Magic doesn't transfer, and other thoughts on Judah-Khan

Heading into Saturday night's title unification bout between Amir "King" Khan and Zab "Super" Judah, there was about as much doubt about the eventual outcome as there is about which pitch Mariano Rivera is throwing next.

Which is to say there was none.

Rivera is throwing the cutter, and the only question is whether or not you'll hit it.

And Khan was going to win that fight, with the only real questions revolving around whether or not the fight would last all 12 rounds. After all, bouts between 24-year-old rising superstars and 33-year-olds with a history of high-profile losses tend to unfold a certain way.

Turns out the fight was a whitewash for Khan, who dominated four rounds before felling Judah in the fifth with a body shot that Judah -- in a desperate effort to save face -- claimed was a low blow.

A disappointing ending? Of course it was. Most of us  expected a better effort from Judah, even if we didn't expect him to win. 

But as anticlimactic as the ending was, the bout wasn't a complete waste of time. In fact, if offered plenty to observe and to learn. 

For example.

1. Khan's stock is set to skyrocket

The 2004 olympian from England has made light years of progress since his one-round blowout defeat against Breidis Prescott in 2008, and each big win at junior welterweight puts that lopsided loss further behind him.

Where Khan goes from here, but his promoters (Golden Boy Productions) and trainer (Freddie Roach) give him a double-barrelled blast of positive publicity and instant entree into the Pacquiao/Mayweather sweepstakes, both potential bouts shot through with seductive subplots.

If he meets Mayweather he's seeking revenge for both De La Hoya and Roach, who trained the Golden Boy for the May 2007 bout he eventually lost to Mayweather.

And if, as Golden Boy's Richard Schaefer has been suggesting, they're trying to maneuver him into a Pacquiao bout, Khan will have to choose a new trainer since he and Pacquiao, who spar together regularly, currently share Roach.

Divided loyalties. Teacher versus student. Too tempting to pass up.

 

2. Zab Judah is Who We Thought He Was

I can't be the only guy who watched Judah quit on Saturday night and had a flashback to this classic rant from Dennis Green.

Remember when Kostya Tsyzu knocked Judah into oblivion during their November 2001 title bout? When Zab regained his senses he blamed referee Jay Nady, which is perfectly logical given that it's clearly Nady's fault that Judah couldn't block the straight right hands Tsyzu bashed him with.

 

And remember when Floyd Mayweather snatched the momentum from Judah in their April 2006 matchup, battering the pride of Brooklyn's body and breaking him down by degrees? Instead of responding with a tactical shift that might have swung the fight back into his favour Judah chose to punch Mayweather in the nuts.

 

(Note...watch the guy in the white and red who dives into the fray about 24 seconds in. That man knows how to brawl.)

Saturday night we got both.

When Judah sensed he couldn't win he searched for a way out, and when Khan banged him on the belt Judah took the exit ramp. He writhed on the floor while referee Vick Draculich counted, as if incapacitated by the blow, yet found the strength to leap to his feet and protest when the count reached 10.

The explanation he offered to HB0 cameras afterward -- that he thought the ref was issuing a standing eight count so he could get himself together and continue fighting -- is irrational and at odds with both the rules and the spirit of the sport.

But here's what makes sense: Judah knew he was losing, so he quit. And when he didn't want to admit losing he blamed the ref, just like he has in the past. He is who we thought he was.

 

3. Magic doesn't transfer

I know a lot of Judah supporters hoped it would. After all his new trainer, Hall of Famer Pernell Whitaker, was, like Judah, a fast southpaw who could attack from all angles. And at 33 he confronted a similar challenge, coming off a poor performance and taking on the then-24-year-old De La Hoya in a welterweight title bout.

And he took De La Hoya to school. Dropped him, cut him, made him miss and made him pay in losing a 12-round decision that many observers (this one included) feel he won.

With his guidance Judah could produce a similarly strong performance under difficult circumstances...in theory.

But the reality is that Judah is who we thought he was, and Whitaker's presence in training camp can't turn him into the second coming of Sweet Pea. 

For Whitaker defense has always been an art. For Judah it's always been an afterthought. 

Whitaker couldn't have transfered his defensive mastery to Judah in the a training camp, a decade or a lifetime. At 33, a fighter can make subtle adjustments, but expecting him to defend like Whitaker is like asking John McDonald spend an off-season with Jose Bautista then return to the Jays as a 50-homer hitter.

It's not going to happen. You can't become a virtuoso by osmosis.

4. Not a signature win for Khan, but valuable nonetheless

If Khan is the fighter people think he can become, this win over Judah won't define his career any more than his win over Paul McCloskey will, so we can't use it as an opportunity to anoint him the pound-for-pound king in waiting. 

