Boxing Banter

Relatively quiet week to report on, but there are some bigger fights coming up in the next few weeks that should be interesting. Here are this weeks notes:

1.) In a battle of undefeated fighters, Hungarian Karoly Balszay (20-0; 14 KO) won a unanimous decision over Denis Inkin (34-1; 24 KO) to snag the WBO Super Middleweight belt. I thought Inkin would get the win in this fight, but I suspected it would be a close bout. It was a fairly close fight, 115-113, 116-112, 116-112, so I wouldn't be all that surprised if the two fought again in a year or so.

2.) The second scheduled title fight was turned into a non-title bout after the challenger failed to make weight. WBO Light Heavyweight champ Zsolt Erdei (30-0; 17 KO) remained unbeated by winning a unanimous decision over Yuri Barashian (25-5; 17 KO). The result wasn't particularly surprising, but Barashian's inability to make weight was. How do you miss your weight in a title fight? Sheesh.

3.) Two title fights next weekend, both on Saturday night. The first will present undefeated WBC Welterweight champion Andre Berto (23-0; 19 KO) making his second title defense since winning the belt in June. His opponent will be 27-year-old Luis Collazo (29-3; 14 KO), the #1 contender for the belt. Collazo hasn't won a fight against a real quality opponent in a few years, so I would expect Berto to retain.

4.) Finally, in a battle for the vacant interim WBO Cruiserweight title, Alexander Alexeev (16-0; 15 KO) will battle Victor Emilio Ramirez (13-1-0; 11 KO). Alexeev has the more impressive pedigree and a few years of experience on Ramirez. He's also more respected by the WBO ranking committee, coming into the fight with the #1 ranking against Ramirez's #7 slot. My money's on Alexeev to become the new "interim" champ.

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.

Boxing Banter

A shortened BB post tonight as I prepare for my last final (ever!) as a law student tomorrow. Here are some brief thoughts on what we saw the past few days:

1.) I hope you had a chance to watch Tomasz Adamek take the IBF Cruiserweight title off of Steve Cunningham on Thursday night. The card was on Versus, and also included an IBF Bantamweight fight won by champion Joseph Agbeko. Both fights went the distance and were entertaining (this was a great free card), but the Adamek-Cunningham matchup provided a great deal of drama. ESPN's boxing page even lists it as a contender for fight of the year. Adamek managed to knock Cunningham down three times (I believe he had only been down once in his entire career to that point) while staying on his feet despite absorbing a lot of punishment, and that proved to be the difference. A stunning round 4 sums up the fight -- Cunningham dominated the round, to the point that the announcers were discussing awarding the round to him 10-8 instead of the standard 10-9. Then, out of nowhere at the end of the round Adamek landed a right to the face that dropped Cunningham. Under the scoring rules in effect, that mandated a round victory for Adamek, and he ended up winning the round 10-9. That was a three point swing in that one round, and had he not picked up the knockdown (all other things staying the same) the fight would have ended in a draw -- one judge for each fighter and one with an even card. Great fight, great card, great job by Versus putting it together.

2.) Wladimir Klitschko easily defeated Hasim Rahman in Mannheim, Germany yesterday to hold onto his IBF and WBO belts. Rahman was a replacement fighter for Alexander Povetkin, who was supposed to get the mandatory fight against Klitschko but was injured in training. This was a ho-hum fight that was never in doubt, as Rahman spent painful amounts of time against the ropes and Klitschko was clearly the better, stronger fighter. It ended in the sixth roung when the referee stopped it following three brutal shots from Klitschko.

3.) Elsewhere in heavyweight land, it was all about the old guys. Riddick Bowe returned to the ring for the first time in three years and picked up an 8-round unanimous decision, while James Toney beat Fres Oquendo by split decision in a 12-rounder. I would like to say that these results are meaningless because both fighters are far beyond their prime, but with Evander Holyfield getting a title shot next weekend I guess I can't quite make that statement.

