Icon Sport recently announced its next event, "Hard Times," which is slated for August 2 at the Blaisdell Arena in Honolulu, Hawaii. As we reported a couple days ago, the company's middleweight champion, Kala "Kolohe" Hose (6-2), will face Rolando Dominique in a non-title fight at a 180-pound catchweight.
The 140-pound North American title, however, will be on the line as the 135 pound champ, Mark Oshiro (11-1) -- often referred to as the "Bantamweight Chuck Liddell" -- will take on Bao Quach (14-8-1) for the vacant strap. Quach hasn't lost since November of 2006 and has reeled off an impressive eight fight win streak.
Both guys are super-explosive and both are loved by the Hawaiian fans. This one will be a treat for those who make it out to the Blaisdell Arena that night.
There will also be a 170-pound state title put up for grabs. Hard-hitting BJ Penn trainee, Ross "The Boss" Ebanez (18-6), will vie for the gold against undefeated submission artist, Keoni Bryant (3-0).
The belt was made vacant after champion Sidney Silva (6-2) decided to drop down to the 160-pound weight class. Speaking of Silva, he'll also be in action on this card. He'll fight Hideto Kondo. This fight will be the 18-year-old Kondo's debut ... and a stiff test at that against the former welterweight champ.
Kondo will have his training partner Hayato "Mach" Sakurai in his corner for this fight. There's some buzz surrounding this kid. This will be an interesting fight for sure.
Phil "The New York Badass" Baroni (10-10) will also be in action at "Hard Times." He'll scrap with Ron Verdadero (3-5) at a catchweight of 175 pounds. Baroni is at least staying busy lately. This will be his fourth fight in 2008 and second in less than a month.
This looks like a really good show so far with a ton of action-packed fights. There's no word on if it will be aired on Showtime or any other channel, but we'll let you know if any more news involving that comes out.
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