(Photo credit: Ed Mulholland/HBO) By Chris Williams: The winner of tonight’s fight between Diego Chaves (23-1, 19 KOs) and Brandon Rios (31-2-1, 23 KOs) won’t be getting a world title shot, of course, but they could face former WBO light welterweight world champion Ruslan Provodnikov (23-3, 16 KOs). Top Rank is interested in matching Provodnikov against the winner of the Chaves-Rios fight.
It’s unclear whether the winner of that fight would get another crack at Manny Pacquiao, but I wouldn’t be surprised. There’s not much else for Bob Arum to match Pacquiao up against, so we could see Rios get a second shot at him if he runs the table and beats both Chaves and Provodnikov.