(Credit, as always, goes to Dan Rafael at ESPN.com)
The November 17 HBO Boxing After Dark fight between Joan Guzman and Humberto Soto has found a home at the Borgata in Atlantic City, which should make for a good crowd. Also on that card, Mexican-American bantamweight prospect Abner Mares (14-0, 9 KO) will make his HBO debut against an opponent to be named.
It looks like Edwin Valero, the Venezuelan-born, Japan-based, 130-pound champion knockout artist, will be making his American TV debut, as well. His fight on December 15 in Cancun against Fernando Trejo could be brought to PPV, as Lou DiBella is working on a deal. The card will also showcase undefeated Jorge Linares taking on Gamaliel Diaz.
Don King and HBO are very close to a deal that will bring the Roy Jones, Jr.-Felix Trinidad bout to HBO PPV in January. King had also been negotiating with Showtime, but HBO executives said that they made a deal with an "energized" King very quickly. It would be Jones' first fight with HBO since 2005.
Edison Miranda will be officially moving up to 168 pounds with his next fight, against Henry Porras (33-6-1, 25 KO) on October 30 in Hollywood, Florida. Miranda is moving up because of difficulty making weight. I never really whole-heartedly buy that as a reason. Everyone has trouble making weight. Either way, Miranda is not likely to ever be a top-line guy, but with his power he'll be dangerous for a long, long time. I think that a healthy Allan Green would've beaten Miranda months before Kelly Pavlik whomped him, but it is worth noting that Miranda did hurt Pavlik once or twice. Again, a guy with that kind of punching power will almost always have a shot.
The next fight in the strangely compelling comeback of Zab Judah will take place on November 17 on the Carribean island of Turks & Caico, most likely against 33-year old Emmanuel Clottey, the older, lesser brother of welterweight contender Joshua Clottey. I say Judah's comeback is "strangely compelling" because as much as I don't like Zab, it feels like he's fighting guys he knows he can beat to use them to get back to peak form, or as close as he can get to that now. I still commend him for showing guts against Cotto, but he got punished in that bout, and he must've known it. I gladly doubt that we'll ever see Zab holding gold again, but no doubt he'll get a crack at someone next year, at least one more time.
As for Joshua Clottey, the rumored Clottey-Cintron title fight is off the books, and it looks like he'll be taking on Luis Collazo next, probably on a November 15 card on the Versus network. There's no guarantee that the fight will happen, as Top Rank won the rights to promote it with a purse bid of $35,000, and both fighters would have to agree to the terms. To sweeten the deal, though, it is to be an eliminator bout, with the winner receiving a shot at Cintron.
American 140-pound prospect Timothy Bradley loses big points with boxing fans for bowing out of his October 5 ShoBox fight against Randall Bailey, instead choosing to use his utterly fucking absurd No. 2 ranking by the WBC in hopes of landing a title shot against Junior Witter. Look, I'm one of those that thinks Bradley could be really good. He is not ready for someone of Witter's caliber. This is a bad, bad career decision.