But he did lay a thorough beating on a big-name opponent -- which is what he has to do if he's the fighter people think he can become. So even if the win isn't a sign that Khan is one of the top three fighters in the world, it definitely signals that he's ready for whatever challenge Golden Boy and Roach seek out for him next.

Let's just hope Timothy Bradley gets it together....

5. As for Judah....

His legacy depends on who's telling the story.

At best he's an all-time very good who just couldn't turn the corner against the fight game's true elite.

At worst he's a crybaby, a product of the New York hype machine who dominated scrubs but crumbled against true champions.

Either way, he'll never headline another big card or earn another seven-figure purse. So I'm hoping somebody close to him is advising him to retire.

He'll always get fights because he still has a big name, but as DeMarcus Corley or Gary Goodridge can tell you, life as a resume-filler for young contenders is hazardous to your health.

Retiring might hurt, but more losses like one Judah suffered Saturday night hurt worse.

 

Follow the Morgan Campbell on Twitter and Google Plus

Sugar Ray on Pacquiao, Money May: "I'd knock 'em both out."

 

Of course, he was kidding when he said that...sort of.

 

Sugar Ray Leonard may be one of the best to ever lace on gloves, an Olympic gold medalist and six-division world champ who blended technique, tactics and tenacity like few others, but he has one thing in common with the rest of us.

He's a boxing fan.

His insights into a hypothetical superfight between Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather may carry more weight than mine or yours, but like me and you he'd rather see the fight than speculate about it.

But that didn't stop us from asking him a few questions about the fight we all want to see but might never witness.

Tuesday afternoon we caught up with Leonard to discuss his new autobiography, and after talking books he agreed to go twelve rounds with your favourite sportswriter, tackling topics from his favourite place to fight, to whether he deserved a draw in his rematch with Thomas Hearns, to how Mayweather and Pacquiao would fare against him in his prime.

Fun stuff as always, and props to Sugar Ray for his honesty. 

To listen to an interview that goes way more than twelve rounds, click the link below.

FightingWordsSRL_July12_2k11_1

 

 

May Weather in June and September

A few weeks back, sick of being teased by sunny days bracketed by entire weeks of rain I posted the following plea to my twitter feed:

"Waiting for the return of May weather. The climate or the fighter. I'm not picky."

For everybody who re-tweeted in agreement, it looks like we're getting both.

Tuesday afternoon Mayweather announced via his own Twitter account that on Sept. 17 he would challenge Victor Ortiz for the WBC welterweight belt.

Granted, the May weather didn't arrive until June and Mayweather still hasn't signed up to fight Pacquiao, but I'm not complaining.

And neither should you.

Any time the biggest name in the fight game steps into the ring it's good for the Sweet Science and for sports overall.

Of course, when Mayweather first tweeted about the Ortiz fight he prompted a backlash both immediate and predictable.

"Your fans aren't waiting for this fight."

"Why aren't you fighting Manny?"

"Floyd knows he can't beat Pacquiao."

Understandable given the Pacquiao-Mayweather dance that has droned on for nearly two years.

But that doesn't make any of the anti-Mayweather reaction logical.

The people bashing Mayweather for his choice in opponents need to remember that Pacquiao was never an option for a September bout, not with the reigning pound-for-pound king already signed to fight Juan Manuel Marquez in November.

Demanding Mayweather face Pacquiao next means asking Pacquiao to compromise his November showdown with Marquez, or asking that Mayweather remain on the sidelines until spring 2012 and face the world's top  fighter after a two-year layoff.

Neither scenario makes sense and if you're honest with yourself you'll recognize that, no matter how much you might dislike Mayweather.

And whether you like or abhor him you realize Mayweather boxing is infinitely more appealing than Mayweather not boxing.

Mayweather not boxing gets into petty skirmishes that land him in legal trouble, or whiles away copious free time by shooting corny videos with washed-up rap stars.

But Mayweather boxing is the biggest draw in the sport.

The people ripping Mayweather for choosing Ortiz might disagree with that point, but they also prove it.

To argue that Mayweather should fight Pacquiao this fall mean you're not fully aware of Pacquiao's schedule but you're fully aware of Mayweather's because you're criticizing it. So even if Mayweather doesn't engender more love than Pacquiao does among sports fans, he still garners more attention -- when he decides to fight.

And understand the September showdown with Ortiz is a legitimate fight.

Is Ortiz supposed to beat Mayweather, or even raise a few lumps on the face so pretty it lent Mayweather his first nickname? 

Of course not.

But he is a world champion who answered nagging questions about his heart by rising from the canvas to vanquish the previously undefeated Andre Berto in April, and who in signing on for the biggest payday of his career figures to enter the ring hungry to knock off a future Hall-of-Famer.

