Domination in America, Starting from being a Boxing Champion-Chapter 358 - 313: Light Heavyweight Competition

"Who are you thinking about?"

"I’m not thinking about anyone!"

"Don’t lie to me, I can tell. You hit harder when you’re lost in thought."

"...It’s Taylor, sorry!"

"It doesn’t matter, I don’t mind. Hmm, you’re thinking about her again, aren’t you? I can feel it."

"You’re really a pesky little imp. Your assistant is here; you should go shower and change."

"I don’t want to, I want to stay connected with you."

——

After discreetly seeing Emma off, Link drove to the main event boxing training facility to practice boxing.

While training, Franco dropped by to discuss moving up to the light heavyweight division, according to the plan he would climb to light heavyweight early next year.

The current masters in this division mainly include four people: WBA light heavyweight champion Belrut Shumenov, WBC champion Bernard Hopkins, IBF champion Chad Dawson, and WBO champion Nathan Cleverly.

Among the four champions was an acquaintance, ’The Executioner’ Hopkins.

Hopkins is 45 this year but still in prime condition. He started his career in ’88, initially as a middleweight boxer, and in ’95 became the IBF middleweight world champion, successfully defending this title for nine consecutive years.

In ’05 he became the WBA-WBC-WBO-IBF undisputed middleweight champion.

In ’06 he moved up to super middleweight, light heavyweight, and last year, after defeating title challenger Enrique Onerlas, captured the vacant WBC light heavyweight championship, possessing considerable strength.

As Link was a renowned boxer, after moving up to light heavyweight, he wouldn’t need to fight qualifiers to contend for a championship challenge; he could declare war on the champions directly through his agency’s arrangements.

Franco told him that he had already issued challenge invitations to the agencies and boxing organizations of the four champions, with only WBA champion Belrut Shumenov accepting the challenge so far. The agencies of the other three champions had yet to respond.

The agency would continue the negotiations to ensure everything went smoothly for his fights in the light heavyweight division next year.

Link had some expectations for the light heavyweight competitions.

First, the opponents in the light heavyweight division were stronger, and the matches were more challenging. Defeating powerful opponents could bring about greater improvement for himself.

Second, after moving into light heavyweight, his weight could increase to 80 kilograms.

With his current height and weight, 76 kilograms was considered sturdy. Adding seven or eight more kilos of muscle, muscles in various parts of his body would become bulkier and more robust, making him look even more valiant.

Furthermore, regarding his diet, there was no need to be as strict. He could relax a bit and eat more meat.

Third, the light heavyweight matches attracted more attention.

In the world of boxing, the heavyweight fights had the highest popularity and the broadest market, with light heavyweight following.

Compared to these, the super middleweight was just a niche rank.

Before Link, the super middleweight matches didn’t draw as much attention as middleweight, lightweight, or super welterweight, which also meant not many boxing stars in this field and lower PPV earnings.

This was one reason why the purses for Link’s recent two fights were always just over twenty million, and he couldn’t reach thirty or forty million.

Simply put, the super middleweight had a relatively low ceiling.

If he wanted to become a globally renowned super boxer, on par with Tyson or Ali, he had to step out of his comfort zone, face stronger opponents in higher divisions, and capture more people’s attention. If successful, his earnings for each fight would also significantly increase.

Those were the benefits.

However, there were also drawbacks. There were more skilled boxers in light heavyweight. If he was defeated in a match, the losses would be substantial.

After discussing the light heavyweight matches, Franco brought up another matter.

Since Dynasty Promotion Company had been developing swiftly over the past two years, with higher net earnings in the first half of the year than top-tier, main event, and competitive gym promotions, it had attracted the attention of investors.

Now, several financial institutions that invested in sports projects wanted to invest in Dynasty Promotion, valuing it between 250 and 300 million US dollars.

Franco asked him whether he wanted to accept the financing.

The advantage of accepting was that the company would have more funds for publicity, brand marketing, and channel expansion, which would enhance Link’s fame worldwide, along with higher box office and PPV revenue.

The reason Tyson became globally famous back in the day was, one, he was formidable, and two, the promotion by Don King and the American media was very successful.

With extra funds, Dynasty Promotion could also sign and train more professional boxers.

Eventually, the company wouldn’t have to rely solely on him to stay afloat, and the development would be more stable.

The downside was that Link’s shares in Dynasty Promotion would be diluted, and conflicts might arise within the company’s management in the future.

This wasn’t much of a problem for Link.