4.) The Kendall Holt-Ricardo Torres rubber-match was called off because Torres was hurt, but Holt still faced a challenge on the Showtime card on Saturday night when he faced previously undefeated challenger Demetrius Hopkins. Holt retained his WBO Junior Welterweight belt by split decision. The judge ruling for Hopkins was sort of on an island, with her point spread very different from what the other two judges had. Normally with a split decision in that situation I'd say a rematch is likely, but the cards of the other two judges weren't that close. Still, a rematch would be nice to see if Holt could do it again. I'm guessing Holt still wants Torres for a third time, so maybe that will come next.

5.) There are some fights next weekend, but there only appears to be one world title on the line -- WBA Heavyweight champ Nikolai Valuev defends his belt in a sham fight against Evander Holyfield, who came out of nowhere when he signed this fight. This thing has no business going beyond three rounds, if that. Holyfield is 46 and hasn't been a meaningful fighter in years. Valuev is a monster who is 11 years younger and has 34 KO's in 51 matches. The only reason this fight was signed at all was that Holyfield needed money and Valuev needed an easy end-of-year opponent, presumably for a tuneup. If Holyfield is even remotely competitive in this fight, Heavyweight boxing should just give up and crawl away.

Boxing Banter

It's a little later in the day than I normally post, but I've been busy studying for my last set of law school finals (Family Law is not as interesting as sports, sadly). Here are some notes from the last few days of fights:

1.) Obviously, the De La Hoya meltdown is foremost on the mind of anyone who follows the sweet science today. As I mentioned last night, I expected this to be a joke of a fight, and I apologize to Manny Pacquiao and his fans for doubting his ability to be competitive against the naturally bigger De La Hoya. There's no reason to recap the fight -- all you need to know if you didn't watch is that Pacquiao won virtually every round and De La Hoya at the end wasn't doing much more than hiding behind his gloves hoping for the fight to end.

There were a few things that interested me about this fight that aren't getting quite as much attention, though. First, HBO weighs the fighters before the fight, showing how much weight was gained from the weigh-in the day before. Stunningly, Pacquiao actually entered the fight last night as the heavier fighter, a remarkable fact in a fight where he should have been struggling to get up to an appropriate weight, and considering that he was actually about five pounds below the max limit in the weigh-in. De La Hoya only gained a couple of pounds from the weigh-in, and while he obviously retained his height and reach advantage, the commentators mentioned several times that they expected him to be at least 10 pounds heavier than he was by the time the fight rolled around. I don't think it would have made much difference -- he certainly wouldn't have been any faster if he had been heavier -- but its an interesting point of curiosity.

I was also somewhat amazed by Pacquiao's approach when he had De La Hoya at the limit. With the exception of a flurry at the end of the eighth round when it looked like Manny really wanted to end the fight, he tended to back off after delivering key blows when De La Hoya was in trouble against the ropes. It's almost as if he couldn't believe that De La Hoya was in as bad a position as he really was, like he was thinking that De La Hoya might have been playing possum. There were several moments when it looked like Pacquiao could have pressed when De La Hoya was defenseless and either scored a knockdown or a stoppage from the ref. I would be interested in knowing what exactly was going through Pac-man's head in those moments. Maybe he already knew that he had won the fight, and didn't want to embarrass De La Hoya any more than he already had. If so, that's a stunning testament to how out of the fight Oscar was by the end.

De La Hoya should be, and almost certainly is, done as a fighter. Pacquiao, however, should have many years of big fights left. It sounds like Ricky Hatton might want a piece of him, and that would be an interesting fight. I imagine Manny will go for whatever is going to net him some major cash. It'll never happen, but last night's result leaves me wondering what a Pacquaio/Floyd Mayweather, Jr. fight would look like.

