Notebook: Bill Haney's visa approved at 11th hour, will be in son Devin's corner

BetUS Boxing Show; Lara wants significant opponent; Quick hits; Show and tell

Jun 04, 2022

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About two weeks ago, Bill Haney, the father, trainer and manager of WBC lightweight titlist Devin Haney, was resigned to the likelihood that he would not able to travel to Australia to be in the corner for his son’s unification fight with three-belt champion George Kambosos Jr. for the undisputed title.

But he had not given up all hope, saying in an interview during a Top Rank Boxing on ESPN telecast, “I’m optimistic about maybe even me eventually being able to go out there. It’s still up in the air. I haven’t been totally denied.”

It did not, however, look good and two weeks ago Devin Haney flew to Australia without him when his father was denied a visa to due to a 1992 drug conviction — 30 years ago — that landed him in jail for more than a year.

Australia’s immigration rules typically don’t allow a felon to enter the country on work visa. So, Haney sent close friend Yoel Judah, a noted trainer in his own right, who guided son Zab Judah to the undisputed welterweight championship and multiple junior welterweight world titles, to Australia with his Devin to serve as his trainer for the fight.

But the review process of Bill Haney’s case yielded a surprise 11th-hour reversal and he was granted a visa and is expected in the corner for the fight on Saturday (ESPN/ESPN Deportes/ESPN+, 9 p.m. ET) at Marvel Stadium in Melbourne, Australia, Kambosos’ home country, where a crowd of around 50,000 is expected. The fight will take place Sunday afternoon Melbourne time.

Travel arrangements were made quickly and Bill Haney departed Las Vegas at 6 a.m. PT on Friday with connections in Los Angeles and Brisbane, Australia before heading to Melbourne, where he was due to arrive Saturday at 8:40 p.m. local time, according to Top Rank.

During his interview during the Top Rank card two weeks ago, Bill Haney said his son would be fine if he was unable to be there with him.

“Devin gets better when he faces adversity,” he said. “This was a 1992 conviction that was well before he was born, but I think that this is now going to propel Devin to bring out the best in Devin. It was hard to let him go though.

“I would say that it’s just like sending away your kid to go to college, but that wouldn’t be true. It’s a little bit more than that. But when it comes to sending away your kid to go to war it’s not quite as extensive as that. It’s a whirlwind of emotions that we’ve been going through as a father and son and as a trainer and a fighter, but we plan to overcome this adversity like we have every time before.”

Now it won’t be necessary for Devin Haney (27-0, 15 KOs), 23, of Las Vegas, to deal with that adversity as his father, who has guided his entire career, will be in the corner as usual for his son’s fifth title defense as he and Kambosos (20-0, 10 KOs), 28, who is making his first defense, strive to become the first undisputed 135-pound champion of the four-belt era.

BetUS Boxing Show

On our new weekly BetUS boxing preview and picks show, TJ Rives and I were live on YouTube and the BetUS website on Friday afternoon breaking down four world title fights and giving our picks related to the BetUS odds. We predicted three fights that will take place on Saturday: the George Kambosos Jr.-Devin Haney undisputed lightweight title fight, Stephen Fulton Jr.’s defense of his unified junior featherweight title against Danny Roman and Kenichi Ogawa’s junior lightweight title defense against Joe Cordina. We also looked ahead to a big-time fight on Tuesday — the bantamweight unification fight between Naoya Inoue and Nonito Donaire, who meet in a rematch of the 2019 fight of the year. We also took a few viewer questions and had a lot of fun. If you missed it live, please check it out and make sure to subscribe to the new YouTube channel for the show! Hope you enjoy.

Lara wants significant fight

Coming off a one-sided eighth-round demolition of grossly overmatched Gary “Spike” O’Sullivan on last Saturday’s Gervonta Davis-Rolando Romero Showtime PPV undercard, WBA “regular” middleweight titlist Erislandy Lara (29-3-3, 17 KOs) reiterated this week that he wants better opposition and a bigger fight.

“I want to fight both Charlo brothers (Jermell and Jermall), either one, as well as I would love to welcome Danny Garcia to his new weight class (at junior middleweight) at some form of a catch weight,” said Lara, who is a former junior middleweight titlist. “If (former welterweight titlist) Keith Thurman wants to fight the best, I am very open to doing a catch weight bout with him too. Errol Spence and Gennadiy Golovkin are two names I would love to fight as well. I know I am one of the best fighters in the world. I want to fight someone people consider is a legend and beat them.”

Lara is a mandatory challenger for unified middleweight titlist Golovkin, although he will first face Canelo Alvarez at super middleweight on Sept. 17. The other fighters Lara mentioned all fight for Premier Boxing Champions, as does Lara.

“With my new coach, I am learning how to fight on the inside more,” Lara said of his work with Cuban trainer Ismael Salas at his base in Las Vegas. “I am hitting harder than ever, and I am more dangerous than ever. I am capable of boxing when I need to, but I’m also able to back fighters up, which is something most people might not think of when they think of my fighting style. I am the most complete fighter at middleweight right now and am open to any-and-all challenges."

Quick hits

Weights from Melbourne, Australia for the Top Rank card Saturday on ESPN: George Kambosos Jr. 134.49 pounds, Devin Haney 134.92 (for the undisputed lightweight title). Kambosos was 135.36 on his first attempt and used about 75 minutes of his allotted two hours to make weight, which he did on his second try. Asked what he did during his time between attempts, Kambosos said, “I took a piss. I chilled out.”

