Thurman vs. Tszyu in Serious Doubt After Keith’s Biceps Injury

Thurman vs. Tszyu in Serious Doubt After Keith's Biceps Injury
By Tim Compton - 03/18/2024 - Comments

Keith Thurman has suffered a bicep injury, which will put his main event fight against junior middleweight Tim Tszyu in doubt for March 30th on Prime PPV at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.

Thaboxingvoice reports that the 35-year-old Thurman (30-1, 22 KOs) suffered a biceps Injury and will have an MRI test today to determine whether he’ll be able to continue the 12-round fight against Tszyu (24-0, 17 KOs).

The MRI will determine Thurman’s fate and perhaps the PBC-promoted event on March 30th. With only 12 days to go before March 30th, there’s not a lot of time for Thurman to heal from a biceps injury, especially at his advanced age. He’s not young and hasn’t stayed active in the last seven years.

Finding a Replacement

PBC had to have foreseen Thurman’s possible injury when they put this fight together for the main event, but it’s still not ideal to have him pull out. Tszyu isn’t a big name in the U.S., so he would need a popular fighter with whom casual boxing fans are familiar to step in as the short-notice substitute.

Finding a high-quality replacement is difficult because of the time required to negotiate and the difficulties that Tszyu would have with preparing.

One obvious choice would be the fearless welterweight champion Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis, who is already training, young and ambitious, willing to fight anyone. While Boots would likely agree to the fight, Tszyu and his management might not feel the same.

Given Terence Crawford’s purse requirements, he’s not a realistic replacement to face Tszyu, especially if he’s asking for 10 to 15 million. That kind of money isn’t available for this level of fight.

The co-feature fight on the March 30th PPV card between WBA light welterweight champion Rolando ‘Rolly’ Romero and Isaac ‘Pitbull’ Cruz isn’t a big enough fight to attract viewers to purchase the event on pay-per-view.

Rolly is considered the weakest link among champions at 140 and illegitimate after he captured his WBA title against 40-year-old Ismael Barroso last July.