hasn't been fighting, a huge number of deals. Obviously we wish him a speedy recovery. We were there for him every step of the way. It's been a frustrating period for him, but like our job is to ensure we can deliver opportunities for him outside of the cage and that's what we'll continue to try to do for him and the relationship has always been good and will continue to be good and yeah we just wish him all the best to get back in in the cage as soon as he can do. Say for example he doesn't pass his medical this is just a hypothesis we don't know what's going to happen. When it comes to you having him as one of your talent, what happens then? The reason why I'm asking Frank, you're the numbers guy, you're the one that says, I'll run numbers on this and this is what we can expect from it. You're like the brains behind all of these investments. But what if this doesn't turn out to be like a solid investment because obviously his credibility comes from the fact that he's a mixed martial arts, he's a UFC fighter. Yeah, but he will always have that profile because of what he's built. you know, commercial appeal. And ultimately that's where we come into it, you know, and it's a bit different to our traditional business. Really you're looking at more of a time investment here than actual financial investment. It's less black and white like a financial investment where it's quite clear. We run a show, how much does it cost to run a show? What can we bring in, et cetera? This is a time investment. You invest in time to build this person into where you believe they can be and get them the opportunities. you know, we've had a great journey with him and we'll continue to do so. What's the strategy with him? You mentioned sponsorships, know, obviously getting more money behind him. So what was the actual strategy with him? What was your intentions to do? To build his profile, to continue to build his profile, to get people talking about him and to get brands to back him and invest in him like they have done. The only reason why I ask is every time you hear a matchroom talent agency, I just presume obviously it's going to be pushing towards his fighting career. So fair enough, he can get a Lucas A deal or et cetera. It's everything around it as well. and that is where I was confused so thank you for clearing that off. Conor Ben, ex-fighter, what I will say, do think there's like a little bit of a curse around matchroom fighters that leave matchroom and go off into the sunset to have a better career? You did a fantastic job with building Conor Ben. You did such a fantastic job that there was people that believed you stood a chance. in that fight against Ryan Garcia, you can argue, well, if you knew boxing you wouldn't say that, etc, etc. But there was a chance. That's what hype and perception and promotion is all about though, isn't it? It's just like people who thought Mike Tyson could beat Jake Paul at 60 odd years old. Do know what mean? Like, that's the world we're in. People buying to storylines, people buying to hype. Our job was, and I always say this, because it's always difficult, but as a promoter, like we've been in loads of fights over the years where I thought, they don't stand a chance, right? Just being honest. but obviously that's like... When Terence Crawford was on the rise and Amir Khan was on the decline of his career, was Terence Crawford the huge favourite in that fight? Yes. I wasn't going to sit up there and go, he hasn't got a... But you get what I'm saying. That's not from a bad place. But that's like your job is to build up and build a fighter into the position to get the big opportunities. Right. Look at what Terence Crawford went on to do. And everyone knew how good Terence Crawford was. And everyone knew... Amir was towards the latter stages of his career as an example. And I'm not just highlighting that, but that's one where I was up there and I got a load of stick for people saying, doesn't know what he's talking about, saying that he's going to smash up Terrence Caulford. But that's your job. Does that make sense? Our job is to stand there and say, this person is the best thing you have ever seen in your life. That's the job of a promoter. In any walk of life is to build and sell a product. And that's ultimately like, although it's an individual, you're still building up an asset. and that's the job and that's what we did with Conor Ben and the reality is he came up against someone much better than him. That's the truth. But commend him for getting to that position. You know, he worked to get himself into that position. Well done to him. And this is the thing, when I think of Conor Ben if he was with Matchroom, because one of things I was thinking, well, what does he do now? You guys are known for like rebuilding someone, say they are like your star fighter, you can rebuild them, but it seems as if he lost that fight and he was like... Yeah, Ryan Garcia is like... Yeah, but that's their business. Their business model is not to build up individuals. Look at the UFC. Their business model is to make the sport or whatever their