Warrior Mark on track to go Bam
TOWNSVILLE’S Mark ‘ Bam Bam’ Flanagan is bracing for the unexpected as he fights to defend his WBA Oceania cruiserweight title against Mauricio Barragan at Brisbane’s Mansfield Tavern tonight.
Flanagan, who went down fighting in his WBA cruiserweight world title shot against Russia’s Denis Lebedev last year, got back to winning ways with a fourthround knockout of Argentina’s Pablo Magrini in November.
Promoters expect Flanagan ( 23 wins — five by KO — and five losses) to earn another title shot, possibly in South Africa, as long as he scores another solid win against Barragan ( 16- 2) who has scored nine KOs.
Flanagan, a former Upper Ross Hawks fighter, will fight before fellow Hawks talent Liam Paro, who is fighting for the vacant Australian super lightweight title against Melbourne’s Andrew Wallace.
Paro has been sparring with Brisbane’s ‘ fighting schoolteacher’ Jeff Horn in the lead- up to his WBO world title defence against Terence Crawford, which has since been postponed from April 14 until May at the earliest.
“Liam is a very clever boxer like Terence Crawford,” Horn said.
“He ( Liam) has all the skills to do what I did and can go all the way to a world title.”
In other boxing news, former welterweight boxing king Floyd Mayweather has teased the possibility he may come out of retirement for a mixed martial arts bout, revealing he plans to start training for the octagon later this year.
In remarks to TMZ. com, Mayweather said he planned to accept an offer from UFC champion Tyron Woodley to train with him.
“I’m going to start soon,” Mayweather said.
Mayweather, 41, came out of retirement last year for a one- off boxing bout against MMA star Conor McGregor in Las Vegas.
Although Mayweather has previously ruled out any chance of him taking part in an MMA fight, speculation that he could yet be persuaded has continued.
Mayweather told TMZ he believed he would need between six to eight months to get ready for any potential MMA bout. “I’ll probably need a little bit longer ( than three months),” Mayweather said. “We just want to make sure everything is done correctly.”