THE GRAFTER
At just 24, Eddie Hearn’s right-hand man Frank Smith has become one of British boxing’s crucial decisionmakers, writes Tris Dixon
WE’RE VERY CLOSE. I’VE PROBABLY SPENT MORE TIME WITH EDDIE THAN I HAVE WITH MY OWN FAMILY”
YOU may see the private jets, the A-list celebrities, the travel and the close relationship with fighters, but what you do not see is the graft.
Like almost any profession that is seen to be glamorous, the alluring side makes up a minor percentage of what a position is actually like.
Frank Smith became Matchroom’s head of boxing in December. Since then, his Instagram has taken him around the globe and ringside at British boxing’s biggest nights.
Behind the scenes, though, he’s been on a treadmill of work and business, running at a frenetic speed that might give the 24-year-old (who turns 25 this week) a few premature grey hairs.
Smith is young. His career is flying. But he’s also put in the type of work in his 10-year association with Matchroom that has seen him promoted from grabbing pizzas for sports stars and sticking the kettle on for other staff members to brokering deals and contracts worth millions.
The incline has been steep but has been negotiated without Smith altering his stride. That has been partly because the cycle of work is so brisk and unyielding. There’s been not time to take stock.
And, as is often the case with big breaks, he managed to snare his foot in the door by chance.
“I met Eddie [Hearn] when I was 14,” he explains. “My dad threw a party and I was selling raffle tickets. My dad sold him his cars as well, and I sold Eddie £20 of raffle tickets and my dad said, ‘That’s the guy who just bought the Bentley.’ So I went over and called him a tight b ***** d. He gave me 50 quid and it went from there.
“I was just a young kid and I wanted to go and do some work somewhere. I didn’t have a view of where I was going to end up. I always wanted to do well, I either wanted to be a stockbroker when I was younger or work in sport, but it’s moved quickly.
“[Now] we go to a lot of places but it’s hard work. Recently in Sheffield [Bramall Lane for Kell Brook-errol Spence], after what happened at the Manchester Arena [with the terrorist attack at the Ariana Grande concert], I spent four days in meetings working until 10-11 at night, putting various measures in place on top of what we have to do week in and week out. A lot goes into it that you don’t see. People say, ‘I’d love your job, it looks brilliant.’ They don’t actually know the work that goes in.”
The public perception of his role, he reckons, is to “just go round all over the place and have a load of fun”. He actually organises events, books venues, works with Sky, assembles budgets, looks after contracts and handles other agreements, domestically and internationally.
And the Matchroom-sky Sports Boxing juggernaut means there is no let up.
“It’s sort of 24/7,” he continues. “We’ve probably done more than 20 shows over the last year and I’ve travelled to all of those, mostly going up on the Tuesday and staying until Sunday. Then you’ve got all of the various site visits around the country with Sky and the meetings you have – you do whatever needs to be done. We usually work in the office until 7-8 o’clock at night. We do so many [shows] that it all blends into one and you’re doing the same thing across the board because it’s working everywhere we go. It’s like a travelling show, you’re just moving it around the country with different fighters, replicating what we’ve done elsewhere. Obviously we’re not getting complacent with it and just putting things in place but I think we’ve built a brand where people are interested in coming to the show more as an event, more than just a single fight. As much as people love or hate Eddie and they boo him, they’re still coming to the show. So it’s working.”
Matchroom boss Hearn is not fussed about winning popularity contests as long as he is successful and his fighters are earning well and regularly. Frank and Eddie, a somewhat unlikely but engaging pair from Essex, disagree only rarely. The ride has, thus far, been smooth. But it’s never long before they move on from any inconsequential infractions.
“Because I’ve grown up with him we disagree about things but we don’t really have huge arguments,” Smith explains. “He’s not the sort of person to lose his temper and not talk to you. We’re very close. I’ve probably spent more time with him over the years than I have my own family, every day in the office, going away – all around the world – to different shows. And I work closely with Barry [Hearn] as well and I can always just go and sit down in his office with him. It’s good to have both Eddie and Barry to learn from. Eddie is passionate about the sport. He loves it. As much stick as he gets he loves being involved. I think the British mentality is when people start doing well they start to dislike them. When it all started he was great for the sport. Now everyone can have a moan but he doesn’t mind. I think he loves it. I think he loves working. Boxing, as you know, is quite a stressful industry. It’s how long you can put up with it all, but we have so much going on away from boxing. People don’t realise the number of sports we’re involved in and that might be something, as time progresses, where Eddie gets involved in other elements of the business.”
