Speaker 1: The countdown is on to fight time. This is Big
Fight Weekend. No, here is your host? TJ leaves.
Speaker 2: Well, it's a weekend that has world title fights in Dublin,
Ireland and also in Anaheim, California, by the way, and
we're ready to preview it, and we got tons of fight.
Speaker 1: News to get to.
Speaker 2: It is the Big Fight Weekend preview pod. I am
the somewhat lucid host, although I don't know how lucid.
TJ reeves. Hello to Big Dan Rayphiel. He's had an
interesting week. There will be lawyers. What did Shakespeare say?
Speaker 3: First thing?
Speaker 1: We do kill all the lawyers. Nonetheless, good to be
with you.
Speaker 2: Ready to preview some fights, talk about some news head
to the weekend. We got March madness. I'll explain more
about that in a moment. But how are things are you?
Are you off the phone with one eight hundred? I'll
sue you or whatever else you for legal advice? All
these law firms and everybody else. I have time to
do the pod or you're done with the lawyers for
at least a little while.
Speaker 3: Here I am. I've talked to more lawyers this week.
I mean I talked to lawyers in boxing all the time,
but I talked to more this week in the last
few days. Then if you took like managers, promoters and
fighters and combined them, unfortunate.
Speaker 1: And we should mention you're not in legal trouble yourself.
Speaker 2: You're actually being sought out, including by an anonymous number.
Speaker 1: We got to get to this.
Speaker 2: We got to get to this about Jiyopataia and you're
being sought out about lawyers.
Speaker 1: So more on that in a few minutes.
Speaker 2: Thank you for finding us on the pod feed as
we're previewing going into the weekend. Full disclosure, I am
headed to Las Vegas, where this weekend I'm on the
college basketball call of the Mountain West Conference title. Raypael
only cares about Duke and the ACC title. Correct this
weekend in Charlotte, I am in Vegas, Big Dan Thomas
and Mack Center Mountain West Conference title game.
Speaker 1: I'm on the live call Saturday.
Speaker 2: Will it be the likes of Utah State, New Mexico,
San Diego State, who wins that tournament goes to the
NCAA Tournament. Maybe they end up planning Duke somewhere down
the road. So I'm headed to Vegas for the weekend,
but we're getting the pod out in the preview mode.
So the first mention here, we will not have a
recap podcast because of all the crazy college basketball and
selection Sunday and me traveling back from Vegas. But we
will hear from you and one time Keith Thurman on
Sunday night on this podfeed. That's why you got to
be subscribed up peeps, Apple, Spreaker, Spotify, rate us and
review us Big Dan and Keith Thurman prior to the
Sebastian Fundora fight upcoming later this month here on the
pot feed coming on.
Speaker 3: He was loquacious, always always.
Speaker 2: We love one one time is one of my favorites,
not just because he lives in Tampa Bay area, but
he is versatile in that he is an athlete beyond
just boxing. He plays musical instruments and then he'll start
talking philosophy, politics, whatever else.
Speaker 1: We love. We love that part.
Speaker 3: I have known Keith Thurman since he first started out
in professional boxing and always been a cool guy to
deal with.
Speaker 2: You will good, good setup, good tease. You will enjoy
hearing Dan with him on Sunday night. All right, so
preview mode here for you and me. Let's begin here
before we get to the lawyers and the lawyer conversations,
let's talk boxing in the ring. Golden Boy to owned
Saturday Night card Anaheim, California. A non title fight between
Arnold Barbosa and Kenneth Sims is the main event, but
we got other world title fights on the card as well,
some meat on the bone, if I do say so here.
Speaker 1: From Golden Boy.
Speaker 2: All right, let's start first with Barbosa and Sims. What
are we looking for in this matchup?
Speaker 3: Well, you mentioned it. It's not a world title fight,
it's not even officially a title eliminator, but it's a
the fact though title eliminator because you have two guys
in Barbosa, you know, who's been a good contender for
a long long time. He's only got the one loss
in his last fight Forgivable. He lost the decision when
he challenged Tiyathimo Lopez for the WBO and the lineal title.
At one he was the interim title holder, and he
got that opportunity. That was the Times Square fight card.
If you remember, they fought night and tif Will looked
really good that night, obviously a lot better than he
did when he lost. Such of course, Stevenson, but certainly
a forgivable loss agar Ola Brobosa. So he is moving
up to the one hundred and forty seven pound weight class,
And in terms of Kenneth Simms, he's kind of like
in a similar situation, also really good fighter, kind of underrated,
unfortunately hasn't gotten a huge amount of activity, let's say,
in recent times. He also, though, is coming off of
a loss that took place in August, a few months
after Barbosa's lost. He lost by the slimmest of margins,
a majority decision in an excellent fight against Oscar Duarte,
who traveled to Chicago, which is Kenny Simms's hometown. They
put on a tremendous battle, and you know, he came
up just a hair short in that fight. And so
he's also moving up to Walter Waite. So he've got
two guys who were very good, legit, solid contenders with
some good backgrounds on their resumes as far as being
an amateur standout, et cetera, coming off you know, tough
losses in one hundred and forty pound notable fights, and
now both are going up to one forty seven to
fight each other. And you know, the guy that loses
is going to have to figure some stuff out because
I'll have lost at one forty I'll have lost his
debut at one forty seven. Not his debut, I mean
Kenny's Kenny Simms has had fights in the division too,
but he's you know, he's now here, I guess for
full time at one forty seven, and say with Barbosa,
of you loses again, it's uh, you know, you kind
of gotta figure things out. So uh, like I said,
it's a the fact though eliminated because Walter Waite right
now has got uh, you know a variety of title holders.
They're all gonna need opponents, and you know, Kenny Simms
and Arler Barbosa are right there as far as being
good quality guys that you can match up with if
you're not dealing with a mandatory and you don't have
like a super fight. But they're guys that I think
fans recognize their names and they usually you know, bring it,
so uh, I expect this to be a pretty interesting fight.
I have long been a fan of Kenny Simms. He's
been in some good matchups. He was a heck of
an amateur fighter, you know, has been on my mind,
he was a he was a big time prospect coming.
He's had some kind of tough luff, tough luck los
you know, close type fights, but just a skilled guy,
like a lunch pal guy. You know, if you're gonna
fight this man, you better be prepared to go the
distance and have a rough night in Barbosa. Kind of similar.
Maybe not as aggressive, let's says, as Sims can be,
but again same kind of thing. You know, bring a
lunch pal you know. Maybe not the most exciting in
terms of Barbosa, but he knows how to fight. He
wants to fight the best guys, and he's experienced against
good opponents. So now they're going to do it against
each other. So this is the main event on Golden
Boys his own card. As we've discussed many times, they're
out of contract with his own so this is a
one off of their agreement as they still continue apparently
to hammer to try to hammer out a longer term deal.
But if this is what we're getting from Golden Boy
in terms of the overall card where they don't have
a long term deal, like I can live with it
because it's not a bad show. Again, not the main
event being a world title fight, but it makes up
for it in terms of some of the other stuff
on the show. But I like this main event as
far as you know, unofficial stakes, you know, like survival
basically of your career as a headliner.
Speaker 2: It has significance for whoever wins it at well, which
is the point.
Speaker 3: And as you mentioned, and it also one where thing
Barbosa hasn't had a chance away to headline at home.
This is an essence a hometown fight for him. So
for him, I know he's very you know, him and
his team are very much looking forward to being able
to you know, to fight in front of the hometown crew.
He's from Los Angeles. He has not been in those
types of fights where he lives. He's been on the
road for years, going to places like England and you know,
New York City, like for the t fight in Manchester,
England when he fought Jack Catterall and got you know
a close win over him, et cetera. So you know,
he gets a chance to bring it home fun in
Saudi Arabia, been all over.
Speaker 1: The place he did, He does, and we'll see what
happens to the main event.
Speaker 4: Now.
