by Johnny Walker
After seeing a widely criticized bout with faded veteran James “Lights Out” Toney fall through, highly ranked heavyweight contender Tomasz “Goral” Adamek is now set to face tough journeyman Travis Walker on September 8 at the Prudential Center in Newark, NJ.
It seemed that the Toney-Adamek clash was set, but after a video appeared on the web showing Toney threatening physical harm to ESPN boxing scribe Dan Rafael–who had written a story critical of the matchup–Adamek’s promoter Main Events announced that Toney was out of the picture.
The official reason given for dropping Toney was Adamek’s likely participation in an IBF heavyweight tournament against unbeaten Russian giant Alexander Ustinov. But Adamek had previously said that he had little interest in the tournament, and that idea quietly went by the wayside.
Instead, Adamek (46-2, 28 KOs) will face off against the nearly 6’5″ tall Walker (39-7, 31 KOs), who stopped veteran Kali Meehan in March of this year and who gave rising star Kubrat Pulev a tough fight in a unanimous decision loss in 2011.
As was the plan with the aborted Toney fight, Adamek-Walker will take place in the afternoon to accomodate a pay-per-view broadcast in Adamek’s native country of Poland.