 

And the fact that he functions as a high-level tuneup bout for Mayweather says more about Mayweather's skill level and profile than about his alleged lack of courage.

This doesn't necessarily mean Mayweather wins in a walkover, but he and his team are banking that the gap in skills between him and the rest of the welterweight division remains too wide for even the WBC champ to close.

And it means that Mayweather, whom I had considered semi-retired until Tuesday, is once again an active fighter, which in turn means a spring 2012 mega-match with Pacquiao is possible.

It'll come two years too late, but if it happens will you complain?

I didn't think so.

 

 

Hopkins wins mental game ahead of title fight with Pascal

If you can afford the pay-per-view or can find a sports bar showing the fight you just might see a world record Saturday night, when 46-year-old Bernard Hopkins challenges Montreal's Jean Pascal for the WBC world light-heavyweight title. 

A win would make Hopkins the oldest man ever to win a world boxing title, outpacing even George Foreman, who was 45 when he knocked out Michael Moorer to win the heavyweight title in 1994.

If the world record attempt eluded your attention, you're forgiven.

Between Jose Bautista's unprecedented hot streak, Jorge Posada's drama in New York and heated playoff series in both the NHL and NBA, it's easy for sports fan to overlook a title fight -- even a historically significant one.

Heck, Saturday's fight -- rematch of a December draw most observers felt Pascal lost -- isn't even the chief reason Hopkins has been making headlines lately.

Early last week Hopkins played Muhammad Ali to Donovan McNabb's Joe Frazier, calling the former Eagles' quarterback's manhood and blackness into question.

If you haven't noticed, black-on-black race baiting is making headlines these days, turning everyone from Grant Hill/Jalen Rose to Jon Jones/Rashad Evans into into talk show, blog and twitter fodder.

The existence of intra-racial tension in the African-American community shouldn't surprise anyone. After all, does it shock you to learn that all white people don't agree on all issues?

Exactly.

The surprise here is the intense interest with which mainstream media -- and its audience -- now follow esoteric issues of African-American identity. I have a theory but exploring it too deeply would take this blog entry into area that would get my knuckles rapped by the people who pay me.

But I'll tell you this: Hopkins' anti-McNabb rant gained traction because it appealed to all kinds of  latent yet widely embraced "isms":

Race. Voyeur. Fetish.

But again, this blog is about the fight game and this entry concerns the upcoming bout between Hopkins and Pascal. And like the bitter verbal fights that have popped into the headlines since March, this bout also revolves around an ism.

Skeptic.

As in, Hopkins is 46 and people don't believe a fighter that old can perform at that high a level without using steroids.

And by people I mean Pascal, who since the rematch was signed has engaged in a one-man crusade to force Hopkins to drug testing more stringent than the Quebec Athletic Commission requires.

In a way, it makes sense. People feel burned by a long line of athletes who shattered records only to be revealed later as performance enhancing drug users. 

Fans, journalists and competitors are wary and it's tough to blame them.

Each home run for Bautista draws a few more sideways glances, thanks to basbeall's steroid-era sluggers.

Every blazing 100-meter dash time laid down by Carmelita Jeter echoes the steroid-fuelled success of Marion Jones.

And as Manny Pacquiao racks up wins, questions mount from Floyd Mayweather's camp about whether he's cheating to achieve them.

But Pascal is different.

Before their first fight Pascal didn't voice a single suspicion about Hopkins and steroids. But the older man batters him for the latter half of their bout last December and suddenly he's Tony Mandarich.

 

Strange.

Pascal hope his steroid accusations would raise suspicions about Hopkins among boxing fans, but instead they only confirm that the Executioner is in his head.

Already.

Again.

If Pascal weren't so distracted he'd realize that an elite fighter at 28 should beat the world's best 46-year-old, steroids or not. Fact is, Pascal struggles whenever an opponent stalks him and fires first, and laboured mightily in December because he couldn't figure out how to avoid Hopkins' soul-sapping left hooks to the body. 

Those are problems you solve through coaching, game planning and execution, not a drug test. 

Chad Dawson exposed Pascal's flaws in the final rounds of their fight last August, and if Hopkins didn't exploit them in December, Dawson would have in the rematch.

Yet Pascal continues to rant about drug testing, Hopkins' fighting style and Antonio Tarver's scorecard.

 

In pre-fight interviews Pascal continues to portray confidence, and offers a litany of accomplishments to an ESPN reporter as evidence that he's a the superior boxer.

Hopkins, meanwhile, stated the more compelling case in the ring in December, beating Pascal into retreat mode over that fight's final rounds.

Does that performance guarantee a win on Saturday?

Not at all.

Hopkins has defied age for more than a decade, but at a certain point 46 is 46. 

