Don King Coming Back?

August 6th, 2010

Don King has almost been irrelevant as a promoter in recent years. He’s been stuck in his ways and has screwed up deals for his fighters because of it. But could he be making a comeback?

First, the reasons why King has been absent from being considered a major promotional player the past few years.

At heavyweight, he had former heavyweight titleholder Nikolai Valuev not accept a deal to fight current titleholder Vitali Klitschko for $1.5 Million. Instead, King wanted Valuev to hold out for $2.5 million. Klitschko refused to budge financially and instead fought Albert Sosnowski. Now, after the fact, King issued a press release saying that Valuev has accepted the $1.5 million offer and its time for his man and Klitschko to get it on. One problem: the offer to Valuev was no longer on the table. Klitschko, having soundly defeated Kosnowski, is now looking at a probable fall fight with former champ Shannon Briggs instead.

At cruiserweight, King had his then client Steve Cunningham fighting on ESPN’s Friday Night Fight’s for a vacant belt against Matt Godfrey. However, the fight and the entire card ended up being cancelled after King clashed with ESPN over advertising on ring mats and international rights. Cunningham eventually left King once his contract was up proclaiming “free at last” that day he became a free agent on his facebook page.

Going down to junior middleweight, he promotes titlist Cory Spinks. However, Spinks has not fought since winning the title against Deandre Latimore over 15 months ago. Spinks title defense against Cornelius Bundrage has been postponed at least twice and it seems like it’ll finally happen this Saturday on the undercard of the Devon Alexander – Andriy Kotelnik / Tavoris Cloud – Glen Johnson doubleheader.

Speaking of Alexander, things seem to be good for him now under his promotional agreement with King. He’s a unified junior welterweight titleholder and a win this Saturday could put him in a major fight to further unify belts with Tim Bradley before the year is out.

However, things were not always cozy. As a prospect coming up, Alexander was not fighting regularly and barely ever on TV. So much so that Alexander’s attorney had to send King a legal notice ordering him to get Alexander fights or release him.

King hasn’t promoted a major PPV in years. The most recent PPV he promoted being Roy Jones smoke and mirror show over a bloated and inactive Felix Trinidad in 2008.

But this could all change.

Recently pictures surfaced of king enjoying lobster dinner with Floyd Mayweather at his home in Florida. There are rumors Mayweather will be ringside for King’s HBO doubleheader this Saturday.

Mayweather, who works with Golden Boy Promotions on a fight-by-fight basis, is technically a promotional free agent.

While the whole world is holding its breath and hoping not to suffocate while waiting for a Mayweather – Manny Pacquiao showdown, the possibility of the fight seems slim at the moment thanks in part to an uneasy relationship that seemingly has hit a stalemate between Pacquiao promoters Top Rank Inc. and Golden Boy Promotions.

But what if Mayweather signed with King?

Bob Arum of Top Rank feels confident he could make a deal for a Mayweather – Pacquiao fight with King.

King stole Hasim Rahman away from promoter Cedric Kushner with a duffle bag full of cash after Rahman won the heavyweight championship from Lennox Lewis in 2001 proving that “Money” talks. Could King entice Mayweather with similar tactics?

Who knows? But it’ll be interesting to see if King can make himself relevant again with his junior welterweight star, Devon Alexander, and a possible megafight between Mayweather and Pacquiao.

Maybe the King’s not dead yet.