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Michael Rothstein, ESPN Staff Writer
Heather Hardy wanted one more shot at gold. A last chance at a championship. One final attempt at the type of payday the 41-year-old long had wanted but never received. Hardy, a former champion with only two losses over a pro career lasting more than a decade, made that clear after her last fight in February: Any titleholder from featherweight to lightweight, she was interested. One of those champions had history with Hardy intertwined through the fabric of Brooklyn boxing.
It was Hardy who gave Amanda Serrano a shot at the WBO featherweight title Hardy held in 2019.Hardy didn’t have to. She wanted to.
Serrano beat Hardy, yet never forgot the generosity. Serrano would return the opportunity — the first time in her career she personally reached out to ensure a fight would happen.
“For her to reach down the ladder and say, here, grab my hand, I got you on this one,” Hardy said. “You know what I’m saying?
“That’s a beautiful thing beyond boxing, it’s beyond sisterhood. It’s beyond woman to woman. It’s beyond, ‘I did something for you.’ It’s like, how can I best be used in this game?”
When Serrano and Hardy fight Saturday night for Serrano’s undisputed featherweight championship as the co-feature on the Jake Paul–Nate Diaz card in Dallas, it’ll represent multiple things: a record paycheck for Hardy in what surely will be a tough, high-action fight due to their styles, and the closing of an era in New York boxing, a memory of two of the most recognizable women fighters in history and a culmination of what they went through building for the future.
Serrano and Hardy were around when women’s boxing was a sideshow instead of the actual show, when they’d fight in early bouts, even before doors opened to fans for an event. Being on the main card then? Unlikely. Being one of the main attractions? Not going to happen.
It’s something Hardy never forgot. Something Serrano often speaks of, even now while fighting with Most Valuable Promotions, Paul’s promotional company, which has helped make her a millionaire.
Serrano remembers the old days, when no one would fight her, when no one even wanted to spar. Hardy always would. They, along with Serrano’s sister, Cindy, were kindred souls in a sport too often uninterested in them, where everything they did was difficult to accomplish.
“It was always our names in Brooklyn,” Serrano said. “Heather opened the doors for women to fight at the Barclays Center. She opened the door for [promoter Lou] DiBella to actually want to look into continuing to sign females.
“So it was us three and, yeah, I consider her my sister and it was always us.”
HARDY AND SERRANO use the same word to describe the majority of their careers: “struggle.” Everything was difficult. From convincing promoters to put either one of them on cards or explaining to so many who didn’t know that, yes, women fight and, yes, they are very, very good.
When they received a chance, it came with a caveat — in order for them to be on the card, they’d have to sell their own tickets. It’s a story of many women fighters in the early days of their careers, one with varying levels of success.
Talent didn’t matter then. Amanda and Cindy Serrano remember taking fights for $50 a round. Hardy remembers selling tickets for one fight — a lot of tickets — only to be moved so early in the card not many fans that bought her tickets could get into the venue in time to watch.
Hardy, an extrovert with a large, engaging personality, was a natural. She could go into a bar, gym or anywhere and convince people to buy tickets for one of her fights. The Serranos were different. They’re more introverted. Serrano and Cindy watched how Hardy operated. How she could go anywhere and sell tickets — and then how fans showed up to her fights en masse.
“She definitely motivated us at times where we knew we had to go out and sell tickets, go to places where we would get out of our comfort zone to actually sell tickets,” Serrano said. “It actually became easy.”
That included her first fight against Hardy, the co-feature of a Devin Haney card at the Theatre at Madison Square Garden. Selling tickets was commonplace for them by then, and Serrano says now people who bought tickets from her were likely doing it so they could watch Hardy.
They are, more than anything else, New York fighters. Saturday will be the second fight of Hardy’s career outside New York. Serrano’s career has taken her all around, but she often fights in either New York or Puerto Rico, where she was born and recently built a home.
“They were the OGs of women’s boxing in New York,” DiBella said. “…Those two girls, there was like a whole crew of really, really good women fighting in New York in total obscurity making zero money. And they fought each other and they knew each other and they cared and they had love for each other because they understood the struggle that they were both going through, they were all going through.
“They shared a struggle.”
BEFORE HARDY TURNED pro, DiBella started hearing about a tough fighter who could punch. Heard she could sell tickets as an amateur and fought in an aggressive style.
