That picture was billed as a way for junior welterweight Joel Casamayor to deal with Timothy Bradley’s head butts, but pot and kettle and blackness and all that. It’ll also enhance Casa’s own head butts. I dunno, let’s let them wear the helmets tonight. It’s the only way that fight is remotely entertaining. (h/t friend of the site ThePJ)
And despite how non-entertaining it will be, despite what a mismatch it is, Bradley is getting paid $1.025 million for the thing, which is is approximately $1 million for every fan he has. That this is coming out of pay-per-view revenues makes that situation a bit less worse than if HBO was forking over the dollars, because every dollar that goes to overpaying someone who doesn’t deserve it is a dollar that doesn’t go into the pocket of someone who does. But insofar as high payments spoil fighters and make them take fewer risks, and insofar as some in the boxing media think that a boxer should be paid equivalent to what kind of draw he is, this is as bad or worse than anything that media whipping boy Andre Berto has managed — and at least Berto’s been in a couple fun fights lately, unlike Bradley. Who can blame Bradley for turning down an Amir Khan fight when he can get this kind of money against opponents with no chance of winning?
It’s also not like Bradley is suddenly getting overpaid, either: the fee was too high for his bout with Luis Carlos Abregu in a mismatch; the fee was too high for him vs. Devon Alexander, however legit that fight was; he was guaranteed a comeback date at a high fee; and now he’s getting this. Bet it happens again, too, because I reckon Top Rank has a pretty high guarantee in its contract with Bradley, or else why would he get this kind of money for this kind of fight? I think it just goes to show: Boxing is so desperate for a young American with talent that someone out there will give you a whole, whole lot of cash, regardless of anything else about you.
P.S., Casa’s getting $100,000 for this fight. That’s $50,000 more than an actual top, prime junior welterweight in Marcos Maidana said he was offered for the fight. Assuming that’s accurate — and I do, because no way this pay-per-view budget had very much money in it for a Maidana-level opponent for Bradley — when Top Rank’s Bob Arum tries to tell you that he “tried” to make a fight with Maidana, know that he’s totally insincere.
In this edition of Quick Jabs, besides the subjects in the headline, we tie up some other loose ends on tonight’s Manny Paquiao-Juan Manuel Marquez III pay-per-view, watch some videos, take a look at some fights in the works under “Round and Round” and more.
Quick Jabs
Both Pacquiao and Marquez looked great at the weigh-in, with Pacquiao at 143 and Marquez at 142. It’s worth remembering, though, that Marquez also looked good at the Floyd Mayweather, Jr. weigh-in at this higher weight for him — but that was before the yeast rose, and on fight night, he looked flabby…
A little bit of drama in the Pacquiao camp: Strength coach Alex Ariza got into a big ol’ fight with his man, but he said it’s all friendly now. Also, I have to imagine there will be some drama after trainer Freddie Roach belittled Floyd Mayweather adviser Leonard Ellerbe by saying, “He’s a gopher guy. He’s Buboy” — only Buboy is Pacquiao’s right hand man, and if I’m Buboy I’m pretty upset that Roach is insulting me like that. As it’s been a relatively drama-free camp for Pacquiao, maybe all this will help him, since Pacquiao feeds on the drama…
This Angel Hernandez cat, who’s helping make Marquez strong, is suing Victor Conte for defamation. In a sport with a lot of idiotic lawsuits, this one’s pretty far up there. Conte hasn’t said anything about Hernandez that isn’t true, not that I’ve seen, because a former admitted steroid peddler is still a former admitted steroid peddler, even if another former admitted steroid peddler is the one calling him that. Also, FightHype highlighted some of Hernandez’ old statements about creating drugs that can’t be tested for yet, so maybe all his “We’ll take any test!” rhetoric doesn’t come off as so free and open, assuming he knows how to beat said tests…
On last night’s 24/7 Pacquiao/Marquez, Marquez trainer Nacho Beristain kind of threw junior middleweight Alfredo Angulo under the bus for going after James Kirkland so aggressively in that 1st round. It wasn’t part of the plan, basically, for Angulo to go nuts like that. That’s the first comment we’ve had on the fight from Beristain, and it does add some perspective…
Arum doesn’t believe the 1.25 million PPV buy figure for Mayweather-Victor Ortiz, explicitly because HBO hasn’t made an official statement on it. That means that his claim of 1.3 million buys for Pacquiao-Shane Mosley — never made official by Showtime — isn’t believable, by his own standard…
It’s quite the surprise that junior middleweight Antonio Margarito hasn’t gotten a license to fight in New York yet for his Dec. 3 rematch with Miguel Cotto, except it shouldn’t be, since boxers rarely have passports for fights and assorted other snafus in paperwork and the like that constantly derail match-ups. There’s a hearing set for Nov. 18 to figure it out. Margarito has at least two issues: His health, due to a bad eye, and the whole hand-wrap scandal that led California to strip him of his license and Nevada to turn him down as well. Publicly, Top Rank officials keep saying it’s not going to be a problem. But there are reports that they’re putting together back-up plans for Cotto to face Vanes Martirosyan. And at least one name journalist, Jack Hirsch, has quoted someone anonymously who says Margarito won’t be licensed. By my reading, this is anything but assured…
At long last, finally, some judge somewhere has done something about Mayweather skipping out on all his court dates. While he was literally burning money in a strip club, he was supposed to be in court, so a South Carolina judge, Joseph F. Anderson Jr., has sentenced him to community service. All those other judges are wusses compared to Anderson…
Below is a video of Mayweather, Sr. sparring — sans headgear — with the ultra-odd Charlie Zelenoff. I’ve long been a fan of Mr. Zelenoff’s work, even though I wasn’t sure whether he was totally insane or an Andy Kaufmanesque performance artist. The first part of the video suggested to me that he’d mastered the Kaufman angle, somehow weaseling his way into the ring with someone famous. There was something kind of funny about watching a nearly 60-year-old man whup him a little until that he jumps out of the ring. The second part, where he sucker punches Mayweather and then gets beaten down by someone else in the gym, isn’t funny at all. It goes back to kind of funny when the ref says to finish the round, and Mayweather Sr. asks Z if he’s OK. But I’m going to have a hard time after this being amused by any more of his antics. I think the question is answered: He isn’t Kaufman. And if he keeps pulling stunts like this — his sucker punches are a habit — he’s going to end up dead somewhere. Still, the video has to be seen.
