FILIPINO Aston “Mighty” Palicte returns to the ring as he takes on Japanese Kazuto Ioka on Wednesday for the vacant World Boxing Organization super flyweight title at the latter’s home turf of Japan. It is a fight that one analyst said requires for the Philippine fighter to be at his utmost best.
EMERGING VICTORIOUS in a grind-it-out contest against the San Miguel Beermen last Sunday, defending Philippine Basketball Association Commissioner’s Cup champions Barangay Ginebra San Miguel Kings said they are satisfied with the result and that they took some lessons from it which they hope to ride on moving forward in the tournament.
Jarrell ‘Big Baby’ Miller hasn’t been contacted by lineal heavyweight champion Tyson Fury’s co-promoters at Top Rank or Frank Warren about a fight between the two of them. There were rumors last weekend that the unbeaten Miller (23-0-1, 20 KOs) was in the running for Fury’s next fight following his second round knockout win over Tom Schwarz in Las Vegas, Nevada.
2016 Olympic super heavyweight gold medalist Tony Yokawill be returning to the ring to face 36-year-old Alexander Dimitrenko next month in a fight at the Azur Arena, in Antibes, France. Yoka (5-0, 4 KOs) has been out of the ring for a year after being banned for missing three drug tests.
Tyson Fury needs to step it up and start fighting world class opposition again if he wants to help make the rematch with WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder into the mega-fight that his promoter Bob Arum is hoping it’ll be in 2020. It’s going to take more than Fury continually calling himself the “lineal heavyweight champion”, and fighting fodder opposition like Tom Schwarz to turn his rematch with the unbeaten Wilder (41-0-1, 40 KOs) into the blockbuster that it could be.
With a little over a month to go before his clash with Keith ‘One Time’ Thurman on July 20, Manny Pacquiao is looking absolutely shredded to the bone for their fight on Fox Sports pay-per-view at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada. Pacquiao is motivated to train hard because Thurman is vowing to retire him.
Andy Ruiz Jr’s trainer Manny Robles says if he were the coach for Anthony Joshua, he would tell him not to make the immediate rematch with his fighter. Robles states that it would be better for former IBF/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Joshua (22-1, 21 KOs) to wait a year, take a couple of tune-ups, and then face Ruiz Jr. in a rematch.
I was cageside at Madison Square Garden, drawing during the fights. It was a cool experience that I’d love to do again. While Rory Macdonald vs Neiman Gracie was an excellent technical fight and part of an ambitious tournament, there were two pivotal moments that have to be noted.
Featherweight contender Renato Moicano wants to bounce back from his TKO loss to former champion Jose Aldo in unforgettable fashion. Paired up against Chan Sung Jung, one of the most aggressive and exciting men in the 145 lb division, the Brazilian tells Combate he could easily see their UFC Greenville bout go down as the best fight of the year.
It appears Nate Diaz is taking his return to the UFC very seriously.
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