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World super flyweight champions Fernando Montiel and Cristian Mijares will be defending their titles in separate 12-round bouts and junior middleweight contender Ronald Hearns will be risking his undefeated record on the pay-per-view extravaganza headlined by the 12-round rematch rumble between world middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik and former world champion Jermain Taylor in one of boxing’s fiercest rivalries.
Promoted by Top Rank and DiBella Entertainment, the Pavlik-Taylor II event takes place Saturday, February 16, at MGM Grand and will be produced and distributed live by HBO Pay-Per-View, beginning at 9 p.m. EST / 6 p.m. PST.
Montiel will be defending his WBO title against former world champion Martin Castillo. WBC champion Mijares will be defending his title against three-time world title challenger Jose Navarro. Hearns will go toe-to-toe against Juan Astorga in an eight-round junior middleweight bout. Their combined record is an impressive 155-11-4 (87 KOs) – a winning percentage exceeding 91% with over half their victories coming by knockout.
Montiel (35-2-1, 26 KOs), from Los Mochis, Mexico, is in his second reign as the WBO 115-pound champion. Montiel captured his first world title – the WBO flyweight championship — via a seventh-round TKO of defending champion Isidro Garcia in 2000. He held the title through 2001, successfully defending it three times before moving up to 115 lbs where he won the WBO super flyweight title, knocking out Pedro Alcazar in the sixth round of their 2002 fight.
He held the title for over a year, successfully defending it twice, before losing it to three-time world champion Mark Johnson via a majority decision. Montiel regained the title in 2005, stopping defending champion Ivan Hernandez in the seventh round and has held the title ever since, successfully defending it five times, including three times in 2007.
Castillo (33-2, 17 KOs), from Mexico City, Mexico, has won 12 of his last 13 bouts. He captured the World Boxing Association (WBA) 115-pound title in 2004, winning a 12-round unanimous decision over defending champion Alexander Munoz. He held the title for nearly two years before losing it to Nobuo Nashiro in the summer of 2006. He hasn’t lost a fight since and is currently the WBA and the International Boxing Federation’s (IBF) top-rated contender and the WBO and the WBC’s No. 2 contender.
Mijares (33-3-2, 13 KOs), from Gomez Palacio, Mexico, captured the WBC 115-pound title in Tokyo, stopping Katsushige Kawashima via 10th round TKO last January. He has successfully defended the title three times – twice by knockout – including a one-sided slaughter of former world champion Jorge Arce.
Navarro (26-3, 12 KOs), from Los Angeles, has challenged for a world title three times since 2005. The 2000 U.S. Olympian’s most recent shot at a belt came in his last bout, where he fought valiantly and dropped a razor-thin decision to IBF super flyweight champion Dimitri Kirilov in Moscow.
Hearns (17-0, 13 KOs), son of legendary multi-division world champion Tommy Hearns, has shown a lot of promise since making his pro debut in 2004. In 2007, the American University graduate fought a busy schedule where four of his six victories came by knockout, displaying the same type of power that made his father feared by so many opponents.
The Detroit native will look to showcase his ability to the worldwide pay-per-view audience. Astorga (11-1-1, 6 KOs), from Brownsfield, TX, has vowed to test young Hearns early in hopes of making a name for himself.
Remaining tickets, priced at $600, $400, $300, $200, and $100, are on sale at the MGM Grand Garden Arena box office. Tickets are also being sold at all Las Vegas Ticketmaster locations (select Smith’s Food and Drug Centers, Macy’s West at the Fashion Show Mall, and Ritmo Latino). Ticket sales are limited to eight (8) per person. To charge by phone with a major credit card, call Ticketmaster at (702) 474-4000 or MGM Grand at (800) 929-1111. Tickets are also available for purchase at www.mgmgrand.com or www.ticketmaster.com
The Pavlik-Taylor II pay-per-view telecast, beginning at 9 pm ET/6 pm PT, has a suggested retail price of $49.95, will be produced and distributed by HBO Pay-Per-View and will be available to more than 61 million pay-per-view homes. The telecast will be available in HD-TV for those viewers who can receive HD. HBO Pay-Per-View is the leading supplier of event programming to the pay-per-view industry. For your Pavlik-Taylor II fight week updates, log on to www.hbo.com.
For room packages and availability and event ticket information about the MGM Grand, call (800) 929-1111 or (702) 891-7777 or log onto the World Wide Web at www.mgmgrand.com
