Golden Boy Prez says he’s waiting by the phone for Arum
Early last week it was widely reported that a fight between Vasyl Lomachenko and WBA lightweight champion Jorge Linares was being negotiated and close to possibly reaching an agreement. After talking to Top Rank CEO Bob Arum 3KingsBoxing.com ran an article with the possible dates for the matchup.
However Linares’ co-promoter, Golden Boy Promotions President Eric Gomez was asked earlier today by Boxing Scene editor Steve Kim about the fight and if he had talked to Arum in regards to negotiations.
“No, not at all,” Gomez is quoted as saying.
“They have not contacted us, at all. They haven’t contacted us on Linares. I think it’s a lot of lip service. I’m being told that they’re waiting for the winner of (Ray) Beltran-(Paulus) Moses. I think despite Lomachenko calling Linares out on the social networks, his opponent is already pre-determined because they haven’t made any overtures.”
We originally reported that Beltran was a likely choice should he win against Moses. The Beltran vs Moses fight is for the vacant WBO lightweight belt and scheduled for February 16th. Top Rank also promotes Beltran.
When we talked to Arum he did say that he was doing the negotiating with Linares’ primary promoter, Teiken Promotions. Gomez did acknowledge that Arum has talked to Akihiko Honda, CEO of Teiken Promotions, about the fight. Gomez says that Honda told Arum to call Golden Boy.
“They did speak to Mr. Honda. Mr. Honda told them to call us.” stated Gomez.
Gomez believes Arum was just using Linares’ name to help promote Lomachenko. He also said that he’s pretty sure that the opponent for Lomachenko has already been decided but just in case he’ll be by the phone waiting on a call from Arum.
By: Chris Henderson
