The last few days have seem a flurry of fights being booked on all levels of the sport. Chief among them is a rescheduled date for Zolani Tete’s postponed title defense against Omar Narvaez onto an already established card. We also have a potential return month and opponent for Naoya Inoue, a Sho Extreme prelims card, Hughie Fury, and more.
- Middleweight contender and IBF mandatory challenger Sergiy Derevyanchenko (11-0, 9 KOs) has picked up a stay busy fight on the pre-television undercard of Deontay Wilder’s WBC heavyweight title defense against Luis Ortiz on March 3rd. He will meet Floridian journeyman Dashon Johnson (22-22-3, 7 KOs) in a fight clearly designed to get him some easy work while waiting for his title shot. Derevyanchenko has not fought since stopping Tureano Johnson in August.
- Sho Extreme prelims are coming back from the dead a week later on March 10th. The main card is a tripleheader on Showtime main evented by Mikey Garcia’s shot at a world title in a fourth weight class against Sergey Lipinets, but now the complete broadcast has picked up more fights beforehand. Junior welterweight prospect Mario Barrios (22-0, 12 KOs) will meet Dominican Eudy Bernardo (23-2, 17 KOs) and his inflated record in a typical Barrios fight in one of the two fights. Much more exciting is a showdown between established lightweight contender Richard Commey (25-2, 22 KOs) and unbeaten prospect Alejandro Luna (26-0, 22 KOs). That fight is also an IBF eliminator for a shot at Robert Easter Jr, a man Commey has already had an entertaining fight with in a very narrow loss.
- Talented but repeatedly self defeating junior welterweight Antonio Orozco (26-0, 17 KOs) has a return date of March 16th. Orozco missed weight in November of last year and December of 2016 for fights that should have been major steps forward but instead were canceled. Now he is being put on the lowest slot possible on Golden Boy’s smallest cards, off-television on a LA Fight Club show. This is probably to see if he can still make junior welterweight and it makes sense, but it also feels like an intentional punishment of a talented fighter. When an opponent is named, it will certainly be as soft of a touch as possible given the placement of the fight.
- Speaking of Golden Boy, they have finalized a main event for their March 22nd “Golden Boy on ESPN” date. 19 year old super prospect Ryan Garcia (13-0, 12 KOs) will be getting his first career main event against Mexican journeyman Fernando Vargas (32-15-3, 24 KOs). This is a shit main event, of course, but Golden Boy is using their ESPN series in such a way that seeing their top young prospects in action is the best we can really hope for to see. Unlike Top Rank, they are still featuring their top fighters on HBO. This will be Garcia’s first scheduled ten round fight. Middling Golden Boy welterweights KeAndre Gibson (18-1-1, 7 KOs) and Eddie Gomez (20-3, 11 KOs) will look for a relatively big win against one another in the co-main event.
- Zolani Tete’s (26-3, 21 KOs) recently postponed bantamweight title defense against ageless Argentinian contender Omar Narvaez (48-2-2, 25 KOs) has been rescheduled. It will no longer main event its own show, but instead will become a great co-main event for Carl Frampton’s upcoming fight with Nonito Donaire in Belfast on April 21st. That is a much, much better show now for it too.
- Young, 23 year old heavyweight Hughie Fury (20-1, 10 KOs) is returning from his first career title shot and loss on May 12th. He will be stepping back down to domestic level to meet Sam Sexton (25-3, 9 KOs) for the British belt. Fury could use a strong, confident showing here as his strange decision to largely run against Joseph Parker did not endear him to the boxing world to say the least even if he did have an argument to win the decision in the end.
- A vague May date is being discussed for pound for pound elite Naoya Inoue’s (15-0, 13 KOs) bantamweight debut at home in Japan. His opponent is looking likely to be Jamie McDonnell (29-2-1, 13 KOs). The Englishman is a respectable opponent, but unfortunately he is likely being chosen to be billed as a world titleholder. He isn’t one. His WBA belt is made illegitimate by Ryan Burnett’s “super” version in the same weight class. Still, he’s a good opponent for Inoue and one Japan already knows as he twice beat Tomoki Kameda in 2015.
- Finally, the World Boxing Super Series team has delayed the super middleweight tournament finals fight a month longer than expected, but it is a wise move. They have secured the 02 Arena in London for June 2nd. Given that there is guaranteed to be a British fighter in the finals and may very well be two, this makes all the sense in the world. The semi-finals will play out over the next three weeks with George Groves versus Chris Eubank Jr first followed by Callum Smith versus Juergen Braehmer.