Speaker 2: The interesting thing is the co feature is the unified
strawway champ Oscar Colazo, who is actually headlined a couple
of times in various places for Golden Boy, Exciting Fighter,
Porto Rico Fighter and Jesus Ouro is the is the opponent.
Speaker 1: I can't. I got to confess, I don't know much
about him.
Speaker 2: I rely on you, but I think we're anxious to
see if Kolaso has another big night here defending those
two strawweight titles.
Speaker 3: Right, yeah, he has the unified title. He is the
Ring magazine champion. He's considered a lineal champion. He looked
incredibly outstanding when he fought in the unification fight to
maintain his WBO belt and also to win the WBA belt.
This is back in November of twenty twenty four on
the Latino Knight that was in Saudi Arabia when he
obliterated your boy Nei Am Trong, Mman Noon Nemstrong in
the unification fight.
Speaker 2: Knock CP freshmart right also is the stage name whichever
you'd like to call him.
Speaker 1: Alaso butchered him.
Speaker 3: He sure so, he's now so. Before the the arm
Trong fight, he had gone the route in a decision
win against Hirado Azapata. Since then include between the Neomtrong
and then two more defenses, he scored knockouts. He's a
very big you know, straweights. He don't get a lot
of knockouts. You know, there's a few guys Roman Gonzalez
got a lot of knockouts for Cardio Lopez back in
the day. Got a lot of knockouts, but mostly strawwaits.
You don't see a ton of knockouts. Kalaso is. One
of the reasons why he's so fun to watch is
because he's a big knockout artist. He's got thirteen pro fights,
He's thirteen to zero. He's won ten by knockout. Now,
the negative part of this situation is that had Golden
Boy finished their deal with his own and been in
a contract, they would be getting more money to put
this card on, and that would have meant we would
have seen a fight that was already agreed to between
Oscar Colaso with the WBC champion Melvin Jerusalem. It would
have been a three belt unification fight. Now, he already
has a victory against Melvin Jerusalem back when he won
the title back in twenty twenty three. That was the
fight where he wanted to get his first ever card. No,
that was a defense. I guess he knocked him out,
but I.
Speaker 1: Believe, I believe he won the title for the first
timing instrument. Yes, we were double chestress.
Speaker 3: So in twenty twenty three, he knocked out Jerusalem in
the seventh round, he won the WBO title. So since that,
since that loss that Jerusalem suffered, he went on to
win the BBC title, which he presently holds, and they
made the rematch, which would have been a unification fight,
but because of the haircut that Golden Boy took on
the money for this show, as far as I understand,
their budget was not as great to get Jerusalem to
get into the ring at a trim somewhere, so they
trimmed it from that fight. So out was Jerusalem. Incomes
Haesus Harrow thirteen and three with two knockouts from Mrceed California,
A very indistinguished type of opponent. If you look at
the resume, you're not going to see anybody that you've
probably ever heard of. And so while I'm a huge
fan of Oscar Colaso, I think he's one of the
most exciting fighters in the sport today. His opponent, in
my opinion, does leave quite a bit to be desired. Certainly,
it pales in comparison if you were giving him a
unification fight, even if he had already defeated that fighter.
Melvin Jerusalem has fought in the recent fights a lot
better I think than he fought the night that he
he got knocked out by Klaso, you know, a few
years ago. So it does take a hit in that sense.
But on the other hand, you still get a chance
to see Oscar Colaso, so you know, you can take
the good, you take the bad, And in that sense,
he'll fight the fight if he wins, hopefully the Golden Boy,
if they get their disonned stuff together, that they can
now come back after that and make the unification fight,
because there's really, honestly, at stroweight where the money's not
big and neither are the fighters, there's no excuse not
to be making unification fights and did the crown. And
the wild thing to me is, given the lack of
riches in the way class, there's never been an undisputed
cru strawweight champion. And whether you're talking three belts or
two belts or whatever, Ricardo Lopez had unified titles. Ironbore
Calderon to my recollection, a unified titles, but it's not.
There's not a lot of like unification fights in the division.
And there's never been, off the top of my head anyway,
never been an undisputed champ. And it's really unfortunate because
it's a they're little guys, but they usually provide tremendous action.
They throw a million punches.
Speaker 2: And if you watch Colaso, he does just that. And
that's and let's see how long this lasts with the
little known opponent in the co feature.
Speaker 3: Ye horror, by the way, like I said, is his record,
you know, you never know what's gonna happen you get
on the chin. I mean, now, he does have three losses.
He's never been stopped, but in his thirteen wins, he's
only stopped two opponents. That's not necessarily, you know, a
good thing for him, because I just don't think he's
stopping Oscar Colaso.
Speaker 2: We'll see that's the co feature. But wait, there's more.
Alexis Roacha also on this show against all right, here
we go whatever's left of Jojo Diaz, but we see
Roacha back at Welter Wade here also on this Golden
Boys show Saday night.
Speaker 3: So Roacha he's coming off a fight he hasn't fought
since December of twenty twenty four. That was a great, great,
exciting fight against rabl Krriell. They fought to a draw,
a tremendous battle. They were supposed to have had a
rematch recently. It got canceled at the last minute because
Roacha was having issues with his weight and so the
fight was canceled. Then, if you recall, this was the
card that was just in January. Again, Golden Boy was
no longer you know, in their contract. This was another
one off they did and they ended up replacing Kuriell
ended up fighting a replacement that they took from the
undercard and he won like a pretty non descript fight.
So apparently roach has got his situation under control. Now
he's back in the ring for this undercard, and I
like Broch, he's exciting to watch. Win or lose, You're
gonna get a pretty good fight. Usually a nice guy
and you know, hard worker and all that. But Joseph
Diaz is long, long, long long past his best. I
mean he was at his best at one hundred and
thirty pounds when he won a world title. He was
a United States Olympian and looked like he had a
good future. And you know, he never did get that rematch.
It he did deserve against Tevin Farmer, who got that
close win against him to take the title. He got
screwed it out of the rematch, and pretty much ever
since then it's been mostly downhill. He had a draw
after that, and then he got one win against Fortuna,
and then he lost three fights in a row and
it's been pretty much all downhill since then. He's won
some fights, but they've been the you know, the the
jermokes that he's won against anybody who's halfway decent.
Speaker 2: Look, this is clearly there for Roacha to have a
big night, but he's been inactive.
Speaker 1: Will he be a bit rusty?
Speaker 3: Well, here's your thing about it. I mean, like I
was saying to you, Jojo Diaz Is has a name,
but he has he's lost like so many. I mean,
I'm not a guy that like throws a guy away.
If you lose a fight, I get it. It's boxing.
You're gonna lose, You're gonna win some. But when you
go on such an extended period of time where you
can't win consistently, and if you do win, it's only
against the complete, you know, low level opponents, and anytime
you even within a halfway decent guy, you know, you lose.
So like his last fight was in August of last year,
he had that war with Regis Progra, who's been looking
pretty shotski himself in recent fights. And Regis won that
fight barely, but got the job done and he won
that decision, and that was yet another loss for Jojo Diaz.
The thing about is Diez was at his best at
one thirty. He had problems at one thirty five. He
lost that one forty two against Progray. Now he's going
up to one forty seven to fight Rocha. So you're
talking about quite a bit of weight above where he's
been at his best. And he's not that big of
a guy. So to me, you know, Roacha may not
be you know, at the top world championship level at
the moment, but he's sure as heck in my opinion. Anyway.
You know, a lot younger, a lot stronger, a lot,
a lot more active, you know, not active, I shouldn't say,
but more better, a better recent opposition. I guess that
it just looks like uh, just a look, Jojo Diaz
is fucking desperate for some money, that's the bottom line.
