By Huck Allen: Teofimo Lopez has agreed to Triller Fight Club’s decision to move his October 4th title defense against George Kambosos Jr. to October 16th at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. Teofimo, a New York native, will be fighting in front of his hometown fans in Brooklyn.
It’s the smart move for Teofimo and Triller to move off the October 4th date, as they couldn’t stay given the competition that night.
ESPN’s Mike Coppinger is reporting the news of the new date for the Teofimo-Kambosos fight. It’s one that’s needed, as there was no way that Teofimo vs. Kambosos Jr could stay on the Monday, October 4th date because of the Oakland Raiders vs. San Diego Chargers football game that is taking place on the same night.
Had Teofimo stayed on the date, his pay-per-view match with Kambosor would have brought in far fewer buys because of the heavy competition from the Raiders-Chargers game.
Teofimo wants to enjoy some of the PPV upside that will come from his fight bringing in many buys, but that wouldn’t happen if he stubbornly stayed on the October 4th date.
Teofimo (16-0, 12 KOs) has inked a contract agreeing to the move to the new October 16th date, and he’s waiting for his opponent Kambosos Jr. (19-0, 10 KOs) to sign his contract to agree.
Now, Triller and Teofimo are waiting for Kambosos to sign, and hopefully, he doesn’t refuse. If so, it’ll be interesting to see what their next move will be.
“I want the best for my son, and I think this is the big stage for him. Fighting Oct. 4 would have f—— killed us,” Lopez Sr., said to ESPN about Teofimo vs. Kambosos competing with the Oakland Raiders vs. San Diego Chargers game on that date.
“I think this is the right thing to do,” said Teofimo Sr.”Money is not everything. The money will come. Exposure is more important than everything in the world right now.”
Teofimo must get this fight against Kambosos Jr. out of the way as quickly as possible so that he can move on with his career. Obviously, in hindsight, Teofimo and his dad likely would have done things differently, and they can’t let this drag out into November or December, as it’s been a real time-waster for Teofimo.
This will be the fifth time the Teofimo-Kambosos Jr. fight has been moved since it was first scheduled. Teofimo may not have realized what he was getting himself into when he chose to take his battle with Kambosos Jr. to a purse bid rather than agreeing to the money Top Rank was offering him.
“It’s unfortunate we had many bumps in the road,” said Triller CEO Ryan Kavanaugh to ESPN. “If it was easy, everyone would do it. Typically in our experience, the most challenging turns out to be the most rewarding.”
While Teo is making $4 million with his decision to take it to a purse bid, it also caused him to lose a year of his career.
Teofimo likely would have made more money in the last year if he’d NOT forced a purse bid. he could have fought two more and probably ended up with more than $4 million.
According to ESPN, Triller will be losing $100,000 from a deposit they gave Madison Square Garden to stage the Teofimo vs. Kambosos fight there on October 4th. Of course, that’s nothing compared to the money they’ve spent with all the moves.
Teofimo, 24, is coming off a massive 12 round decision win over Vasily Lomachenko last October to become the undisputed lightweight champion.
That was a win that was supposed to catapult Teofimo into superstardom, but instead, he’s been trapped in this IBF mandatory defense against Kambosos.
This is not a big high-level fight, as far as Americans are concerned. That’s why Teofimo needs to get it out of the way so that he can move on to bigger fights against Josh Taylor or whoever Teo wants to fight.