HBO Sports serves up an action-packed night when HBO BOXING AFTER DARK: JUAN DIAZ VS. PAUL MALIGNAGGI AND VICTOR ORTIZ VS. ANTONIO DIAZ is seen SATURDAY, DEC. 12 at 10:15 p.m. ET/ PT & 9:15 p.m. CT from the UIC Pavilion in Chicago, exclusively on HBO. The HBO Sports team of Bob Papa, Lennox Lewis and Max Kellerman will be ringside for the event, which will be available in HDTV, closed-captioned for the hearing-impaired and presented in Spanish on HBO Latino..
The main event is a highly anticipated welterweight rematch between Houston’s Juan Diaz (35-2, 17 KOs) and Brooklyn’s Paul Malignaggi (26-3, 5 KOs). Last August, the two faced off in Diaz’ hometown, in what many saw as a close, hard-fought contest, with Diaz winning by unanimous decision. The call for a rematch stemmed from the judges’ controversial scoring, which had many in the boxing community questioning the lopsided numbers in favor of Diaz. This time, the two expect a neutral arena to help settle the score.
In the opening bout, Victor Ortiz (24-2-1, 19 KOs) of Oxnard, Cal. faces off against Antonio Diaz (46-5-1 29 KOs) of Coachella, Cal. in a scheduled ten-round welterweight bout. Ortiz is returning to the ring for after absorbing just his second loss – a tough battle with the formidable Marcos Rene Maidana in June – and now looks to get back on the winning track. Tested ring veteran Diaz is out to derail Ortiz’ comeback.
Following the live action, HBO Sports presents bonus tape-delayed coverage from Berne, Switzerland of the same-day heavyweight title bout between Vitali Klitschko (38-2, 37 KOs) of the Ukraine, now living in Los Angeles, and Atlanta’s undefeated Kevin Johnson (22-0, 9 KOs). Klitschko is coming off a dominating September win over Cristobal Arreola that reestablished him as a major force in the division; Johnson intends to use his speed and agility to claim Klitschko’s portion of the heavyweight crown.
The executive producer of HBO BOXING AFTER DARK is Rick Bernstein; producer, Thomas Odelfelt; director, Mike Sheehan.
® HBO BOXING AFTER DARK is a registered service mark of Home Box Office, Inc.