Is Philly still a boxing town? We’ll find out in July when Jaron Ennis fights at the Wells Fargo Center

Eddie Hearn, one of the world’s top boxing promoters, walked Friday morning onto the floor at the Wells Fargo Center and spotted Jaron Ennis gazing at the empty arena. The Philadelphia boxer’s face was on the scoreboard, his name was in lights around the seating bowl, and it was easy to imagine where the ring would be on July 13 for a fight billed as Ennis’ homecoming.

“There’s nothing better than seeing him standing there like, ‘Wow,’ ” said Hearn, the British promoter who signed Ennis in April.

The South Philly arena — which last hosted a boxing match in 2001 — will belong to Ennis (31-0, 28 knockouts) but he could face a stiff challenge before stepping through the ropes: selling tickets.

The city, once one of America’s true fight towns, has fallen behind as a boxing destination. Philadelphia has hosted just one championship fight in the last 20 years and Ennis’ IBF welterweight title defense against Cody Crowley (22-0, 9 KOs) will be the first title bout at the Wells Fargo Center, which opened in 1996.

Philly still produces world-class fighters and has active boxing gyms. But championship fighters — like Bernard Hopkins, Danny Garcia, and Stephen Fulton — usually had to fight on the road.

“How has Boots Ennis not boxed or headlined in Philadelphia? It’s absolutely crazy. I don’t understand it,” Hearn said. “Is it laziness? Is it you want to keep him in a box? Sometimes, you have to roll the dice a little bit. But you’re not really rolling the dice when you’re headlining in his own city where he’s born and bred in a sports city like Philadelphia.”

Hearn insists that Ennis, who grew up in Germantown, can be a hometown fighter and prove that Philly still has a place for the sweet science. Ennis’ fight sold 4,500 tickets last Thursday during a pre-sale, forcing Hearn to rethink his original goal of drawing 7,000 fans. Ennis told Hearn he wants to sell out the arena. If so, it would be a statement as impressive as a first-round knockout.

“You’re talking about a fighter who might be the best fighter in the world, pound for pound,” Hearn said. “Sometimes when I’m selling it to the city, it’s like, ‘Come on and watch this guy. He’s good.’ But this is, ‘Come and watch this guy. He could be the best there is.’ ”

The Wells Fargo Center was built on the site of JFK Stadium, which opened in 1926 for the Sesquicentennial and held more than 120,000 fans later that year for Gene Tunney’s heavyweight victory over Jack Dempsey. Across the parking from the Wells Fargo Center lot was the Spectrum, which rivaled Madison Square Garden in the 1970s thanks to the fights put on by Hall of Fame promoter J. Russell Peltz. Philly fighters had the Arena on Market Street, the Blue Horizon on North Broad Street, and Convention Hall on 34th Street.

The city loved boxing and had more champions than just a fictional movie character. But the sport’s attraction seemed to fade, beginning with the legalization of casino gambling in Atlantic City as fights moved from South Philly to the boardwalk. It wasn’t rare for Philadelphians to become world champions, but it did become less likely that they would keep fighting in the city.

Garcia fought most of his title fights in Brooklyn, Fulton took his title last summer to Japan, and Hopkins made just one of his 20 middleweight-title defenses in his hometown. Hearn said the Wells Fargo Center would be the new home for Ennis, which would make him the rare Philly champ who fights in Philly.

“We need more fights in Philly. Hopefully, I’m a trendsetter,” Ennis said. “I feel like I can be that guy and bring boxing back to Philly. I have a fan-friendly style. Everyone loves when I fight. It’s always action. It’s entertainment. I have fun and I get the knockout. That’s what everyone wants to see. They want to see knockouts and they want to see me look good.”

Hearn sold 17,000 tickets last December when Devin Haney fought in San Francisco, the fighter’s hometown. Ennis fought on the January 2023 undercard of a Gervonta Davis fight that sold nearly 20,000 seats in Washington, a short drive from where Davis grew up in Baltimore. Fight night was a happening, packed with fans who wanted to see the hometown fighter and celebrities in the front row. Ennis felt that energy and thinks he can replicate it in Philadelphia.

“It’s going to mean everything to sell this place out, to win and to defend my belt in a knockout fashion,” Ennis said. “It’s going to be a dream come true. I always said I wanted to fight here and now I’m doing it.”

If July’s fight is a success, Ennis could return later this year to South Philly for a title unification fight. Selling those tickets, Hearn said, would be easy. Selling the first fight is the “tough bit.”

“This has to be his home,” Hearn said. “Everything stems from July 13. What I mean by that is the amount of people who are in the building and more importantly the performance. I can’t stand here and tell you this is the second coming of [Floyd] Mayweather or [Terence] Crawford or these guys and then you don’t go in there and look sensational. The pressure is on him to look sensational. If he goes in there and looks sensational on July 13, they’ll come back and come back again and this will end up being Boots Ennis’ home.”

There has been little doubt about Ennis’ ability as the 26-year-old has rarely been challenged as a professional. Ennis, who is trained by his father and graduated from Walter B. Saul High School in Roxborough, has earned 20 of his last 21 victories by stoppage. His latest win came in a 10th-round KO of Roiman Villa in Atlantic City last July. He has the skills to do everything in the ring, even fight southpaw.

But there has been doubt about his chances to secure title fights. The big bouts always seemed to elude him, so much that he finally secured a world championship last November only because the champion — Crawford — vacated the belt.

And that was part of the reason Ennis signed with Hearn’s Matchroom Boxing. Hearn said he first tried to sign Ennis five years ago. He wants Ennis to become the undisputed champion at 147 pounds before moving to junior middleweight, but the promoter could see him facing Crawford as early as December. That fight, Hearn said, is “the megafight of boxing” and he is confident it will happen.

“I definitely know that Eddie can make that, for sure,” Ennis said. “As soon as possible.”

Crowley, a 31-year-old from Canada, is a respectable opponent but still a long shot to leave Philadelphia as champion. For Ennis, the stiffer test could be at the box office. He appeared to throw the first punch last week, even stunning his promoter with how fast the pre-sale tickets sold. Ennis was a popular draw in Philly before his star took him elsewhere as he remembers the standing-room only crowd of 1,300 people who crammed into South Philly’s 2300 Arena in 2018 for his last hometown fight.

His next fight is nine weeks away and there are plenty more seats to fill. A Philly boxer is defending his title in Philly and he could have the fan base to give him a hometown advantage.

“The fans love Boots and like the way he fights,” said Ennis’ father, Bozy. “The majority of the time, he gets the knockout and you know that people love knockouts. I think Boots is going to bring them out. A lot of the others couldn’t do it. He’s going to bring them out. … It’ll be a beautiful thing to see. We’re back on the map.”