im thinking hbo is trying to discredit showtime's super six tournament by having a little unnofficial super middleweight tourney of their own with the pavlik-martinez winner eventually facing the bute-miranda winner, assuming pavlik or bute comes out on top hbo can pretty much say that showtime's tournament wasnt complete, because they own the best super middleweight in the world and not showtime.
I don't think Pavlik is going to move up until the end of the super six tournament ... he can still make the weight and still has big enough names to fight until that tourney is over. I'm sure the winner and the runner up will be on HBO after the tournament. I'm sure that Kessler and Abraham would be the odd men out ... once the semis officially begin.
What names does Pavlik have at 160 apart from Williams? Sturms problems with Universal and his tv deal make that fight unlikely. Who else is there? Bute should have been in the Super 6 ahead of Taylor and he would have been a much better replacement than Green. The other five were excellent choices though.
Williams, Sturm, and Sylvester are good anmes along with being titlists ... Pavlik has names and he doesn't need any big ones since, he can sell out the Boardwalk hall and he's a HBO fighter no matter what. They'll find names for him to fight. I'm talking about the fighters that are already in the tournament.
I don't know why Showtime didn't put the best fighters in the world ... they put the Europeans vs Americans ... since the Europeans have dominated the division since it's existence -
The only big fight for Pavlik at 160 is Williams imo. The Sturm fight won't happen for various reasons and Sylvester (along with the rest of the top 10) is an absolute no-name outside of his own country. He could do well at the Boardwalk against guys like that maybe but no-one who isn't a die-hard Pavlik fan would really care. Pavlik will probably have to move up to 168 to get a big fight after he (hopefully) fights Williams. I don't think he'll fare well against the better Super-Middleweights.
Pavlik doesn't need a big name ... he puts on a show a majoirty of the time ... and he's a champion ... a bunch of the names on Hopkins middleweight championship reign - resume were no names. Pavlik and his team wants to defend and want to stay at middleweight till the end of the super six tourney. Right now the super middleweight division wouldn't be at its deepest until Pavlik makes that change in weight class.
I agree that Bika would be good for the Super Six. His ugly, brawling style would be a nightmare for anyone, and it would create some really interesting fights. He would be the bad guy of the tournament.