If you’re looking for more thoughts on the insanely awesome Kendall Holt-Ricardo Torres fight, or new ones on the best fighter award at the ESPYs,¬ Oscar De La Hoya’s adventure with USA Boxing, the wackiness of Juan Diaz’ manager, Joe Calzaghe-Roy Jones, Miguel Cotto-Antonio Margarito or the wisdom of placing bets based on my predictions, that’s after the jump. If you’re looking for more ridicule of Floyd Mayweather alleging racism at the organization that paid him millions of dollars, or a second take on the Peterson brothers, that’s after the jump, too. It’s called “Quick Jabs,” and it’s an especially quick set.
The right thing for Kendall Holt to do is give Ricardo Torres a rematch pretty quickly. Torres relinquished his 140-pound belt to Holt over the weekend in one of the wildest fights I’ve ever seen. Torres gave Holt a rematch of their 2006 fight when he didn’t have to, but because there was controversy, Torres wanted to answer who was the better man once and for all. Holt, who complained endlessly about the early stoppage and all other sorts of real injustices in the first fight, surely knows that the head butt he landed set up the finishing punch. Torres, who’s been pretty manly about the whole affair, hasn’t complained too much about that. Holt may fight Lamont Peterson next, and that’s fine, since Torres is going to need a long rest after that vicious knockout. But even after that knockout, because the two men have now exchanged knockouts and multiple knockdowns amid considerable questions about each, do we know who the better fighter is? If he’s honorable about it, Holt will give Torres the favor Torres gave him, and want to answer that question definitively…
Speaking of Lamont Peterson — fellow MVN scribe Sean covered the expectation/achievement gap for the talented but sometimes frustrating Peterson bros, but I wanted to add my two cents. They are basically the Brian De Palma of the boxing world. At his best, like, say, “The Untouchables,” De Palma makes some beautiful art. Shy of that are tantalizing but ultimately unfulfilling products like “Femme Fatale.” I still like the Petersons and De Palma, in the end…
Sean also covered the whole Floyd Mayweather racism thing, which doesn’t deserve much more attention because it’s clearly just a temper tantrum designed to get said attention. It’s too late; there’s already attention out there about the retired welterweight (147 lbs.) champ’s remarks, so I might as well contribute my own disdain. What I did was, I conducted a little bit of what you might call oppo-research about this comment from Mayweather about HBO’s announcers, like Jim Lampley: “They praise white fighters, they praise Hispanic fighters, whatever. But black fighters, they never praise.” I did it because I remember Lampley et al often saying exorbitantly complimentary things about not just Mayweather but black boxers in particular. I happened across this quote from Lampley about Mayweather, a black fighter, just last year in the New York Post: “If Floyd Mayweather were fighting God tomorrow, I’d make him the favorite to win by unanimous decision. Until proven otherwise, the logical prediction in every Floyd Mayweather fight is Floyd Mayweather by unanimous decision. You’re looking at the pound-for-pound best fighter in the world.” If saying that the very black fighter who claims HBO announcers don’t praise black fighters could defeat God in mano-a-mano combat isn’t praise, then there is no such thing as praise…
Speaking of Mayweather, he’s up for an ESPY again this year for “Best Fighter,” even though he hasn’t fought this year and is officially retired. He arguably deserved it last year, but not this one. What say everyone rub his nose in all that dumb racism stuff and vote for middleweight (160 lbs.) champ Kelly Pavlik, who’s also in the running this year? Go to www.espys.tv to vote. There’s a female boxer and mixed martial arts fighter in there too, and while I’d hate to see the MMA fighter win it, I’m in the anybody-but-Mayweather category. (By the way, Manny Pacquiao deserves the honor this year, so far, if anyone, but he’s not nominated)…
