Eddie Hearn has spoken candidly about his decision to give Andy Ruiz Jr a shot at Anthony Joshua on four weeks notice back in 2019.
Joshua had been set to face Jarrell Miller that night only for the American to fail a drugs test when three banned substances were found in his system.
Ruiz was drafted in as the late replacement for Joshua’s American debut at Madison Square Garden – and the rest is history.
The Mexican-American caused one the biggest shocks ever in the heavyweight division, stopping AJ in the seventh round and taking his titles from him in the process.
Many in the sport believe that result caused Joshua to change his style, with Carl Froch believing the Brit is now gun shy after Ruiz took a part of his soul in New York.
Speaking to iFL TV about the change in opponent, Hearn admitted he has doubted whether they made the right decision in drafting in Ruiz.
“I’ll be honest with you yesterday, because it was the anniversary of that fight, I wondered whether as a team we made a mistake taking that fight [against Andy Ruiz Jr].
I’m getting quite a lot of stick right now for putting my fighters into ‘too tougher fights’, which is ironic because I’ve always been accused of giving my fighters easy fights and easy paths.
When we were deciding between Andy Ruiz and Trevor Bryant, actually we weren’t even deciding, but I got offered Trevor Bryant from Don King and he said to me ‘don’t fight Andy Ruiz, he looks terrible in his trunks and he’s good’.
But I was thinking if AJ is the heavyweight that we believe he is, he beats Andy Ruiz and in boxing tradition perhaps we should have taken the easy rollover, but I promise you this it would have been over in a round.”
Joshua would go on to avenge his defeat six months later in a money spinning rematch in Saudi Arabia.