Bob Arum: Teofimo Lopez vs George Kambosos Jr will go to purse bid, managers want ‘crazy’ money

Which fight is closer to being made: the Tyson Fury vs Anthony Joshua heavyweight super-fight, or the mandated Teofimo Lopez vs George Kambosos Jr lightweight title bout?

That was my query for Bob Arum, the Top Rank promoter behind Fury and Lopez.

“For the Teofimo fight, we’re going to purse bid,” Arum told Bad Left Hook.

He didn’t give a reply as to which scrap will get announced first, sharing that Fury-AJ will be one of those mega-fights where everyone coordinates. So he’ll not be inclined to let slip that things are done, and the fight will run on X date, etc.

Arum instead hammered home a point to me that was well taken. Basically, he said that too many folks are not really wrapping their brains around the fact that the pandemic is still a major league factor.

“Nobody is stupid,” the 89-year-old promoter noted. “Oscar is not stupid, Eddie is not stupid, Al Haymon is not stupid, they’re all slow walking this stuff because we’ve got to get robust spectators. And the better the fight is, the more spectators will be there to contribute to the overall (revenue) pie.”

The IBF will have a date for the Lopez-Kambosos purse bid no later than Monday, Arum said, adding his belief that managers David McWater (Lopez) and Peter Kahn (Kambosos) are “crazy” in their asks for the matchup.

“It’s not one of the great fights of all time, and this is the way it’s solved, with a purse bid.”