I keep posting videos that you might already have seen on the usual logic that if you haven’t, you must. There are a number of great moments in the above video, but the best of them is when heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko stares menacingly at David Haye for an uncomfortably long time, and Haye then declares that he has a “hard-on.”
This first sentence is for the ladies: What really hurts about a nut shot is that it’s in the nuts, if you weren’t aware. But for Haye’s sake, I hope he rids himself of his stiffie prior to the Klitschko fight. Never before have I myself been hit in a boner. (<—Least likely sentence I ever expected to write.) But in my imagination it is quite painful to one’s wood.
(Also, I write more about men’s penises in connection with Wladimir Klitschko than I do for any other boxer. This is… odd.)
Why don’t we use that as a jumping-off point [boi-oi-oing] for the rest of a weird Monday edition of Quick Jabs? We’ll hit the subjects in the headline, plus review a couple fights from the past weekend, recent TV ratings for Julio Cesar Chavez, Jr. and a few movements among boxers promoters, as well as yet more.
Quick Jabs
Fernando Guerrero became the latest overdog to go down to an underdog in the Year of Upsets, after Friday Night Fights over the weekend, where any number of upsets have gone down in 2011. I knew Grady Brewer wasn’t a pushover for Guerrero’s junior middleweight debut, but I didn’t expect him to score a 4th round knockout. I do think that the poor way Guerrero handled getting hurt and a slow start on offense points to the possibility that Guerrero drained himself too much, but he also did himself no favors by not tying up. The main event didn’t do much for me; welterweight Karim Mayfield neither thrilled me nor impressed me with his skill in a 10th round stoppage of Steve Forbes. I still haven’t caught up to some of the other cards outside the HBO show and FNF, so I must recommend Mr. Rafael for the rest of the action…
We’ve heard some absurd figures involving fights for either Floyd Mayweather, Jr. or Manny Pacquiao or both, but why I doubt it will never happen is because of things like Mayweather not showing up for a deposition in Pacquiao’s lawsuit. Firstly, it’s no good that Pacquiao and Mayweather are still fighting in court over Mayweather’s allegations of steroid use by Pacquiao, rather than being anywhere near one another in the boxing ring. Secondly, I keep thinking one of these days that the Mayweathers will be punished for their serial refusal to show up for court dates, as if their regular brushes with the law aren’t enough. It’s a reminder that Mayweather is just as likely to be in jail for a while as he is to actually spend much time in the ring against anyone. And what’s frustrating about it is, the guy actually does have a good side, as he shows from time to time, most recently by paying for the funeral services of Genaro Hernandez (putting him in rare agreement with Pacquiao promoter Bob Arum, who paid the medical expenses of Hernandez)…
The Boxing Examinator is kinda funny. Check it out for a good pound-for-pound list and a general parody of the Examiner network of Pacquiao ass-kissing blogs. I think I know who’s behind it but I won’t say…
Usually by now Fighter of the Year speculation has begun, but there’s been little of it yet. A little bit of forecasting: The winner of the Super Six finale between super middleweights Andre Ward and Carl Froch will be well-positioned, especially when combined with their earlier wins. Haye would be in great position if he beats the Klitschko brothers. Bernard Hopkins could be the favorite after becoming the oldest man to win a championship belt earlier this year and could top it off with a win over fellow light heavyweight Chad Dawson. From there, I think the field drops off. I could see lightweight Brandon Rios sneaking into the conversation if he beats Urbano Antillon and gets a third high-quality win at year’s end, but it’d have to be really good to top the winner of Ward-Froch, the only sure thing among the candidates above (barring a draw in that fight)…
Mr. Chavez Jr. reportedly did big ratings for HBO this month, more than any Boxing After Dark main in three years. These things are worth celebrating, be it for HBO, Top Rank or Chavez himself. I don’t even care that much about whether he’s all that good or his level of opposition (although HBO’s reversal on Sebastian Zbik from “terrible” to acceptable — which I wasn’t previously aware of — was sleazy), so long as he’s fun and brings eyes. I do still think it’s interesting that Hopkins-Jean Pascal II did better numbers, considering that Hopkins is “boring.” I’ve said it a bunch recently and I’ll say it more: There are a lot of reasons someone will watch a fight, and only one of them involves how “exciting” a fighter is…
Middleweight champ Sergio Martinez has re-upped with promoter Lou DiBella, so he’s either happy with what DiBella has done for him — a subject of criticism from Top Rank — and/or he’s loyal. DiBella’s one of the smaller promoters, so he doesn’t invest like some of the bigger promoters do, but I have noticed he’s been teaming up with another smaller promoter, Gary Shaw, a lot lately. Maybe they can make up for not being Golden Boy or Top Rank to some extent by joining forces. Another promoter move: Golden Boy signed junior middleweight Luis Collazo. Hopefully that’ll get him back in the ring. Collazo’s not a bad fighter and he was exciting in that Andre Berto clash, so his stubbornness/Don King-induced inactivity hasn’t been a good thing…
We haven’t heard much from Integrated Sports Pay-Per-View in 2011, but I like them picking up the British heavyweight grudge match between Tyson Fury and Dereck Chisora. I plan to buy it — both are action-oriented dudes who’ve been talking up a storm…
We keep hearing, too much, from Paul Williams and his team about the supposed lucky punch Martinez landed on him in 2010’s KO of the Year. I know fighters have to figure out ways to get over losses, and obviously this kind of delusion worked for Vic Darchinyan after his KO loss to Nonito Donaire. And I like Williams’ attitude that you win some and lose some and it’s nothing to get too upset about. But I feel like it fails to take into account things Williams needs to do to make sure it doesn’t happen again. Just plain denial won’t work. Sometimes you have to fix underlying problems when they’re exposed like this…
Good to see Juan Diaz wise up and retire so he could move on with his academic life. It’s not that he couldn’t still be a to-10 lightweight, but he wasn’t going to beat anyone of note, and he was going to take a lot of punishment along the way. I’ll have fond memories of Diaz. He was always in good fights like the Ring Magazine 2009 Fight of the Year against Juan Manuel Marquez, he was at times the best lightweight in the world and he even had a brief stretch in some pound-for-pound top-10 lists. He also helped inject some energy into Texas boxing and he was a likable young fella. I look forward to reading about Diaz next when he runs for office. By contrast, Shane Mosley is a free agent after his loss to Pacquiao and it’s difficult to imagine him getting any meaningful fight after such a lackluster showing, so I want him to leave not because I want him to do something else with his life but because I’m not interested in seeing him again. If this all works out right, Mosley will be forced into retirement rather than fighting for peanuts, and then I can revisit my warm feelings toward Mosley for much of his career, rather than think about the current bad taste in my mouth…
Middleweight Austin Trout failed one drug test and passed another after his win over David Lopez, although it’s not clear yet whether the win will be turned into a no contest. What I wonder about is, if it’s true, why you’d be smoking marijuana while training for a fight. It just seems like a recipe for eating a lot of Cheetos and being lethargic. It’s not some workout aid, that I know of…
Here’s the CNN segment on Nick Charles, the boxing announcer who’s been battling cancer, if you haven’t seen it.
