After a layoff since December, Premier Boxing Champions will return to NBC in prime time on April 16 with a card that will take place at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York, and it looks like a good one.
The main event, according to multiple sources, is supposed to feature welterweight and 2015 ESPN.com prospect of the year Errol Spence Jr. (19-0, 16 KOs) taking on his first top opponent -- former junior welterweight titlist Chris Algieri (21-2, 8 KOs), who is from nearby Huntington, New York, and will have the home crowd behind him.
Spence, a 26-year-old southpaw and 2012 U.S. Olympian from the Dallas suburb of DeSoto, Texas, has looked superb fight in and fight out, but Algieri will clearly be his best opponent to date.
Algieri, 31, won a debatable split decision against formidable Ruslan Provodnikov in June 2014 to win a junior welterweight world title, also at the Barclays Center. He never defended the belt, instead going up in weight. First he challenged then-welterweight titleholder Manny Pacquiao in Macau, China, and got knocked down six times in a lopsided decision loss in November 2014. Last May, he returned to the Barclays Center, and although he lost a decision, Algieri gave Amir Khan a very tough fight.
In December, Algieri bounced back. He looked good in a hard-fought unanimous decision win against Erick Bone on the Daniel Jacobs-Peter Quillin undercard.
The April 16 co-feature is expected to include cruiserweight titleholder Krzysztof Glowacki (25-0, 16 KOs), 29, of Poland, making his first title defense, probably against former two-time titleholder Steve Cunningham (28-7-1, 13 KOs), 39, of Philadelphia, who is returning to the weight class after a stint at heavyweight.
With a Polish crowd cheering his every move, Glowacki won the title in dramatic fashion against Marco Huck, whom he knocked out in the 11th round in August at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey, in a contender for fight of the year .
Algieri promoter Joe DeGuardia declined comment for this article, as did promoter Lou DiBella, who is putting on the card.
Article courtesy of ESPN