By Mark Vester
At the New York press conference scheduled by former heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield, to announce his bout with Fres Oquendo at San Antonio's Alamodome on November 10, it was revealed that the 10-round scheduled bout would be the main event of a Fox Sports Net boxing pay-per-view, with a price tag of $44.95. Holyfield will be promoting the card under his Real Deal Events promotional company.
Holyfield (39-8-2 with 26 knockouts) feels that he is ready to fight for a heavyweight title and a win over Oquendo (26-3 with 16 KOs) will put him in line for a title shot, which is why he took the big step up in class over his last opponent, insurance salesman Jeremy Bates.
"It was me telling them I'm not going to be running around here trying to fight 10, 11, 12 people," Holyfield said. "It's not an ego thing. I know I'm ready. Next year I should be a champion. By 2008, I'll be undisputed heavyweight champion of the world. I'm hoping that when they put the lights out on the Olympics in Beijing in 2008, I think I'll be the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world. I'm going to wash my hands and invite everybody to the retirement party. Then I will have done what I said what I was going to do."
Oquendo feels Holyfield picked the wrong man this time around, and is planning to use Holyfield as his own stepping stone towards a title shot. The heavyweight from Puerto Rico vowed to send Holyfield into an early retirement.
"My job is to reach world heavyweight contender status, that's been my job since I started fighting in 1987. This is it, he's fighting the real deal," Oquendo said.