By Dan Ambrose: In what will sure to surprise a lot of boxing fans, Robert Guerrero (31-2-1, 18 KO’s) will be by far the highest paid fighter on Saturday’s Showtime fight card from the StubHub Center in Carson, California. Guerrero, 31, will be getting $1 million for his fight against little known contender Yoshihiro Kamegai (24-1-1, 21 KO’s) for their non-title fight.
According to Steve Kim, Guerrero is getting the $1 million because of his deal to fight Floyd Mayweather Jr last May included a minimum for his return fight.
That’s pretty wild because of the way that Guerrero was beaten, he doesn’t seem to be in the same league as the other guys in the division in terms of talent. We just saw Marcos Maidana give Mayweather all kinds of problems in their recent fight.
Guerrero’s opponent Kamegai will be getting just $75,000 for the fight, which obviously far below Guerrero’s money to the point where it doesn’t seem fair to him.
Here are the other purses on the card according to Dan Rafael of ESPN:
Vasyl Lomachenko $631,500
Gary Russell Jr $421,000
Devon Alexander $450,000
Jesus Soto Karass $150,000
Chad Dawson $15,000 (but loses $3K in fines for coming in overweight)
George Blades $20,000
What’s kind of surprising is how little Chad Dawson is getting for his fight against George Blades. Dawson was recently knocked out twice in losses to Andre Ward and Adonis Stevenson, but he’s had by far a better career than Guerrero has in terms of being the best fighter in his own weight class. Guerrero was never the best guy while fighting at featherweight, super featherweight, lightweight and welterweight. There was always at least 1-3 guys better than him in those weight classes, and yet he’s getting $1 million and Dawson just $15,000.
Lomachenko has a record of 1-1, and it’s shocking that he’s getting $631,500 for his fight against Russell Jr. It seems like Lomoachenko is getting paid for what he did as an amateur in winning two Olympic gold medals in the 2008 and 2012 Olympics rather the promise he’s shown in the pro ranks. He was beaten by Orlando Salido in his last fight in March in losing a 12 round split decision and now he’s getting another world title shot.
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