Saturday’s HBO Boxing After Dark® telecast begins at 10:20 p.m. ET/PT. Opening the telecast from Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas is Francisco Vargas battling Stephen Smith in a 10-round super featherweight fight.
Leading up to the main event, Tevin Farmer takes on Kenichi Ogawa in a 12-round bout for the junior lightweight world title.
Top Rank promoter Bob Arum is already looking past his fighter Vasyl ‘Hi-Tech’ Lomachenko’s fight against Guillermo Rigondeaux this weekend towards a rematch between Lomachenko and Orlando Salido. Lomachenko (9-1, 7 KOs) suffered his only pro career loss to Salido in 2014 in losing a 12 round split decision, and the loss marred his perfect record. Salido (44-13-4, 31 KOs) is now 37-years-old, and clearly not the same fighter he was in 2014, but that doesn’t matter to Arum.