And you know they don't with a name that puts
me in Golden Boy, which is working them for a
very long time. You know, he has no no place
to negotiate. Here's here, here's the offer. If you want
to do it, let's do the fight. If not, no, sorry,
but that's that's what the budget is. So you know
he's in a no win situation. So I don't you know,
Roacha should win this fight, in my opinion, should be
a pretty handily a handy victory, and that's that fight.
But you know, then you still got one more world
title fight on the card, and.
Speaker 2: That would be Gabriella Fondorra. Before her brother fights later
in the month. She will just defend the undisputed women's
flyweight championship against a mandatory challenger.
Speaker 1: We said there was some meat on the bone.
Speaker 2: Here for this Golden Boy de Own show, So tell
me a little more about this fight.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, look, Claso and Fondora for their weight
classes and where they're at, they're very interesting and exciting fighters.
That's just you kind of you know, it's unfortunate they
don't get the top level opponents. I already discussed what
happened with Colasmo not getting the unification against Jerusalem. Gabrielle
Fandora is one of the top female boxers pound for
pount in the sports. She is undefeated at seventeen to
oho now I knockouts. You mentioned she is the younger
sister of Sebastian Vendora, who is the WBC's Junior Middleway Champion.
And what I like about Gabrielle Fandor when I watch
her is compared to most female boxers, she's a gal
that knocks out her opponents. I mean, you don't see
that many. She's riding the street. She's knocked got three
opponents in a row, yep. And between those three opponents
that she's beaten in her last three fights, they had
a combined only two losses, one of them was undefeated.
But she's still knocking these women out and doing so,
you know, fairly dominating fashion. You know. So she's up
like in pretty one sided scores on the scorecards before
she gots them out. So she's very exciting to watch. Now,
Her opponent in this particular front is a woman named
Viviana Ruiz Cordera Corridor. She is the WBA's interim champion
and the mandatory challenger. She's only ten wins and two losses,
did not have a big resume. She's also, by the way,
forty three years old, and she's fighting a girl and
a woman in Gabrielle Fondora, who was basically half r Age.
Gabrielle is twenty years younger. Okay, so the opponent is
the mandatory is forty three and Gabrielle is twenty three.
So that's a humongous red flag for me. Anyway, when
I look at the matchup, so again, to me, this
is more of a I know it's a mandatory, but
it's more of a showcase sort of the same way
I look at the Colaso fight, like the main event,
Barbosa against Simms. In my mind, that does shape up
as a very competitive fight where you know, I couldn't
fight you if you told me you thought one guy
was gonna win and I thought the otherwise other guy
was gonna win. You know, on paper, it looks like
it's a pretty even type of fight. Not so much
with the other three bounds we're talking about whether it's
Roach should being a big favorite or Fondora you know,
or Colaso. So there's that as far as the cargoes.
Speaker 2: All right, lots of good action on that. One more
prominent fight of note and this one will be earlier
in the day. The Queensbury dis Own main event US
time Saturday afternoon Saturday night in Dublin, Ireland as James
Jazza Dickens will take on Anthony Casace, a former world
champion himself. This is for Dickens WBA Junior Lightweight title. Now, interestingly,
Dickens was supposed to have fought on the night of
the Samurai card in late December, but his opponent got
hurt and so that shifted now to this fight. So
pick it up on how this came about and what
do we think of the matchup Saturday.
Speaker 3: Well, like you said, he was on that card that
the headliner was Noia in a way, and obviously they
had Nakatani in the co features. They were trying to
set up their fight that was just announced and unfortunately
his opponents assume he had an injury and he was
out of the show. So you know, Dickens just sort
of like lost out on that opportunity, lost out on
a great payday in Saudi Arabia, but still had the title.
And so you know, I guess his team went and
look to see if they can make what's the most attractive,
lucrative interest thing fight they can find, and it turned
out that it will be Dickens making his way to Belfast,
Northern Ireland to fight the irishman in Kasachi, who's you know,
got a fan base and like you said, he's a
former title holder himself, and you know it should be
in you know, if you see any kind of Irish
type fight. I've been to fights with featured Irish fighters
in New York, can only imagine what it's like when
you're in a place like the Dublin I mean, they
they love their fighters, they go crazy. Obviously, Ksachi's gonna
have massive fan support. It should be quite the atmosphere.
They're doing this at the Three Arena in Dublin. That
is the same arena where, for example, Katie Taylor had
her two fights with Shantell Cameron that were you know,
very very excellent fights that were also you know, huge
turnout from the Irish fans that were there to see
Katie do her thing. And again this is you know,
Ireland versus England, so you know Dickens is in a
in a you know, he's a very beatable guy. He's
got five loss, has been stopped four times. Not to
say that Kachasi is invincible, but you know him being
at the home, this is one of those deals where
it's like, okay, you can definitely see perhaps the title
changing hands. He the regular title back in July of
last year when he went on the road to his
credit fought in Istanbul, Turkey on an IBA card. He
was a heavy underdog against Bargazia, who was an Olympic
medal winner, and he shocked everybody that night. We're getting
a fourth round knockout. That was a major, major upset.
He's supposed to make that first defense, like I said,
against Tssumi in Saudi Arabia didn't happen. So now he's
making his first defense against Kasachi. Whether he survives through
this defense with his title intact, I am highly suspected
about Kasachi. He's got just a one loss. He got
to go way back to twenty seventeen, a decision against
Martin Ward. He's looked good since then. You know, one titles,
one a title and has some solid wins. Beat Joe Cordina,
that was the big upset where he knocked him out
and dominated to win the belt the IBF DELP. This
is back in twenty twenty four and one of the
big shows I had in Riad. Then he had Denny
beat josh Warrington in Wembley in a big card. This
was the undercard of Anthony Joshua was getting knocked out
by Daniel Dubois. And now he come back and he
has another good, solid victory in uh in May of
last year where where he had a knockout against the
Lee Wood. So, I mean, that's that's some pretty good Cordina,
Warrington Wood back to back.
Speaker 2: Those are three names and a couple of world champs. Yeah,
I mean, so were world champs that he's beaten.
Speaker 3: Right, like Wood and Warrington. Maybe they weren't at their
absolute best, but they were still pretty damn good fighters
when he beat them. And Cordeina at the time was
undefeated and you know, was supposed to be the heavy
favorite in that fight. So you know the fact that
he's at home, the fact that he's on the kind
of streak he's on the fact he's been you know,
in against those three good names. He knocked two of
them out. Like it's hard to see Casace uh, you know,
not not taking the title this fight. But Dickens did
pull the upset in in the stand ball when he
beat the hotshot Olympic medal winner that was undefeated, that
everybody over in that area was trying to build towards
and thought it was gonna be something spectacular, and he
shocked everybody. Not so sure, he shocks that. A lot
of people come this weekend on this card.
Speaker 2: Okay again, that is in uh bab Blind's Saturday afternoon
on diz own US time before the Golden Boys show
Saurday night. It's primetime obviously from Queensbury for that.
Speaker 1: Now some news.
Speaker 2: Okay, so I'm trying to travel back from Indianapolis. I
did travel back from Indianapolis calling college basketball Tuesday night,
got back, got some stuff done, did a live college
basketball show Tuesday and then my man's rayheel is like
on a rampage on social media. One swatting the savages
and the trolls, but two you're tweeting about lawyers and
lawyers contacting you, and I read into this a little
more on what is this? Is this lawyers for the prosecution?
Is this injury?
Speaker 1: Personal luxury?
Speaker 3: Lawyers?
Speaker 2: All right, So this relates to ji Opataiah, who when
last we saw him on Sunday night, was winning in
Las Vegas, and the threat was there after the fight
that they were looking he and ZUFA Boxing and Dana
White into maybe suing the IBF.
Speaker 1: That has now escalated, and.
Speaker 2: You pick it up from there because you've had a
bit of a weird day, my friend, hearing from lawyers.