But betting against him isn't easy. He doesn't take a fight unless he's sure he can win, and December's fight gave him a close-up view of glaring flaws that Pascal may not have corrected since then.

There's a chance Pascal has used this training camp for a Rocky III-style reprogramming, but there's an equal chance that the glitches in his style are deeply too deeply ingrained to change in six months.

And if Hopkins can still pull the trigger quickly enough to exploit them we might see a new world record Saturday night.

 

 

 

 

The Super Six and the Search for Boxing's Next Star

Andre Ward's 12-round decision over Arthur Abraham Saturday night, summarized in one word.

Impressive.

The lopsided result, which propelled the undefeated Ward into the final of Showtime's Super Six 168-pound tournament, shouldn't surprise anybody beyond Abraham's immediate family.

When opponents stand right in front of Abraham and bang away at his gloves -- like Edison Miranda and Jermain Taylor did -- he looks impressive countering with hard, accurate shots.

But Abraham adjusts to shifting tactics worse than Manny Ramirez adjusted to shifting outfield winds. Andre Dirrell exposed Abraham in March 2010, working angles and potshotting so relentlessly that in the 11th round a frustrated Abraham got himself disqualified, slugging a downed Dirrell after the American slipped to the canvas.

And last November Carl Froch further outsmarted and outclassed Abraham over 12 of the most one-sided rounds you're likely to see at boxing's elite level.

Against that backdrop Ward couldn't afford to struggle. For fighter working to enter the pound-for-pound title picture, a shootout against an opponent two of his peers had dominated wasn't an option.

And Ward didn't let it happen.

After two competitive rounds Ward pressed the action in the third and established the pattern the rest of the fight would follow: Ward snapping jabs and uppercuts through Abraham's guard, ripping shots to the body and looping hooks to the head a confused Abraham staggered forward winging wild shots.

 

The victory earns Ward a spot in the Super Six final, but his future beyond the ring isn't so clear.

Ward's diverse skills have him surging upward on boxing's pound-for-pound list, and under the old formula for creating boxing superstars -- Olympic Gold plus an unblemished face and record -- he would already be NBA player-famous. 

But that system of producing boxing celebrities disappeared with Oscar De La Hoya, so despite Ward's impeccable pedigree we can't be sure that he's the transcendent superstar who will sustain the sport in the future.

Which might seem like yet another troubling sign for a sport many experts believe is on a steep, one-way decline, but i'm not sure it matters much.

There's no disputing that boxing depends heavily on a few huge stars to earn what little attention the sport still receives from mainstream fans and media. And there's no denying that the sport's current crop of superstars sorely needs a boost.

De La Hoya is a full-time promoter now and Bernard Hopkins is 46. Floyd Mayweather is 34 and semi-retired, and while Manny Pacquiao is still producing he, too, is creeping deeper into his 30s. Besides, without Mayweather as a partner, just about every potential matchup for the Pac Man seems like an anticlimax.

Since the Super Six tournament kicked off October 2009 Ward has emerged as one of several exciting fighters grabbing attention among hardcore boxing followers. The group includes Cuban exile and featherweight champ Yuriorkis Gamboa and cyclist-turned-154-pound champ Sergio Martinez, but it doesn't include a sure-fire successor to Pacquaio and Mayweather as a boxing champ with mainstream cachet.

That's problematic for sure, but I'm not convinced its a sign that, as Frank DeFord argues, we'll never see another great boxer.

It's a tempting conclusion to leap to.

A generation ago we could see boxing stars coming. They were Americans who either won medals at the Olympics (think Holyfield, Whitaker et al) or smashed their way through through the heavyweight division with spectacular knockouts (think Mike Tyson).

But it's been a genereation since the pro debut of De La Hoya,a 1992 Olympic champ the last boxer to graduate from the 20th-century system of making stars.

 Yes, Mayweather won bronze in Atlanta, but he didn't exactly step into stardom. Boxing fans knew him a mind-blowing skill set and massive ego, but was a minor player in the sports world at large until HBO's 24/7 reality series exposed him to the mainstream.

Now he's (arguably), the second-biggest name in the boxing game, (arguably) eclipsed only by another star nobody saw coming.

*Although at this point the only one arguing against Pacquiao's primacy is Mayweather himself.*

Three years ago Manny Pacquiao could have walked unnoticed down just about any street in North America -- even if he was wearing the WBC super featherweight belt he owned back then. Now his image graces billboards on both sides of the Pacific, evidence of a rocket ride to mainstream fame in North America that as unexpected as it was sudden. 

And that's the point.

In this age of fragmented title belts and audiences it's increasingly difficult to manufacture a superstar, much less predict who will become one. 

Yet superstars still develop.

