BKB 2015: Rosado vs. Stevens Fight Card, TV Info, Predictions and More

Big Knockout Boxing—or BKB for short—is back after a long layoff, as middleweight Gabriel Rosado returns to the unorthodox ring to defend his BKB title against Curtis Stevens on Saturday in Las Vegas.

This is the second pay-per-view edition of BKB, a ramped-up, brutalized version of an already brutal combat sport. Saturday's event will feature a total of nine fights. Rosado is making his return to the boxing innovation as the headliner after defeating Bryan Vera via sixth-round knockout in August 2014. 

Sports Illustrated's Chris Mannix offers up a quick rundown of what makes a BKB fight different from a regular boxing match: 

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Its modified rules are designed to increase the likelihood of—you guessed it—big knockouts. Instead of a ring, fighters enter a circular pit 17-feet in diameter. Rounds are two minutes long instead of the traditional three. Title fights are seven rounds; non-title bouts are five. There are no ropes. Intentionally stepping out of the pit is the equivalent to a knockdown on a boxing scorecard.

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Fight fans will also find familiar names such as Javier Garcia, David Estrada and Jesus Soto Karass on the card.

Here's the rundown of the event, including fight card, predictions and viewing info:


Date: Saturday, April 4th

Time (ET): 10 p.m.

Location: Mandalay Bay Events Center Las Vegas

TV Info: BKB.TV (Pay-per-view only)

Bout	Matchup	Prediction
Middleweight Championship (main event)	Gabriel Rosado vs. Curtis Stevens	Rosado, KO
Junior Middleweight Championship	David Estrada vs. Khurshid Abdullaev	Abdullaev, UD
Welterweight Championship	Javier Garcia vs. Jonathan Chicas	Garcia, KO
Cruiserweight Championship	Anthony Johnson vs. Joey Montoya	Johnson, TKO
Women's Lightweight Championship	Layla McCarter vs. Diana Prazak	Prazak, UD
Undercard	Gabe Duluc vs. Antonio Canas	Duluc, KO
Undercard	Jesus Soto Karass vs. Ed Paredes	Karass, KO
Undercard	Julian Pollard vs. Elijah McCall	McCall, SD
Undercard	Herbert Acevedo vs. William Hutchinson	Acevedo, TKO

BKB favors brawlers, straight-ahead fighters who waste little time in sizing up opponents and get right down to fisticuffs. With the shrunken dimensions, lack of ropes and short rounds, there is little opportunity for a participant to draw out the fight or play defensively.

There is little choice but to stand in the center of the pit—and really, the whole pit is a center, as there is little room for dancing—and deliver blows. 

This, of course, is by design, per BKB co-commissioner Chris Long, via Damian Calhoun of the Orange County Register: 

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When we laid out the opportunity, we wanted straight-ahead, fighers, not defensive fighters. This is not a place where Floyd Mayweather would excel. There is nowhere to run. You can’t take 30-40 seconds off. With two-minute (rounds), you know the excitement is coming to them. You have a short period of time to impress the judges.

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Some, like Garcia, don't seem to have too much trouble adjusting to the BKB style, at least from a conditioning standpoint.

"It’s easy to adjust because it’s only two minutes, where I was used to fighting three minutes," he said, via Francisco Salazar of the Ventura County Star.

Big Knockout Boxing has dipped heavily into the same stable of fighters that participated in the first event, hoping to keep the cards consistent and entertaining. Rosado, along with Estrada, Garcia, Herbert Acevedo, Gabe Duluc, Anthony Johnson and Khursid Abdullaev all return from the inaugural BKB.

While many of these fighters may seem ideally suited to the intended style, it doesn't necessarily mean that they were the event runner's first choices. Mannix noted that BKB went after several big name fighters in an attempt to bolster the nascent event's status:

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BKB has not been shy about going after some of boxing’s biggest names. Ruslan Provodnikov, Brandon Rios and Mikey Garcia have been offered fights. Last summer, BKB approached 160-pound kingpin Gennady Golovkin. A potential summer fight against Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. had just fallen apart, so BKB gauged Golovkin’s interest in stepping in the pit. Golovkin declined, ultimately electing to face Daniel Geale on HBO.

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While BKB will certainly have to stick with many of the same fighters looking for a unique opportunity to boost their Q rating in boxing circles, this doesn't necessarily mean those who participate in this will be branded sideshow attractions. Mannix notes that Rosado parlayed his win over Vera into an HBO fight against David Lemieux.

Of course, Rosado lost that bout via technical knockout in the 10th round and was also knocked down in the third round of the bout. Considering the loss to Lemieux turned out to be Rosado's fourth loss in his last five standard bouts—with only a no-contest busting up the ignominious run—he may find BKB his only shot at real glory in the near future. He seems destined for journeyman, cannon-fodder status otherwise.

The BKB organizers will certainly be hoping that the long gap between bouts won't have cooled off its status as the hot new thing in boxing.

With the bold Premier Boxing Champions series and the impending Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao bout siphoning most of the boxing world's attention as of late, BKB may seem even more like a gimmicky sideshow rather than a brave new venture in boxing.

It will take an action-packed card, and, of course, some big-time knockouts, for BKB to really gain some traction in the combat-sports consciousness.