DiBella compares Hardy to Micky Ward now. Back then, DiBella didn’t really know. But he put Hardy in a four-round fight at the Roseland Ballroom against Mikayla Nebel in 2012.
“It was the fight of the night,” DiBella said. “And I loved it. It was a blood-and-guts, bloody fight. These two little girls beat the f— out of each other. I mean, even the other girl deserved the bonus that night.
“And I watched that and I said, ‘They’ve come a long way. They deserve at least some kind of attention.'”
When DiBella signed Hardy, one of her nicknames became “The First Lady,” because she was the first woman signed by DiBella, now one of the most prolific promoters of women’s boxing in the world.
DiBella believes he would have eventually pushed to sign women fighters at some point because he watched Lucia Rijker fight in the 1990s and saw the potential in the future. From the 1990s to Hardy, the thought remained in his head. Hardy’s impressive performance became DiBella’s leap into promoting women’s boxing. They’ve been together so long, DiBella considers Hardy a family member. DiBella is the only boxing promoter Hardy has ever had.
After Hardy turned professional, she and Serrano became sparring partners because Hardy didn’t have anyone to work with at her gym. Serrano and her sister “took her under her wing,” along with Serrano’s trainer and manager, Jordan Maldonado.
“She was tough as hell,” Serrano said. “She was the only one that kept coming back.”
Hardy jokes she “probably was the only girl who could take Amanda’s power and not cry, and I still came back for it.” If Hardy could survive Serrano in sparring, she could handle any fight. A mutual respect formed, a long-term understanding. Hardy said Maldonado helped secure sponsorships for her.
Hardy introduced Serrano to DiBella, who had heard of Serrano through New York boxing circles. DiBella signed Serrano, working with her and Hardy — two of the best women fighters DiBella ever had – for many years.
“Because of [Hardy], he figured it’s worth it and that’s how we came about. We could never forget that,” Maldonado said.”And because of that, this fight is happening. I don’t think there’s anybody out there that deserves this opportunity more.”
WHEN THEY FOUGHT in 2019, half of Hardy’s team was against it. Hardy wanted the best fights, the hardest fights, and she knew Serrano represented that. The two knew each other so well by then. Besides sparring and selling tickets together, they attended each other’s fights.
They aren’t best friends, but “it’s always been a fair back-and-forth,” Hardy said. “I want you to win so I can win.”
Hardy and Serrano were as close as fighters could be when the possibility always existed they could fight one another.
“When someone says to me, ‘I want to fight you,’ my heart won’t let me say no,” Hardy said. “Even though half my team was dead against it, I couldn’t not do it. It wasn’t even a matter of giving her a chance.
“She wanted to fight me. I was like, ‘All right, bet. Let’s do it.'”
Even though there was never an official agreement or even a handshake understanding the two would fight again after Serrano’s 2019 win, Serrano never forgot.
Hardy agreed to Serrano’s request in 2019, so when Hardy wanted the rematch this year, Serrano quickly reached out and Hardy accepted. Not only did Serrano return the opportunity Hardy gave her, she offered Hardy something almost unheard of.
At age 41, for the first time, Hardy will earn a six-figure payday — something she has always hoped for. Hardy also had three months to prepare so she could have a proper training camp.
“Amanda gave me three months, put the money out for me. She really, really went above and beyond,” Hardy said. “More than you would ever think a fighter would do for another fighter.”
This week might be an emotional one for Hardy and Serrano. Hardy joked she’ll probably cry a few times, in part because, according to her, she’s a crier. Serrano, who doesn’t often show emotion publicly, might reminisce, too.
Hardy and Serrano are two women on the back ends of their careers. They both acknowledge that. They’ve been at this for a long time, their lives and career connected in a profession that didn’t always want them, didn’t always accept them.
So, Saturday will be special for them. They’ll be in front of a pay-per-view audience, in a 20,000-seat arena expected to be packed. They’ll put their friendship aside for 10 rounds yet also be able to look across the ring and know, deep down, the reality. They’ll see someone who understands what it took to come out of Brooklyn as a fighter. Serrano and Hardy experienced women’s boxing when it was nothing and pushed to turn it into something. No matter what happens Saturday night, that will carry with them.
“This is a business, but we can also have friends outside of it,” Serrano said. “And then come together and be able to make money, and I’m happy we’re able to make money together.
“The struggle was definitely real and I’m glad to give back.”