While you were sleeping, bantamweight Fernando Montiel upset Hozumi Hasegawa with a 4th round knockout in a fight Hasegawa was winning before Montiel put together a menacing flurry that forced referee Laurence Cole to step in and end matters right at the bell. Montiel caught Hasegawa with a left that staggered him, as you can see above, then hit him with several more flush power punches while Hasegawa was tied up on the ropes. It was a very defensible stoppage — Cole was involved so controversy was inevitable, but Hasegawa was quite defenseless at the time of his call, even with a second left on the clock. I hesitate to say “I told you so” on warning people not to get carried away about Hasegawa as a huge pound-for-pound contender until he faced better competition, because Hasegawa was beating Montiel and since I picked Hasegawa to win this fight, I can’t talk much. Even though Hasegawa was winning, though, Montiel was countering him at times, and that’s how he caught him. A great win for Montiel, who’d hovered on the edge of pound-for-pound contention himself until some shaky performances and weak competition. Maybe we can get Montiel against Nonito Donaire now, or maybe he figures in for some good fights in the stacked bantamweight division? This is also a good omen for people who like an upset in the other big fight of the weekend, Floyd Mayweather-Shane Mosley.
Other early week results: Multi-KO’d cruiserweight Enzo Maccarinelli revived his career a touch with a 1st round knockout over Russian prospect Alexander Kotlobay, as you can see from the unnecessarily long video above; junior featherweight Toshiaki Nishioka defended his belt successfully in advance of what is presumably an mandatory defense against Rendall Munroe, who won a title eliminator last weekend; and all the Yuri Foreman maniacs (ForeManiacs?) put on their yarmulkes and celebrated watching him on Jimmy Kimmel Live Thursday, and if you missed it (it was pretty good, actually), I’ve included it below.
It may be surprising to discover that anything is happening in boxing this other than Mayweather-Mosley, but it is, it is! I can prove it to you! (P.S. The videos above stay up as long as YouTube leaves them up.)
Quick Jabs
Fairly busy weekend schedule outside of all that. We’ll divide it up into two. ShoBox Friday has probably the strongest all-around card, as it features six super middleweights (say, “six” and “super” — is that a theme on Showtime?) with nice records fighting each other. Marcus Johnson, Don George and Edwin Rodriguez are the prospects in the spotlight, but their respective opponents, Derek Edwards, Kevin Engel and Osumanu Adama, all have good records, albeit against lesser competition. Rodriguez and Johnson are confirmed fun to watch, and like Rodriguez, George goes by “The Bomb” (although Rodriguez’ nickname is in Spanish), so that’s a good sign. Also Friday comes the return Solo Boxeo on Telefutura, with the Golden Boy logo on it. Robert Guerrero headlines in a lightweight bout against gimme opponent Roberto Arrieta, who somehow fought in a title eliminator in 2009 despite never beating anyone of note. Heavyweight prospect Deontay Wilder and junior welterweight prospect Frankie Gomez also are on the card, and I might very well attend in person…
The fight likely to be the best brawl of the weekend won’t air on U.S. television, but it’ll be worth tracking down: cruiserweight titlist Marco Huck meets Brian Minto in his cruiserweight debut Saturday, and it should be a doozy. Huck is the more skilled man, but as Minto is moving down in weight, it’s not clear what he can do in the division. The cruiserweights also figure into Friday’s Prizefighter tournament in England, where hard-hitting 38-year-old Herbie Hide is the biggest name. Top Rank Live on Fox Sports Net continues a streak of lesser-appetizing fights after a strong, strong start, as junior bantamweight Tomas Rojas headlines the main event; Rojas, who’s entertaining, nonetheless has ever beat a top opponent, and is coming off yet another KO loss. Junior middleweight prospect Jose Pinzon is also on the card. (Glancing ahead at the Top Rank Live schedule, this streak of lesser-appetizing looks to be a trend for the near future.) And there’s a Telemundo card Friday featuring the always-entertaining bantamweight William Gonzalez…
I continue to be amazed that anything positive might come of the Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao fallout, yet here is Nevada, strongly considering adopting blood testing for fights. The timetable for potential adoption puts it around the time Mayweather-Pacquiao might be revived, the fall, and since Pacquiao has said he’d agree to blood testing if Nevada administered it, it’s almost like Nevada is trying to make boxing fans’ wishes come true by coming up with excuses for making the fight happen. I’m OK with that. Pacquiao trainer Freddie Roach also has proposed a possible 17-day cutoff for blood testing, when 14 days was the line drawn by the Mayweathers to Pacquiao’s earlier 24 days, per BoxingScene. But even if this gets resolved, don’t be surprised if the purse split is harder to make after Mayweather-Mosley does better numbers than anything Pacquiao has done…
More Pacquiao-related news: Is the pound-for-pound king going to start switching to the orthodox stance? He raised the interesting possibility himself. Did he lend a hand to a politically-motivated assassination attempt? It sounds ludicrous and flimsy, but that it even is being discussed goes to show that running for office in the Philippines is probably no easier that taking on a string of naturally bigger welterweights or dealing with scurrilous character attacks from the likes of the Mayweather clan.