2.) The undercard for HBO last night was horrid. The first fight, featuring Daniel Jacobs (who fought 12 fights in 2008!), was what was expected -- a dominant performance from the undefeated super middleweight. The other two fights, though, were absurd. At the junior welterweight level, Victor Ortiz very well may have ended the career of Jeffrey Resto by finishing him off quickly in the second round. Resto just didn't get much offense in, and for a fighter who was looking to rebound and prove he deserves promotion by Golden Boy, it was a mess. Even worse, the WBO junior featherweight championship fight between Juan Manuel Lopez and "Argentinian Champion" Sergio Medina was possibly the worst fight I've ever seen. After seeing this fight, I can now say that Punch-Out!'s "Glass Joe" is real, and he hails from Argentina. Somehow, Medina entered the fight with a 33-1 record, but after what looked like one glancing blow from Lopez, he ended up on the ropes cowering. After being knocked down three times in 98 seconds, the referee stopped the fight. Medina's stats -- he landed one punch out of six thrown in the fight. Ouch. I believe it was also Medina who gained a whopping 16 pounds from the weigh-in the day before -- I guess eating like a glutton in the 24 hours before a fight isn't the best plan.

3.) I would have loved to see the Carl Froch/Jean Pascal WBC supper middleweight championship fight yesterday, but unfortunately it wasn't available anywhere that I normally look for fights. The Fight News account of it sounds intriguing, and hopefully I'll get to see Froch's next fight. Froch picked up the unanimous decision and the vacant belt. The WBO interim strawweight title was also up for grabs last night, and Manuel Vargas took out champion Daniel Reyes to win the strap. So far as I know, those were the only major belts that were up for grabs on the weekend.

4.) It looks like two IBF titles will be defended on free TV this Thursday night on Versus, including what should be one very fun fight at the Cruiserweight level. IBF Cruiserweight champ Steve Cunningham (21-1), who hasn't stepped into the ring since knocking out Marco Huck last December, will face Tomasz Adamek (35-1) for the strap. On the same card, IBF bantamweight champ Joseph Agbeko (25-1) returns to the ring for the first time since September 2007 when he defends against William Gonzalez (21-2). For a free TV card, this thing is awfully promising.

5.) Next Saturday features cards put on by HBO, Showtime, and Versus yet again. Unless you're a big James Toney fan, the Versus card isn't anything to shout about this time. There are some interesting fights on HBO and Showtime, however. First, I'm a sucker for Heavyweights, so the HBO main event featuring Wladimir Klitschko (51-3; 45 KO's) defending his IBF and WBO belts against Hasim Rahman (45-6; 36 KO's) is compelling even though it's unlikely to be much of a fight. Rahman, remember, is only getting this fight because mandatory challenger Alexander Povetkin was injured while training. HBO's card also features the return of Riddick Bowe after three years absence. Yeah, I'm not quite as excited about that one. Showtime counters with a third match between Kendall Holt (24-2; 13 KO's) and Ricardo Torres (32-2; 28 KO's) for Holt's WBO junior welterweight title. The last fight, in July, was bizarre -- Holt won in 61 seconds with a KO, but he was knocked down twice before getting the win. A third fight in those circumstances makes a lot of sense.

Wow

I figured tonight's De La Hoya/Pacquiao fight would be a lopsided affair. I was right -- but I backed the wrong fighter. De La Hoya just quit after the eighth round, after a fight in which he didn't just lose every round, he lost humiliatingly. The standard round loss is scored 10-9 for the winner unless there is a knockdown. De La Hoya lost at least one round 10-8 despite staying on his feet, and that's an indication of how much punishment he was taking. I'll have more on this tomorrow in my Boxing Banter post, but I couldn't leave it alone tonight. Remarkable result, and Pacquiao clearly showed that he fully deserves the title of the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world.

Boxing Banter

Sadly, my computer is dead (fried motherboard), but a couple hundred dollars later I spruced up my old one with a new battery and power cord, and I pulled my data off the dead one with a SATA-USB dock (handy little things -- I recommend having one around). So, I'm back in the blogging game with my old computer and a fancy new one on the way. Not that I've had much to say for most of the off-season -- hopefully that will change soon!

