During this conversation with Top Rank promoter Bob Arum, Arum responds to the news of Teofimo Lopez testing positive for COVID and explains why it’s really nobody else’s fault other than Lopez that this fight is having to be pushed back. Check out some of what Arum had to say on the topic below.
On Teofimo Lopez’s fight against George Kambosos Jr getting postponed:
“Let me tell you something, we tell all our fighters ‘you guys are fighting for big money and promoters are laying out big money — get yourself vaccinated so you don’t contact the COVID. You take the fighters here, Fury is totally vaccinated, and I talked with Shelly Finkel a little while ago and he said that WIlder’s been fully vaccinated, and their corners have been vaccinated. That’s taking responsibility.
“Now Teofimo, he was off with this Triller thing and so forth. There was no reason why before he went into training that he didn’t get vaccinated. No reason! And if he had gotten vaccinated he wouldn’t have lost this payday. So I feel sorry for him but the fight will still happen. But again, this is different from when we first went into the bubble last June and we had every other fight with a guy getting COVID because nobody knew really how to handle it. But now with the vaccination anybody who gets COVID — shame on them. Shame on them because they haven’t taken the time or they haven’t, for some crazy reason decided not to get vaccinated. That’s nuts!”
On what could be next for Lopez if he beats Kambosos
“Well there are some good PPV fights for Teo, a rematch with Lomachenko, a fight with Josh Taylor...or even a fight with (Jose) Ramirez leading to a Josh Taylor (fight). So I’m not concerned with making big fights for Teofimo in the future.”