[url]Arslanbek Makhmudov[/url] is scheduled to fight on September 9. No opponent has as yet been named.
Maybe a less than dominating UD is exactly what Dychko needed to entice the Kevin Johnsons, Johnnie Rices, etc. into fighting him? Maybe I'm a bit overly-suspicious - and the Dychko fight wasn't televised - but the accounts of the fight I read suggested that Dychko was content to stomp around and throw jabs at his opponent and never really pressed the action. BTW: It's true that his opponent has not been stopped as a Pro, but he had been stopped a couple of times as an amatuer.. It's rare that I accuse a boxer of carrying his opponent - but maybe this was one of those rare occasions. There's no denying it - Dychko is having big problems getting useful fights.
Joe Cusumano - last seen being blown to bits in a single round by Daniel DuBois last summer in a truly dreadful bit of matchmaking - returned to the ring on Friday night against Irineu Beato Costa Junior as part of a CES Boxing card in Lincoln, RI. Cusumano enjoyed better success this time around, as he recorded a KO victory over his opponent whose name reads a lot longer than his list of accomplishments. That is, unless you consider being knocked out by Joseph Parker, David Price, Denis Boytsov, Dillian Whyte, Sergey Kuzmin, Otto Wallin and Olesander Zakhozhyi to be an accomplishment...which I suppose it is.
The fight will be at the Montreal Casino. In a perfect world Simon Kean would step up and take this fight - because Simon hasn't made any real forward progress in the past few years. I don't really think Kean's chin is up to it and I suspect this fight won't happen because Simon Kean, himself, is of the same opinion.
This content is protected I read on another site that Joyce is trying to get Dillian Whyte as his September opponent. I think Parker is too craven to fight Joyce, and with Whyte there might be promotional differences. But perhaps someone like Bakole who never avoids anyone might agree.
Yeah Joyce is in the who needs him club for those fringe contenders who are looking to make money. Bakole would be a good choice, or why not someone like Kossobutskiy? Both have links to the same promoter and both are looking for opportunities.
Anybody but Christian Hammer. Please. Putting Hammer on the HW main event of a card is like serving somebody diabetic chocolates for their dessert... Dillian Whyte vs. Joe Joyce would be a good fight. I'd favor Joyce but Whyte is a live-enough underdog and I don't think too many people would be surprised to see Dillian Whyte pick up where Derek Chisora is leaving off. Seems like a big money fight. Joe Joyce will be 37 at the end of September. If he's taking any risks at all - there better be big money involved. Allegedly, Bob Arum is trying to line up a fight between Tyson Fury and Joe Joyce...but I'm guessing Dillian Whyte-Joe Joyce would be a lot easier to arrange. Speaking of Parker - Ben Shalom thinks Joseph Parker is in the running for Wilder's comeback saga: [url]https://www.msn.com/en-gb/sport/boxing/wilder-wanted-for-parker-he-isnt-ducking-joyce/ar-AAYVzsS[/url] (though notice the title of the article). Joe Joyce isn't a low-risk option for Parker, but I could see Parker outworking Joe over 12 rounds. OTOH, as hard as Bakole can hit, I'm not at all confident he's going to stop Joe Joyce inside of 7 or 8 rounds. Experience shows that Bakole tends to fade quite a lot after 7/8 rounds, so I'm actually leaning towards Parker having a better chance of beating Joyce than Martin Bakole. Looks like that fight will never happen, though...
Opponent still TBD. My guess: Iago Kiladze. He's always good for a few exciting rounds after all... I'm guessing we can probably rule out the likes of Arreola or Breazeale. Those two would likely want a couple months to prepare. Since we are already just 2 months away from August 27th...I think they would have been already named as the opponent if there were any chance that they would be Anderson's opponent. I suppose Jerry Forrest can't be ruled out. He seems to be everywhere these days... Jermaine Franklin? I'd imagine Arum would need some pretty big guarantees from Salita that Jermaine won't back out near the date.
Iago is in the PBC stables so I don't see him taking it. Arreola and Breazeale as well. I don't expect anyone really dangerous.
Joey Dawejko? He's got a TBA a few days later, maybe then move him here. Ejagba and Stephan Shaw are with Top Rank, so maybe they choose one of them (let's be real, its going to be Dawejko). Maybe Ejagba if they don't see much in him as he lost last October to Frank Sanchez
