The WBC welterweight tournament co-promoted by Bernard Hopkins' Real Deal Sports and Entertainment company has its entire quarterfinal field set with a date and venue.
All four quarterfinal fights will take place on April 27 at the KFC Yum! Center in Louisville, Kentucky. The main event will see former junior welterweight world title challenger Felix Diaz, the No. 1 seed in the tournament, face off against No. 8 Francisco Santana. Santana steps in for Derrieck Cuevas, who was going to participate in the tournament, but withdrew due to the death of his grandmother.
Below are the first round matches of the tournament taking place on April 27. All fights are scheduled for 10 rounds.
- #1 Felix Diaz vs. #8 Francisco Santana
- #2 Chris van Heerden vs. #7 Timo Schwarzkopf
- #3 Fredrick Lawson vs. #6 Baishanbo Nasiyiwula
- #4 Radzhab Butaev vs. #5 Brad Solomon
The tournament does not guarantee the winner a title shot of any sorts, but is unique in various ways. The tournament will implement an open scoring system that notifies boxers if they are winning or losing their respective bouts and create a standardized scoring criteria that will clearly define how judges should score the fight.
Tournament fights will also have additional judges scoring the fight. A fourth judge will be scoring the fight at ringside while a fifth judge will be scoring the fight looking a television monitor with no audio commentary. All five judges' scorecards will be used if a fight were to go the distance.
