By Dan Ambrose: The proposed date for the HBO pay-per-view fight between IBF/WBA/WBO light heavyweight champion Sergey “Krusher” Kovalev (29-0-1, 26 KOs) and Andre Ward (28-0, 15 KOs) is November 19. However, Ward will need to win his next fight against unbeaten Sullivan Barrera (17-0, 12 KOs) on March 26 at the Oracle Arena in Oakland, California.
Kovalev doesn’t have a fight scheduled yet after his second win over Jean Pascal last January. Kovalev will need to fight again unless he wants to wait for Ward’s fight against Barrera to get done next month and go straight into that fight.
Ward is going by the impression that he his fight against Barrera will be his first fight of his three-fight contract with HBO rather than his second fight. Ward’s first fight of his contract was supposed to have taken place last November, but Ward pulled out of the fight.
There seems to be some disagreement between Ward and HBO about whether he already used up one fight by pulling out of the November fight. If Ward gets his way with HBO, then he’ll get another fight after the Barrera fight to get a second payday and another tune-up to get ready for the Kovalev fight.
“That fight was supposed to be Ward’s first bout of a three-fight deal with HBO,” Dan Rafael said at ESPN.com. “However, because the fight was canceled, Ward’s team and HBO have battled over whether the March 26 fight is the first fight of the deal or the second. HBO’s position was that March 26 is the second and that the third fight should be the one against Kovalev. Ward’s position is that since the November bout did not happen, March 26 should be the first fight, and he should get a second fight, and the accompanying seven-figure payday, before facing Kovalev.”
I’ll be surprised if HBO counts the Barrera fight as the first one of Ward’s three-fight contract. It puts HBO in a bad position if Ward keeps getting hurt and keeps pulling out of fights in the future.
The working date for #KovlaevWard is Nov. 19 but, of course, they both have work to do first. #boxing
— Dan Rafael (@danrafaelespn) February 10, 2016
If HBO counts the Barrera fight as the first one of Ward’s three-fight contract with the company, then it’s going to put a lot pressure on Ward to stay healthy long enough for him to get the third fight of his HBO contract in 2016. With Ward’s history of injuries, he’ll be under a lot of pressure to try and stay healthy for two more fights before he finally faces Kovalev in late 2016.
With all the time that it took Ward and his promoters at Roc Nation Sports to get the Barrera fight negotiated, I think it’s highly possible that Ward’s next fight after Barrera will take a considerable amount of time to get the fight put together. This means that the chances of HBO getting the Kovalev-Ward fight in 2016 aren’t so good. It’s in HBO’s best interest to have the Barrera fight be Ward’s second fight of his three-fight contract and the Kovalev fight be the third on November 19th, provided that Ward can stay healthy enough to make that fight.
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