WWE President and TKO board member Nick Khan appeared on the Varsity podcast with host John Ourand ahead of Saturday’s Zuffa Boxing card in Las Vegas, where Ryan Garcia faces Conor Benn at 147 lbs (66.7 kg) in a welterweight title match broadcasting on Paramount+.
The conversation focused heavily on how Zuffa Boxing is trying to consolidate a historically fragmented sport into a single, dependable league structure, following the models Khan pointed to at both UFC and WWE.
Khan explained that the appeal of the sport comes from matching top boxers against each other consistently, something he said hasn’t happened reliably in boxing for years.
“This sport of boxing when it’s great, there might not be anything better. The problem is it’s just not great often enough,” Khan said, describing the thinking behind partnering with Turki Al-Sheikh and Rakan Alharthi of the Sela Group to relaunch the promotion.
He drew a direct line between Zuffa Boxing’s ambitions and how UFC and WWE previously unified fractured combat sports and wrestling landscapes.
“There’s two companies that entered into fragmented sports spaces and were able over time to create some sort of ecosystem where the branding on the companies is significant,” Khan said, citing UFC’s absorption of promotions like Pride FC and EliteXC, and WWE’s consolidation of regional wrestling territories decades earlier.
Khan also addressed why past US television partners, including ESPN, Showtime, HBO, Fox, Spike and NBC, all exited the boxing business.
“They said decisions that should take two hours take two weeks and you can’t get straightforward answers from your partners,” Khan said, adding that networks want big matches but were repeatedly underserved by unreliable promotional partners. He said Zuffa Boxing’s plan is to “outwork everyone” to earn back that trust.
On sport selection and scheduling, Khan pointed to missteps by rival promoters as evidence of the gap Zuffa Boxing hopes to fill, noting an athlete’s bout was scheduled the same night as an NBA Finals game.
“Why put a San Antonio athlete on the same exact night?” he said, arguing that basic awareness of the sports calendar should guide event placement.
Beyond boxing, Khan discussed WWE’s media landscape, including its Netflix deal for Raw, ESPN Unlimited carrying premium live events, and Smackdown’s continued home on USA Network. He also confirmed WrestleMania will be held outside the US and Canada for the first time, in Riyadh, alongside companion viewing events at the MSG Theater.
