Notebook: Dubois hopes to take U.S. by storm on Paul-Woodley Showtime PPV card

Serrano aims for memorable showing; WBC purse bids

England’s Daniel Dubois, one of boxing’s most promising heavyweights, is excited to make his United States debut on the undercard of the Jake Paul-Tyron Woodley cruiserweight fight on Sunday (Showtime PPV and FITE, 8 p.m. ET) at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse in Cleveland.

“I want to show that I’m all action. I’m not a man of many words, but when I get in that ring, they’re going to see that I’m the real deal. It’s going to be a devastating performance,” Dubois said.

Dubois will face Joe Cusumano (19-3, 17 KOs), 33, of Danville, Virginia, in a 10-rounder. The fight will be Dubois’ second since he suffered a broken orbital bone in a 10th-round knockout loss to countryman and contender Joe Joyce in November.

“I’m 23, so with that loss I have just gotten stronger,” Dubois said. “I’ve had to learn to tighten up my game and that I have flaws, so I’ve just been working on that. This is going to be like my debut. I’m full of confidence and I’m ready to go right now. I can make this fight as easy as I want it to be in my opinion. I’m the next one coming through. I’m destined to be a world champion. That’s my goal.”

Dubois (16-1, 15 KOs) returned to blitz Bogdan Dinu in the second round to claim an interim title on June 5 before getting the opportunity to fight on the Paul-Woodley show.

“I feel good about this and I have been waiting for the chance to get over to America and make my debut,” Dubois said. “Now it is finally here, and I can't wait. This is definitely my chance to show (American fans) a future world champion. I have made some changes to my team and I am ready to get back up there again and challenge for big belts. I want to be back in the firing line.

“We will see how I look after more time with (trainer) Shane McGuigan, but in the gym, I have been looking different and better. Now I can't wait to show it all on fight night. I am sure Joe Cusumano will come and bring his A-game and that is what I want, because it makes a better fight. We will clash in there and the winner takes all. The name Daniel Dubois will crack America now.”

Dubois promoter Frank Warren said Showtime pursued Dubois and it made sense to bring him over to the U.S., along with cruiserweight Tommy Fury, Tyson Fury’s brother, who is also on the pay-per-view and looms as a likely future opponent for Paul.

“This has come about for two reasons,” Warren said. “One, Showtime have been onto us constantly about Daniel coming over to the States. Simultaneously, the situation was developing between Tommy and Jake Paul, with them calling each other out, so Tommy called me a couple of months ago and said if you can make that fight, let's do it.

“I go back a long way with Showtime — many, many years — and we brought Naseem Hamed and Joe Calzaghe, along with many others, through on Showtime. I was instrumental in getting the ‘ShoBox’ series going. We were doing regular shows (in the United Kingdom) that were being broadcast (in the U.S.) with the likes of Ricky Hatton. This may be the chance for us to re-engage and do that again. There will be a lot of eyeballs on this show and it will attract a new audience for our guys.”

Serrano out to steal show

Unified women’s featherweight world titlist Amanda Serrano is aiming to steal the show when she defends against junior featherweight titlist Yamileth Mercado.

They will meet in the co-feature of the Paul-Woodley pay-per-view on Sunday night in Cleveland, where Paul grew up.

“Jake Paul is the main event, but he’s not the main attraction,” Serrano boasted at this week’s media workout. “I am going to make sure I steal the spotlight from him and entice people to enjoy female boxing and to understand that women can fight and put on shows, and showcase that we’re deserving of this opportunity.

“It's a Puerto Rican champion versus a Mexican champion. That’s enough said. She’s young and hungry and wants my titles, but I’ve worked super hard for those titles and it’s not going to be an easy task to take them away from me.”

Serrano (40-1-1, 30 KOs), 32, a Puerto Rico native fighting out of Brooklyn, New York, has for several years been one of the pound-for-pound best in women’s boxing and has won world titles in a women’s record seven weight classes from junior bantamweight to junior welterweight. Now she is taking on yet another credible opponent in Mercado (18-2, 5 KOs), 23, of Mexico.

“I bring excitement, knockout power, skills, and a great chin as well,” Serrano said. “I’ve been boxing since I was 18 years old. Boxing is all I have known. I’ve dedicated and sacrificed my whole life to the sport of boxing. I fight for the sport of women’s boxing. It’s not for me; it’s for the future girls coming into the sport.”

Even though Serrano aims to steal Paul’s thunder, she is appreciative that he put her on the card.

“I want to thank Jake for putting his faith in me and pushing to get me on this card,” Serrano said. “This is going to be two champions going at each other and leaving it all in the ring. These belts are my babies. It’s going to be very hard for her to beat me and take these back to Mexico. She’s going home empty-handed. I thank Mercado for taking the fight, but she’s not winning.

WBC purse bids

WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman told Fight Freaks Unite that the organization has scheduled two purse bids for Sept. 17, although the camps could still reach an agreement until then.

One is for the fight between unified light heavyweight champion Artur Beterbiev (16-0, 16 KOs), 36, a Russia native fighting out of Montreal, and mandatory challenger Marcus Browne (24-1, 16 KOs), 30, of Staten Island, New York.

