Jarrell ‘Big Baby’ Miller to be part of Sky Sports Box Office team for Whyte-Parker

Boxingnews24.com

By Scott Gilfoid

Heavyweight contender Jarrell ‘Big Baby’ Miller (21-0-1, 18 KOs) will be working the Dillian ‘The Body Snatcher’ Whyte vs. Joseph Parker fight as of the commentating team for the Sky Sports Box Office PPV fight from the O2 Arena in London, England. Miller, 30, is being groomed by Matchroom Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn as an opponent for him to stick inside the ring with Anthony Joshua for April 13 at Wembley Stadium in London, England.

Give that there’s very little time for Hearn to increase the familiarity of Miller with the British boxing public in the next nine months before April 13, one way of helping the process is by adding the 300 pound American Sky to the Sky Box Office team on July 28 so he can talk trash about Joshua and Whyte.

It’s unclear if Miller will be able to increase his popularity enough in the UK for the British boxing fans to like the idea of him facing Joshua next April instead of WBC champion Deontay Wilder. That’s the guy that the fans want to see Joshua fight, but Hearn has shown little interest in making the Joshua-Wilder fight judging from the flat fee offers that he’s been giving him. The offers seem to have a message written to them that suggest that Hearn doesn’t want to make the fight. Wilder isn’t being offered a percentage deal for the Joshua fight. As such, Miller is now being crammed down the throats of the UK fans as the guy that will be facing Joshua on April 13. It’s kind of sad, but that’s how it goes. Miller isn’t a threat to end the Joshua gravy train. Wilder is a threat, a very big one.

On Tuesday, Miller got in the face of Joshua at Hearn’s news conference in New York to announce the Joshua-Povetkin fight, as well as his DAZN signings of Jessie Vargas, Daniel Roman, Artur Beterbiev and Maurice Hooker. Miller and Joshua stood for a face off while Povetkin stood off to the side, looking totally out of place like a cardboard prop. Povetkin might as well have been invisible, as it was clear that Miller was the one being marketed as a future opponent for Joshua to fight. It’s understandable why Hearn was trying to cram Miller down the throats of the boxing fans, because the press conference was in New York and he’s obviously more familiar to the casual fans in that country than the 38-year-old Povetkin. What Hearn doesn’t realize is that Miller isn’t all that well thought of by the U.S fans.

While there are some fans in the States that like Miller, a lot of them don’t. They see him as a fat, slow guy, who fights weak opposition and labors when he faces guys that have a tiny bit of talent. Gerald Washington almost knocked Miller out last year in hurting him in the 5th round of their fight in July 2017. Washington hit Miller with 10 consecutive head shots in the 5th round after hurting him. The only reason Washington didn’t knock Miller out is because he got tired of punching him in the head. It was a woeful performance by Miller, and he looked just as bad in his last fight against former heavyweight world title challenger Johann Duhaupas last April. Miller won the fight by a 12 round unanimous decision, but he made Duhaupas looked great.

Miller is in the process of inking with Hearn’s Matchroom Boxing promotional company in order to fight on his DAZN cards in the U.S. Miller is scheduled to fight on October 6 on DAZN against an opponent still to be determined in Chicago.

“I am a student of the game and keep a close eye on the heavyweight division,” Miller said to skysports.com. “Dillian Whyte versus Joseph Parker is a great, significant match-up. I look forward to giving the boxing fans watching Sky Sports a detailed view from my perspective on their physical and mental preparations for this exciting fight. See you ringside!”

Other than Joshua, Miller will almost surely be matched against Whyte soon by Hearn, as it’ll give him a chance to make another in house fight. Miller vs. Whyte would be a fun fight between two limited heavyweights. It’s doubtful that the fight would inspire U.S boxing fans to want to pay $10.00 to subscribe to DAZN in the States in order to see Whyte and Miller face each other. That’s more of a fight that American boxing fans might be mildly interested in seeing if they had nothing going on with their lives on a Saturday night and the fight popped up on free television on ESPN or Fox. I’m not talking about ESPN+, because that one requires that fans subscribe to it by paying $4.99 per month for the app. It’s highly doubtful that fans would want to subscribe to ESPN+ to see Miller fight Whyte.

What Hearn should be doing it having guys like Miller, Whyte and Joshua fight on free television in the U.S if he wants to increase interest from the American fans in paying $10 to subscribe to DAZN to watch them fight. Hearn is putting the cart before the horse. First you’re supposed to increase interest in fighters like Miller, Whyte and Joshua by having them fight a lot on free television before you ask boxing fans in the States to pay $10.00 to see them fight on DAZN. I’m just saying. That’s the way Hearn should be going about it in my view if he wants to get the fans to get worked up about seeing the likes of Miller on DAZN.

The winner of the Whyte vs. Parker fight could determine the opponent for Joshua on April 13. If Whyte defeats Parker on July 28, he has a good chance of facing Joshua on April 13 if Hearn doesn’t select Miller. If Parker wins, the Miller will likely be the one that ends up fighting Joshua. It won’t be Parker that will be fighting Joshua, because a rematch between them in April would be too soon. Joshua defeated Parker last March in Cardiff, Wales, and the British boxing public likely won’t want to see a second helping of that fight next April.

The previous Joshua vs. Parker match last April was too boring and too controversial for there to be a rematch at the huge Wembley Stadium, which will be expanded to 100,000 seats for April 13. The only way that 100,000 fans boxing fans are going to show up to see Joshua fight at Wembley is if Hearn is able to get Wilder to ink the contract for the fight. The only way that happens is if Hearn increases Deontay Wilder’s offer substantially by giving him the 50-50 purse split that he’s asking for. Since it looks like Hearn is trying to get Wilder to sign for the Joshua fight on the cheap by offering him a small fraction of the purse for the fight, it doesn’t appear that a fight between them will happen. This means that it’ll be either Whyte or Miller that will be facing Joshua on April 13. I think Hearn should let the Wembly Stadium officials know that they should forget about expanding the Stadium to 100,000 and instead think about retrofitting it to 60,000 to 70,000. Those are more realistic numbers for a fight involving Joshua and Miller or Whyte.

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