So yes, the search for a boxing saviour looks grim at the moment. Ward is an outstanding fighter but lacks Mayweather's flash or Pacquiao's combination of power and personality.

But in the months leading up to De La Hoya/Mayweather the outlook was equally gloomy.

Then from that fight a superstar emerged. Mayweather, B-side of what was supposed to be the last significant fight in history.

A year and a half later another star popped up. Pacquiao a small but powerful filipino with spotty English and a jones for karaoke.

So while we search for a star to replace those two we need to remember that he is probably already out there.

We just don't know who he is yet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Former champ Witter hopes to revive career in Mississauga

The folks from Hennessy Sports might be world wide players in boxing, promoting world champs like Carl Froch, but lately they've been hustling hard to breathe life into the local pro scene, even buying commercial time during last Sunday's Heat-Celtics game to hype this Saturday's card at the Hershey Centre.

Makes sense.

A card with so much local flavour needs a lot of local hype.

Orangeville's Logan Cotton McGuinness headlines his third straight Hershey Centre event, and the undercard features a welterweight showdown between Mississauga residents Samuel Vargas and Tebor Brosch.

But in addition to fighters trying to build a following in the 416/905, Hennessy has also infused this card with some star power, even if it's faded.

Saturday's undercard features England's Junior Witter, a former WBC champ at 140 who defended his title four times before losing to Timothy Bradley in May 2008. He hasn't fought since an eighth-round stoppage loss to Devon Alexander 18 months ago, but Saturday the 36-year-old starts the climb back to the top of the ranking, facing Toronto-based Romanian Victor Puiu.

Thursday afternoon I caught up with him at a media workout in Mississauga, and without ace videographer Randy Risling I had to fend for myself. So I filmed with the Canon point-n-shoot, fired up iMovie for the first time ever and put together this video on Junior Witter and the comeback that begins right here in the GTA.

 

Motoring through Detroit to catch a Super Fight

That would be the 140-pound title unification bout between Timothy (Desert Storm) Bradley and Devon  Alexander (The Great), which takes place Saturday night at the Pontiac Silverdome.

I've assembled a crew, secured a car and a place to stay, and Friday morning we head to one of my favourite cities to see an early candidate for fight of the year. 

As some of you know I spent six months of my rookie year in pro journalism interning at the Detroit News, so I have a huge soft spot for the city, even through the body blows it has suffered in recent years.

The economic downturn.

Kwame Kilpatrick.

The Lions.

It's easy to kick the city while it's on its knees, so I'm happy whenever a fight promoter decides to bring an important bout to an area that has contributed so much to boxing.

In this respect boxing is following the lead of the UFC, which could have brought November's showdown between Quentin Jackson and Lyoto Machida anywhere but chose to stage the event in Auburn Hills.

Likewise, a unification bout between undefeated champions, neither with ties to the area, is a coup for metro Detroit. Butfor me it's still bittersweet that, like Jackson and Machida, they'll trade punches 20 miles north of the city.

It's sort of like celebrating Toronto with a big party in Newmarket.

And let's face it, the suburbs don't have the same connection to boxing history that the city does. 

Joe Louis' home base. Sugar Ray Robinson's birthplace. Home of the legendary Kronk Gym.

The common thread there isn't Metro Detroit.

It's Detroit.

And let's face something else.

As accomplished and hungry as Bradley and Alexander are, they don't have the juice to sell out the cavernous Silverdome the way Hulk Hogan and Andre the Giant did in 1987. In fact, the seating configuration for Saturday's fight reportedly will accommodate no more than 15,000 spectators.

But if you focus on everything Saturday's fight doesn't have, I don't have to be Black Milk to tell you you're losing out.

 

Both Bradley and Alexander bring a whole lot to Saturday's showdown to make it worth watching for both hardcore and casual fans.

1. The Stakes -- Somebody's "0" will go.

How often do we see undefeated champions butt heads with the stakes this high?

Not often, since these days the only thing more rare than an undefeated champ is an undefeated fighter willing to put his unblemished record in real danger with this size of challenge.

These days our guy Floyd Mayweather (justifiably) takes heat from critics who wonder if he's more concerned with protecting his undefeated record than defending it. But a decade ago he wasn't that guy. In January 2001 he was what Bradley and Alexander are now -- an undefeated champ risking his belt and perfect record against a fighter in Diego Corrales who was doing the same.

The bout turned into a whitewash, with Mayweather out-thinking Corrales and dropping him five times on the way to a 10th-round TKO, but heading into that bout few boxing experts could pick a winner. 

When sizing up a pair of fighters who matched up so evenly on paper the what became most clear about that fight was that win or lose both fighters deserved immense respect for tackling the challenge.

If there has been a more significant matching of undefeated champs in the decade since Mayweather-Corrales than the Bradley-Alexander bout, I can't recall it.

