_1616899210.jpg)
Frank Warren wants to make it abundantly clear that Dillian Whyte is dangerously close to flouting his publicity requirements ahead of his fight with Tyson Fury.
The head of Queensberry Promotions has not been shy about expressing his dismay regarding Whyte’s reluctance to do his part in promoting what Warren feels is a life-changing opportunity for the Jamaican-born, British native.
The Fury-Whyte bout, which is for Fury’s WBC belt, will take place April 23 at Wembley Stadium in London. The fight has reportedly sold out the venue, nearly 94,000 tickets, a figure that evidently reflects an enormous appetite on the part of the British public to see their countryman in the ring. Fury, a native of Manchester, has not fought in his homeland in nearly four years.
Still, Warren, who co-promotes Fury with Bob Arum of Top Rank, has been rankled by Whyte’s silence, despite its seemingly negligible effect on the gate, and stressed in a recent interview that Whyte was already in violation of some of the clauses in their bout agreement. Warren seemed to indicate he would be willing to take legal action in the event Whyte decided to keep up his recalcitrance come fight week.
“He’s obliged to do certain things,” Warren told SecondsOut.com. “Everything he doesn’t do is going to be a problem afterward. Breach of contract is a breach of contract.
“One thing I’ve never done is roll over in my life. I’m not rolling over for him, that’s for sure. He needs to show up and he needs to meet his obligations, he needs to do all the things that all boxers do when they’re involved in big fights.”
Warren feels Whyte is making an antagonist out of him for no good reason, citing that his company’s purse bid to win the rights to the fight is responsible for putting Whyte in line to pocket a career payday.
Earlier this year, Warren beat out rival promoter Eddie Hearn, Whyte’s longtime handler, with a record $41 million offer, nearly $9 million more than Hearn’s bid. Whyte (28-2, 19 KOs) is set to make $7,384,500, while Fury (31-0-1, 22 KOs) will collect $29,538,000. According to the rules of the WBC, the winner stands to make more, exactly $4,102,500, or 10% of the winning bid.
“This guy is getting 32 times the purse he got lodged by the WBC for his last fight,” Warren said. “Why am I the enemy? Why? We’re paying him good money. He’s getting fortunes.”
While Whyte has been unusually discrete thus far, that does not mean Warren has not bickered publicly with members of Team Whyte. A recent row on TalkSport Radio saw Warren engage in a verbal jousting session with Jeffrey Benz, a lawyer for Whyte who represented the heavyweight in bout negotiations.
As in the TalkSport interview, Warren, once again, blamed Benz for coming up with demands that were not bound to the legal dictates of their agreement.
“Our point of communication is with Jeff Benz, and Jeff Benz is absolutely ridiculous in where he’s at,” Warren said. “All he keeps doing is going off center, off course, coming up with other stuff that’s not in the contract.
“All I want Dillian Whyte to do is what is in the contract, nothing more, nothing less. Up to now he has not done that. He’s in breach. He’s not done that.”
Reached for comment, Benz denied that his client is in breach of any of the terms of their contract and dispelled any notion that Whyte would not engage in publicity events during fight week.
“Dillian’s focused on beating Tyson Fury,” Benz told BoxingScene.com. “He will be at the fight. He will be at the weigh-in. He will be at the fight week press conference. Those are all things that Frank specifically negotiated for and were specially agreed.
“He’s lived up to his contractual obligations and he will live up to his contractual obligations.”