A sequence of explosive lefts and rights from cruiserweight Troy Ross in the 4th left Ehinomen Ehikhamenor (“Hino”) with his back turned and his chin draped over the top rope like it was his security blanket and he was going to sleep. When the referee stopped the fight, Ross became the champion of “The Contender” […]

I’m about to reverse myself, or appear to, on all kinds of things about this cruiserweight championship fight between divisional king Tomasz Adamek and challenger Johnathon Banks Friday night on Showtime: I know I said earlier this week that I expected this to be an excellent fight. I’m no longer convinced it will rise to […]

Wednesday night on Versus brings an unexpected season finale of “The Contender” boxing reality show. They aren’t the two men anyone probably thought would end up in the finale before it started, but Troy Ross and Ehinomen Ehikhamenor (“Hino”) didn’t get there by luck of the draw. No sir. They dispatched with the most seasoned […]

Hi there. You might notice things look a little different around here all a sudden. It’s because that second redesign, promised as far back as October, just went into effect. Obviously, we’ve got a banner, a real one. The concept is thus: The typeface is from a newspaper that you might read in 1867, back […]

It should be a truly excellent week of boxing on television, both in the quality and quantity departments. Just take a look at the schedule: It’s time, already, for this season’s “The Contender” season finale. Wednesday on Versus, cruiserweights (200 lbs.) Troy Ross and Ehinomen “Hollywood Hino” Ehikhamenor will square off for all the marbles. […]

Time didn’t permit an extended take on the Top Rank pay-per-view Saturday night, so here’s where I (and hopefully you) will revisit what went down in more detail.

Neither Miguel Cotto nor Kelly Pavlik, the two rising stars whose ascendance was stalled last year by the first losses of their careers, proved all that much by beating inferior opponents Saturday night. What they did prove was the bare minimum they had to: that neither are severely diminished from 2008 defeats that were both […]

It hasn’t gotten a ton of attention yet, but Oscar De La Hoya, on the Ring magazine website, has finally talked about his devastating loss to Manny Pacquiao in a welterweight (147 lbs.) bout in December. It’s a sad sort of interview. He talks about wishing that Pacquiao would land one shot that would knock […]

Holy SMOKES, boxing has gotten weird over the last couple months. On ESPN2′s Friday Night Fights, in an echo of one of the most infamous incidents in boxing history, lightweight (135 lbs.) journeyman Humberto Toledo was disqualified in the final round of his fight with Breidis Prescott when he chomped down vampire-style on Prescott’s neck, […]

Oh, the haters. Before 2008, Kelly Pavlik and Miguel Cotto were young undefeated superstars, among the elite in the sport, until, golly, they both got one loss each against top-flight opponents, and now we have to acknowledge that their entire careers are jokes. Attacking this kind of pervasive narrow-mindedness is an ongoing crusade of mine, […]

Here’s the latest from welterweight (147 lbs.) star Miguel Cotto, discussing his promotional company Top Rank’s advocacy for the license-revoked Antonio Margarito, who got caught using loaded hand wraps in January and may have used loaded hand wraps last summer to put Cotto’s career in jeopardy: “I’m just going to stay with them until the […]

Not since I began following boxing has there been such a concentrated spate of people pulling out of fights. The latest is what could have been the best fight on the coming weekend’s pay-per-view card, the lightweight (135 lbs.) bout between rising Anthony Peterson and exciting Edner Cherry. When combined with the news that negotiations […]

You’re looking at Sarah Blewden, a Brit who has been barred from fighting because of her breast implants. In related British news, did you know that Joe Calzaghe totally sucked because everyone else he ever fought totally sucked? You should not know this, because it is false. But with the way some folk think, you […]

It’s been a weird month and a half in the sport of boxing. Cheating scandals (Antonio Margarito). A five minute round (Juan Urango-Herman Ngoudjo). Everything about the Valentine’s Day card coming in was strange: three different opponents dropping off the slate, a long delay in picking the location before ending up in Florida, and the […]

Just caught up to the Friday Night Fights card on ESPN2. First things first: It was where I learned that Nate Campbell didn’t make the lightweight (135 lbs.) limit for his HBO main event bout with Ali Funeka, and after starting at 138, he only was able to get down another half pound. Is there […]