Speaker 3: So just for the clarity's sake, the IBF, despite their
news dump on Friday Saturday night saying that that they
had withdrawn the sanction of the of the I take
that back Friday night, forty eight hours before the fight,
after the press conference, they as we discussed on the
preview or I mean, I guess on a post show
on some of the in the recap exactly that they
had put out a statement on on a late Friday
night that they were going that they had withdrawn the
sanction of the fight, which I'd only agreed to sanction
earlier in the week, and and they cited their specific
rule and if a champion fights in an unsanctioned out
at the weight that whether that champion wins or loses,
then they will vacate the title. So Gi o'catiah fit
all of those those those elements. He did fight the fight,
it was unsanctioned, he fought at the weight, and he
won the fight, and so therefore by by their statement,
he should have been stripped by what they said. Now
the IBF has backtrack. They put out another statement where
they gave their version of the story but said they
were considering their situation. They made up or they stated
that they felt like maybe Opa TI didn't know what
was going on. I mean, in my opinion, they're trying
to avoid a lawsuit because they didn't do the right
thing in this particular case. That said. I'm mine in
my own business, working on some stuff in my office
on what day was it?
Speaker 4: It must have been on Wednesday, on Tuesday, on Tuesday
night for the first time thing, and I get a
text message and the text message was from a number
that's not in my phone. So but uh okay, So
I look at the text message and it was a
three page document.
Speaker 3: I had a teacher. I'm so fucking blind, like I
saw at the top of it, but I had to
like cop I had to like do a cutt and
paste from my phone and I had to email it
to myself and blow it up so I could read
it because I'm so blind. But anyway, the gist of
the letter was it was from a lawyer from a
It was on lawyer let like a law firm's letterhead
from Las Vegas. The lawyer's name, I believe was Jordan Smith.
It was a letter that was addressed to Mauricio Suliman
from the WBC, I believe it or not. And in
the He's like, what in the world does Maursio Suliman
have to do with an IBF championship or theoretically an
IVF championship.
Speaker 1: We're going to connect them dots here, we are going.
Speaker 3: To connect them dots.
Speaker 4: So uh.
Speaker 3: I looked in to see, like, Okay, is this an
actual lawyer, Is this an actual law firm? Yes? Yes, yes,
it checked all the boxes I knew of. Another one
of my boxing writing colleagues who I knew had gotten
this letter also. We touched base and kind of compared
notes a little bit, and he had also received the
same thing, and we had all he'd also check things out.
So the two of us who've been doing this a while,
we're pretty well convinced, like this is legit. Like as
far as like.
Speaker 1: This is a legitimate lawyer.
Speaker 2: It's got some crank correct acting like a lawyer, it's
a lawyer.
Speaker 1: Continue.
Speaker 3: The number that it came from which I called was
obviously like what do they call that? A like burner phone?
Because it was said the number was disabled or disinected
or whatever.
Speaker 2: My first thought would be that this is a scammer
who's trying to hack my phone. No, no, whatever, you're
far more brave than I am.
Speaker 3: It's not about brave types. First of all, the letter
was seeking it was It's clear that this letter, if
it was sent to Mauricio, was also sent to other
people within the business, the other organizational presidents and other
promoters and people of consequence within the business. It was
the demand for record preservation. So if you're not familiar,
if somebody's about to do a lawsuit and they believe
there are people out there that have things that would
be germane to their case, they do a court a
llegal letter that that demands, just so it's on the record.
Don't destroy your emails related to this subject. Don't destroy
your text messages, don't destroy you if you're a journalist,
don't destroy your notes. Blah blah blah. Now I have
some experience in this, so if you go back to
my days at ESPN, I can think of at least
one occasion where there was about to be a litigation
and this was not on the negative side. I was
on the ESPN employee and I was copied on an
email from the ESPN legal department that included myself and
about twenty other people that were involved in boxing in
some capacity at the network, telling us, Hey, there's this
brewing litigation between us and XYZ on this topic. Make
sure you don't destroy any of your notes, any of
your records, any of your phone messages. Iver. I'm not
going to fuck a out with that anyway. So I've
seen these types of things happen. So what their reason is,
because clearly this was, as the letter stated, this is
from team Opataia, a lawyer that had been retained. The
lawyer said in the opening that he had been retained
by Opataia and that they believed that the IBF's decision
to withdraw their sanction was based and coordinated, and I
will quote an industry wide collusion designed to punish him
for working with zoop of Boxing and to deter other
athletes from doing the same. And they went on to
say that it's been aided and embedded by other promoters,
other sanctioning bodies, and that the IBF intentionally inflicted or
threatened to inflict financial and reputational harm upon mister Opataia,
et cetera, et cetera. Uh, and so he basically said,
to preserve all your records. Ye, don't screw around. And uh,
you know the.
Speaker 2: Question I have, does it show on the letter that
they copied this letter to other organizations and other people.
Speaker 1: No.
Speaker 3: My my understanding based on what i've and I can't
say this for sure, is that a letter went to
Maurici Suliman. Another letter that basically said the same thing,
but that the numbers and the emails and all that
was changed went to Guestavo Oliveri from the WBO, and
one went to Daryl people Interest separately, one went well
Gilberto Mendoza from the w b A, and probably one
went to you know, pick your promoter. One went to
Eddie Hearn, probably one because he cited in the letter.
One went to uh, you know, a top rank. Probably
one went to you know, PBC whoever. So they're they're
basically saying, you know, all these people, uh, they basically
they're saying, we believe you possess documents and communication and
informations that are related. Not that they're not accusing them specifically,
but it's related to the potential claims against the IBF.
You know any sites also, Daryl People's at WBCWBAWBO, matroboxing
and other entities and individuals like it's you know, it's
a it's a legal letter meant to rattle the cage.
And so we'll see what becomes of it. But it's
just another step in this whole process. Now, the way
this can all go away is if the DIBF just says,
you know, what are bad, you can keep the title.
Then they have no damages really to speak of. So
probably the thing goes away. Whether that will happen or not,
I can't answer. But it was interesting to get.
Speaker 2: But you've got a letter, and you've done some digging.
It appears to be legitimate lawyer, legitimate law firm. And
the only other question I have is Opataia has not
commented that this is his lawyer. As we do this
pod and head into the preview mode, Opataia is not
confirmed yet as far as we know, yeah, this is
my lawyer.
Speaker 3: The only thing I've heard we don't know that thing
from JAHI was his comments immediately after the fight in
the ring and then at the press converce, but he
didn't say anything about having a lawsuit. Now, the interesting
thing is this, Okay, so I get the letter from
some random number. Now, if there's a lawyer, a random
lawyer in Las Vegas on a law firm, he just
pulled my number out of his ass, you have to
get it from somebody now. Not to say my number
is not hard to get if you're in the boxing industry. Obviously,
I know you know, I know everybody pretty much, but
they're working on behalf of Timo but Die. It's clear
to me most likely that somebody from Opatia's team who
I know, I deal with and I have their numbers
and people I know plenty of people that weren't Bob
with ZUFA Boxing that right, you know their pr staff.
Dana White you know, Nick con these are people that
I'll have my numbers. So somebody said, hey, here's Rayfiel's number,
send them the fucking letter, and that's what they did.
Speaker 2: Okay, we'll see if it goes anywhere else from there.
You would like to confirm that a partner in the
firm is not Jackie Chiles, the pseudo Johnny Cochran character
from Seinfeld. You are confirming on this pod the fictitious
Shackie Chiles not a.
Speaker 1: Partner in the firm on the letter.
Speaker 3: I don't think he's a partner in the firm.
Speaker 2: Archie Bunker's lawyers, do you know your trivia? Archie Bunker's
lawyers from the seventies were Rebina Witz, Rebena Wits, and
he kept saying, I gotta get my lawyers Rebno Wits,
Rebino Wits and Rebino Wits. They're not silent partners or
on the letterhead either of this.
Speaker 1: Love right.
Speaker 3: Childs was one of the all time television characters on
Seinfeld in the history of No doubt about it, No
doubt about it?
