Highlights!
- The biggest fight of the weekend comes from England, where Joshua Buatsi will face Dan Azeez in a matchup of legit 175 lb contenders for the British and Commonwealth belts. That airs on Peacock in the US and Sky in the UK.
- Conor Benn is taking his road show to Las Vegas to face Peter Dobson in a Saturday afternoon (yes) main event on DAZN, which competes with the much bigger Buatsi-Azeez fight.
- ProBox TV has the second-best fight of the week, really, so don’t ignore Wednesday’s action!
Wednesday, Jan. 31
ProBox TV, 8:00 pm ET, Angelo Leo vs Mike Plania. HEY! Another real solid ProBox main event to keep 2024 moving over there. Leo is a former 122 lb titleholder, beating Tramaine Williams (remember him?) for the WBO belt in 2020, then losing that belt to Stephen Fulton Jr in early 2021 and then won a tough one over Aaron Alameda five months later, then basically disappeared off the face of the boxing earth. He resurfaced last November on a ProBox card with a win over Nicolas Polanco. Plania is a Filipino fighter you may remember “upsetting” Joshua Greer Jr (remember him and his silly pillow bit?) in the Top Rank bubble in 2020, then was badly outclassed by Ra’eese Aleem when he finally got another decent fight over two years later. He was also stopped by Elijah Pierce on an Overtime Boxing (remember them?) card last August in Atlanta. Romero Duno faces Antonio Moran and Chris Pearson takes on Trevor McCumby, too. BLH will have live updates and results.
Thursday, Feb. 1
DAZN and social media, 3:00 pm ET, Benn vs Dobson press conference.
Friday, Feb. 2
DAZN and social media, 3:00 pm ET, Benn vs Dobson weigh-in.
DAZN, 8:00 pm ET, Ashton Sylve vs Estivan Falcao. Most Valuable Prospects is back. It’s a pretty bad show in terms of relevance, with one fighter (Sylve) you could actually call a serious prospect. Honestly, they took the old CBS Sports Network boxing venue and are basically providing cards of that level unless they put Serrano or Jake Paul himself in that room.
TrillerTV+, 8:00 pm ET, BKFC 57: Luis Palomino vs Austin Trout. Yes, that Austin Trout. There is not another Austin Trout. It is that one. This is a potentially fascinating bare knuckle fight. Trout is 1-0 in BKFC, beating Diego Sanchez in a pretty shameful matchup 11-and-a-half months ago, and now he faces Palomino, who is maybe the greatest P4P fighter in BKFC’s young history, a genuine specialist in this style who may just have too much experience in bare knuckle for Trout’s superior boxing skills. It happens pretty frequently when former top boxing contenders try this sport. Paul Malignaggi lost to Artem Lobov, for God’s sake.
Saturday, Feb. 3
DAZN and social media, 1:00 pm ET, Benn vs Dobson prelims.
Peacock, 3:00 pm ET, Joshua Buatsi vs Dan Azeez. Also airing on Sky Sports in the UK. This fight was meant to happen late last year, got postponed, and now it’s here. Reminder that Peacock actually picks up the full Sky broadcast so it’s not the crappier watch that ESPN+ provides when they import UK shows. Buatsi vs Azeez is a really good fight, they’re kinda fighting to be considered the No. 3 light heavyweight in boxing at the moment, and there are people in the UK boxing scene who believe strongly that Azeez will beat Buatsi, which would be an upset if not an enormous one. Also on the card: Adam Azim vs Enock Paulsen, Caroline Dubois vs TBA, Ben Whittaker in a total stay-busy he’s really beyond, and Viddal Riley vs Nick Parpa. BLH will have live updates and results.
DAZN, 3:00 pm ET, Conor Benn vs Peter Dobson. Really have to admire Eddie Hearn’s incredible determination to push Conor Benn on everyone even though Benn can’t get licensed in the UK still, so he’s taking this to Las Vegas where it has basically no chance of making money. And the start time is not a mistake; they want the fight to air on DAZN for a prime time UK audience, so yes, it starts at Noon local time in Las Vegas. Dobson is a 33-year-old from The Bronx who hasn’t fought in nearly two years and was a down south club fighter before then. BoxRec finding four “stars” to give this matchup is fascinating. Austin “Ammo” Williams takes on Connor Coyle, maybe — Coyle has been due to try to step up a bit for a while now. Johnny Fisher is in action, too. I’ll have this on and we’ll chat about it and such, but the key focus is Buatsi vs Azeez, this is the secondary show in live coverage. BLH will have live updates and results.