Bad Left Hook

Bernard Hopkins and Chad Dawson will meet again on April 28 in Atlantic City, live on HBO, but a proposed TV co-feature fight between WBC lightweight titleholder Antonio DeMarco and Michael Katsidis doesn't see likely. From Richard Schaefer, via Dan Rafael at ESPN.com:

"Katsidis wants to fight at 140," Schaefer said. He also said they offered to do a DeMarco rematch with Jorge Linares, but "DeMarco does not want to do that next, but rather take an interim fight first."

Katsidis (28-5, 23 KO) is coming off of an exciting but ultimately pretty one-sided loss to Ricky Burns in November, and that fight actually came after Katsidis made his plans to move to 140 full-time. For now, it appears the loss to Burns was his lightweight swansong.

DeMarco (26-2-1, 19 KO) is coming off of a brilliant comeback victory on October 15 on the first Hopkins vs Dawson undercard, bloodying and stopping Linares in a thriller. DeMarco, 26, trailed badly going into the 11th round and went for broke, battering Linares until referee Raul Caiz Sr had no choice but to step in. It was one of the most heart-pounding rounds of 2011.

With DeMarco vs Katsidis not likely to come through, heavyweight prospect Seth Mitchell (24-0-1, 18 KO) may get the featured undercard slot. "Mayhem" Mitchell, 29, is coming off of a two-round destruction of Timur Ibragimov on December 10, the televised co-feature to the Khan vs Peterson fight. Golden Boy is really pushing Mitchell, and HBO seems ready to buy in on the former college football star, and with good reason. While it would be easy to dismiss him as just another athlete making an ill-fated transition to the fight game, Mitchell has proven his seriousness and dedication, and has made significant improvements. He's as good an American heavyweight prospect as there is.