Speaker 2: What is the line about ridiculous? What what is like
send of like Don King and Johnny Cochran, What is.
Speaker 3: The ridiculous, preposterous, something.
Speaker 1: Like that and outrageous and any other os this is.
Speaker 3: It's outrageous, it's preposterous, It's ridiculous.
Speaker 1: Shall we move on?
Speaker 2: In case you get any more correspondence, you will update
us about the Opataiah situation. Uh oh hey, speaking of
legal proceedings, Gravante Davis is back in the news, but
it's not for a legal matter. However, I have an
immediate question. Is he going to be allowed to fight
a rematch coming up? He's under charges again in South
Florida for domestic violence, but you're reporting this week. I
saw it on the substack that the talks are down
the road for him to rematch Pitbull Cruise.
Speaker 1: Correct.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, look, the legal case is working its
way through the courts, and you know, you know, these
things don't happen overnight. These type of criminal things take
some time to go through the process, and so I
guess Tank and his team believe that they can get
in a fight sometime, you know, this summer, probably like June, July, August,
before he actually asked to be in court to deal
with the case. Because it does take some time, and
so maybe he needs the money. Maybe he knows that
he might be in some more trouble and wants to
put a big payday away before whatever happens, you know,
in whatever happens in the in the court case, I mean,
certainly could walk three, but perhaps they'll get toss in
jail for a period of time. Who that knows. But
in any event, he hasn't fought, you know, since March
last year when he fought Lamont roach, so he's that
was the you know, the highly controversial probably be coming
off of that. It is my understanding from the people
I spoke to or involved in this discussion, that the
fight would in fact have Tank going back up to
one forty, where he's fought one time in the past,
back you know, several years ago when he knocked out
Mario Barrios and won you know, the the regular title
in that weight class, and then immediately vacated and went
back down to one thirty five where he's been for years.
But he did fight in a title defense at one
thirty five against Isaac Pittbull Cruz back in twenty twenty one.
It was a very competitive fight, really good fight. They
duked it out. This was a big crowd at Staple
Center in Los Angeles. You know, Tank had a good
fan base and Pitt Bull's a popular Mexican fighter, so
they put on a great show. Tank did get to win.
There was a lot of conversation right off the bat
after that happened that they would do a rematch. You know,
for various reasons, it did not happen. He went out
his way and he fought, you know, fights against guys
like Roly Romero and Hector Luis Garcia, the big Mega
fight with Ryan Garcia, and you know, then you know,
the Frank Martin fight and then of course the Lamont
Roach fight. Then he turned down the rematch. He tried
to go for the Jake Paul exhibition. That guy canceled
because he got in trouble because of the domestic violence.
He got dumped out of that fight. So they're going
to look to do this matchup, and uh, he will.
He'll go back up to one pitbull in that weight
class has the WBC's interim title, which I guess would
be at stake in the fight. Uh, you know, I
think it will be a pretty good fight. I mean,
I'd rather see him fight the best of the lightweight division.
I mean, nothing against Pitbull. But you know, he has
not shown the desire to take on the legitimately top
guys in his own weight class for most of his career. Now,
the interesting thing is Pitbull. In his most recent fight,
that was the part that was in December in San Antonio,
the headline the PBC pay per view. He got a
majority draw against Lamont Roach. And in his last fight,
Tank Davis got a draw against Lamont.
Speaker 1: We got a whole triangle. We got Tank Roach Pitbull.
Speaker 3: But Roach has yet to fight Pitbull crew. So maybe
they'll fight someday. Right, So they have that common in
terms of the opponent, and uh, we'll see if they
get that done. I suspect they get it done.
Speaker 2: Here's a legitimate question because we remember this from back
now almost three years ago. Remember they raced to have
the Tank Davis Ryan Garcia fight before the hit and
run trial because they were trying to settle that in Baltimore,
where ultimately he pled guilty to a felony and other
charges and ended up getting a sentenced by the judge.
Is this the similar thing it could be. I mean,
they're having to race to have this in the next
sixty to ninety days.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 2: I'm just asking you he because the man has legal
problems that are going to come to a head coming
up at some point.
Speaker 3: Look, he pled in the in the in the hit
and run case, he ended up doing you know, well,
he got he originally was not sent to jail. The
problem was he was given home confinement. He broke the
terms of the probation in the home confinement, correct, and
the judge was not taken that shit, and she cast
him in jail. And he served like forty four days
in the lock up, which to me is you know,
if you're if I'm Tank Davis, I don't want to
spend one day, much less an hour in prison or
jail or whatever, you know, whatever the case may be.
He did them, you know, the month and a half
and got out and was still still under probation at
this point. And so maybe he does feel like it's
a similar situation that he may be going. He made
all that money against Ryan Garzen, he couldn't enjoy it
because he was cooling his heels in a Baltimore Jael cell. Right,
we'll see what happens. This is different. This is uh
that was a a a broken probation or the breaking
of the home confinement situation. I believe that the domestic
violence is more serious because it's a criminal complaint and
it seems to be a bigger deal than a probation violation.
You know, in terms of breaking the probation. He didn't
he wasn't convicted of like doing another violent act against
somebody in the domestic violence well, no, that was the
hit and run case.
Speaker 2: He was not right, right, But there is still probation
from the hit and run case, and he's charged with
domestic violence felonies, multiple felons.
Speaker 3: I'm just making the point that when he when he
broke to probation, that was the infraction that put him
back in the camp. It wasn't because he went out
when he somebody else outside.
Speaker 2: My thing is this was len This was back last fall.
There are chargers. Remember they couldn't find him either. They
were trying to take him into custody.
Speaker 3: That he was hiding for two weeks. So on the
US marshals involved.
Speaker 2: The last chapter is not written on whether a Davis
pitbull rematch can happen before the legal stuff gets going,
stay tucked.
Speaker 3: The fact that they know the timing ball that he
probably will be able to do the fight and then
whatever happens happens with their case.
Speaker 2: Stay tuned, all right, But wait, there's more on the
news front. I was reading my Dan Rayphael Substack, and
we knew that Dmitri Bivol and the IBF light heavyweight
mandatory challenger Michael Eiffert were negotiating was there going to
be a purse bid? Well, it's it's resolved, and you've
got the latest here on when he's going to fight
and where and what could be coming after this as
Evil is coming off of a back surgery, so go ahead.
Speaker 3: So he had the back surgery last August. He has
been out for that period of time. He's back, He's
already been back for a few weeks. I think, you know,
doing some light training and you know, get him getting
his body back in the groove and ready to you know,
go into a full training can of fight. So Michael
Eifert has been his mandatory for quite a while. Uh,
he stepped aside, gave up his you know, to let
the rematch between better be off than bibe happened so
all the belts could be at stake. Obviously, Bibol won
that fight became the undisputed champion. Then there was the
Eiffert mandatory that was there. The WBC also ordered there
in the mandatory, even though I believe they did so
out of order of when it should have been, but
nonetheless they ordered the David Benavides fight, and at that point,
uh the plan was for better for Bible to have
a third fight with better BF. Eiffort probably would have
taken another step aside deal and he vacated the WBC
title and didn't fight David Benabdees. Then the third fight
with with a better BF. There were some issues, but
they were still hoping to do the fight. But when
it seemed like that was going kind of sideways a
little bit, he ended up having the back surgery on
this problem. It wasn't like an injury that we suffered
that he suffered in the bout with a better BIB.
