Pavlik may fight WBA champ Sturm

By JOE SCALZO

Vindicator sports staff

YOUNGSTOWN — Kelly Pavlik may fight a German middleweight champion this fall, but it’s not the one everyone expected.

Pavlik’s handlers are pursuing a possible bout with WBA middleweight champion Felix Sturm in October in what would be Pavlik’s first bout since February’s knockout of Marco Antonio Rubio in Youngstown.

“We’re looking at it,” said Pavlik’s co-manager Cameron Dunkin of the Sturm fight. “It’s always been there [as a possibility].

“It’s just a matter of finding the best deal for Kelly and the best direction for us to go.”

Pavlik and his trainer, Jack Loew, are traveling to New York this Thursday for Miguel Cotto’s WBO welterweight title bout with Joshua Clottey. Once there, Dunkin and Pavlik plan to meet with Top Rank president Todd duBoef to discuss his next bout.

Pavlik had been slated to fight former WBC light middleweight champion Sergio Mora later this month before the fight was postponed due to a staph infection Pavlik suffered in one of his hands in February.