44-year-old former WBO heavyweight champion Tommy “The Duke” Morrison has passed away in Omaha, Nebraska. Morrison died last night with his wife at his side. The cause of death hasn’t been revealed yet. Morrison started in the movie “Rocky V” with actor Sylvester Stallone. One of the top boxers in the late 80s and 90s, Morrison was said to have Gullain-Barre Syndrome, according to his wife Trisha.
Morrison tested positive for HIV back in 1996, which halted his promising boxing career. Morrison would later fight two more times in stopping John Castle in the 2nd round in 2007, and Matt Weishaar in the 3rdnd round in 2008. Morrison didn’t look good in the Weishaar fight, as he was badly out of breath before finally halting him.
Tambong, del Rosario, the former trainer of Rustico Torrecampo, thinks Manny Pacquiao (54-5-2, 38 KO’s) needs to be extra careful in his fight on November 23rd against Brandon Rios (31-1-1, 23 KO’s). Del Rosario’s concerns are that Pacquiao could hurt against Rios in the same way that he was in his 6th round knockout loss to Juan Manuel Marquez last December. 
(Photo credit: Stephanie Trapp/Showtime) Episode 2 of Mayweathr vs. Canelo ALL ACCESS will be aired on SHOWTIME tonight at 10 pm ET/7 pm PT for boxing fans to tune in check out the two fighters as they go about their paces to get ready for what they hope will be a record-breaking pay-per-view card on September 14th on SHOWTIME from the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada. Episode 1 of Mayweather-Canelo was a disappointment as far as viewing numbers go with it drawing only 225,000 viewers, and those are pretty dreadful numbers. 
(Photo credit: Naoki Fakuda) WBC featherweight champion Abner Mares (26-1-1, 14 KO’s) was stopped in the 1st round tonight by the hard hitting challenger Jhonny Gonzalez (55-8, 47 KO’s) at the StubHub Center in Carson, California. Gonzalez knocked Mares down twice with left hands near the end of the 1st round to get the stoppage. Referee Jack Reiss called a halt to the fight after the second knockdown, even though Mares was getting back up, and probably would have been able to make it out of the round. That’s the controversial part of it. Mares only had to stay on his feet for a short amount of time and he would have made it to the end of the round. 
Light heavyweight contender Andrzej Fonfara (24-2, 14 KO’s) kept himself in position for a title shot by defeating 34-year-old veteran Gabriel Campillo (22-6-1, 9 KO’s) by a 9th round stoppage on Friday night at the U.S. Cellular Field, in Chicago, Illinois, USA. Campillo was pretty much finished in the 8th round after getting hit with a right hand that hurt him by Fonfara. 
Mike Alvarado (34-1, 23 KO’s) and the recently beaten Ruslan Provodnikov (22-2, 15 KO’s) have reportedly agreed to terms for a fight televised by HBO on October 19th at the First Bank Center, Denver, Colorado, USA. Top Rank finalized the deal, according to Yahoo Sports. 
Keith Thurman (21-0, 19 KO’s) won an impressive 10th round TKO victory over the tough as nails Argentinian Diego Chaves (22-1, 18 KO’s) last Saturday night in San Antonio, Texas to win the interim WBA 147 lb. title. Instead of targeting WBA champ Adrien Broner, Thurman wants to fight #1 WBA, Marcos Maidana next. 
#9 IBF, #10 WBC, Curtis Stevens (24-3, 17 KO’s) is a strong possible opponent for WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin’s next fight on November 2nd in New York, according to Steve Kim. Golovkin’s promoters at K2 are interested in matching him against Britain’s Martin Murray, but that fight likely won’t happen.