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GGG PPV 2015?

WBA and IBO middleweight titleholder Gennady Golovkin dominated and stopped Marco Antonio Rubio on Saturday night at the StubHub Center in Carson, California. Golovkin stunned Rubio in the first then finished him off in Round 2 with a stunning left hook to the top of the head.
But Golovkin is sick and tired of chopping down the Rubio trees of the world. He wants big fights, against the likes of big stars like Miguel Cotto, Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. and Canelo Alvarez.
According to Tom Loeffler, Golovkin’s promoter, those fights would likely be on HBO PPV should they occur in 2015 as Golovkin and team hope.
“I think in order for him to be on PPV, he needs the right dance partner. There’s only a few guys that would warrant that. It’s pretty clear who those guys are: Canelo, Cotto, Chavez. Those are pretty much the guys that would warrant a PPV fight [at middleweight].”
But is a Golovkin-headlined PPV bout something HBO is planning in 2015?
“PPV is very opportunist,” said HBO Sports senior VP Mark Taffet. “Rather than plan for PPV, it’s more relevant to describe it as seizing the opportunity when it’s in front of you. And for Gennady, that could happen in 2015 on any one of a number of fronts. But it needs to happen in its own course.”
Taffet said Golovkin was set to fight Chavez on HBO PPV earlier this year but the fight fell through.
“We had discussed, with Tom Loeffler and Bob Arum, Gennady vs. Chavez for a number of months. The deal was reached between the promoters. But it didn’t come to fruition on the Chavez side, between Top Rank and Chavez. So as a result the fight didn’t happen. But that would have been Gennady’s first PPV.”
Taffet said PPVs aren’t exactly thought out the way you and I think of them. Rather, HBO and the promoters study the economics of the proposed bout closely to see if the expected revenue of the fight extends past typical HBO license fees. If so, they work together to put together a PPV.
Taffet said it was a year-round dialogue.
“It’s a frequent conversation that takes place here at HBO with Ken Hershman, myself, Peter Nelson and boxing promoters. We talk about a menu of potential opportunities, the optimal timing for various fights, as well as those fights, because of their economic potential, which might be PPV candidates.”
Nelson, HBO Sports VP of programming, said it was part of HBO’s role in Golovkin’s career to help him get the kinds of fights he wants, including PPV bouts.
“The responsibility of a network, in part, is to try to help athletes succeed in their endeavors. What that means in terms of trajectory…is about the path we all are pursuing together. If fans are willing to pay money today to see him fight at StubHub, then that’s an indication that people are willing to part with the money they earned to watch this man in action. “
Nelson said a fan’s willingness to pay to see a fighter in person isn’t the only factor in the equation, but certainly a necessary component in a fighter’s progression toward a PPV date.
Nelson said people expect big things from Golovkin because he seems so intent on fighting the very best opponents. While Team Golovkin has struggled to find willing participants to step inside the ring against him, Loeffler said HBO’s increased financial commitment to Golovkin would help them secure the bouts fans want to see in 2015.
Still, it takes two to make a fight happen, and Loeffler said Golovkin was content to continue to drum up interest in megafights on regular HBO should circumstances outside their control warrant it.
“If not, Gennady is content to continue his name and his reputation on HBO. He gets now some of the highest ratings on the network.”
Nelson said working with Golovkin was easy from a programming perspective because he was truly willing to fight anyone from 154 to 168 pounds. He said many fighters and promoters say the same thing but don’t actually mean it when it comes down to it. Golovkin means it.
Nelson seemed as anxious as the rest of us to see Golovkin in the ring against top-notch competition.
“At the end of the day, what’s created so many stars in boxing so many times has been fighters who have upending the expectations people had. So is there someone out there who can provide the kind of test for him that nobody is expecting?”
Taffet thinks so. He mentioned other PPV possibilities as well for Golovkin that were above the middleweight limit of 160 pounds.
