Earlier this week, Showtime announced its boxing cards through mid-June, a schedule that includes four matchups of top-five ranked fighters, and 12 world champions. Eleven world title bouts are ahead.

Touting boxing's rising popularity, Showtime President of Sports and Event Programming Stephen Espinoza said the sport "provides a young, stable and multicultural audience and ... delivers that audience reliably."

Two of boxing's best, Keith Thurman and Errol Spence Jr., will headline future Showtime cards, although the outstanding welterweights won't go at each other.

Thurman will fight in Brooklyn on May 19, and Spence, who stopped Lamont Peterson last Saturday, will enter the ring in his hometown of Dallas on June 16.

"2017 was a great year. Unifying the WBA and the WBC titles was a dream come true," Thurman said.

"Since then, we had the elbow surgery, but 2018 is a get-back year. I'm truly looking forward to being back in the ring May 19. After that, I'm going to bring a more exciting fight later on this year. There are a lot of contenders and champions gunning for my No. 1 spot, but I'm going to have to let them know that I'll be right here at the top."

Another welterweight coming back is former two-time champion Danny Garcia, who faces Brandon Rios in a WBC welterweight title eliminator on Feb. 17 in Las Vegas. As part of that card, David Benavidez, at 21 the youngest current world champion, defends his WBC super middleweight title against Ronald Gavril. It’s a rematch of a close fight from last September.

Garcia has been out of the ring since suffering the first loss of his career, a twelve round split decision to Thurman in March 2017.

“On Feb. 17, I will show the world why I am one of the most popular fighters in boxing,” Garcia said. “I will show the world why Danny Garcia is a superstar.”