Fighting

Vincent Astrolabio promised promoter Manny Pacquiao a knockout as a gift for Pac-Man’s 44th birthday today, and he delivered on that, stopping Nikolai Potapov in the sixth round of a fairly one-sided fight to open tonight’s Showtime Championship Boxing broadcast. We’re still live with Rivera vs Martin coverage, so join us for the rest of

Frank Martin closed out 2022 with a dominant win over Michel Rivera tonight on Showtime, winning a clear decision over 12 rounds in a matchup that was never really in doubt. Martin took the fight on unanimous decision scores of 117-110, 118-109, and 120-107. Bad Left Hook unofficially had it 120-107, as well. The fight

Showtime’s final event of 2022 is also the final major U.S. boxing broadcast of the year, with Michel Rivera and Frank Martin meeting in a battle of unbeaten lightweights on Saturday night. Who wins the fight? Scott Christ (90-39) Love this matchup, love the risk both are taking, love that they’re not farting around with

Michel Rivera and Frank Martin meet tonight on Showtime in what will be the final major U.S. boxing broadcast of 2022. The unbeaten lightweights headline a three-fight main card on Showtime starting at 10 pm ET, with prelims airing free on YouTube and Facebook from 8 pm ET. We’ll be here with live updates, highlights,

Ryan Garcia will not be going ahead with a planned Jan. 28 fight against Mercito Gesta, instead focusing himself on the agreed April 15 mega-fight with Gervonta “Tank” Davis. Garcia vs Gesta was slated to be Garcia’s “tune-up” fight in January, and would have given him an opponent who is a southpaw, like Davis, and

It’s almost as if Paul Butler gave away his game plan during the ring walks on Tuesday. The Briton – who’s assignment was to become the first undisputed bantamweight champion in half a century – strolled out to “Eye of the Tiger” by Survivor and, from the opening round inside the Ariake Arena, it was

Matchroom founder Barry Hearn is well aware that they need to play their cards right with star fighter Anthony Joshua if they’re going to salvage him as an elite attraction. After all, Joshua has lost three of his last five fights and despite his better showing against Oleksandr Usyk in their rematch, Hearn says Joshua

Michel Rivera says he has no doubt in his mind that he’s going to have his hand raised when he takes on Frank Martin this weekend in Showtime’s main event. Rivera says while Martin may be a good fighter, he’s still got the edge between them. “We know that Martin is a good boxer with

Josh Taylor’s name has been attached to a potential future fight against Teofimo Lopez — mostly because Lopez has steadily been targeting him — and after seeing Lopez’s most recent performance against Sandor Martin, Taylor believes Lopez is starting to face the realities of his current situation. Taylor tells Sky Sports that he still thinks

Shakur Stevenson’s quest for dance partner for his WBC final eliminator continues. He revealed recently that he had his eyes on no. 5 George Kambosos Jr after no.2 Isaac Cruz and no. 4 William Zepeda turned him down, but took to Twitter last night to announce that Kambosos had also declined the order. Kambosos defended

During a video interview with Fight Hype, welterweight contender Jaron Ennis talks about his upcoming interim title fight with Karen Chukhadzhian before going on to talk about his difficulties in securing the biggest names at welterweight. Ennis admits he may need to be more outspoken in order to force their hand, but believes his talent

Regis Prograis talks to Fight Hype about a number of topics, including an announced fight between Adrien Broner and Ivan Redkach. Prograis, who is obviously not blind, says he really has no idea about what weight Broner and Redkach could possibly meet consider the size of Broner at this current time. Prograis on Broner vs

Teofimo Lopez might be in his own head even worse than we thought. After Lopez’s split decision win over Sandor Martin over the weekend — a fight many thought he should’ve lost — Lopez doesn’t want anyone to see the chinks in his armor. In particular there was a moment captured by ESPN cameras where

Scratch a very good fight from the upcoming schedule. Keith Idec reports that Occar Valdez has been forced out of his February 3rd vacant title fight with Emanuel Navarrete due to injury, while Mike Coppinger brings word that “Vaquero” has agreed to face Liam Wilson in his stead. Valdez will be next for the winner.

Naoya Inoue is now the undisputed bantamweight champion of the world, which probably won’t last very long, after knocking out Paul Butler on body shots in the 11th round. Butler, who came in defending the WBO title against Inoue’s WBC, WBA, and IBF belts, mostly was in survival/defensive mode throughout the bout. He looked very

The WBA are sticking to their promise to reduce their mountain of “world titles,” as the sanctioning body officially ordered “super world” heavyweight titleholder Oleksandr Usyk to defend against “world” heavyweight titleholder Daniel Dubois. This is another wrinkle in the title reign of Usyk, who also has the IBF and WBO belts, and was recently

Shakur Stevenson caught up with Marcos Villegas over the weekend and spoke a bit about what he’s got planned for his move to 135 lbs, mentioning that some of the names he’s been targeting have been flatly turning down offers to fight him. Check out some of what he had to say below. Stevenson on

Rankings go up on Mondays. There will not be another update until Monday, Jan. 2. Ranked fights the next three weeks: Super Middleweight: (10) Christian Mbilli vs Vaughn Alexander, Dec. 17 Lightweight: (10) Michel Rivera vs Frank Martin, Dec. 17 Junior Featherweight: (7) Takuma Inoue vs Jake Bornea, Dec. 13 Bantamweight: (1) Naoya Inoue vs