In a strange weigh-in event from Caesars Atlantic City, Sergey Kovalev made the 175-pound limit with no trouble, while challenger and first-time HBO fighter Cedric Agnew was a bit overweight. With a main event not quite settled, the co-feature fighters Karim Mayfield and Thomas Dulorme got into a brawl on the stage after hitting the scales.
Just one of those days.
Kovalev (23-0-1, 21 KO) weighed in at 174.3 pounds, while Agnew (26-0, 13 KO) tipped the scales at 175.8, or 0.8 pounds over the limit. The challenger weighed in a second time after the staredown, going au naturel with the aid of someone's jacket (a towel was not at the ready), but the weight was not announced by MC Joe Antonacci. Main Events tweeted that Agnew has 45 minutes to lose the 0.8 pounds.
UPDATE (4:33 pm EDT): Cedric Agnew weighed in at 174.4 on another attempt. The fight is on, the title is on the line.
After the main eventers had weighed in, the HBO co-feature fighters hit the stage. Both made weight and looked good, with Mayfield (18-0-1, 11 KO) weighed in at 139.6 and Dulorme (20-1, 14 KO) at 139.8, but they followed that with some close quarters trash talking and ... licking. Yes. Licking. Which led to choking. And all of that led not to anything kinky, as the description might make one expect, but to a flash of real violence that was a bit more nasty than the usual pull-apart between camps. This followed on the heels of a confrontation the two had that was captured by HBO earlier this week.
Luckily, Aaron Davis, the gigantic (6'7", 280, according to reporter Keith Idec) New Jersey commissioner, took control of the situation and cleared the stage, towering over all who dared disrespect his sport in his state.