And if you can't pick a winner yet between Bradley and Alexander I can't blame you. 

2. Styles -- they make fights

Between the two men Alexander is by far the more stylish boxer, but he also packs plenty of power. If you don't believe me ask Colombia's Juan Urango, whom Alexander flattened last March.

 

Bradley, meanwhile, mixes relentless pressure with smart movement. As his knockout record (11KOs in 26 wins) attests, he doesn't possess Alexander's one-punch power. But he can sting you, and those shots add up. He's boxer enough to shut down foes who think they can outwit him, but fighter enough to bang with bigger opponents.

If you don't believe me ask Luis Carlos Abregu, whom Bradley decisioned last summer.

 

Their styles may diverge but they have an opponent in common: Junior Witter, a former world champ from England who will try to resuscitate his career iFeb. 19 at a United Promotions card at Mississauga's Hershey Centre.

If it helps you choose between these two, Bradley nipped Witter by split decision in May 2008, while the following summer Alexander outboxed Witter cleanly over eight rounds before their titled bout was stopped.

3. The Bigger Picture

After negotiations between Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao collapsed last December, and before Mayweather signed to fight Shane Mosley, rumours swirled that Money was looking for a 140-pounder to lure to welterweight for "superfight" and a seven-figure payday.

At the time I remember thinking I'd boycott any such bout on principle -- unless that 140-pounder named Timothy Bradley.

While Mayweather waits on the sideline as his legal issues play out, the winner Saturday night gains the credentials and publicity required to enter the Mayweather/Pacquiao future opponent lottery. 

And if not, both men remain in the middle of a frighteningly intense round-robin at 140 pounds, and in the running for yet another massive matchup -- an eventual showdown with Pacquiao stablemate Amir Khan.

Either way, Saturday's fight is both the culmination of a unification process that began when Bradley claimed his first world title in 2008, and the beginning of what looks like a long run of high-skill, high-stakes matchups in one of boxing's hottest divisions.

And I'll be ringside, giving you the details on the blog and on twitter.

So load the car and cue the Slum Village (RIP Dilla and Baatin) because we're headed to Detroit.

Or at least through it on the way to the superfight.

 

Molitor set to defend title in South Africa

Looks like the Canadian Kid is finally headed to South Africa.

Tuesday afternoon ESPN's Dan Rafael reported that Steve Molitor's new promoter, Top Rank, lost a purse bid to South African promoter Branco Milenkovic for the right to promote Molitor's mandatory title defence against Takalani Ndlovu.

That means the third -- and hopefully final -- installment of the Molitor-Ndlovu series will likely take place in South Africa, even though it had tentatively been scheduled for March 19 in Montreal on the undercard of Lucian Bute's Showtime debut.

The bout is also the latest chapter in a long history between Molitor, a Sarnia native who lives and trains in Mississauga, and South Africa.

If you followed Molitor's initial ascent to the IBF 122-pound crown then you'll remember his first title shot was scheduled for August 2006, when he was slated to face Gabula Vabaza in Johannesburg. Molitor and his team even traveled to South Africa for final pre-fight preparations before learning that Vabaza had failed a pre-fight blood screening.

That bout was canceled and Vabaza would never fight again.

Less than a year later, after jetting to England to finally claim the IBF title, Molitor debuted at Casino Rama, systematically dismantling Ndlovu over nine rounds before knocking him out to retain his belt.

After dropping his title to Celestino Caballero and working his way back to the top of the IBF's junior featherweight rankings, Molitor and Ndlovu at Rama once again in March 2010, with Molitor pounding out a unanimous 12-round decision.

That win should have freed Molitor to move on to bigger challenges, but the stubborn Ndlovu wouldn't go away. While Molitor defended his belt successfully in England Ndlovu quietly won a title eliminator and positioned himself once again as Molitor's manadatory challenger.

After lopsided results in the first two bouts between Molitor and Ndlovu, local interest in a third fight was understandably low. But Ndlovu was a mandatory challenger, so Molitor had to face him or vacate the crown.

Enter Cameron Dunkin, the U.S.-based manager tasked with finding a home in North America for the bout, lest Ndlovu's promoters put up the promotional fees, move the show to to South Africa and force the champ to fight in the challenger's hometown.

Placing the bout on the Bute undercard seemed like a reasonable solution, but that deal was contingent on Top Rank winning the purse bid.

Which it didn't.

Which means Molitor now faces the scenario his team had hoped to avoid -- a second-straight title defence overseas against a hometown fighter.

No fighter wants venture into another man's lair if he can avoid it, but neither can any fighter deny that cash rules everything. 