He owned 30% of Dynasty’s shares, worth about thirty or forty million dollars. After financing, the value of his shares would rise as well.

Moreover, the main source of income for Dynasty Promotion came from his share of boxing match earnings. No matter who managed the company, they couldn’t shake his core position in the team.

If the management’s decisions harmed his interests, he had every right to demand corrections.

If the cooperation was unsatisfactory, he could terminate the contract ahead of time.

When he had signed the contract initially, the penalty for breaching the agreement with Dynasty Promotion was three times the signing bonus, about 24 million US dollars, which wasn’t much for him.

Link told Franco to make all the decisions, and that he would support whatever decision he made.

Franco expressed his gratitude.

Link also discussed with Franco that in the future, in addition to signing boxers, Dynasty Promotion could also sign football, basketball, and American football players to diversify and allow Dynasty Promotion to go further.

In this area, their competitor, Athletic Room Sports, was doing well. Aside from boxing, they also signed athletes in niche sports such as tennis, badminton, and ice hockey.

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Link had the idea that when he had time in the future, he might buy an NBA team or an American football team just for fun.

Upon hearing this, Franco indicated it was worth considering.

After sending Franco off, Link continued his boxing practice.

In the meantime, Mario came over to bother him, saying he wanted to spar with him to see how long he could last against him and whether he had improved.

Link did not agree. Since Mario turned professional last year, he had initially enjoyed several consecutive victories, but later when competing for the WBC Cruiserweight US championship, he was eliminated in the second round of the preliminaries.

He currently had a professional record of 9 fights, 6 wins, and 3 losses, which was a mediocre performance, slightly worse than Reggie’s.

"Link, are you refusing to fight me because you think I’m not worthy of being your opponent?" asked Mario with his belly sticking out and a dark expression on his face.

"Yes, you’re not worthy!"

"....."

Mario’s facial muscles twitched as he wanted to get angry, but then he remembered that this guy was no longer the little boxer of the past but a billionaire, a big star, a super boxing champion.

He rubbed his big nose and grumpily asked, "Why not?"

Link glanced at him, took a water bottle, and poured it over his hot muscles, then wiped his chest with a towel, "If you want to know if you’ve improved, go punch the heavy bag. If your punch strength has increased, it means you’ve improved; otherwise, you haven’t. Why spar with me?"

"But my technique..."

"Don’t talk to me about technique, this is professional boxing. Technique without the support of punch power is just a paper tiger. If you want to keep fighting in the ring, just train properly, and don’t always think about becoming an overnight sensation. If you don’t want to fight anymore, then go back to Miami early to take over the family business; after all, your family isn’t short on money,"

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said Link.

Mario’s family owned a cattle farm and a meat processing plant, one of the largest beef suppliers in Palm Beach County with a market value of seven or eight million dollars. He was indeed a second-generation rich kid.

"No, I want to box. My goal is to become a Cruiserweight world champion, and at the very least, the world champion of a smaller organization,"

said Mario, clenching his fists resolutely. But then, with a slump of his shoulders, he added, "But professional boxing is too difficult. It’s very hard to win a match. Sometimes, even when I give it my all and my face is swollen from being punched, I still can’t win. What can I do? I’m not like you, practicing for a year and gaining more than fifty pounds of punch weight. That’s just too exaggerated; nobody can compare with you."

Mario’s face, creased with folds of flesh, looked pitiful.

Link shook his head, "A person who has given their all and lost a match would never complain like this. They would be burying themselves in training, striving to improve their strength and aiming to turn defeat into victory in the next match. Go and train. Persist in your training, and your fists and body won’t betray your efforts. If you don’t believe me, go into retreat and train for half a year, then compete again. If you lose, come find me."

"Fine, you said it. If I lose, you have to lead the training. Don’t forget, I’m your first sparring partner, not Morales,"

said Mario, pounding his chest with his fists before running off to the weight training area to lift weights.

Link put on his gloves and continued to spar against his training partner, Curry.

After training, he went to test his current punching power at the punch force machine.

Last June, he had tested it and recorded ten consecutive punches with a maximum of 1610 pounds for his right fist and 1440 pounds for his left fist.

A year later, he tested again to find the maximum at 1640 pounds for his right fist and 1480 pounds for his left fist.

Although both had increased, compared to the rapid progress during the latter half of 2008, his improvement over the past year was not significant.

With the current punching power, there wasn’t much of an advantage in the Light Heavyweight domain.

To win the division’s Golden Belt, he would need to improve his technique further to compensate for the lack of punching power.