“Carl Froch is another one people talk about for Gennady,” said Taffet. “You can look at Cotto, Canelo, Chavez, Andre Ward—even a few years down the road potential fights with Bernard Hopkins or Sergey Kovalev. Gennady has a tremendous range of opportunities and the sky’s the limit.”
A Golovkin rise to PPV stardom would be unlike any other in boxing history. Well, except for the fact that boxing is full of rises unlike any others in boxing history.
“There has never been a fighter from Kazakhstan who became a PPV attraction,” said Nelson. “But boxing is a sport that is full of never-beens and firsts. There’s never been a Filipino PPV attraction prior to Manny Pacquiao. And we see that one of the great things that great athletes and great artists do is that they’re permission givers.”
So will we see a GGG PPV in 2015? That part remains unclear as of now. But what everyone seems to be on the same page about is this: Golovkin will be an active fighter seeking bouts against the very best competition.
HBO likes that, and fans should, too.
“It always comes down to putting great fights in front of consumers,” said Nelson. “That’s what people want to see. Athletes are competitors, and people want to see great competition.”
Golovkin has shown himself to be a great competitor. Let’ s hope the powers that be can drum up some great competition for him in 2015.
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Avila Perspective, Chap. 322: Super Welter Week in SoCal

Two below-the-radar super welterweight stars show off their skills this weekend from different parts of Southern California.
One in particular, Charles Conwell, co-headlines a show in Oceanside against a hard-hitting Mexican while another super welter star Sadriddin Akhmedov faces another Mexican hitter in Commerce.
Take your pick.
The super welterweight division is loaded with talent at the moment. If Terence Crawford remained in the division he would be at the top of the class, but he is moving up several weight divisions.
Conwell (21-0, 16 KOs) faces Jorge Garcia Perez (32-4, 26 KOs) a tall knockout puncher from Los Mochis at the Frontwave Arena in Oceanside, Calif. on Saturday April 19. DAZN will stream the Golden Boy Promotions card that also features undisputed flyweight champion Gabriela Fundora. We’ll get to her later.
Conwell might be the best super welterweight out there aside from the big dogs like Vergil Ortiz, Serhii Bohachuk and Sebastian Fundora.
If you are not familiar with Conwell he comes from Cleveland, Ohio and is one of those fighters that other fighters know about. He is good.
He has the James “Lights Out” Toney kind of in-your-face-style where he anchors down and slowly deciphers the opponent’s tools and then takes them away piece by piece. Usually it’s systematic destruction. The kind you see when a skyscraper goes down floor by floor until it’s smoking rubble.
During the Covid days Conwell fought two highly touted undefeated super welters in Wendy Toussaint and Madiyar Ashkeyev. He stopped them both and suddenly was the boogie man of the super welterweight division.
Conwell will be facing Mexico’s taller Garcia who likes to trade blows as most Mexican fighters prefer, especially those from Sinaloa. These guys will be firing H bombs early.
Fundora
Co-headlining the Golden Boy card is Gabriela Fundora (15-0, 7 KOs) the undisputed flyweight champion of the world. She has all the belts and Mexico’s Marilyn Badillo (19-0-1, 3 KOs) wants them.
Gabriela Fundora is the sister of Sebastian Fundora who holds the men’s WBC and WBO super welterweight world titles. Both are tall southpaws with power in each hand to protect the belts they accumulated.
Six months ago, Fundora met Argentina’s Gabriela Alaniz in Las Vegas to determine the undisputed flyweight champion. The much shorter Alaniz tried valiantly to scrap with Fundora and ran into a couple of rocket left hands.
Mexico’s Badillo is an undefeated flyweight from Mexico City who has battled against fellow Mexicans for years. She has fought one world champion in Asley Gonzalez the current super flyweight world titlist. They met years ago with Badillo coming out on top.
Does Badillo have the skill to deal with the taller and hard-hitting Fundora?