For most of his 10 bouts at Casino Rama Molitor pocketed roughly $100,000, but according to ESPN's report he will gross $240,000 for the upcoming Ndlovu bout.

More than anything, boxing is a business and Molitor understands that.

And right now business is good.

Even in South Africa.

 

Follow the Star's Morgan Campbell on Twitter

Pascal and Hopkins give fight fans a happy holiday

So if boxing is a declining sport riddle me this:

Why is it that the opening a movie about a boxer could anchor the front pages of both entertainment and sports sections of the print version of Friday's Toronto Star?

Oh wait, I can hear some of the skeptics now, suggesting that Friday's Star proves only that dying industries deserve each other.

Maybe.

But maybe people really do like boxing, or at least the idea of it and the characters that surround the sport. Even if suspect decisions and a string of superfights that haven't happened have turned you off of the action in the ring, its tough to deny that among major North American sports boxing provides the setting for some of the most interesting stories.

And one more will play out Saturday night in Quebec City, when Montreal's Jean Pascal defends his WBC Light Heavyweight title against rugged veteran and sporting senior citizen Bernard Hopkins.

If you saw Dawson's August title defense against Chad Dawson then you know the 27-year-old is athletic and aggressive but vulnerable to opponents who pressure him. Dawson discovered that flaw a few rounds too late help him win a decision in a bout that went to the scorecards when a headbutt cut Dawson in the 11th.

 

And if you follow boxing you know the scouting report on Hopkins -- smart, rugged unflappable.

And old.

Years ago the former middleweight champ promised his elderly mother that he would retire from fighting before he turned 41.

Less than a month after the Pascal bout he turns 46, and if he wins he becomes the oldest fighter ever to challenge successfully for a world title.

So much for promises.

The Philadelphia native has been a pro fighter for fully half his life, and over his 22 years in the game he has mastered both his ring craft and the mind games that precede every great fight.

When the two fighters matched wits at an October news conference in Toronto Hopkins battered Pascal with language, beating him to the verbal punch in every verbal exchange.

And at a news conference earlier this week Hopkins simply jacked Pascal's championship belt, holding it just beyond the Montrealer's reach, turning Pascal into the Tantalus of the prize ring.

A glance their birth certificates says Hopkins won't be able to keep pace. At 27 Pascal is in his athletic prime, and while Hopkins may be significantly younger than the last guy to fight Canadian heavyweight champ Neven Pajkic (seriously, look at him), at nearly 46 he's positively paleolithic by non-heavyweight standards.

The problem for Pascal is that B-hop is brilliant, and a specialist in upending fighters who appear to have every advantage over him.

Yes, he dropped a disputed 12-round decision to 168-pound champ Joe Calzaghe in 2008, and his official record does contain a pair of decision losses to the talented but tactically challenged Jermain Taylor. But the loss to Calzaghe was a long way from decisive, and  Hopkins lost the Taylor bouts more than Taylor won them, frittering away the early rounds before late rallies fell short.

Beyond those fights Hopkins and trainer Nazim Richardson have a track record of surprising wins that stretches back nearly a decade.

Or did you forget the 12-round boxing lesson Hopkins handed to Felix "Tito" Trinidad in September 2001?

Or the one-sided win he collected over light-heavyweight champ Antonio Tarver in his first start following the Taylor losses.

Or the near-shutout he pitched against the previously undefeated Kelly Pavlik, a thorough beating from which "The Ghost" still hasn't recovered.

 

 This isn't to say that Hopkins walks through Pascal like he did Pavlik, but if Hopkins' pressure keeps Pascal from setting up it'll be a long and taxing night for the champ.

And it could be a record-setting one for the old man.

 

PARTING SHOT

Unless some crazy urge to work for free overtakes me, this is my last entry for 2010, but be sure to check back in early January when "Fighting Words" returns with the insights, interviews and interaction that have made the first year of this blog so much fun.

And if you want to check in during my time off, feel free to follow me on Twitter. 

See you guys in the New Year.

Till then have a happy and safe holiday season...

UFC Winners blend martial arts and sweet science

Before we headed to Cineplex Queensway Cinema to watch UFC 124 my good friend Andre Batson -- former Argo and Eskimo and mid-90s saviour of York University's football program -- highlighted something interesting about welterweight contender Josh Koscheck.

In my preview to the fight I mentioned that Koscheck held tight to his peroxide blond locks even even though some of the hairstyle's most famous proponents abandoned it years ago. But Batson pointed out that while Koscheck's hair isn't back to its natural colour it's darker than the platinum blond to which we'd grown accustomed, and that he looked less like Sisquo and more like Titans CB and notorious NFL instigator Cortland Finnegan.

And when the bell rang for Koscheck's title shot he fared about as well against Georges St-Pierre as Finnegan did in his punch-up with Texans receiver Andre Johnson.

