06.06.06 – By Matt Stein: For many people, a fight between James Toney (69-4-3, 43 KO’s) and Wladimir Klitschko, the IBF heavyweight champion, would seem to be a match made in heaven. However, as the saying goes, ‘good things never come easy,’ which is the case for the making of a fight between Wladimir and Toney. Apparently, from all accounts, Toney isn’t particularly interested in fighting Wladimir (46-3, 41 KO’s) for a mere $1.5 mil, saying, in part, he’s not interested in that “chump change,” and is leaning more towards fighting the winner of Hasim Rahman and Oleg Maskaev for the WBC heavyweight title, which takes place on August 12th..
If somehow Toney accepts the match with Wladimir, it will be taking place at the Madison Square Garden on November 11th. Nevertheless, the offer will have to increase substantially, since Toney is reported to want at least $2.5 million to fight Wladimir, which is quite a bit of money for a challenger to get.
In a sense, I can understand Toney’s point of view about the money not being sufficient for him, considering he would only be getting a portion of the 1.5 mil, and likely would end up with little over a quarter of a million after taxes and other expenses have been paid out. Not a lot of money, indeed, particularly when you factor in his chances against a fighter as tall and offensively skilled as Wladimir. Clearly, Toney’s chances wouldn’t be good in a fight with Wladimir and the evidence suggests, he would likely come out of the fight beaten up and not better off much financially.
For many people, Toney is probably even more popular than Wladimir, and this fight would have no problems attracting a huge amount of attention worldwide. And, given Toney’s ability to sell a fight with his superior speaking skills with the media, I don’t blame him for wanting more, even a lot more. The bottom line is, if they can somehow make this fight into PPV, I could easily see them finding the extra money to lure Toney into signing for the fight. Come on, give Toney the money.