KATHY DUVA TALKS UP STELLAR KOVALEV-BIVOL DOUBLEHEADER ON HBO

Boxing talk
By G. Leon

We’re just two weeks away from your intriguing HBO World Championship Boxing doubleheader headlined by Kovalev-Alvarez, with Bivol-Chilemba serving as the chief support. Can you give us some thoughts on the televised action? I think this is a really fun show. We’ve got two good fights and it’s the kind of thing you love to see, especially in a weight division that’s got so much activity and so many interesting fights in it. We’re really excited about this card, Alvarez is rated number one in the world, he’s undefeated and a really strong opponent for Sergey and Sergey is still the man. Then we’ve got Bivol who is looking like the future of the division and he’s up against Isaac Chilemba, and Isaac is going to make him work so it should be great.

GL: Alvarez is certainly more of threat to Kovalev than Lepikhin was, but do you think he’s capable of giving Sergey a difficult fight or a run for his money?

Kathy Duva: “We’ll find out on August 4th. He’s certainly one of the best fighters in the division, all I can say is that Sergey has been at the top of this division for four years and he’s taken on anybody that wants to fight him.”

GL: It seems inevitable that Kovaelv and Bivol will eventually meet to unify the titles. How far down the road do you see that fight taking place?

KD: “I don’t know. It could very well end up next or maybe after a few more. We’ve got to get through this one first and neither guy is going to have an easy night on August 4th, so they’ve got to get through that first before they can worry about fighting each other.”

GL: I asked Bivol this question during the conference call the other day and he answered as a fighter should, but as businesswoman in the game for years do you feel that he needs to headline his own main event on HBO before facing Kovalev?

KD: “I’d sure love to see that but I don’t get to decide those things. Sergey is roaring to go and he wants to fight him, so we’ll see what happens.”

GL: Vaughn Alexander will be facing Denis Douglin on the undercard. Douglin is a solid fighter, but seems to lose when he steps up the level of opposition. With that being said would you be disappointed if Vaughn anything less than imrpressive?

KD: “Again, we’ll see. This is really a chance for Vaughn to make his mark on the division and really climb into the rankings. This is the time and we’ll see what happens. One thing I’ve learned is you can’t sit there and say, well he’s got to be impressive. It’s a fight and anything can happen. Sometimes they’ll have a night where they’ll look like Superman and sometimes they have a night where something goes wrong.”

GL: What can you tell us about the rest of the undercard?

KD: “It’s going to be fantastic, there’s a ton of fights that we believe are going to be very fan friendly. (Frank) Galarza is going to be on the card and he’s the perfect guy for Atlantic City, I think this is going to be a really nice opportunity for him to find a following there. He’s always exciting and he brings a lot of people out. Bakhram (Murtazaliev), Madiyar Ashkeyev, we’ve got several junior middleweights on this card and with Jaime Munguia’s performance last night he’s clearly somebody to watch and I think we’ve got like five junior middleweights here at main events so it’s going to be interesting. Karl Dargan will be making his return to the ring also, he’s stayed in touch with (matchmaker) Jolene (Mizzone) and he’s ready to go.”

GL: What kind of turnout are you expecting?

KD: “I think the room is going to be full. It’s doing really well, everybody is excited about the card. We’ve got plenty of reasonably priced tickets. The bulk of the tickets are priced at $50, we’ve pretty much priced them the same way we did for Arturo Gatti’s fights. The highest priced tickets are $200 so it’s a great bargain in a brand new venue. People are going to come out and see it and everybody who sees it is going to be blown away, we can’t wait!”

GL: Tell us about Facebook Watch, what made you want to get involved with the platform?

KD: “Actually my daughter Nicole put that deal together. It is the future and if it works we have a platform that we can go back to with as many fights as people want to see. We get to go out world wide to attract an audience and having plenty of eastern Europeans among our ranks it’s very appealing to us. I think everybody is out streaming, but they’re going behind paywalls. I don’t think the sport can survive if the only way you can watch it is if you have to pay for it, but as of now that seems to be the way it works. If Facebook works, and we really hope it does then we’re going to have a platform where people can watch for free and I think that’s significant. Are plan is to have interesting fights that don’t happen on HBO. There’s a lot of competition for fights at the highest level that cost millions of dollars; you’ve got HBO, Showtime, the Super Series, Da Zone, ESPN is buying high level fights, but you’ve got nobody buying fights that are a few notches down from that yet, but those can still be very important and interesting fights. We’re basically looking to replicate what we were doing with NBC.”

GL: Closing thoughts?

KD: “August 4th, don’t miss it! It’s going to be a great night and if you can’t come out watch it on HBO. If you can come down, make it to the Hard Rock in Atlantic City because it’s going to be a great time!”