When a fighter has a six-inch height advantage like Fundora, it is almost impossible to out-maneuver especially in two-minute rounds. Ask Alaniz who was nearly decapitated when she tried.
This will be Badillo’s first pro fight outside of Mexico.
Commerce Casino
Kazakhstan’s Sadriddin Akhmedov (15-0, 13 KOs) is another dangerous punching super welterweight headlining a 360 Promotions card against Mexico’s Elias Espadas (23-6, 16 KOs) on Saturday at the Commerce Casino.
UFC Fight Pass will stream the 360 Promotions card of about eight bouts.
Akhmedov is another Kazakh puncher similar to the great Gennady “GGG” Golovkin who terrorized the middleweight division for a decade. He doesn’t have the same polish or dexterity but doesn’t lack pure punching power.
It’s another test for the super welterweight who is looking to move up the ladder in the very crowded 154-pound weight division. 360 Promotions already has a top contender in Ukraine’s Serhii Bohachuk who nearly defeated Vergil Ortiz a year ago.
Could Bohachuk and Akhmedov fight each other if nothing else materializes?
That’s a question for another day.
Fights to Watch
Sat. DAZN 5 p.m. Charles Conwell (21-0, 16 KOs) vs. Jorge Garcia Perez (32-4, 26 KOs); Gabriela Fundora (15-0) vs Marilyn Badillo (19-0-1).
Sat. UFC Fight Pass 6 p.m. Sadriddin Akhmedov (15-0) vs Elias Espadas (23-6).
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TSS Salutes Thomas Hauser and his Bernie Award Cohorts

The Boxing Writers Association of America has announced the winners of its annual Bernie Awards competition. The awards, named in honor of former five-time BWAA president and frequent TSS contributor Bernard Fernandez, recognize outstanding writing in six categories as represented by stories published the previous year.
Over the years, this venerable website has produced a host of Bernie Award winners. In 2024, Thomas Hauser kept the tradition alive. A story by Hauser that appeared in these pages finished first in the category “Boxing News Story.” Titled “Ryan Garcia and the New York State Athletic Commission,” the story was published on June 23. You can read it HERE.
Hauser also finished first in the category of “Investigative Reporting” for “The Death of Ardi Ndembo,” a story that ran in the (London) Guardian. (Note: Hauser has owned this category. This is his 11th first place finish for “Investigative Reporting”.)
Thomas Hauser, who entered the International Boxing Hall of Fame with the class of 2019, was honored at last year’s BWAA awards dinner with the A.J. Leibling Award for Outstanding Boxing Writing. The list of previous winners includes such noted authors as W.C. Heinz, Budd Schulberg, Pete Hamill, and George Plimpton, to name just a few.
The Leibling Award is now issued intermittently. The most recent honorees prior to Hauser were Joyce Carol Oates (2015) and Randy Roberts (2019).
Roberts, a Distinguished Professor of History at Purdue University, was tabbed to write the Hauser/Leibling Award story for the glossy magazine for BWAA members published in conjunction with the organization’s annual banquet. Regarding Hauser’s most well-known book, his Muhammad Ali biography, Roberts wrote, “It is nearly impossible to overestimate the importance of the book to our understanding of Ali and his times.” An earlier book by Hauser, “The Black Lights: Inside the World of Professional Boxing,” garnered this accolade: “Anyone who wants to understand boxing today should begin by reading ‘The Black Lights’.”
A panel of six judges determined the Bernie Award winners for stories published in 2024. The stories they evaluated were stripped of their bylines and other identifying marks including the publication or website for which the story was written.
Other winners:
Boxing Event Coverage: Tris Dixon
Boxing Column: Kieran Mulvaney
Boxing Feature (Over 1,500 Words): Lance Pugmire
Boxing Feature (Under 1,500 Words): Chris Mannix
The Dixon, Mulvaney, and Pugmire stories appeared in Boxing Scene; the Mannix story in Sports Illustrated.
