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Thursday, July 5
Sky PPV (New Zealand) / Main Event PPV (Australia), 3:00 a.m. EDT, Shane Cameron vs Monte Barrett. Barrett beat David Tua, so he's a celebrity of sorts in this part of the world (kinda), which erases his 1-3-2 record in his last six and turns it into 1-0 in his last one, and not a whole lot was made of a reported failed drug test after that fight, which Barrett claims was unsanctioned, and since nothing actually happened, it's hard to wonder if he's not just right. Cameron was once mauled by Tua, which is his greatest achievement in boxing thus far. The good news is that this should at least be a decent fight to watch unless Barrett plays survival mode the whole way, which is possible. I guess Monte's WWE career never got out of the blocks. Perhaps John Cena started blocking his texts. I would try to watch this and do live coverage, since I dig doing 3-6am live coverage, but this is technically the late night of the 4th of July here, and I plan to be blasted drunk yelling at hipsters about ZZ Top by 3 a.m. EDT, so sorry. BoxRec lists this as a four-star fight, which blows my mind so hard.
BoxNation (UK), 2:30 p.m. EDT, Ashley Sexton vs Paul Butler, Stephen Ormond vs Mickey Coveney. The latest edition of BoxAcademy, with a good main event for this type of show.
Friday, July 6
ESPN2 / ESPN3.com, 10:00 p.m. EDT, Javier Fortuna vs Cristobal Cruz, Magomed Abdusalamov vs Maurice Byarm. The main event here should be a good one, as Fortuna has emerged as a serious prospect to watch at super featherweight following his two-minute blowout of Yuandale Evans, and Cruz is always a whirlwind of fouls and awkward punching with a ton of grit. The heavyweight co-feature should be decent if both guys are in shape, as Abdusalamov is being pushed as a FNF prospect without any wins of substance, and Byarm was decent earlier this year against Bryant Jennings. Bad Left Hook will have live coverage.
Saturday, July 7
Sky Sports (UK), 3:00 p.m. EDT, Kell Brook vs Carson Jones, Gavin Rees vs Derry Mathews II, Kerry Hope vs Grzegorz Proksa II. It's a good three-fight card, this one, with a solid main event and two interesting rematches on the undercard. This is where we'll get to find out if Derry Mathews really drank from the fountain of invigoration, or if Anthony Crolla was just the right matchup. And we'll find out if Proksa just had a bad night the first time with Hope, or if we overrated him before that. Bad Left Hook will have live coverage.
Epix (US) / RTL (Germany) / BoxNation (UK), 5:00 p.m. EDT, Wladimir Klitschko vs Tony Thompson II. The show starts at 5 EDT on Epix, so that's about when you can expect the main event. BoxNation is going live at 2:30 p.m. EDT, but the undercard is garbage even for a standard Klitschko undercard, which is always bad. Chances are this will wind up running head-to-head with the Sky card, and quite frankly, if the main events are going up against one another, I'm going to watch the Brook-Jones fight instead of Klitschko-Thompson II, because this just isn't compelling to me whatsoever. We'll have a live thread up for those who are watching this instead, and if it's this fight against one of the undercard bouts, we'll go here. Bad Left Hook will have live coverage.
Channel 5 (UK) / Wealth TV (US), 5:00 p.m. EDT, Tyson Fury vs Vinny Maddalone, Stuart Hall vs Lee Haskins. This is a card we'd normally be happy to cover, since Fury-Maddalone is what it is but should also be a fun fight (Fury doesn't have bad fights, and Maddalone tries like hell not to, as well), and Hall-Haskins is a good fight for the vacant European bantamweight title that Jamie McDonnell has given up, but it comes in third place. We'll probably put a thread up for this one, too, so folks choosing to watch Channel 5 (or watching it out of necessity) can have a place to talk about these fights.
GFL ($9.99), 8:00 p.m. EDT, Patrick Majewski vs Chris Fitzpatrick. Ryan Bivins will be on hand for this show in AC, as Majewski (18-1, 12 KO) and Fitzpatrick (15-1, 6 KO) square off in the middleweight main event. Both fighters had their bubble burst late last year with losses, but have each come back with a win since then.
TyC Sports (Argentina), 8:00 p.m. EDT, Billi Godoy vs Sebastian Heiland.
CadenaTres (Mexico), 9:00 p.m. EDT, Oscar Cortez vs Wilson Campos, Miguel Angel Gonzalez vs Fermin de los Santos.
HBO, 10:00 p.m. EDT, Nonito Donaire vs Jeffrey Mathebula, Kelly Pavlik vs Will Rosinsky. A 122-pound unification in the main event, and a chance in the co-feature for former middleweight champ Kelly Pavlik to make a statement at 168 pounds. Donaire vs Mathebula really does speak to HBO's belief in Donaire as a top fighter, since Mathebula is a complete unknown to mots of their audience, so that's nice to see. Pavlik and Rosinsky both fought about a month ago so they're coming back on a quick turnaround here, which means they should be ready to go. Rosinsky is a nice next step for Kelly, and definitely tougher on paper than the last two opponents have been as he tries to get his career back on track. Bad Left Hook will have live coverage.
Televisa (Mexico), 10:00 p.m. EDT, Hugo Ruiz vs Jean Sampson. Ruiz is a solid bantamweight contender. Sampson is a 22-year-old Nicaraguan with only 13 fights and 53 pro rounds under his belt.
TV Azteca (Mexico), 10:30 p.m. EDT, Tyson Marquez vs Fernando Lumacad. Marquez is done at flyweight, apparently, as this won't be for his WBA title and is instead being billed as a super flyweight eliminator. It's an OK fight at best, but when guys start moving up weights this low in the weight classes, you just never really know. The three pounds might be a big difference for Marquez.