This was the way it was described to me by
his manager, Betty in cornewob Is. This was a nagging
back injury that's given him problems for literally several years,
and it was just time to get it taken care
of because it was causing too much problems. So he
did have that surgery and apparently it went okay, and
he's been back in something like I said, light training,
doing his thing. So Eiffert was still the mandatory due
by the IBF. When he had the surgery, the IBF
issued a medical exemption, so it extended the length of
time before he had to do the mandatory that's going
to come up. So as he comes back from surgery
and he's looking for a fight and there's not like
the mega fight that's right there to be made right away,
he's this was the perfect time to take care of
the mandatory effort. Has been waiting very patiently to do
the fight, and so they will do this matchup. They
had the pers bit from the IBF was scheduled like
four times. It was canceled, postponed because they were getting
close with deal, again, postponed again. Finally it was supposed
to take place this pat like this week on Tuesday,
but the two sides finally made the deal. They told
the IBF canceled the perspon so they have a deal
in place. And as I am told, this has not
been officially announced anything like that, but if when it
does happen, I'm told it's scheduled to take place on
the May twenty third card that is headlined by Alexander
Usik's heavyweight title defense against your boy Reek over Hooven,
the kickboxer. That's going to be uh at least for
the moment out doors at the Pyramids and Geezy. There
are rumblings if you talk to people in the business,
there's a lot of skepticism whether not that the fight
between Usik and Verhova won't happen, but they may have
to move into a different location given all the stuff
that's happening in the Middle East and.
Speaker 1: The rest currently in the Middle East because Iran.
Speaker 3: Bombing other places while the United States is at war
with them, and this and that, and they're throwing bombs
into Dubai and other places in the Middle East, and
you know, some people may not feel it's the best
plan to do this heavyweight title fight open air, you know,
in the middle of the fucking desert at the Pyramids.
So we'll see what happens. So anyway, so be it.
Speaker 1: But even if it's not at somewhere else, your understanding
is this is gonna be the co feature.
Speaker 3: I didn't say the co feature, not necessarily.
Speaker 2: I mean you would find the cart I'll speculate you
would think it would be, but who knows it will
be on the card. And then cornel Off, the manager
also suggested to you another opponent or two.
Speaker 3: I was going back and forth with with that deem
about it because you know a lot of people were
pissing on the Eiffer fight, even though they didn't. I
don't understand people sometimes. Okay, I understand there are certain
fights w you want to see guys fight, but jost
have to understand there's a human beings. Here's a man
who was fought a lot of top guys, had two
tremendous battles with U with Arthur better bev super close fights.
He won the second one, lost the first one, and
now he's been out of the ring for a while
because of a back surgery. He has a mandatory that's due.
He already gave up one Dove doesn't want to give
up the other one. So you you do the mandatory
and it covers you on two bases. Number one, we
get to see how you were feeling after a surgery
against a good, solid professional what not somebody at the
level of an Arthur better Beev or another top top guy.
And number two, you take care of your mandatory obligation.
This man has been waiting for you for a long time.
You owe it to him. And so that Dean outlined
what this is Arthur. This is what Dmitri Biebel hopes
that will take place over the next three fights. Do
the May twenty third probably you know, probably made twenty
third against Eiffert for the mandatory in the next fight,
probably later in the year. He would like to have
the third fight with Better Beef, which at this point
I think a lot of people were like, we don't
need to see those three fights back to back to back.
But with a little time and space and maybe another
guy has another fight in between, now people maybe have
an appetite for it. Again, the second fight was really good, Okay, fine,
so and then again this is all presuming he wins
and he's healthy. Iffert end of the year against Better Bef.
And then for the third fight of the three fight plan,
he mentioned three possibilities. Either, he would love to have
a rematch with Canelo, who he beat back several years
ago in an upset when Canelo went up from sixty
eight to challenge him for the WBA belt at light heavyweight.
Canelo turned down his contract actual option for an immediate rematch,
but that doesn't mean they still wouldn't like to have
that fight. Obviously, it's a lot of money against a
guy already beat if barring that, he said, I'd love
to fight David Dennavides, whether David wants to come back
to light heavyweight or he would go to cruiserweight either way,
and if not, that somebody with a cruiserweight title, because
he would like to win the title in that weight vision.
Dimitri has been a you know, a long time, long
time career long light heavyweight where he's done, you know,
the biggest fights that he's had, and you know, to
go up and wait at his career age and you
know how much wear and Terry's had on them through
the years long amateur career. To us, if he can
get a title another weight class would be a big
accomplishment for him. And so that was those that's the
hit list. Basically, Ifert Canelo or rather I'm sorry, Eifert
better bev and then either Canelo Bennovites or somebody with
a cruiserweight title, that's a pretty damna.
Speaker 2: Stay tuned and get the win first and then find
out can better be of who's up there in age
over what now?
Speaker 1: Forty one, forty two?
Speaker 3: He's getting up there?
Speaker 1: Is he gonna? Is he gonna to fight?
Speaker 2: On?
Speaker 1: We shall see if that, if that fight even comes
up again, and how how much longer is Canelo fighting?
By the way, if he.
Speaker 2: Has to wait a year before, so well, is it
too far fetched? Okay, I'm just saying this and then
we'll move on. Is it too far fetch to say
that Bivol comes back, looks good, wins this fight, and
maybe Canelo was next in the fall instead.
Speaker 1: Maybe who knows.
Speaker 3: I don't know about that because I don't think Canelo
wants that fight.
Speaker 1: Okay, good, good, good debate, And the list.
Speaker 3: I gave you was Dimitri's desire.
Speaker 1: Not what to fight? Better be a third time for
a long if.
Speaker 3: Turkey, who is the next couple of Canelo fights, says, hey, Canelo,
I love you to fight. Uh Bivol? You know, here's
the money? You know Canelo probably stay tuned.
Speaker 1: A couple more items.
Speaker 2: Frank Sanchez is having problems with a surgically repaired knee
and now is not able to fight in a couple
of weeks. On this Sebastian fund Dora Keith Thurman fight.
So what what does this mean for Richard Torres, who
we were anxious to see back in the ring here.
What does that mean and what is he going to
do now that Sanchez can't fight?
Speaker 3: Well? The fight was supposed to be the co feature
on the under Cardiffondora against Keith Urn on March twenty eighth. So,
like you said, just a couple of weeks away, he's
had the knee prepared. He was having some inflammation in
the knee. You went and saw the doctor in San
Diego where he's been training. He saw the doctor on
h on Tuesday, and he ended up having to pull
out of the fight, or not pull out of, but
postpone the fight. I guess I take that back. It
was on Wednesday, I guess where he saw the doctor,
and the doctor, from what I was told, told Sanchez, listen,
you go, you gotta lay off it for two or
three weeks. So the doctor gave him that instruction. Obviously,
if you can't prepare for the next two or three weeks, right.
Speaker 2: And talking about running for conditioning and talking about training
being able to spar and if the doctor is saying this,
you know you got arrest this how are you going
to be ready a week and a half from now, So.
Speaker 3: He's he's postponed the fight, which unfortunate because if you remember,
there was a lot of adgitive trying to get somebody
to accept the fight against him in the first place,
when he went to all including Richard Torres, who turned
it down the first time because he had another fight schedule,
and then when they came back around to him this time,
he accepted the fight. Richard Torres, as I talked to
Carl Murady from Top Rank, which is Richard's promoter, did
apparently did not take the news very well. It's he's
a you know, not the most experienced professional. He's never
had this happen. In terms of a major fight. This
was This is a significant fight from the standpoint of
it is an IBF official final eliminator. The winner of
this fight will become the IBF Heavyweight mandatory challenger, whether
it's against Alexander Usik, somebody that might beat us Sick
perhaps for a vacant title, but the guy who wins
that fight is getting a shot eventually at the IBF
Heavyweight Championship, which is still a big deal for a
lot of fighters anyway, uh, I am told that Sanchez,
we'll see his specialist because, like you said, he had
a surgery, you know, back a while ago. He's had
only one fight since then. They'll see this. They'll see
the specialists to get a sort of a second opinion
or a deeper take on it compared to the regular
doctor he saw in San Diego. Well, a little more
information about that, and in the meantime, I guess it
depends on what the doctors have to say. But the
fight is theoretically going to be rescheduled, will take place
on May thirtieth, if they get the PBC on Prime
Video pay per View main event done, which is winding
its way towards conclusion between Devin Haney and Roly Romero.