Now, onto some fight notes. I didn't get to see any of these live, but there were some interesting results to comment on:

1.) Paul Williams is something of a beast, and now he has the WBO interim Junior Middleweight title to lug around and possibly entice people to fight him. This is one of those troublesome interim titles -- the actual titleholder, Sergiy Dzinziruk, is out fighting and defending his title. Why is there still an interim belt when the real title-holder isn't hurt or otherwise out of the picture? And why would the WBO bother with the extreme farce of a "vacant" interim title? These are the mysteries around which boxing is made. If the world made any sense, this would lead to a mandatory fight between Dzinzurik (36-0-0) and Williams (36-1-0) -- but that would probably make too much sense for the WBO. Anyway, based on the results of this fight, Williams isn't going to have any problem with his move up from welterweight.

2.) Maybe I should give Cristobal Arreola more credit than I did in last week's post. After knocking out Travis Walker last night, he's 26-0 with 23 knockouts. He did the deed in the third round after Walker sent him to the canvas in the second, so he would seem to have some staying power. I still doubt that Arreola would have much of a chance against either Klitschko or Nikolai Valuev -- but it's starting to look like we'll get a chance to find out.

3.) This fight wasn't on my radar, but WBC junior flyweight champion Edgar Sosa handed mandatory challenger Juanito Rubillar his 11th loss on the way to defending the title.

4.) I'm looking forward to December 6. The headline fight for most is the Oscar De La Hoya/Manny Pacquiao tilt -- but I tend to agree with the commentators who think that the natural size difference is too much and that De La Hoya will dominate. Far more interesting to me is the Carl Froch/Jean Pascal fight for the vacant WBC Super Middleweight belt. Both fighters are undefeated, and I think sup mid is an interesting weight that can produce some good fights, so that could be interesting. The vacant WBO Cruiserweight belt will also be contested in a fight between Enzo Maccarinelli and Johnathan Banks. Maccarinelli comes in at 28-2-0 with 21 KO's, while Banks is undefeated with 20 wins and 14 KO's. The WBO junior featherweight belt will also be defended by Juan Manuel Lopez against Sergio Medina.

Boxing Banter

Short post today -- it's my birthday and I'm off doing a number of things. I did want to comment briefly on three fights from this weekend:

1.) Ricky Hatton/Paulie Malignaggi was a non-starter for me. The fight just wasn't all that exciting, with Malignaggi diving inside a ton to try to short-arm Hatton, and with Hatton (especially early) grabbing Paulie whenever that happened. After the first round, Hatton dominated the fight (which contributed to the lack of excitement). I expected something better out of two fighters who had only two losses between them coming in, but the combination of styles just didn't lead to a great fight and I ended up being relatively disappointed. Bizarre decision by Paulie's corner to wave the towel in the middle of the 11th round, also. Malignaggi wasn't going to win the fight, and doesn't have the power to legitimately hope for a miracle knockout, so on that level I understand. However, at the time he wasn't really in danger physically, and I'm not sure why they wouldn't have let him keep going until and unless he did get himself in trouble.

2.) Speaking of bizarre fights, the James Kirkland/Brian Vera fight that came right before the Hatton/Malignaggi main event qualifies. Kirkland hammered Vera mercilessly, and knocked him down three times, but two of those falls looked more like slips or pushes and Vera took punch after punch after punch. The referee ended up stopping the fight in the 8th after a defenseless Vera took a particularly nasty punch. For several rounds before that, the british announcers who I was listening to were mortified that Vera's corner wasn't stopping the fight -- but I understood their decision. Vera was occasionally landing big right hands to Kirkland's chin, and Kirkland was occasionally getting winded. Whereas Malignaggi in the main event had no realistic hope of landing a knock out punch, Vera did seem to have that hope. The referee made the right decision in stopping the fight when he did, but I also think Vera's corner was correct in keeping their fighter in the bout.

3.) I didn't get to see the Celestino Cabellero/Steve Molitor junior featherweight unification fight, but I wish I had. Caballero dominated the previously unbeaten Moliter, knocking him out in the fourth round. It sounds like he wants to fight the other champions in the division, and I'm hopeful we could see a fully unified junior featherweight champion in a year or so.

