Greene out of Jan. 17 fight, HBO looking for replacement

Queens fighter "Mean" Joe Greene (pictured, courtesy Sky Sports) is out of a scheduled fight on January 17 against Sergio Martinez, which was to be the co-feature to Andre Berto-Luis Collazo on HBO. The unbeaten Greene is currently suffering from kidney stones, and despite a desire to fight anyway, promoter Lou DiBella and doctors have strongly advised Greene to fight, and thus he will not.

The 22-year old Greene was taking a massive step up in competition, going from fighting the likes of Joshua Okine and Jose Miguel Torres to Martinez, a world-ranked competitor who stole the show on HBO's last "night of the prospects" offering when he thoroughly dominated the rugged Alex Bunema.

According to Dan Rafael, ESPN first tapped 154-pound titlist Daniel Santos on a deal to fight over the divisional weight limit in a non-title bout, but even though promoter Don King was OK with it, Santos balked at having to get ready for a fight on just ten days' notice.

HBO is now looking at 27-year old Anthony Thompson, whose career has stalled a bit after back-to-back controversial losses to Yuri Foreman and Ishmail Arvin, and 37-year old ex-titleholder Travis Simms, who hasn't really fought since a July 2007 loss to Joachim Alcine. Simms did fight last August, but against a total tomato can at a Radisson Hotel in South Carolina.