So if that gets all squared away, that would be
May thirtieth and Brooklyn, New York on PBC on Prime
Video pay per View, and the rescheduled down between Torres
and Sanchez would take place on that card.
Speaker 2: Let's hope Sanchez gets healthy. Otherwise Richard Torres is out
of a fight. Well, I'm saying Torres is an exciting
American up and coming fighter who's been out of the
ring because the top rank stuff, and if he's not
fighting here in March and they can't make the fight
for may get him in the ring with somebody coming out.
Speaker 3: But he did just fight in December in Mexico and
had a good solid count to work out there.
Speaker 1: A couple more items.
Speaker 2: The IBF on Tuesday announced that janebec and Lim Kan
is no longer they're Middleway champion.
Speaker 1: However, what are we parsing here?
Speaker 2: The IBF that it's not just due to the VADA
failed test, but what else here on why the IBF
made this decision.
Speaker 3: Now, it's not really that much later. He had the
failed test, the result came back in December, early December.
This was in the few days leading up to what
was supposed to be a unification fight for three belts.
He had, of course had the IBF and the WBO.
He was supposed to fight Aristondi Lara to unify those
three tunnels. This was the co feature on the card
we just spoke about where Pitt Bull Cruz fought Lamont
Roach in the main event, and then, like I said,
during the week of the fight, the VADA test comes back.
He's positive for the band substance meldonium, he gets dropped
from the fight. He's out. They match up Lara with
the guy from the undercard that comes up, and now
they go through the process. And so it didn't take
a long time. I know, we're sitting here at the
very beginning of March, and that was in the beginning
of December. But they go they have a period of
time time to get the b sample tested. They went
through that process that of course came back positive as well.
Then you had the hearing that he had with his
home federation and the Kazakhstan regulators. They took their time
to go through and do a hearing and hear all
the evidence, and there's a lot of delays and letters
back and forth. In other words, the timing is perfectly
normal and acceptable. And as you remember, as we spoke
about not that long ago, like last week, the Kazakhstan
Commission Federation gave him a six month ban. They claimed
that it was that they believed what was presented, which
was that the reason for the meldonium being in his system,
which is enough substance that is banned worldwide. It has
been since twenty sixteen. If you take that or it's
in your system, for some reason. It's the kind of
thing that stays perhaps for months and months and months.
It's not the kind of thing where you take it
and it's out of your system with the piss, you know,
three days later. If you take meldonium, it can be
deeping your system for months and months and months. So
if you go back to what he fought in Kazakhstan
in his last fight whenever, that was like a freaking
almost a year ago, I guess it was right. He
had a medical emergency. This is what they say. And
in terms of getting treatment for that medical emergency, whatever
they gave him had meldonium in it. He got better
from that, and that was somehow still in his system
all these times later when he took the drug test
for the Laura.
Speaker 2: But you're here, and we debated this before you hear
all these different excuses as to how something got there.
Point number one is you and I both agree on
the strict liability thing it got there. And two, if
you know anything about this, which we debated before, and
we've talked about several times, the Eastern Europeans, the Russians,
in all sports in athletics, including boxing, have been caught
using this and so it made highly suspicious on whatever
the extent.
Speaker 3: I am not making a judgment on whether he purpose
or not. I'm merely saying to you that the Kazakhstan
Federation say they looked at the various evidence and their
determination was the reason for his particular test was based
on the medical treatment he received in urgency situation in
Kazakhstan at the time, and that, you know, nine months
later or whatever it was, was still in his system
as he was tested prior to the Laara fight. So
they gave him a six month ban. Once that ban
was announced by his federation, then the WBO announced their ruling,
which was they didn't strip them of the title. They
we talked about that last week. They suspended them for
a year. They ordered the eliminator fight that was already
set to be for the interim title and said, when
you come back and fight after your time is up,
you then have to fight whoever wins this interim title fight.
The IBF took a little bit of a different instead,
they stripped them of the title because in their rules,
if you are having a doping violation, you're automatically suspended
for a year. The problem that they said is so
he gets stripped the title, not specifically because of the
positive test, but because it butts up against another rule
where if you're suspended for a year and you're a champion,
you're not able to fulfill your mandatory defense in the
timeframe in which you're supposed to defend the mandatory. His
mandatory happens to be due July on or before July fourth,
So if you're suspended until December, which is when the IBF,
they don't backdate it. The date that the test result
came back was December two. He suspended for or you know,
he's not able to fight in an IBF sanctioned.
Speaker 1: Fight until this December, twelve months later.
Speaker 3: So if you can't fight in an IBF fight till
December second, but your mandatory is due on July fourth,
you can't make your mandatory. Therefore, they they had their
little confab on the on the conference call, and the
board of directors, the majority of them said he's going
to be stripped, and they stripped them to the title.
So he still has the WBO when he comes back,
but the IBF is no longer part of his uh
his resume or it's on his resume, but he no
longer holds it.
Speaker 2: It's getting late. I'm getting punchy because they've been traveling.
Do you fear that you're going to hear from a
international Kazakhstan law firm on the IBF stripping Olympic.
Speaker 3: One thing that makes this this job fun is you
just never know if that's gonna happen.
Speaker 1: You never know. Stay tuned.
Speaker 3: I have thought to Kazakhstan lawyers before I will tell
you that.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, I don't have enough time. Uh.
Speaker 2: Tim Zoo, by the way, officially announced midweek is back.
Tell me a little more. This is coming up in Australia.
It is not Errol Spence. However, he is fighting an
Albanian fighter right in Nurgia, Dennis Nurgia if I have
the pronunciation correct. This is coming up in early April.
This will be here soon. Tell me more about the
Zoo fight being officially announced.
Speaker 3: Here well, as we spoke about, and I wrote about,
and plenty of mothers wrote about back in February. PBC,
which works with Tim, but his main promoter in Australia
No Limit Boxing. Obviously, PBC also works with Ero Spence.
They were planning to make a match between Spence and
Zoo to take place this summer around June time frame.
It would be a pay per view in the United
States on Prime Video, but it would take place in Australia,
and the timing works out. Go okay, because in Australia
there used to these morning kind of fights are like
late morning, early afternoon. For here in the United States
would be our prime time. And uh, for whatever reason,
Tim Zu, who did fight in December, wanted to have
a tune up fight. I think it's the crazy I
just I just don't agree. I think this is a
bad idea, that's my opinion. I mean, you don't blow
you don't risk the aerol Spence fight when you don't
really need the tune up you just fought in December.
So to go from then until June is really not
that big of all, doesn't It doesn't. It says two things.
Speaker 2: It says two or three things to me. One, he's
getting a payday. Two he must not think this guy's
that big of a threat, else why do it again?
But more importantly, hold on door number three. Is he
skeptical that a Spence fight ever happens because he's been
out of the out of the ring almost three years,
and Errol Spence has reportedly been about to fight two
or three other guys.
Speaker 3: This one is a little more serious, it seems to me.
And even if you have relative debate about it, you
just don't fuck around and and and get.
Speaker 2: You back to my first two doors. If you want
the money and you believe this guy's beatable, you got
three this year.
Speaker 3: Again. When you take a tune up, no matter what
the situation is, you're risking a lot. I guarantee you
he's not making crazy money for a nerd of fight
compared to what he make for a Spence fight one
hundred percent.
Speaker 1: I can guarantee you.
Speaker 2: There's debate in his own camp about whether there's ever
going to be a Spence fight.
Speaker 1: Okay, tune, stay tune.
Speaker 3: They are planning to do the Spence fight. Whatever you can.
If it doesn't happen, doesn't happen.
Speaker 1: But I'm just I'm just having fun with you. I'm
just having fun with you.
