A surprise bidder emerged in the Alycia Baumgardner-Delfine Persoon sweepstakes.

Global Combat Collective LLC claimed the promotional rights to the RING/undisputed 130-pound championship. The upstart company submitted $500,000 to outpace Matchroom Boxing ($251,800) and Filiep Tampere ($111,144) during a WBC purse bid held Friday via Zoom.

Matchroom has Baumgardner (15-1, 7 knockouts) under contract for one more fight. Tampere is the manager and regional promoter for Belgium’s Persoon.

Ten-percent ($50,000) will be set aside as a win bonus, per WBC purse bid rules. Baumgardner, The Ring champ, will receive seventy percent ($315,000) as the defending champion. Persoon (49-3, 19 KOs), No. 1 at 130, is due the remaining thirty percent ($135,000) as the mandatory challenger.

The Ring has learned that no actual talks took place between camps, despite the WBC-ordered mandatory title fight and negotiation period.

The lack of progress prompted a purse bid hearing. Matchroom and Tampere each hoped to win. They were both caught off guard by the participation of unknown Global Combat, whose listed representatives include Nelson Lopez Sr. and Sergio Rodriguez. Nelson Lopez Jr. heads Baumgardner’s management team.

A date and location was not attached to the winning bid, though expected to be announced in the coming weeks.

The fight was ordered by the WBC but on hold while Baumgardner was under suspension for a positive drug test surrounding her previous fight. The fully unified 130-pound queen tested positive for the banned substance Mesterolone from a July 12 sample collected by Drug Free Sport. The test date was three days prior to her ten-round points win over Christina Linardatou last July 15 in Detroit.

Baumgardner avenged her lone career defeat with the win. However, she was forced to spend the past eight months attempting to clear her name.

An independent investigation by the WBC absolved her of intentional use in a January 15 ruling. However, she was still deemed responsible for what went into her system and was placed on one year’s probation by the sanctioning body.

The ruling came as Persoon’s team pushed for months to enforce their mandatory status.  The former WBC lightweight titlist is the number-one challenger to all four major titles at the weight.

Baumgardner will attempt the third defense of her Ring championship, which she won in a Oct. 2022 split decision over Mikaela Mayer in London.

The win also saw Baumgardner defend her WBC belt and win the IBF and WBO titles. She became the undisputed champ after a points victory over Elhem Mekhaled last February 4 in New York City.

Baumgardner has held the WBC title since a Nov. 2021 fourth-round knockout of unbeaten Terri Harper on the road in Sheffield. Her upcoming bout versus Persoon will mark the fifth defense of that belt.

Persoon is 5-0 with one No-Contest since her return to 130 after her repeat loss to then-undisputed lightweight champ Katie Taylor. Their August 2020 rematch saw Persoon fall just short, fourteen months after her WBC title reign ended in their June 2019 undisputed championship in NYC.

Her most recent significant win saw Persoon outpoint Bo–mire Shin last May 28 in Torhout, Belgium. Persoon became the WBC mandatory with the victory. She has since added a six-round, unanimous decision over Agustina Marisa Belen Rojas last November 1 in Izegem, Belgium. 

Jake Donovan is a senior writer for The Ring and vice president of the Boxing Writers Association of America.
Follow @JakeNDaBox

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