There are at least two Joe Frazier tributes out there that are very nice reads, so I have to recommend them: This one in a Philly paper, and this one that our man Alex showed me…
Ex-HBO Sports boss Ross Greenburg, embattled over his handling of the network’s boxing programming has landed at NBC Sports. It sounds like he’ll be doing something at which he’s undisputed success: producing sports documentaries. He’ll also do a Bob Costas interview show, and he’s teaming up with the NHL on another production company….
Oscar De La Hoya’s in another crossdressing scandal. I’m so glad I can make jokes about this kind of thing now that Oscar’s confirmed it was indeed him in those old crossdressing photos. I don’t have any right now, but I reserve the right…
A coroner in Quebec has concluded that there’s no “hard evidence” Arturo Gatti was murdered, but on the other hand, authorities in Brazil totally mishandled evidence, so it’s impossible to know. I think we are just going to have to stop talking about this now. There’s always going to be some new opinion or the other on what actually happened, so barring some new evidence, I plan to ignore this story for a long time…
Ray Markarian wrote a story for The Sweet Science about what might have happened had Mike Tyson faced Evander Holyfield in 1991, and he quoted me and a bunch of other boxing writers/trainers/so forth. Check it out…
Speaking of Tyson, here he is as Hermain Cain. I’m obligated to post all boxing/politics blends by virtue of my day job/night job blend, but by virtue of same day job I can’t comment on any of this. Enjoy it, or don’t. I’m totally neutral.
Herman Cainâs Campaign Promises with Mike Tyson from Mike Tyson
Round And Round
This week Arum was all over the place about a potential Pacquiao-Mayweather, first saying he wasn’t eager to make the fight happen because of Mayweather’s history of racist remarks toward Pacquiao, then saying they’d be willing to drop the defamation lawsuit by Pacquiao against Mayweather over Mayweather’s allegations of Pacquiao steroid use in the process of making a deal for the fight. Gah. Lightweight Robert Guerrero says he wants the fight with Mayweather on May 5, by the way. I say, “Not yet.” Let’s see him even be a junior welterweight first. And Arum also said that Pacquiao would face Sergio Martinez at 150 pounds if there’s a same day weigh-in, which means that Arum has exceeded his lofty weekly quota of ludicrous remarks for the week, and it’s only Saturday afternoon.
Berto has dropped his welterweight belt for a rematch with Ortiz because HBO turned down Berto-Randall Bailey, the fight required for Berto to keep his belt. Berto-Bailey wasn’t a bad fight, but Berto-Ortiz II is a far preferable one. As I’ve said before, some people don’t like HBO playing matchmaker, but in this case HBO was a better matchmaker than a member of the alphabet gang. Amir Khan has said he’d like to face the winner, if he doesn’t get Mayweather in May — yes, please — but won’t fight Kell Brook unless Brook dumps the Hearns as his promoter, because he’s mad at them for some remarks they made after the Paul McCloskey fight, which is an invalid reason.
There’s some other fallout from that Berto-Ortiz rematch, too. The Mike Jones-Sebastian Lujan winner will be elgible to face Bailey for the vacant belt. I like that fight, but I also liked the other option on the table, which was Bailey facing Carson Jones for the belt. Meanwhile, Berto promoter Lou DiBella is fighting to keep a welterweight fight between Devon Alexander and Paulie Malignaggi off the undercard of Berto-Ortiz II Jan. 28. Alexander-Malignaggi doesn’t thrill me, but doesn’t bother me too much, either.
Nobuhiro Ishida’s team says they want a rematch with Kirkland, but Kirkland’s side says they’d rather look forward than look back. I’m assuming that’s code for “There’s no money in the Ishida rematch,” because it’s hard for me to imagine why a boxer wouldn’t want to avenge a loss if he blamed it on bad conditioning at the time and now has fixed that.
Brit Kevin Mitchell wants to make a lightweight bout with Scot Ricky Burns. I really like it.
Super middleweight Edwin Rodriguez still wants to fight Kelly Pavlik, or if not Allan Green, but Green is now a light heavyweight and wants to fight Jean Pascal, while Will Rosinsky wants a rematch with Rodriguez, only Rodriguez’ team has said, “maybe later.” Unrequited love triangles, man. Or maybe that’s a square. I lost track.
(Round and Round sources: ESPN, BoxingScene, The Examiner, various boxing reporters on Twitter)
