Adviser Al Haymon signed former 3 division world champ Abner Mares (27-1-1, 14 KOs) to a contract on Thursday. Mares is still trying to rebuild his career, so Haymon might be able to assist him in getting him some more tune-up fights and then eventually a world title shot.
Mares’ contract with Golden Boy Promotions reportedly expires in November, and it’s unknown at this point whether he’ll stay with them or move on to another promoter like Mayweather Promotions.
Lucian Bute (31-2, 24 KOs) will be looking to pick up the broken pieces of his career when he fights on December 6th at the Bell Centre in Montreal, Canada. Bute, a former IBF super middleweight champion, doesn’t have an opponent for the 12/6 date yet, but his promoters are working on it. Bute, 34, is expected to be facing a high quality fighter.
Bute lost his last fight in January to Jean Pascal by a 12 round unanimous decision. Bute put in a woeful performance in that fight by failing to take the fight to Pascal and let his hands go.
IBF welterweight champion Kell Brook’s promoter Eddie Hearn says that former IBF/WBA 140 pound champion Amir Khan (29-3, 19 KOs) is interested in facing Brook next year. Hearn says he wants to schedule the Brook vs. Khan fight next summer in 2015, and possibly stage at Wembley Stadium.
If that’s the case, Brook will have a chance to defend his title 1-2 times before he faces Khan. Hearn once again is saying that Khan-Brook will be as big as the Carl Froch vs. George Groves 2 fight that took place last May at Wembley Stadium in London. Hearn thinks it will sell out the 80,000 seat stadium.
IBF lightweight champion Miguel Vazquez (34-3, 13 KOs) plans on using his boxing skills, long reach and movement to beat fringe contender Mickey Bey (20-1-1, 10 KOs) in their fight on September 13th on the undercard of the Floyd Mayweather Jr vs. Marcos Maidana rematch at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada.
The fight card will be televised on Showtime pay-per-view, and the Vazquez-Bey fight will be one of the fights that makes it onto the televised portion of the card.
On Thursday, the Nevada State Athletic Commission has selected Kenny Bayless as the referee for the Floyd Mayweather Jr vs. Marcos Maidana rematch on September 13th at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada. The previous referee that worked the Mayweather-Maidana I fight was Tony Weeks, who Mayweather was unhappy with because he failed to control the fouling that Maidana did throughout their 12 round bout. Mayweather felt that Weeks had an off night.
The Commission also appointed the following judges for the fight: Dave Moretti, Guido Cavalleri and John McKaie. Hopefully, the judges will score the fight well and not come up with some wild scores like we’ve seen recently with other judges.
After 10 years as a pro, Britain’s Paul Smith (35-3, 20 KOs) will finally be getting a world title shot against WBO super middleweight champion Arthur Abraham (40-4, 28 KOs) on September 27th in Germany.
Whether Smith actually deserves the title shot is debatable, as he’s won four fights against soft opposition since his 2nd round knockout loss to George Groves in 2011. On paper, the 31-year-old Smith doesn’t have much of a chance of winning, because he’s lost each time he’s tried to take a step up during his career in defeats against Groves and James DeGale.
IBF/WBA light heavyweight champion Bernard Hopkins (55-6-2, 32 KOs) thinks that some boxing fans are hoping to a high degree that WBO light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev (25-0-1, 23 KOs) will knock him out in their unification fight on November 8th in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
Hopkins believes for some fans, they’ve circled their wagons around Kovalev and embraced him as the guy that can finally put him down after all these years and put him in his place by showing him that he should have retired like they wanted to.
(Photo credit: Goosen Promotions) Former WBA 154 pound champion Austin Trout (26-2, 14 KOs) successfully weighed in on Thursday for his fight on Friday night against #15 WBA Daniel Dawson (40-3-1, 26 KOs) at the Pechanga Resort & Casino, in Temecula, California, USA. The 36-year-old Dawson also weighed in at 154 pounds and looked in good shape.
Trout is counting on looking good on Friday night in beating Dawson in an impressive manner. Trout wants to show boxing fans that he’s the same fighter he was before his consecutive losses to Saul “Canelo” Alvarez and Erislandy Lara in 2013. Trout blames those losses on him not fighting his game.
Ricky Burns (31-4-1, 11 KOs) will be hunting for his 3rd division world title next year at light welterweight. He’s given up on the idea of saying at 135 due to the problems he’s been having in making weight for the class.
Burns and his manager Alex Morrison feel that a move up to light welterweight will result in Burns having the strength and energy that has recently abandoned him. Burns is scheduled to fight for the first time at 140 on October 4th in Leeds.
Former three division world champion Adrien Broner (28-1, 22 KOs) doesn’t see either Amir Khan or IBF welterweight champion Kell Brook as being able to beat him. Broner feels he beat both of them if he shared the same ring with them.
When asked by esnewsreporting who would win between Khan and Brooks, Broner said “I don’t give an [expletive], neither of them could beat me.”
Khan and Brooks are in the welterweight division; whereas Broner fights at 140. Broner is currently on a different path than those guys because he’s already captured a world title at 147, and he’s now looking to win a world title at 140. After that, Broner wants to unify all the light welterweight belts before he decides what his next move is.