Berchelt-Salido, Farmer-Ogawa likely for HBO in December

A pair of world title fights are likely coming to HBO on either December 9 or December 16, with the main event between WBC super featherweight titleholder Miguel Berchelt and Orlando Salido currently being negotiated.

The co-feature fight would be a fight for another super featherweight title, the vacant IBF belt, between Tevin Farmer and Kenichi Ogawa. Farmer and Ogawa have come to terms, according to a report at ESPN.com, with the IBF canceling a purse bid.

Farmer (25-4-1, 5 KO) is a 27-year-old Philadelphia fighter who has been pretty much daring any of the division’s top dogs to fight him. He’s won 19 straight fights, dating back to a 2012 TKO loss to Jose Pedraza, who would go on to win a world title himself. Farmer last fought on April 29, winning a decision over Arturo Santos Reyes.

Ogawa (22-1, 17 KO) is a 29-year-old from Japan who is on a 14-fight win streak of his own. He won the Japanese 130-pound title in 2015 against Rikki Naito, and has defended it successfully five times, most recently against Hirotsugu Yamamoto on July 1 at Korakuen Hall.

Obviously, the bigger fight is the one still being worked out. Berchelt (32-1, 28 KO) has become a top HBO name in his last two fights, beating Francisco Vargas in January to win the WBC title, and defending on July 15 against Takashi Miura.

Salido (44-13-4, 31 KO) won his last fight on May 27 in Mexico, beating Aristedes Perez in a tune-up. He was in negotiations to rematch Vasyl Lomachenko, but those fell through. Prior to the win over Perez, he’d gone 0-1-2 in his previous three fights, losing to Rocky Martinez in April 2015, drawing with him the following September, and then fighting Francisco Vargas to a draw in June 2016.

Dan Rafael of ESPN says that the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas is being considered as a venue for the card.