And as for would-be Mayweather dance partner Oscar De La Hoya, he’s doing something good on the surface by assisting USA Boxing. There’s the whole debate, morally, about consequences versus intent, and I’m sure at least part of De La Hoya’s intent is that he’s grateful to the Olympics for how it helped his career. I can’t imagine at least part of it is that he hopes to sign the best fighters off the USA Boxing team to his Golden Boy Promotions, though, something that has not been noted in the mainstream media coverage of De La Hoya’s move. It’s a little like Nike getting acquainted with youngsters in high school with their basketball camps and what not so that they can lock ’em up with contracts later. I’m not, by any means, attacking De La Hoya’s move. I think it’s one that should be commended, because U.S. amateur boxing needs all the help it can get. I’m only pointing out a relevant hypothetical…
Welterweight Antonio Margarito claims that his superfight with Miguel Cotto July 26 will be “easy.” It’s a little out of character for Margarito to mouth off like that, and, well, he’s wrong. I’ve heard some say they think Cotto will easily outbox Margarito, including Paulie Malignaggi, who’s turned out to be a pretty good fight forecaster and knows a little something about fighting Cotto, having fought him and all. I don’t know anyone who thinks it’ll be easy for Margarito. Really, I don’t think it’ll be easy for either man, and that’s why it’s such a big, big fight. If you don’t watch it, you might as well check yourself into an insane asylum…
Willie Savannah, the manager of lightweight Juan Diaz, keeps making quizzical decisions on behalf of his fighter. After Diaz got beat up by Nate Campbell in the spring, he hinted that Campbell was on ‘roids and lamented the lack of a drug test. More recently, Savannah threatened to pull his man out of a Sept. 6 fight with Michael Katsidis when Katsidis intended to use Cleto-Reyes gloves instead of Diaz’ preferred Everlast. In both cases the common denominator was this: The contract didn’t make Savannah’s wishes into policy. Want a drug test? Get it in the contract, which is clearly possible, since Savannah apparently did it to Katsidis. Want to make sure your favorite gloves are used? Write it into the contract, since this one left it up to the individual fighter…
I suppose Joe Calzaghe-Roy Jones ain’t a bad fight at light heavyweight (175 lbs.), but I’m just not looking forward to it. It’s a done deal for Sept. 20, the date left behind when Mayweather-De La Hoya II fell through, and probably will be held in Madison Square Garden. I have my doubts that their styles will mesh well. Calzaghe and Jones are probably both at their best when someone’s aggressively coming after them, so who’s gonna get that party started? When the most interesting thing about a fight is “Wow, 10 years ago one guy would’ve destroyed the other, but now the other guy’s the favorite,” I’m not sure that speaks tremendously well of it…
A commenter the other day noted that I’d been of aid to him as a boxing bettor, and he, from what I understand, is not alone. That’s some responsibility, and it’s flattering. On the down side, I hope no one makes a bet based on my prediction and ends up getting their hand chopped off by the mafia. It made me consider my prediction record since I joined MVN in December. Here’s what I discovered: In fights where I made a prediction, my record stands at 16-8. Some of those 16 were the easier kind, fights like Oscar De La Hoya over Steve Forbes (I’ll skip over the weights for this exercise). Some where not. I’m quite proud of correct close calls or underdog picks like Juan Manuel Lopez over Daniel Ponce De Leon, Joel Casamayor over Michael Katsidis, Kendall Holt over Ricardo Torres and Antonio Margarito over Kermit Cintron. On the other hand, two of my bad calls involved Paul Williams vs. Carlos Quintana, since I picked one the first time and the other in the rematch, and if those two had never fought, I’d be sitting at a far prettier 16-6. The other miscalls are mainly ones I really struggled with and almost picked one over the other, matches like Rafael Marquez vs. Israel Vazquez, Clinton Woods vs. Antonio Tarver, Bernard Hopkins vs. Joe Calzaghe and even Nate Campbell vs. Juan Diaz, since I thought Campbell had all the right stuff for the upset. Oh, and I still think Juan Manuel Marquez actually beat Manny Pacquiao. I’m on a hot streak lately — eight in a row! — but keep this all in mind, boxing bettors, when using me as a resource.
