Amer Abdallah is an international boxing executive, promoter, and manager who built an undefeated 18-0 kickboxing career before moving full time into the business side of combat sports. He founded Lace Up Promotions, managed three-division world champion Badou Jack, represents Global Icon Mike Tyson and has worked on boxing initiatives across Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Libya, and the UAE. In this Q&A, he talks about how his idea of success has changed since his fighting days, and what he actually uses to measure it now.
How Has Your Definition of Success Changed Since You Stopped Competing?
It hasn’t. I’ve always had the same mentality of climbing the ranks, pushing the limits, fighting the best and striving to achieve the top championship levels of my sport. And when you get to the top, find another level to reach. After I retired, that simply transitioned from inside the ring to outside of it. The definition didn’t change, it just changed in how it was measured. I never look back and say 10 years ago I did this or achieved that. It’s all about what I’ve done recently. But my ultimate measure of my success is measured when I walk into my home, hold my kids and wife, while being able to provide a safe and comfortable life for my family.
What Did Success Look Like the Day You Retired In 2018?
Honestly, it was as sad as it was as much as pride. I’d been promoting events, running a gym, training fighters, and competing myself, all at the same time. Walking away undefeated and as a world champion mattered to me. But what mattered more was knowing the business side was already standing on its own, and I wasn’t walking away from the sport I loved. I wasn’t retiring from boxing or kickboxing. I just stopped getting punched in the face…
How Did You Measure Success While You Were Still Fighting and Promoting at the Same Time?
I was the first to promote themselves under my own banner back in the early 2000’s. From that initial step into a new territory, I knew I had to keep raising the bar. Lace Up Promotions started small, out of Western New York, and I was doing every job at once. Success in those years was simple and unglamorous: did the card come together, did the gate cover the purses, did the guys on the undercard want to fight for us again, were the fans happy, did I make my community proud. Those were my baseline questions that equated to wether I was successful or not.
Working With Someone Like Badou Jack, Did Your Definition of Success Change Again?
It had to. Managing and guiding a three-division world champion is a different kind of pressure than promoting a regional card. Success stopped being about one event and started being about a career: Which fights made sense, which ones didn’t, where could I take him to be the biggest star, when to push for a bigger stage and when to wait. Some of the biggest wins in that chapter were fights we had outside of the ring with particular decisions that had nothing to do with in the ring boxing.
Does Success Look Different Working in Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Libya, and the UAE Than It Does in the U.S.?
Yes, and I think a lot of people in American boxing underestimate how different. In the U.S., success is often measured fight to fight. In the markets I’ve worked in across the Middle East, through my role with Skill Challenge Entertainment and advisory work with boxing federations, success gets measured in years and the impact on the country in a global perspective. You’re building toward something a government or a federation wants to exist five or ten years from now, not just the next pay-per-view. It’s giving the citizens of the country a new sense of hope and entertainment for their local heroes as well as the ones they see on television, now fighting in their country.
Is the Badou Jack Foundation Part of How You Measure Success?
It’s a quieter kind, but yes. The foundation grew out of wanting to give kids a fighting chance, and some of that work has reached refugee camps and orphanages around the world. I don’t put that next to a win-loss record. It’s a different column entirely. But if I’m honest, it’s the column that matters the most. Badou didn’t want it to be a public entity, but I told him his reach could affect and help so many more underprivileged children by making it public.
What’s a Measure of Success That Most People Wouldn’t Think to Ask About?
Whether a fighter I represented can still call me after their career is over. Anybody can manage a winner or sign for a fight. The real test is whether the relationship survives a loss, a bad decision, a market that didn’t pan out the way we planned or retirement. Because I was a fighter, I know what matters and how important having the right people around you is. I always hope that I’m considered that guy that I wanted around me when it mattered.
What Would You Tell Someone Who Already Has Their Definition of Success Wrong?
Stop borrowing someone else’s scoreboard & don’t let social media depict your definition. Find out who you are and love what you find. Most people die at 30 but get buried decades later. Keep the same fire you had in your 20’s, the dreams, the goals, the hunger. Often the older we get the more we compromise what we really want. True success is to not settle. Define what you want and go get it at whatever cost it takes. Then push for the next level.