Former two-division champion Paulie Malignaggi prepared for the lengthy flight to Australia Sunday night, hoping to become Jermall Charlo\u2019s replacement to take on Koen Mazoudier on the July 26 Tim Tszyu-Errol Spence undercard, but wholly understanding the chances were slim.<\/p>\n
\u201cUnless something dramatic happens before I board this flight, it\u2019s not happening,\u201d Malignaggi texted BoxingScene. \u201cBut it was being discussed to potentially happen.\u201d<\/p>\n
Malignaggi, who\u2019s turned to bare-knuckle fighting in recent years after last boxing professionally in 2017, is still headed Down Under to both work as a co-commentator on the Australian broadcast and to participate in a special pre-fight boxing engagement with fellow former American champions Terence Crawford and Shawn Porter.<\/p>\n
The 45-year-old was in talks to fight Australia\u2019s Mazoudier, 15-4-1 (6 KOs), after former two-division champion Jermall Charlo of Houston was stopped from going to Australia because of travel visa issues.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are too far apart on certain terms,\u201d Malignaggi said without elaborating. \u201cIt was being discussed, but likely isn\u2019t happening.\u201d<\/p>\n
The former 140lbs and welterweight champion from New York who fought the likes of Miguel Cotto, Ricky Hatton and Danny Garcia left boxing with a 36-8 (7 KOs) record.<\/p>\n
He most recently fought for and lost the BKB super-welterweight title May 16 in England.<\/p>\n
Malignaggi said his interest was piqued by the talks to fight in the co-main event.<\/p>\n
\u201cI mean, it\u2019s a sold-out event,\u201d he said of Texas\u2019 former three-belt welterweight champion Spence returning from a three-year-long layoff after a brutal loss to Crawford to meet Australia\u2019s former WBO 154lbs champion Tszyu.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt definitely would\u2019ve got my juices flowing. I have ability left, but at my age, it\u2019s likely not for much longer. I admit I got excited at first because these are things that likely won\u2019t present themselves again.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt definitely would\u2019ve been cool. I vibe well with the fan base Down Under.\u201d<\/p>\n
An official connected to Tszyu said Sunday that they \u201chaven\u2019t been advised\u201d yet on who will fight Mazoudier.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former two-division champion Paulie Malignaggi prepared for the lengthy flight to Australia Sunday night, hoping to become Jermall…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":703709,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[2560,6102,10078,104065,14497,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-703708","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-boxing","tag-boxing-news","tag-boxingscene","tag-jermall-charlo","tag-paulie-malignaggi","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=703708"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703708\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/703709"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=703708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=703708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=703708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}