By Chris Williams: The contracts have been signed for the May 12th fight between WBA World lightweight champion Jorge Linares (44-3, 27 KOs) and Top Rank fighter Vasyl Lomachenko (10-1, 8 KOs) for a contest that will be televised on ESPN at Madison Square Garden in New York.
By Jim Dower: Golden Boy Promotions president Eric Gomez says the fight between WBA lightweight champion Jorge Linares (44-3, 27 KOs) and Vasyl Lomachenko (10-1, 8 KOs) is still not done for May 12th.
By Chris Williams: Golden Boy Promotions president Eric Gomez is working on a compromise with Top Rank and ESPN to stage the important lightweight clash between WBA champion Jorge Linares and Vasyl Lomachenko on May 12th at Madison Square Garden in New York.
By Chris Williams: Jorge Linares says he’s going to tell his promoters at Golden Boy Promotions to make the fight with Vasyl Lomachenko for May 12th for the sake of boxing,. Linares (44-3, 27 KOs) is insisting Golden Boy put the fight together with the Top Rank promoted Lomachenko (10-1, 8 KOs) for May 12 on ESPN, even though by doing so, Golden Boy would be competing with themselves due to them having the Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez vs. Gennady ‘GGG’ Golovkin replay taking place on the same night on HBO.
By Chris Williams: Top Rank boss Bob Arum doesn’t look like he’s going to get his wish to schedule his fighter Vasyl Lomachenko (10-1, 8 KOs) against WBA World lightweight champion Jorge Linares (44-3, 27 KOs) on May 12th on ESPN like they were hoping.
By Jeff Aranow: Last Saturday night’s doubleheader on ESPN between WBO super middleweight champion Gilberto ‘Zurdo’ Ramirez and Habib Ahmed in the main event and IBF World super flyweight champion Jerwin ‘Pretty Boy’ Ancjas vs. Israel Gonzalez in the co-feature bout averaged 741,000 viewers on ESPN, according to news from the Nielsen Media Research. The fight card took place at the Bank of America Center in Corpus Christi, Texas.
By Chris Williams: Bob Arum says he’s planning on staging the Jeff Horn vs. Terence Crawford fight for April 21 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Horn (18-0-1, 12 KOs) will be defending his WBO welterweight title against mandatory challenger Crawford (32-0, 23 KOs).
By Chris Williams: Scott Quigg (34-1-2, 25 KOs) will do the job on WBO featherweight champion Oscar Valdez (23-0, 19 KOs), says trainer Freddie Roach. The negotiations for the Valdez-Quigg fight are still being finalized. Valdez’s promoter Bob Arum of Top Rank views Quigg as “good competition” for the 27-year-old Valdez, but he thinks he’ll win.
By Jim Dower: WBO welterweight champion Jeff Horn’s successful title defense against challenger Gary Corcoran on December 13 brought in excellent viewing numbers on ESPN despite the early morning hours the fight was televised on in the U.S. Horn vs. Corcoran averaged 284,000 viewers on ESPN in the U.S, according to Dan Rafael.
By Matt Stein: Former junior middleweight contender James Kirkland (25-0, 22 KO’s) will be getting released early from prison next month on September 17th instead of the original release date of October 2nd, according to Dan Rafael of ESPN. This is going to please a lot of boxing fans of Kirkland, as he was poised for a shot at one of the junior middleweight titles a year ago when he was arrested in Austin, Texas a year ago after a gun was found in his vehicle. Having a gun in his car wouldn’t have been such a big deal had Kirkland not already served time in the past for armed robbery.