Sergiy Derevyanchenko (11-0, 9 KOs) stayed unbeaten with a 12th round knockout over #1 IBF Tureano Johnson (20-2, 14 KOs) in an IBF middleweight eliminator bout on Friday night at the Buffalo Run Casino in Miami, Oklahoma.

Derevyanchenko, 31, knocked Johnson down with a left hook to the head in round 12. The referee halted Gary Ritter then stopped the fight. The official time of the stoppage was at 0:40 of round 12. This was one of the most grueling televised fights of 2017. I can’t remember seeing anything nearly as hard a fight for both competitors as tonight’s Johnson vs. Derevyanchenko.

For one and rare times in his lengthy career Floyd Mayweather Jr. has experienced defeat. The defeat has happened before the match in all the pre-talks and interviews leading up to his fight tomorrow night against charismatic Conor McGregor at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.

McGregor has outlasted and outmatched any of the promotional antics of Mayweather. McGregor appears to be a natural in that department. He talks like no other Mayweather has ever faced.

In a huge blow to Floyd Mayweather’s promotional company, IBF super featherweight champion Gervonta Davis (18-0, 17 KOs) came in 2 pounds over the 130 lb. limit on Friday at the weigh-in for his title defense against #7 IBF Francisco Fonseca (19-0-1, 13 KOs) for their fight on Saturday night at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.

By Michael Angelo S. Murillo

TEAM Philippines had a five-gold medal day yesterday with the sports of boxing, lawn bowls, ice hockey and track & field chipping in their share to the country’s total haul midway into the 29th Southeast Asian Games in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Boxers Marvin John Tupas and Eumir Felix Marcial won the top hardware in the light-heavyweight and middleweight divisions, respectively, while the Philippine men’s lawn bowls squad won its event earlier in the day.

#1 IBF Tureano Johnson (19-1, 14 Kos) weighed in at 159.8 pounds on Thursday for his IBF middleweight eliminator bout against #2 IBF Sergiy Derevyanchenko (10-0, 8 KOs) on Friday night on Premier Boxing Champions on FS1 & Fox Deportes from the Buffalo Run Casino, in Miami, Oklahoma.

WBA World light heavyweight champion Nathan Cleverly (30-3, 16 KOs) thinks former 168 lb. world champion Badou Jack (21-1-2, 12 KOs) lacks the required experience in the 175 lb. division for him to win on Saturday night at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Jack, 33, will be making the move up to light heavyweight against Cleverly in his first fight in that weight class. The World Boxing Association didn’t have any problems with Jack going straight to the head of the line despite him never having fought in that weight class.

Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Conor McGregor will have the privilege of fighting for the World Boxing Council Money Belt. The gold, diamond and emerald belt the WBC created just for the occasion of the Mayweather-McGregor fight. With no other world titles being on the line, the WBC stepped forward and created a special belt for the two popular fighters to battle over.

Miguel Cotto will be looking to win the vacant WBO junior middleweight title this Saturday night against Yoshihiro Kamegai at the StubHub Center in Carson, California. Unless Cotto (40-5, 33 KOs) has lost his boxing skills in the 20 months he’s been out of the ring since his last fight, he should have an easy time defeating the 34-year-old Kamegai (27-3-2, 24 KOs) this Saturday night on HBO Championship Boxing.

KUALA LUMPUR -- Two-time champion Mario Fernandez inched closer to an unprecedented three-peat as he outclassed Nat Siek Nin of Cambodia to reach the bantamweight finals in men’s boxing competition of the 29th Southeast Asian Games Tuesday at the Malaysia International Trade and Exhibit Center here.

Conor McGregor is now starting to sound like he believes he’s omnipotent with the way he’s talking about his own talents in comparison to Floyd Mayweather Jr. as D-day quickly approaches for their fight this Saturday night on Showtime PPV at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Saul “Canelo” Alvarez cannot compete with the power that Gennady “GGG” Golovkin has going for him, according to GGG’s trainer Abel Sanchez. Golovkin (37-0, 33 KOs) will be putting up his IBF, IBO, WBA and WBC middleweight titles against the highly popular Canelo (49-1-1, 34 KOs) in a little over 3 weeks from now on September 16 on HBO pay-per-view at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Throughout the boxing world there are many fighters that for one reason or another never achieve their full potential. This can be due to any number of reasons: a thirst for money over glory, the lack of a fighters’ mentality, or problems with mental health. Over the next few weeks I am going to invite the readers to explore the history of some of these cases of wasted talent with me, and hopefully make some helpful suggestions to the fighters and their training team as how to get them back on track and moving forward.