Kovalev will fight Mohammedi in July

[Kirkland Laing]

Kovalev/Pascal is a complete waste of time. Kovalev will fight anyone, but the suits likely just want to fleece the masses.

Aside from, inexplicably, HBO - no one wants to see that fight.

It's just that Pascal has more of a name than Gonzalez and it would be easier to market, but clearly it has no merit. I'm not sure Gonzales is ready either and his team would likely want to build him up more. Kovalev needs a name fight, but top names don't want to fight him. Understandable I guess. He is rather terrifying.

Who doesn't want to fight Kovalev?

Stevenson.

But Kovalev killed that fight. No he says she says. He was his mandatory, he asked out of his spot and said the fight could only be done on HBO which means they aren't willing to entertain fair negotiation. Again, Kovalev literally asked out of that fight.

I think he smokes Stevenson if they fight but that doesn't change who said they were eager to go to purse bid and who asked out of the fight.

Kovalev is signed and sealed to HBO. When the fight is being negotiated Stevenson does a runner to Showtime/Haymon and eventually Haymon/PBC. It wasn't down to who offered the best deal and it wasn't a good faith negotiation.

They were set to have the purse bid in like a week when Kovalev signed his extension with HBO. They now say no negotiations that the fight is on HBO or no fight. But HBO gives a smaller license fee than Haymon would get on PBC so they want Stevenson to take a paycut. How is them asking Stevenson to take a paycut make Stevenson the bad guy? This stuff is madness. I like Kovalev and hate Stevenson but the facts are the facts, the better deal would be on PBC and that is why Duva won't go to a purse bid, because if it went to purse bid the fight would be on PBC. How are you going to argue the better offer is not in good faith? How should the team that is making the worse offer dictate, take our pay cut or no fight, it's ridiculous

It was Stevenson's side who ducked out of the negotiations and ran off to Showtime. Kovalev eventually got the mandatory but Main Events knew they could never outbid Haymon and his hedge fund and can't not fight on HBO. You also have HBO insisting that Kovalev only fights on HBO -- they don't have so many marketable stars or fights now that Haymon is doing his thing and can't afford to lose one of their biggest -- so Main Events, not a promotional outfit with bottomless pockets, are caught between a rock and a hard place.

Something similar will happen with Kovalev Berbetiev. I can't see Haymon letting his guy go off and fight in Russia so even if Main Events do make a fair offer I can't see that fight happening.