4.) There aren't a lot of big fights next weekend, but HBO's November 29 card has a couple of semi-interesting bouts. Verno Phillips and Paul Williams will battle for the vacant WBO junior middleweight title, and that's a weight that I enjoy watching. There's also an IBF heavyweight eliminator on the card between Cristobal Arreola and Travis Walker. Neither one has a hope of beating IBF champ Wladimir Klitschko if they get a title fight, but at least this is a heavyweight bout between what passes for a couple of high level fighters -- it probably won't be that entertaining but I'll still give it a shot. And don't forget that in two weeks we'll all get to witness the likely disaster that will be De La Hoya/Pacquiao. How great would it be if Pacquiao somehow pulled off an upset in that fight, by the way? I'd find it hilarious, although it'll almost certainly never happen.

Boxing Banter

I would like to introduce a new regular Sunday feature of this blog -- a boxing "notes" post which, as you can see, will be called Boxing Banter (I'm all about alliteration). I plan on putting a Boxing Banter post up every week, with a few observations on the events that took place over the previous few days (the schedule for most weeks includes fights from Wednesday to Saturday, with the big events usually on Saturday). I am by no means as versed in boxing as I am in baseball, having been a fan for a much shorter period of time. Also, while I get to watch a fair number of fights, I don't get a chance to watch them all, and there should be no expectation that I've seen all the fights I'm talking about. These aren't meant to be recaps of fights, anyway, but thoughts on the implications of fights and on the events yet to come. Here goes:

1.) With the heavyweight division in such a state of stagnation (Evander freakin' Holyfield is getting a title shot against Nikolai Valuev on December 20 -- and his last significant win came in 2002 against Hasim Rahman), it was good to see David Haye make a definitive statement in his full-time heavyweight debut against Monte Barrett. Barrett isn't exactly a title contender, but he's a solid enough fighter to debut against. Haye knocked Barrett down five times before the fight was stopped in the fifth round. I don't know what Haye's ceiling is as a heavyweight, but I look forward to his eventual contest with Valuev and/or one of the Klitschko's. Haye has already challenged Vitaly, but he'll have to wait in line for at least one more fight. Hopefully he doesn't move too soon -- but you bet I'll be watching when he gets his shot at a title.

2.) Another heavyweight who might get some notice is Denis Boytsov. He's undefeated at 23-0 with 18 KO's, and so far has only been ranked by the WBA and WBO. At some point I'm guessing he'll get some love from the WBC and IBF. That recognition will come if he starts beating some bigger names. He beat Vinny Maddalone on Saturday night.

3.) The big fight of the week was between Jermain Taylor and Jeff Lacy in a WBC super middleweight eliminator. Taylor won big on points, but now might not pursue the title fight against an as-yet-to-be determined champion. The reason? ESPN's Dan Rafael reports that Taylor wants a piece of Joe Calzaghe at light heavyweight. Ironically, the belt Taylor would be fighting for if he accepted the fight he's earned would be a belt vacated by Calzaghe when he moved up in weight. I understand why Taylor wants Calzaghe -- it's all about the payday, and he could undoubtedly make more bank against Calzaghe than he would against the winner of the fight between Carl Froch and Jean Pascal. I don't begrudge him that; boxing is a violent sport that messes up competitors, and grabbing the cash while you can makes sense. It's frustrating, however, that so many boxers have to ignore weight classes and mandatory fights (or, in Taylor's case, possible title fights) to go make money in one-off challenges. In some cases, this impulse gets us freak-show fights like the looming disaster that will be De La Hoya-Pacquiao. In other cases, it just means good fighters aren't identified with a particular weight class. Either way, it's frustrating. I wish there was a solution, but I doubt there is.

