British boxing great Carl Froch says WBO Middleweight King Billy Joe Saunders has the skills to take out Kazakh middleweight king Gennady Golovkin.
Froch, a four-time super-middleweight world champion, refuses to jump on the GGG bandwagon and has backed the undefeated Saunders to prove he is the world’s true middleweight champion.
Sullivan Barrera (17-0) and Andre Ward (28-0) are scheduled to fight each other this Saturday at the Oracle Arena in Oakland, Ward’s hometown. Barrera, an ex-Cuban amateur who turned pro in 2009, is the mandatory challenger for Sergey Kovalev’s IBF title but he will fight Ward instead who is rated fourth after one fight at light heavyweight. The Cuban is advertised as an amateur standout but the last time he stood out was back in the year 2000 when he won the World Junior Championship.
Olympic Bronze Medalist Andre Dirrell (24-2, 16 KOs) takes on Australia’s Blake Caparello (22-1-1, 6 KOs) in a 10-round super middleweight attraction as Premier Boxing Champions (PBC) returns to Spike on Friday, April 29 from Taj Mahal Casino and Hotel in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Also on the same card, Dirrell’s brother, former world champion Anthony “The Dog” Dirrell (28-1-1, 22 KOs) will meet former world title challenger Caleb “Golden” Truax (26-2-2, 16 KOs) in a 10-round super middleweight affair as part of an exciting night of PBC on Spike action beginning at 9 p.m. ET/8 p.m. CT.
World Boxing Association (WBA) Interim Cruiserweight World champion Beibut Shumenov (16-2, 10 KOs) is targeting the May 21st unification title winner between WBA titlist Denis Lebedev (28-2, 21 KOs) and International Boxing Federation (IBF) champion Victor Emilio “El Tyson de Abasto” Ramirez (22-2-1, 17 KOs). When Shumenov defeated B.J. Flores (31-1-1, 20 KOs) last July in Las Vegas, the former WBA light heavyweight champion became WBA Interim champion as well as its No. 1 mandatory contender.
British great Herol Graham – widely recognized as one of the finest fighters of recent years never to have won a world title – is currently in hospital, battling complications that arose from a burst appendix, so reports The Sheffield Star. The former British, Commonwealth and European king who retired with a 48-6(28) record in 1998 – after a stoppage loss to Charles Brewer in what was the ludicrously talented southpaw’s third crack at world glory – has been given a boost by way of hospital visits from the likes of Frank Bruno, Colin McMillan and other British boxing stars.
Superstar Manny Pacquiao, a once vicious, unstoppable whirlwind of a fighter, has heard the criticism thrown his way for not scoring a knockout victory in quite some time (Pac-Man’s last stoppage win coming over Miguel Cotto back in 2009) – and the former multi-weight king has an explanation: he is not a welterweight.
Despite having fought in the 147-pound division for some time – included amongst his welterweight bouts the highest grossing fight in history with Floyd Mayweather Junior – 37-year-old Pacquiao, 57-6-2(38) told ESPN Deportes he is really a natural 140-pounder who could still make lightweight if he really wanted to. This, Pac-Man says, accounts for his long string of KO-less fights.
Recently crowned WBA heavyweight titlist Lucas Browne, who made history by becoming the first Australian to win a portion of the world heavyweight title with his stunning stoppage win over Ruslan Chagaev, is today seeking legal advice after reports surfaced saying he failed a drugs test.
According to a story broken by ESPN.com and subsequently picked up by a vast number of publications and web sites, Browne tested positive for the metabolism booster, Clenbuterol. Browne, responding to the report via his Twitter page, insists he knows nothing about these events and that he will seek the advice of a lawyer immediately.
Stephen “The Rock” Ormond crushed Marcos Leonardo Jimenez over ten one-side rounds, en route to unanimous decision victory, 100-90 on all three scorecards in the main event. Ormond with the victory, obtained the vacant lightweight IBF intercontinental title and upped his record to 21-2, 11 KOs. He has won four in a row while Jimenez dropped to 21-7, 14 KOs.
Ormond pressed the action and connected on whatever he wanted, especially in the last couple of rounds. He landed several extremely powerful combinations on Jimenez throughout this fight that badly staggered him and it appeared that he would knockout Jimenez, but Jimenez somehow hung in there and didn’t go down. Jimenez deserved a great deal of credit for not getting knocked down from all the punishment that he absorbed from Ormond’s punches. Jimenez; however, was unable to sustain any effective offensive output to turn this fight around.
LOS ANGELES (March 21, 2016) – Before WBC, Ring Magazine and Lineal Middleweight World Champion, Canelo Alvarez (46-1-1, 32 KOs) and former two-time world champion Amir “King” Khan (31-3, 19 KOs) step into the ring at the new T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on Saturday, May 7 for the biggest fight of 2016 thus far, three hard-hitting bouts have been confirmed to get fight fans ready for the main event.
Canada’s biggest boxing star and former IBF Middleweight World Champion David Lemieux (34-3, 31 KOs) will be looking to make an impression and use his power against the swift contender from Passaic, New Jersey, Glen “Jersey Boy” Tapia (23-2, 15 KOs) in a 10-round middleweight co-main event.
Hughie Fury, cousin of heavyweight ruler Tyson Fury, has a busy schedule planned; with two fights set for the next month. The unbeaten 22-year-old who is currently 18-0(10) will face a TBA on April 30th but this Saturday, durable, never stopped Dominick Guinn will face the contender on very short notice.
Nagy Aguilera was to have fought Fury – who has just signed a deal with promoter Frank Warren but will still work with Mick Hennessey also – but he pulled out injured, leaving the respective promoters of Fury to find a late replacement foe.