In other boxing/politics developments, Hugo Chavez says it’s OUR fault in the media, not his, that Edwin Valero is dead. Riiiiiight. Also, the WBC is forbidding Mexican boxers from fighting in Arizona because of its controversial new immigration law. I can’t comment on that because of my day job, but I thought you should know…
I like Ron Borges, but I gotta disagree with this piece about heavyweight Chris Arreola and middleweight Kelly Pavlik not having been in tough fights to prepare them for Tomasz Adamek and Sergio Martinez, respectively. Both men lost last weekend. But Arreola had fought Vitali Klitschko, for God’s sake, and had been in a life-and-death struggle with Travis Walker, while Pavlik had taken on a slew of middleweight contenders and twice fought difficult matches with Jermain Taylor, not to mention Bernard Hopkins. You can argue that their boxing skills are lacking and you’d have a fair point, but that’s a question of coaching more than it’s a question of competition…
A second assault case against heavyweight Nicolay Valuev has been dismissed, per BoxingScene. You didn’t really think Valuev was guilty, did you? When’s the last time he assaulted anyone? I kid. More on Valuev in a moment…
Who R Paul Williams Picking? He likes Mosley to upset Mayweather by knockout, per a news release. If Williams makes it past Kermit Cintron next weekend, it would be great if he could get into the Mayweather-Mosley-Pacquiao discussion. Cintron also is picking Mosley…
Junior welterweight Amir Khan has gone on a bravado SPREE. First he claimed on Twitter that Marcos Maidana ducked him. Completely wrong, obviously the other way around — Maidana had wanted Khan badly, but got a nice deal from Golden Boy to avoid fighting Khan, another Golden Boy fighter, for a while. I guess it’s more accurate to say that Golden Boy ducked Maidana for Khan. Khan also said he wants to fight Pacquiao, which would almost surely require him dumping trainer Roach, since Roach trains both, and besides, Pacquiao would kill Khan at this point in their careers despite some competitive sparring sessions. Whole different fight without headgear, Amir. Lastly, he said he wants to end Paulie Malignaggi’s career in their upcoming fight, which sounds meaner than Khan usually is. What’s gotten into you, Amir? More on Khan in a moment, too…
I know I keep promising a pound-for-pound update, but with the Hasegawa-Montiel fight today and Mayweather-Mosley tomorrow, I figured I’d wait until Sunday. I mean it this time…
As promised: Foreman on Kimmel.
Round and Round
For all the threats coming from the Carl Froch camp, it’s good to hear it from his mouth that he won’t withdraw from the Super Six tournament over the site of his fight with Arthur Abraham. It was always a hollow threat given his obligation to compete, but I’m more comforted by the words coming from him mouth. It looks like it might end up being at a neutral site, according to ESPN UK, although it’s unclear where.
On the other hand, Khan was denied a work visa to the United States for his May 15 fight with Malignaggi, according to the Telegraph, probably because he zooms his car all over the U.K. and can’t stop getting in trouble for it. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Why aren’t these things worked out far, far, far in advance? Anyway, everyone’s predicting the show will be salvaged. Let’s hope so.
Donaire-Vic Darchinyan II remains in limbo over international television rights. Ugh.
Brandon Rios suffered a cut that forced him to withdraw from a nice lightweight fight with Urbano Antillon next weekend. Don’t Latin Fury cards have a knack for falling apart like tissue paper? Rios-Antillon was about the only reason to consider buying the show, unless you like filling the coffers of confirmed cheaters like Antonio Margarito. In other injury news, featherweight Chris John, a pound-for-pound top-20 guy, has had to put off his May fight with Fernando Saucedo, citing a shoulder injury. If this is setting up a potential clash with YURIORKIS GAMBOA! instead, I can accept some fakery.
Comebacking Keith Holmes will fight Kassim Ouma in my backyard on May 29 in a middleweight bout. Pretty brave matchmaking for the 41-year-old Holmes. I guess if you’re gonna go for it, you might as well really go for it. Hard to root against someone taking on a big challenge, especially a local guy, but I have this soft spot for Ouma and he deserved better in his bad-scorecard loss to Vanes Martirosyan.
(Round and Round notes: The Telegraph [U.K.]; Boxing Along The Beltway; Fightnews; BoxingScene; ESPN UK)
