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Andreas Hale
Sebastian Fundora will put his WBC junior middleweight championship on the line against Keith Thurman on Oct. 25 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, sources confirmed to ESPN on Thursday.
Fundora-Thurman will serve as the “PBC on Prime” main event with O’Shaquie Foster defending his WBC junior lightweight title against former super bantamweight titleholder and current WBC featherweight champion Stephen Fulton in the co-main event.
The championship fight between Fundora and Thurman was previously confirmed by ESPN, but a date and venue had not been secured. Las Vegas will play host to Thurman’s pursuit to become a two-division world champion, the same city where Fundora stepped in on short notice to replace an injured Thurman and defeated Tim Tszyu to become the WBC titleholder at 154 pounds.
Fundora (23-1-1, 15 KOs), 27, successfully defended his title against Tim Tszyu with a seventh-round stoppage in July on the undercard of Manny Pacquiao’s majority draw against Mario Barrios. The fight with Thurman will be his third defense of the title.
Thurman (31-1, 23 KOs), 36, has struggled to stay healthy and has fought only twice since dropping a decision to Pacquiao in 2019. In his only fight at 154 pounds earlier this year, Thurman knocked out Brock Jarvis.
Foster (23-3, 13 KOs) was rumored to defend the title against Fulton in August on a proposed pay-per-view event headlined by a rematch between Gervonta Davis and Lamont Roach. The fight didn’t come to fruition with Davis opting to face Jake Paul in November instead. Foster, 31, will get an opportunity to defend his title on a different pay-per-view with an opponent who is pursuing a third world championship in three different weight classes.
Fulton (23-1, 8 KOs) will move up another weight class after defeating Brandon Figueroa by unanimous decision for the WBC featherweight title in February. Fighting out of Philadelphia, Fulton was a unified champion at super bantamweight until he suffered his only loss to ESPN’s No. 2 pound-for-pound fighter, Naoya Inoue, in July 2023. The WBC will allow Fulton to keep his featherweight title while challenging for Foster’s WBC championship.
Also featured on the card will be a showdown between Jesus Ramos (22-1, 18 KOs) and Shane Mosley Jr. (22-4, 12 KOs) for the interim WBC middleweight title and former super welterweight champion Tony Harrison (30-4-1, 21 KOs) squaring off with undefeated Isaac Lucero (17-0, 13 KOs) at 160 pounds.