Boxing Banter

Very little to talk about today, as there was only one major fight this weekend and there's only one next weekend. Here goes:

1.) I said last week that if Evander Holyfield was even remotely competitive in his fight with WBA Champion Nikolai Valuev, that heavyweight boxing should give up and crawl away. I guess it should start crawling, because Holyfield was far more than competitive yesterday. According to several sources, he should have won the fight. Not everyone agrees -- ESPN comentators seem to be split on the subject. The point is that Holyfield survived for 12 rounds against a champion, and had a legitimate chance to win the fight and a belt at 46. It seems clear that Holyfield was better than he has been in quite awhile, but he was by no means championship caliber. Instead, Valuev was exposed as a sham champion. I didn't know much about Valuev before this fight other than that he was a monstrous fellow with a strap around his waist. Now, I know that despite his size he's not much of a fighter, and also that he ducks legitimate fights. Those two things tend to go hand-in-hand; he's not very good, so why bother fighting a legitimate fight? This makes me wonder whether there's any possibility he'll fight one of the Klitschko's -- I imagine the money would have to be huge to force him into a fight he'd go into knowing he was going to lose. As for Holyfield, he should leave now. This fight was nearly as good as a win for his legacy. He didn't get squashed, and if he left now he could retain some dignity. If he fights anyone better than Valuev, he'll almost certainly be down in a hurry. It's well past time to hang 'em up, Evander.

2.) The only fight of any consequence this week will be on Tuesday, when WBC flyweight champ Daisuke Naito (33-2-3; 21 KO) defends against Shingo Yamaguchi (23-5-2; 9 KO). I've got nothing on this fight; I don't know anything about either fighter. This will be Naito's fourth defense since winning the belt in July of 2007 from Pongsaklek Wonjongkam. He's won two of the fights and retained via draw in the other. Yamaguchi does not seem to be a serious threat to take the strap.