Lou Dibella laughs off Dmitry Pirog as prospective opponent for Maravilla
Lou Dibella of Dibella Entertainment has silenced demands for a fight between his fighter Sergio Martinez and WBO middleweight king Dmitry Pirog.
In a recent boxingscene.com article, Dibella said a fight between WBC middleweight king Martinez and Pirog "doesn’t make any sense” because Dibella doesn’t perceive Pirog as a winning draw, or a fighter that will bring a lot of money and fans to the table.
Dibella said: "I'm the promoter. I've been told by my fighter that he's got two years left [before he retires.] I'm not fighting guys who don't bring 50 cents to the table. [Pirog] doesn't make any sense.”
“But we'll fight anybody who wants him and anybody who HBO will pay the money [for] him [to] fight. We're not running from anybody. I'm not running to go and fight 168-pounders, that's absurd. But in terms of 160 to 154, we'll fight anyone,” Dibella confirmed.
Dibella and Martinez are basking in the celestial lights of boxing highest echelons following Martinez’s stunning knock-out of Paul “The Punisher” Williams this weekend.
The bout, which took place in Atlantic City, was expected to be a throwback to their first fight, a twelve rounder that could have gone either way.
It didn’t, though, and Williams sneaked by with a close decision even as many felt Martinez landed the cleaner, more impressive shots.
Dibella has given every indication that following Martinez’s new-found superstar status, he will no longer bend to the demands of other camps or even the broadcasting networks, without which professional boxing probably wouldn’t exist today.
Dibella said recently to FanHouse: “They [HBO] knew, and we told them, that we were going to make ourselves the A-side of negotiations after this fight.”
He further berated having to settle for unfair terms with Williams, and said that the broadcasting companies would now pay for earlier injustices. “They [HBO] are going to pay for it because he [Martinez] is a star. He's a star now.”
Tags: