Arum: Chavez Jr. will fight on June 22nd on HBO; Vera and Macklin possibilities

By Boxing News - 03/14/2013 - Comments

chavez675By Dan Ambrose: Top Rank promoter Bob Arum says his fighter former WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (46-1-1, 32 KO’s) will be back in the ring on June 22nd against possibly Brian Vera or Matthew Macklin in a fight that will be televised by HBO from Texas.

The interesting part about this is Golden Boy Promotions is also scheduled to have a fight televised by HBO on the same night between WBA World welterweight champion Paulie Malignaggi and WBC lightweight champion Adrien Broner.

These fights can’t happen on the same network on the same night because they’re different promotional shows. One of them will either have to fight on Showtime or look for another date.

Arum said to esnewsreporting.com “We wanted him [Chavez Jr] to fight on June 15th. The Nevada Commission took the position that the suspension doesn’t run out until the morning of June 16th. Instead, HBO is giving him the date of June 22nd, and we’re going to do the fight in Texas. Lou [Dibella] has a fighter [Macklin]; [Brian] Vera had some victories.”
There’s no way Chavez Jr. will be fighting on the same HBO broadcast as

Broner-Malignaggi. One of these two fights is going to have to be moved, and my guess it’s going to be the lesser fight involving Chavez Jr. His fight is going to be a mismatch anyway involving Vera or Macklin, so he shouldn’t mind having his fight moved off to another date or network.

Chavez Jr. has been looking really heavy recently in his training photos. He tweeted photos of himself working out on a stairmaster and a treadmill yesterday, and looked to be at least 200 pounds. My guess is he’s weighing in the neighborhood of 210. He’s huge. He’s got three months to take off the weight, but he’s still likely to be at least 190 when he steps inside the ring on June 22nd to face Vera or Macklin.

I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t make weight for the fight. It won’t matter all that much because this isn’t a title fight given that he lost his WBC middleweight title in his last fight against Sergio Martinez last year in September. Chavez Jr. is still serving out his suspension for that fight for failing the post-fight drug test after testing positive for Marijuana.

Chavez Jr. will have little problems with Vera and Macklin. Those guys can’t move very much, and they tend to come right at you. Vera might come into the fight weighing in the 180s, but it won’t matter. He’s not in Chavez Jr’s class and he’ll get taken out.



Comments are closed.