The so-called British mentality was bucked by the largest event Smith has been intrinsically involved in, the Wembley record-breaker that saw Anthony Joshua defeat Wladimir Klitschko in April’s thrilling worldwide heavyweight extravaganza.
Yet playing a hand in hosting the principal fight in modern British history was never a childhood ambition. He used to have a season ticket at Upton Park where he watched the likes of Robert Green, Marlon Harewood and Dean Ashton ply their trade in the traditional claret and blue of West Ham. As soon as the Matchroom gig became full-time, football was forgotten but even now Smith confesses he’s no boxing authority. He just knows how to run a show and make a deal.
“I’m so heavy on the events side that I’m not constantly watching boxing as such,” he admits. “I’m not an expert and I never
really say anything about fights because that’s not what I’m an expert in. I’m lucky that I get to get on with what I do. They trust me and that’s where I’m lucky in my job, I’m allowed to make decisions on my own – but me and Eddie work closely.”
Frank has also had the challenging job of coming to the fore following the departure of the highly-respected and popular John Wischhusen, who was seen by many in the trade as the glue that held the boxing department together.
“It’s been a natural progression and then John left,” Smith adds of his ascent. “We had very different jobs. He worked more on the boxing side whereas I worked on events, budgets and the contractual side. Now we’ve got Paul Ready, who’s our matchmaker and he does all the boxing-related aspects of the show. I learned a lot from John and worked with him all the way through when I moved in to boxing. He’s respected by everyone and a lot of people were shocked when he left, but we’ve carried it through and it’s going quite well.”
That is an understatement given the lucrative achievements of pay-per-views and the increase of big events that have seen the sport switch back into the arenas and stadiums from the leisure centres.
Sky also has live competition from the BT Sport and Boxnation alliance, as well as ITV and Channel 5 venturing into boxing.
“I think it’s great for the sport,” Smith concurs. “Even over the last few years, when we’ve been leading the way, we’ve never been complacent. We love making huge events. And it’s a great buzz when you walk out and you’ve got 15-20,000 people and that’s what we love doing week in, week out. We don’t want to put on sub-standard, average shows. We’ve never been complacent, even without the challenge there. It’s good for the sport overall, it’s great for the fighters and the managers and we’ve got to keep striving and fighting for our position as number one.” While inexperienced, Smith’s youthfulness can help him in other instances. He shares interests with many of the 40-or-so fighters
on Matchroom’s roster because he’s a similar age. He’s particularly close with world champions Joshua and Kal Yafai.
“When I was coming through, I was helping those guys with their medicals at the start and because I’m a similar age we talk about the same things so we get on quite well,” Smith offers, when asked whether there is a danger that he could become too close to the boxers.
“I think it’s just natural. If you spend a lot of time with someone you do become close to them. But look at Tom Stalker, for example. He signed with us at the start, he’s now with Frank Warren but when I see him we have a laugh and we still get on. You can be friends and treat business separately.”
There are no guarantees, though, that Smith – who has being part of a world heavyweight title fight in Las Vegas high up on his boxing bucket list – will be in it for the long haul. “I’d like to say retired. I’d love to be,” he initially jokes of where he’d like to be in five years.
Then he reconsiders. “I do actually love working so I’d probably get bored after three or four weeks. I think it’s just the relentlessness of it.
“Everyone sees the good times, when you’re having a laugh and you’re all over the world, but you miss out on a lot of things. I think I’d still like to work in boxing or sport. There are so many things you can get into off the back of what I’ve learned. I work on the international TV, so that’s a huge market. At the minute boxing is getting bigger and bigger but it’s like anything. It has its times.”
EVERYONE SEES THE GOOD TIMES, WHEN YOU’RE ALL OVER THE WORLD, BUT YOU MISS OUT ON A LOT OF THINGS”