4.) Next week, undefeated IBF junior featherweight champion Steve Molitor faces WBA junior featherweight champion Celestino Caballero in a unification fight. The fight also has ramifications for The Ring rankings, as Caballero is the Ring #2 and Molitor the Ring #4 in that division. My dream would be for the winner to face WBC/Ring champion Israel Vazquez in a further unification sometime in April or May -- but we'll see what Vazquez has in mind coming off of three straight fights against Rafael Marquez.

5.) Next week will also see Ring junior welterweight champion Ricky Hatton defending his title against Paulie Malignaggi. Both fighters have one blemish on their record -- Hatton's is a 2007 loss to Floyd Mayweather, Jr., and Malignaggi's a 2006 loss to Miguel Cotto. Malignaggi enters the fight as the #1 contender to Hatton's belt, so this should be a heck of a fight. My guess is that Hatton will retain, but I guess I wouldn't be surprised either way.

Emeritus Champion No More

Boxing has always fascinated me, probably because I can't imagine anyone wanting to step into the ring knowing that even on a good day, you're going to leave the ring in rough shape. This afternoon I watched WBC Champion Samuel Peter lose his belt to WBC Champion Emeritus Vitaly Klitschko (in German nonetheless!). The fight was . . . bad. There wasn't clutching and grabbing, which is the bane of so many major heavyweight fights -- but Peter got pretty much no offense in over the course of the 8 rounds that the fight lasted. He couldn't answer the bell for the ninth. It was pretty much the equivalent of watching Ohio State lose to LSU in the NCAA Football National Championship game. Oy.

Boxing has bigger problems, though. For one thing, the idea of having a "Champion Emeritus" in the first place. Nearly four years ago, Klitschko "retired" due to injuries while holding the WBC belt. As a result, the WBC needed to strip him of the title -- but named him "emeritus" champion so that if he chose to come back, he could demand a title fight. The WBA did the same thing with injured champion Ruslan Chagaev, although they deemed him the "Champion in Recess." By my way of thinking, getting hurt is part of boxing. If you can't defend your title, you should lose it -- and when you come back, you should at least have to fight someone before getting a title shot again. Four years gone and then right back to a title fight? Of course, Klitschko's win today hurts my argument a bit.

The bigger problem is the one that has long plagued boxing. How can you get anyone to follow your sport when you have four major sanctioning bodies (WBO/IBF/WBC/WBA) and countless minor sanctioning bodies? This problem was made worse tonight with Vitaly's win, because the possibility of unifying the titles has now disappeared until either Vitaly or his brother Wladimir (holder of the WBO and IBF titles) loses their belts or retires, since they've long refused to fight one another. I've read enough boxing articles recently to know that even boxing journalists were hoping that Peter would retain his belt to hold open the possibility of a unified title.

I will continue to watch fights when I get the chance, because I remain fascinated by the sport. It's no surprise, however, that the sport seems to be slowly dying. Maybe someone new and exciting will step up and electrify the sport. I suppose Alexander Povetkin, a 29-year-old Russian with a 16-0 record, could step up and stun Wladimir Klitschko in December to start a run as a monster in the sport -- but it seems unlikely. Maybe David Haye can step up into heavyweights and electrify the division -- but before he's fought a single fight at that weight it seems premature to pin the sports' hopes on him.

My suggestion? A way should be found to eliminate at least two of the major sanctioning bodies. Combining four into two would reduce some of the redundancy and make the sport easier to follow, while leaving some of the intrigue of having dueling sanctioning bodies. That won't happen unless all parties agree, but it would help immensely. The sport should also try to get some major heavyweight fights back on free TV. How else are you going to convince people that it's worth watching? If you charge people $50 for Evander Holyfield's latest return fight, or a Mike Tyson freak show, or an underwhelming battle between two lumbering fighters, you'll only get the hardcore supporters. Get some of the younger, up-and-coming heavyweights on Friday Night Fights. Maybe be really radical and put a title fight on free TV. Do something to spark interest!

As for me -- I'm still hooked. I can't wait for the flurry of heavyweight fights in November and December that could make things interesting in the division. I just hope something changes before the sport suffocates itself.