brand is bigger than the athletes. The reality is really difficult. You can't do that in boxing. Look at the UFC. There's so few names you know in the UFC, but you buy into the UFC. Hence why they sell tickets before they even announce a card. That's what they built, an amazing product. It's sensational. But the reality is very different to boxing. Boxing is built on starts. And one day, Conor Bennie is like the guy that's going to build the business of Zuffa. The next day, they're posting a picture of him bent over like this and going, Ryan Garcia is sensational. But he is what he is. But that's what they do. And that's what they'll continue to do. How does a, you had like a more of a personal bond, maybe not yourself, but say Eddie had more of personal bond with Connor. I had a very personal bond with Connor. But I was, I was always up and down with Connor. My relationship with, and it like, it was never plain sailing all the time, because a lot of people want people around them to blow smoke up their ass. Right? I don't do that. Because there's enough people around the team of a fighter who are there to blow smoke up their ass. I'm very honest. And sometimes people don't like that. But the reality is you need someone to tell you the truth. You know? So I had a very good relationship with Connor. Very good relationship. Very close with him. But was up and down. Well you saw the... Well, I'm not saying you did, but he did put out a tweet and it was almost like I've achieved... It It read sort It kind of like a retirement Like a goodbye tweet, yeah. He's made a fortune. So like, he's made a fortune in the sport and he's never gonna beat anyone at that higher level. That's just the truth. And that's no disrespect for him. I couldn't beat anyone at a lower level. So like, he's done a lot more than me. So I don't mean to say it in a manner of like being disrespectful. That's just the reality. You come up against, I'll come up against someone in business that is a low bit. Do you know what I mean? That's life. And... you know that's just the reality of situation so I wouldn't be surprised if he retires he's made an absolute fortune out of sport. So what do you think will happen from a promoter's point of view potentially with Ryan Garcia? He's got fight with Oscar De La Hoya and Golden Boy he'll deliver that fight I'm sure and then from there who knows. So how would you have rebuilt him? Who? Conor Ben? Or would you have said to you know what you've enough money? he's in charge so if he doesn't want to fight anymore doesn't matter what anyone thinks you know so it's up to him as to what needs to be led by him when a fighter's made that much money you know and they're in the position where it's like you know kind of the way that statement read could he walk away from the sport? Possibly. Are matchroom interested in Chris Eubank jr? We will have Eddie's had discussions with Chris Eubank jr but as he's spoken about publicly. But nothing more than that right now. So I'll try to not ask you too many questions because I know he is family. Ben Whitaker, headlining Birmingham, talked to me about that fight and how you have to build him carefully because we can see what happens when young fighters... Arroshed. Mine's like it's a wonderful thing Frank bought. But the truth is with Ben Whittaker we want to build him into a superstar for many years to come. This isn't just a one year job like, you this is about making him a superstar of the sport and building him in the right manner. It's another step up for him. know a real step up for him in Connor Wallace, the biggest step up he's had in his career. IBF Final Eliminator sets up a world title fight in the next 12 months I would say. And yeah that's our job is to position him so he's ready to be the star we believe he can be in the sport for years to come. When you decide on fighters and the belt route that they're going to take, because I thought he was more or less going the WBC route, tell us about like the parallel IBF side and why you're kind of pushing him that way. He's still got the WBC silver title. That title will be on a line ensuring that he's highly ranked within the WBC as well. But the IBF ordered the fight. He was in the position for the eliminator. The IBF ordered the eliminator. Hence that's the fight we've gone down. we will look at all available routes but that was the one that was right in front of us and made the most sense. Recent signing of yours, heavyweight, that's come over from Queensbury, David Adelaide. Your choice to sign a fighter like that and what can Matroom do for him to build him some more? He's got a great profile already, know, and he's a great character and I think he's got big opportunities in the heavyweight division. We've just got continue to develop him, build him, keep him active. When is he going to be out then? When can we expect his debut? November. news very soon but November yeah. Interesting, listen Frank I'm gonna let you crack on because I know you've got a few minutes to start always a pleasure. Thank you very I know we'll do something again soon. you