FS1 will replay one of FOX’s best action fights of 2019 on Saturday night, as well as one of the network’s most controversial contests of last year.
Live boxing was supposed to air on FS1 on Saturday night, but that Premier Boxing Champions show was postponed Thursday due to coronavirus concerns. In place of that live programming, FS1 will replay former welterweight champion and FOX boxing analyst Shawn Porter’s two fights from 2019.
Starting at 7 p.m. ET/PT, FS1 will present a one-hour encore of Porter’s split-decision defeat to Errol Spence Jr. in their welterweight title unification fight. At 8 p.m. ET/PT, FS1 will replay Porter’s previous fight, a split-decision victory over Yordenis Ugas, as part of a two-hour show.
Spence and Porter produced once of the most entertaining action fights of 2019 on September 28 at Staples Center in Los Angeles. The unbeaten Spence dropped Porter in the 11th round and won their back-and-forth, 12-round battle on two of three scorecards.
Judges Rey Danesco (116-111) and Steve Weisfeld (116-111) scored that fight for Spence (26-0, 21 KOs), who retained his IBF welterweight title and took the WBC belt from Porter (30-3-1, 17 KOs). Judge Larry Hazzard Jr. scored Porter the winner over Spence (115-112) in the main event of a FOX Sports Pay-Per-View telecast.
Six months before Porter lost to Spence, he barely beat Ugas in a highly competitive clash March 9 in Carson, California.
The Cuban-born Ugas (25-4, 12 KOs) topped Porter on the scorecard of judge Zachary Young, who scored nine rounds for Ugas (117-111). Judges Steve Morrow (116-112) and Max De Luca (115-113) scored Porter the winner over Ugas in a fight FOX broadcast.
At 6:30 p.m. ET/PT Saturday, when FS1’s live undercard coverage was supposed to start, the cable network has scheduled a half-hour replay of Porter’s fifth-round knockout of Ecuador’s Erick Bone. Porter knocked down Bone twice in that March 2015 fight in Ontario, California, before it was stopped.
The postponed card FS1 was supposed to broadcast Saturday night, starting at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT, was to feature former junior middleweight contender James Kirkland. The 35-year-old Kirkland (34-2, 30 KOs), of Austin, Texas, was scheduled to face Fresno, California’s Marcos Hernandez (14-3-1, 3 KOs) in a 10-round main event at MGM National Harbor in Oxon Hill, Maryland.
Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.