Speaker 2: There was supposed to be an Aero Spence Sebastian Fundora
fight all last year. He was in the ring with
Fundorra after he beat Tim Zuo the first time. Or
was he in the ring with him after you beat
him the second time last July, he was in the
ring with him and that fight has never happened.
Speaker 3: So I don't know. Maybe that I think the tune
up is stupid and even though it's still gonna happen.
Here the deal they are going to fight. It will
be Saturday, April fourth, the United States time. It will
stream live on Prime Video for Prime members. It will
be one of the rare non pay per view fights.
I told you they were going to do some more
non pay per views. This is one of them. It
will be from Australia in our prime time. If you
if you have Prime membership, like one hundred million people
do in the United States or something like that, you
just watch it now. So that'll be that, and then
it will.
Speaker 2: Be Sunday in Australia and they will have it on
in pay per view. We actually have some audience. I
see this in the analytics in Australia. Yeah, gotta pay
for the pay per view mate in Australia on Sunday afternoon.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so they'll do it on there, like what do
they call it a main event or t t A
t k O pay per view whatever they call it. There,
it'll be on paper view here in America and probably
all the places around the world it won't be on
paper view.
Speaker 2: Still, he's still a very popular, if not the most
popular Australian fighter.
Speaker 3: That maybe his problem is where he got you know,
he basically got stopped and quit against Fandor in the rematch.
I mean his last three real fights. He lost Fandora
in the blood bath in the first fight. That is mark.
Speaker 1: I continue, I continue to say this.
Speaker 2: He has not won a significant fight outside of Australia.
Speaker 3: He has correct he got he got caught up and
beat up by by Fandora in a close fight. He
got Blitzpeimer, Taza Lev. He came back in Australia, he
blew away you know, Joey Spencer, a much lower level
opponent than he you know, quit and got beat up
against Fondor in the rematch in July of last year.
I was at that fight. And then he came back
in Australia again and he took on the undefeated New
England club fighter and what a ten round decision against
Anthony Malaskaz. Yeah, always taking another sort of against an
unknown type of guy in Nergia, hoping to set up
the Spence fight. So you know, the good news is
if if you don't care about whether he wins or
loses the fight, at least you can watch this fight
on prime video. The Alaskas fight was not televised here
in the United States or streamed anyone in the United States.
So one thing about Tim is that he's always got
something going on. There's always some drama, I think, and
you know, we can check it out.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 3: The rest of the card that they're going to show,
they're not showing all like you know, ten fights on
the show, but the prime video will show two additional bouts.
He'll see the Australian Sam Goodman, who's going to be
fighting in his hometown because this fight is taking place
in Wollongong, Australia, and so he's in a w and
an IBF Junior featherweight title eliminator against Rodrigo Ruiz. And
there'll be one other fight that features one of the
twenty twenty four up and coming Australian Olympians who will
be in a in a prospect fight on the card
as well. And so that's you, that's your card.
Speaker 2: So that Zoo card coming quickly here in about three weekends,
not this weekend, but three weeks after that. On April
the fourth and fifth time zone and part of the
globe adjusted. One more thing and then we're gone, and
that is Zufa Boxing made the announcement they're also going
to be back on Sunday night, April fifth, that night
in the United States in Las Vegas and real quick
one are those fights for their their latest card.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they're gonna do that. That's their Their April show
will take place once again at the Apex, where they've
had all of their shows so far, including the Opa
Tai fight. It was Sunday night when the Opa Tai
will fight was taking place. They put up on their
social media. They may have announced it also on the broadcast.
The main event for that card will be Andres Cortes,
the he had been. We've discussed this. He was one
of the fighters that was not extended a contra a
new contract by top rank when and when his deal
ran out. Even though he's, you know, an unbecoming contender.
He's twenty e years old. He's on the feet of
top ranks, but a lot of time and fights into
him over the last few years. He's a Las Vegas guy.
He's twenty four to zero with thirty knockouts. He's moving
up to lightweight. He's taken on Aridson and Garcia is
twenty three and one with fourteen knockout He's a Dominican
SouthBay who's won six fights in a row. That'll be
a ten rounder for the main event. That was the
fight that was announced, and even though it wasn't officially announced,
I am told by my sources that the co feature,
which to be quite honest, I actually find to be
a slightly more interesting fight than the main event, and
that's the former WBC featherweight title holder from the Philippines,
Mark Megsio. He is going to take on the irishman
Feargol McCrory, who challenged and you know he lost by knockout,
but he gave a pretty you know, good account of
himself in terms of entertainment when he lost Lamont Roach
in a title shot at one thirty. He's also moving
up to lightweight and you'll see that a lot in
some of these ZUFA shows that are upcoming, because they're
not using a lot of the other they're dealing with,
mainly the senior weight classes. So these guys were junior lightweights.
Now they're fighting in the lightweight division because that's a
division that ZUPA Boxing will recognize, So that will be
the ten round code feature. I actually think that's a
pretty interesting fight.
Speaker 2: Okay, we gave you a bunch on this again on
the timeline, the Jazza Dickens fight with Kasachi is the
afternoon in the United States. In Ireland on Saturday, the
Queensbury Dezone Show Saturday afternoon and then Saturday night.
Speaker 1: The Golden Boy de Zone Show. All the way in.
Speaker 2: Anaheim, California, a long way from Dublin, Ireland, has Arnold
Barbosa and Kenneth Simms in the main event, Oscar Colazzo
in the co feature defending his unified strawweight titles, Alexis
Rocha the welterweight on the undercard, and Gabriella Fondora, the
undisputed women's flyweight champ as well on the on the undercard,
making any a defense. You will recap all of those
fights on your sub stack. You'll be posting on social
media as those fights go on. So again for the audience,
read Dan substack, Subscribe, read his newsletters. See him on
social media, you'll get his thoughts on those fights. We
will not have a recap pod on the weekend. However,
you and one time Keith Thurman will be the Sunday
Night podcast before the Fundra fight. Here Keith, in his
own words, trying to get a junior middleweight world title.
He has been on and off in the ring, out
of the ring for a while. Back in the ring,
that out of the ring for the while. Can he
pull the upset I considered an upset of fun drawy
hear him in his own words, Sunday Night with Big Dan.
You'll enjoy that conversation.
Speaker 1: Other than that, I think we're good for the weekend.
Speaker 2: Lots of college basketball that's going on. I'm headed out
to Vegas. I'll be back in touch with you when
I get back, and we'll see what happens with everything
this weekend.
Speaker 1: Big Dan, have a great weekend here in March.
Speaker 3: We made it through an entire show. I got zero
text messages from many lawyers.
Speaker 2: And you know, honestly, you had about thirty nine f
bombs in the show because you were so worked up
last Sunday Night. I honestly think you just made it
through a full hour and there was not one of them.
I don't normally have a counter. I don't have the tickers.
Speaker 3: I think I let a couple go.
Speaker 2: Actually I don't know that there was. The audience will
have to play the show and find out. If I
don't know that there was one, well.
Speaker 3: I won't drop one right now, just in case we can.
Speaker 1: Ye, don't break the street.
Speaker 3: Don't break the street, drop a couple.
Speaker 1: But in any event, have a great weekend.
Speaker 2: Let's enjoy the fights this week and follow and subscribe
on his fight for each to night. Substack to read
the recaps that he will have, and follow him on
social media as well for all of it on Twitter, x,
Facebook page, the Instagram, TikTok.
Speaker 1: All of it.
Speaker 3: I don't do TikTok.
Speaker 1: Please don't do TikTok. Never mind, but find him on
those other offorts, Big Dan, have a great weekend.
Speaker 3: Thank you all right? DIDJ enjoy the basketball?
Speaker 2: There we go Beat Thurman with Dan Sunday Night on
this pod. Feed, follow, subscribe you'll get it automatically when
it's up on Sunday night. Rate us and review us
as well. You've been listening to the Big Fight Weekend
Preview podcast