Which is to say he got manhandled.

Beyond a takedown late in the first round Koscheck mustered zero offence against St-Pierre and his game plan seemed to have been crafted by Kimbo Slice:

Wade straight in throwing wild right hands and pray one lands.

Meanwhile St-Pierre demonstrated why he belongs at or near the top of pound-for-pound lists, controlling nearly every minute of every round with his superior size, strength, quickness and boxing skill.

St-Pierre spent part of his training camp sparring with Montreal-based pro boxers like Sebastien Demers and working with famed boxing trainer Freddie Roach -- and it showed. While Koscheck arrived in Montreal promising to score a knockout win in front of St-Pierre's hometown crowd, the champ set the pace with a stinging left jab. 

With the most basic weapon in a pugilist's arsenal he blunted Koscheck's headlong rushes, raised an ugly welt over his right eye and set up the takedowns that underscored his dominance.

In jabbing his way to a lopsided decision St-Pierre didn't just prove that he's the world's best welterweight by a wide margin. He reminded us all of an important fact that's often lost in the "Boxing vs MMA" debate.

Boxing is a martial art too.

And a very effective one in the right situations.

Nobody debates whether jiu jitsu and wrestling skills are essential to an MMA fighter's arsenal -- naturally, since 80 percent of all MMA matchups go to the ground. 

And muay thai's importance is a given, mainly because elbows, knees and leg kicks hurt (bad), and because the clinch allows you to combine striking and grappling to inflict some serious damage.

Yet whenever a boxer transitions to MMA it's seen as a final referendum on which sport -- and by extension fighting art -- is superior, even though boxer vs. mixed martial artist matchups prove only what we already know. Somehow we see the two disciplines as mutually exclusive simply because the two industries are going toe-to-toe over the pay-per-view dollars of mainstream sports fans.

Fighters know better.

Does that mean a background in boxing is the best foundation on which to build a mixed martial arts career?

Nope.

Somebody as accomplished in jiu jitsu as James Toney is in boxing would have lasted longer than two minutes against Randy Couture and even with little specific mma training might have even forced "The Natural" to sweat. 

But can an advanced education in boxing enhance a mixed martial artist's skill set?

Ask Joe (Daddy) Stephenson, who lunged chin first at Mac Danzig on the St-Pierre/Koscheck undercard and paid a painful price.

 

 

Boxing folks call that shot a check hook, and it could have come straight from Floyd Mayweather's playbook.

 

Or ask Koscheck, who took a thorough beating Saturday night because he had zero answers for the punch you learn on the first day of boxing class.

The left jab.

Now let's get this straight. GSP is far from a master boxer.

When baseball people talk about how fast certain baseball players are I'm always pointing out most of them aren't really fast -- they're just baseball fast. No denying guys like Ichiro and Chone Figgins are light years faster than their baseball peers but in the broader world of fast guys they're on the left end of the bell curve.

Far left.

So GSP is to boxing skill what Jose Reyes is to sprinting. He'll destroy most of us and hold his own with journeyman pros (like the guy getting flattened here) but an experienced pugilist nullifies that jab and hurts him bad.

But in his world he doesn't need to be Bernard Hopkins. He simply needs to sharpen a skill -- boxing -- that many mixed martial artists neglect.

He did exactly that in training for UFC 124 and his performance Saturday night hit observers like a revelation but it shouldn't have. The UFC's welterweight champ simply understands something a lot of his competitors are learning the hard way.

Boxing may be the sweet science, but its also a hell of a martial art.

 

END NOTES

* As mentioned above, I caught Saturday's fights at a movie theatre. First time for me and thanks to the folks at Cineplex for making it happen. If you're the type who likes his fights with a lot of beer and hollering then cinema viewing isn't for you. I like O'Doul's as much as the next guy, but I also enjoyed actually hearing the commentary for once. The polite applause after each fight will jar you, (especially if you're used to war cries in the sports bar) but you adjust to decorum. Besides, everybody loves a huge screen and surround sound. Can't replicate that experience at home or in a bar. So was the UFC experience different without alcohol and a mountain of chicken wings. Of course. A little. But would I watch in a theatre again? No question.

* From the "Find a way to watch it" file: this past Saturday's boxing. Between the double header on HBO and the bantamweight tournament on Showtime/Superchannel, I can't recall a single Saturday so saturated with boxing action. So I picked wrong on the Amir Khan/Marcos Maidana fight. So what? As I told folks on twitter, each of those four fights was more exciting than anything that went down at UFC 124. Even if you say you don't like boxing, if you're reading this blog you like action. And if you like action find a way to watch those fights. And if you're still not entertained you better go check for a pulse.

 

Follow the Star's Morgan Campbell on Twitter.