Sulaiman said the split for that fight is 70 percent for Beterbiev and 30 percent for Browne.

Beterbiev is coming off a 10th-round knockout of Adam Deines, his IBF mandatory challenger, on March 20 in Moscow. Browne ended an 18-month layoff on April 20 with a shutout 10-round decision over journeyman Denis Grachev to bounce back from an eighth-round technical decision loss to Jean Pascal in a WBA interim title bout.

The second fight is a middleweight title elimination bout between former junior middleweight titleholder Jaime Munguia (37-0, 30 KOs), 24, of Mexico, and former two-time world title challenger Sergiy Derevyanchenko (13-3, 10 KOs), 35, a Ukraine native fighting out of Brooklyn, New York, for the right to become the mandatory challenger for Jermall Charlo (32-0, 22 KOs).

Sulaiman said the split for Munguia-Derevyanchenko would be 50-50, although there is no guarantee the fight will happen since there have already been talks for a fall fight between Munguia and Gabriel Rosado.

Munguia has knocked out all three of his opponents since moving up to middleweight, most recently a sixth-round knockout of former world title challenger Kamil Szeremeta on June 19. Derevyanchenko is 0-3 in middleweight world title fights, having lost highly competitive decisions to Gennadiy Golovkin and Daniel Jacobs and a more clear-cut decision in his most recent fight to Charlo last September.

Joe Smith defense on Oct. 30

WBO light heavyweight titlist Joe Smith Jr. will make his first defense against mandatory challenger Umar Salamov on Oct. 30 at the Hulu Theater at Madison Square Garden in New York, according to Smith promoter Joe DeGuardia of Star Boxing.

A Smith victory likely would propel him into a much bigger all-New York fight with former middleweight titlist Daniel Jacobs in early 2022, DeGuardia said. I wrote about the Smith-Salamov particulars and the prospect of the Smith-Jacobs fight for World Boxing News. Please read that story here: https://www.worldboxingnews.net/2021/08/27/joe-smith-jr-defense-daniel-jacobs/

Quick hits

The WBO on Friday announced that Tim Tszyu, the son of Hall of Fame former undisputed junior welterweight champion Kostya Tszyu, has been installed as the organization’s junior middleweight mandatory challenger to titlist Brian Castano. The WBO asked rated contenders Tszyu (19-0, 15 KOs), 26, of Australia, and Magomed Kurbanov (22-0, 13 KOs), 26, of Russia, earlier this month present their case as to why they should be the No.1 contender. Both fighters submitted written cases, which were reviewed by the WBO. It went with Tszyu, who has the deeper resume, among other reasons noted by the WBO. In its ruling, the WBO said that should a rematch of the recent draw between unified titlist Jermell Charlo and Castano, who were fighting for the undisputed title, be agreed to the WBO has the right to sanction it before a mandatory fight.

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The WBA on Friday ordered a strawweight title elimination bout between Nicaraguan countrymen Leyman Benavides (19-6-1, 3 KOs), 28, who has won six fights in a row, and former world titlist Byron Rojas (27-4-3, 11 KOs), 31, who lost his belt to by unanimous decision to Knockout CP Freshmart, of Thailand, in November 2018. They have 30 days to make a deal, until Sept. 26. If they don’t reach an agreement a purse bid will be ordered. If it goes to a purse bid the split is 50-50. The winner would move a step closer to becoming the mandatory challenger for CP Freshmart (21-0, 7 KOs), who still holds the title.

Show and tell

With the legendary career of Manny Pacquiao perhaps coming to an end last Saturday with his unanimous decision loss to welterweight titleholder Yordenis Ugas at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, I’ve been thinking this week about what a great ride it has been covering Pacquiao since he arrived from the Philippines and fought in the United States for the first time in June 2001 — 20 years ago this summer — by stunningly destroying favored Lehlo Ledwaba to win a junior featherweight world title. It has been an absolute joy to cover Pacquiao. He’s always been fantastic with the media and always been a gentleman in my many dealings with him. He was in many huge fights and never backed away from a tough challenge. He always came to give fans their monies worth. Even as he reached absurd levels of wealth and fame, he has remained a genuinely nice and humble person. It has been a privilege to write about him and all of his fights since his U.S. debut, including covering 24 of them at ringside, beginning with Ledwaba through the Ugas fight. I was fortunate to be there in person to witness Pacquiao winning titles in six of his record-setting eight divisions and for so many of his biggest fights, including against Floyd Mayweather, Oscar De La Hoya, all four Juan Manuel Marquez fights, Miguel Cotto, Ricky Hatton, Antonio Margarito, two of the three fights against Erik Morales, the second Marco Antonio Barrera fight, all three Timothy Bradley Jr. bouts and many more. Suffice to say, I have so many great memories.

One of them is from March 16, 2019, when Pacquiao came to Dallas for the Errol Spence Jr.-Mikey Garcia fight at AT&T Stadium, knowing that either man loomed as a possible future opponent. Earlier that day, I interviewed Pacquiao at length in his hotel room. His adviser, Sean Gibbons, took this photo of our interview and surprised me when he sent it to me because I had no idea he had taken it. This interview is just one of the many great memories I have of covering Pacquiao.

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Dubois and Serrano photos: Amanda Westcott/Showtime