Jason Moloney 117.6, Aston Palicte 117; Lucas Browne 261.02, Junior Fa 268.3; Andrew Moloney 116.9, Alexander Espinoza 115.1; Amari Jones 159.2, Ankush Hooda 159.1; Terry Nickolas 155.9, Lachlan Higgins 154.7; Taylah Robertson 111.6, Sarah Higginson 110.8; Yoel Angeloni 146.9, Ken Aitken 146.3; Hemi Ahio 255.5, Christian Ndzie Tsoye 256.1; David Nyika 199.2, Karim Maatalla 199.8; Isaias Sette 153 vs. Luke Gersbeck 153.4.

Weights from Minneapolis for the Premier Boxing Champion card Saturday on Showtime: Stephen Fulton Jr. 121.5 pounds, Danny Roman 121.5 (for Fulton’s WBC/WBO junior featherweight title); David Morrell 166.5, Kalvin Henderson 167.5 (for Morrell’s WBA “regular” super middleweight title); Karl Dargan 138.5, Alfredo Santiago 141.2; Jose Sanchez 123.5, Ariel De La Torre 123.2; Travon Marshall 150, Amin El 151.5; Demler Zamora 134.4, Raul Chirino 138.4; Malik Warren 129, Pedro Hernandez 129; Abilkhan Amankul 161.4, Devontae McDonald 158.4; Ablaikhan Zhussupov 149.4, Edgar Ramirez 151.7; Yevgeniy Pavlov 124.6, Alexis Salido 121.2; Bek Nurmaganbet 170.8, Khainell Wheeler 169.8.

Weights from Cardiff, Wales, for the Matchroom Boxing card Saturday on DAZN: Kenichi Ogawa 129.5 pounds, Joe Cordina 130 (for Ogawa’s IBF junior lightweight title); Faroukh Kourbanov 129, Zelfa Barrett 130 (for Kourbanov’s European junior lightweight title); Dalton Smith 139.5, Mauro Alex Hasan Perouene 139.5; Skye Nicolson 127.25, Gabriela Bouvier 127.25; Gamal Yafai 124, Sean Cairns 124.25; Calum French 137.25, Gadatamen Taylor 137.5; Joe Morgan 143.5, Rustem Fatkhullin 144.25; Kyran Jones 163.5, Vasif Mamedov 164; Ben Crocker 149.5, Evgenii Vazem 151.5; Monique Bux 167, Ester Konecna 160.5.

Golden Boy, as expected, announced that the fight between lightweight star Ryan Garcia (22-0, 18 KOs) and Javier Fortuna (37-3-1, 26 KOs) in the DAZN main event on July 16, will take place at Crypto Arena (the former Staples Center) in Los Angeles. The fight was announced earlier in the week but Golden Boy and arena executives were still finalizing the site deal. “Let’s turn LA upside down,” said Garcia, who is excited to headline at the famed arena.

Show and tell

When the late Diego Corrales and Jose Luis Castillo met to unify two lightweight world titles in 2005 they produced perhaps the greatest fight in boxing history, a rock ‘em, sock ‘em non-stop action battle that culminated with Corrales getting off the deck twice in the 10th round to score perhaps the most dramatic stoppage of all time. To this day, it is the greatest fight I’ve ever been ringside for. Five months later they met in a rematch but Castillo missed weight by 3½ pounds. Corrales accepted additional money, went through with the fight and paid dearly as he got knocked out in the fourth round of what became a nontitle bout.

A rubber match was scheduled. I covered the first two fights, both in Las Vegas, and traveled back to cover the third fight and have vivid memories of what unfolded. The site of the fight was the Thomas & Mack Center but Caesars Palace was the host hotel, so we all gathered in a big ballroom there the day before the fight for the weigh-in, where Castillo shockingly again missed weight, this time coming in at 139½ pounds — 4½ over. Top Rank’s Bob Arum and Gary Shaw, who were co-promoting the fight, and other officials huddled in the corner of the ballroom while we waited to see what would happen. Ultimately, Corrales elected not to fight and it was hard to blame hm. He had been KO’d the last time Castillo missed weight and wasn’t about to put himself at such a disadvantage again. So, the fight was canceled at the weigh-in.

I did a live phone interview with SportsCenter from the ballroom and then went back to my room to write about what had happened. As I was walking across the Caesars lobby toward to the elevators a group of four young guys recognized me and came over to me to chat me up about the fight. They had literally just arrived at the hotel from Vancouver for the fight and a weekend in Vegas and asked me how the weigh-in went. I had to break the news to them that the fight was off. They were crushed. I thought they were going to cry.

The card did go ahead with the undercard fights, including Vic Darchinyan retaining his flyweight title by knocking out Luis Maldonado in the new Showtime main event. But instead of a sold-out crowd there were maybe a few thousand people at the arena after thousands returned their tickets. I even changed my flight from a Sunday afternoon departure to a Saturday night red-eye. I brought my bag to the arena, wrote a brief recap of the bouts and then got a ride from the arena to the airport. This all went down on June 3, 2006 — 16 years ago on Friday. Here is a very scarce site poster from the fight that never happened. The print run was limited to only 250 posters but most of them went unsold at the arena, for obvious reasons, and were trashed after the show.

Devin and Bill Haney photo: Al Powers/Matchroom Boxing; Lara photo: PBC; Kambosos-Haney: Mikey Williams/Top Rank; Fulton-Roman photo: Esther Lin/Showtime; Ogawa-Cordina photo: Mark Robinson/Matchroom Boxing

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