The Bernie Award recipients will be honored at the forthcoming BWAA dinner on April 30 at the Edison Ballroom in the heart of Times Square. (For more information, visit the BWAA website). Two days after the dinner, an historic boxing tripleheader will be held in Times Square, the logistics of which should be quite interesting. Ryan Garcia, Devin Haney, and Teofimo Lopez share top billing.
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Mekhrubon Sanginov, whose Heroism Nearly Proved Fatal, Returns on Saturday

To say that Mekhrubon Sanginov is excited to resume his boxing career would be a great understatement. Sanginov, ranked #9 by the WBA at 154 pounds before his hiatus, last fought on July 8, 2022.
He was in great form before his extended leave, having scored four straight fast knockouts, advancing his record to 13-0-1. Had he remained in Las Vegas, where he had settled after his fifth pro fight, his career may have continued on an upward trajectory, but a trip to his hometown of Dushanbe, Tajikistan, turned everything haywire. A run-in with a knife-wielding bully nearly cost him his life, stalling his career for nearly three full years.
Sanginov was exiting a restaurant in Dushanbe when he saw a man, plainly intoxicated, harassing another man, an innocent bystander. Mekhrubon intervened and was stabbed several times with a long knife. One of the puncture wounds came perilously close to puncturing his heart.
“After he stabbed me, I ran after him and hit him and caught him to hold for the police,” recollects Sanginov. “There was a lot of confusion when the police arrived. At first, the police were not certain what had happened.
“By the time I got to the hospital, I had lost two liters of blood, or so I was told. After I was patched up, one of the surgeons said to me, ‘Give thanks to God because he gave you a second life.’ It is like I was born a second time.”
“I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. It could have happened in any city,” he adds. (A story about the incident on another boxing site elicited this comment from a reader: “Good man right there. World would be a better place if more folk were willing to step up when it counts.”)
Sanginov first laced on a pair of gloves at age 10 and was purportedly 105-14 as an amateur. Growing up, the boxer he most admired was Roberto Duran. “Muhammad Ali will always be the greatest and [Marvin] Hagler was great too, but Duran was always my favorite,” he says.
During his absence from the ring, Sanginov married a girl from Tajikistan and became a father. His son Makhmud was born in Las Vegas and has dual citizenship. “Ideally,” he says, “I would like to have three more children. Two more boys and the last one a daughter.”
He also put on a great deal of weight. When he returned to the gym, his trainer Bones Adams was looking at a cruiserweight. But gradually the weight came off – “I had to give up one of my hobbies; I love to eat,” he says – and he will be resuming his career at 154. “Although I am the same weight as before, I feel stronger now. Before I was more of a boy, now I am a full-grown man,” says Sanginov who turned 29 in February.
He has a lot of rust to shed. Because of all those early knockouts, he has answered the bell for only eight rounds in the last four years. Concordantly, his comeback fight on Saturday could be described as a soft re-awakening. Sanginov’s opponent Mahonri Montes, an 18-year pro from Mexico, has a decent record (36-10-2, 25 KOs) but has been relatively inactive and is only 1-3-1 in his last five. Their match at Thunder Studios in Long Beach, California, is slated for eight rounds.
On May 10, Ardreal Holmes (17-0) faces Erickson Lubin (26-2) on a ProBox card in Kissimmee, Florida. It’s an IBF super welterweight title eliminator, meaning that the winner (in theory) will proceed directly to a world title fight.
Sanginov will be watching closely. He and Holmes were scheduled to meet in March of 2022 in the main event of a ShoBox card on Showtime. That match fell out when Sanginov suffered an ankle injury in sparring.
If not for a twist of fate, that may have been Mekhrubon Sanginov in that IBF eliminator, rather than Ardreal Holmes. We will never know, but one thing we do know is that Mekhrubon’s world title aspirations were too strong to be ruined by a knife-wielding bully.
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