RASKIN’S RANTS: The Real Winners & Losers Of Mares-Agbeko

Published

14 years ago

August 15, 2011

SHOCHAMP_AGBEKO-MARES_FIGHT-1492 If this life were fair, Russell Mora would be sentenced to about ten of those “bordeline” shots that Mares threw at Agbeko’s groin and legs.

One of these days, we’re going to get a highly entertaining fight that ends with one boxer winning deservedly, no controversy, nobody making excuses, nobody filing appeals. But until that day comes, we have fights like Abner Mares vs. Joseph Agbeko to discuss. This week’s dip into the mini-mailbag asks a simple question that allows me to comment extensively on Saturday’s action-packed but ultimately unsatisfying end to Showtime’s bantamweight tournament:

Eric,

Jay Nady, Laurence Cole, and Arthur Mercante Jr. are like the Muhammad Ali, Joe Louis, and Jack Johnson of lousy refereeing, three absolute legends of sucking. But then there is Russell Mora, apparently the Buster Douglas of awful referees. He doesn’t have a consistent track record of sucking to compete with a buffoon like Cole, but for one night, at the peak of his powers, nobody could touch him. This really might have been the worst single-fight performance by a ref I’ve ever seen.

Here’s my question for you: There’s a certain so-called boxing writer on a certain site you used to write for who reviews the weekend in boxing with incredibly lame and obvious picks for “biggest winner” and “biggest loser.” (In the spirit of the last episode of Ring Theory, where you chose not to give sanctioning bodies or bad writers free publicity by stating their names, I won’t state his name either. But I think you know who I’m talking about.) I can promise you right now, this “writer” will tell us Abner Mares is the big winner because he technically won the fight, and Joseph Agbeko is the big loser because he technically lost. So I’m turning to you to think more creatively and tell me who the big winners and losers from this fight REALLY were. Looking forward to what you come up with.

Thanks,
Alex

Alex,

Thanks for the email, it’s an excellent set-up. I’d be more than happy to tell you who the real winners and losers from the Mares-Agbeko fight were:

BIGGEST WINNER: JOSEPH AGBEKO

Agbeko scored huge sympathy points, which sometimes carry a career farther than a simple “W” does. He also earned major respect points by battling through all the low blows and a slow start (I only gave him one of the first six rounds) to rally and do enough to earn the win had he not had the 11th-round knockdown call go against him and had Mares been penalized at least once or twice like he should have been. That 11th round alone might have been a four-point swing; two judges apparently ruled it 10-8 for Mares, but it should have been 10-8 for Agbeko. Bottom line: People will remember that Agbeko fought his ass off, and he’ll be more popular than ever before on account of the fact that he got blatantly screwed.

BIGGEST LOSER: RUSSELL MORA

Not a whole lot of explanation needed here. This was the height of incompetence, compounded by a stubborn streak. When Mora was shown the slo-mo replay of the “knockdown” punch landing squarely on the cup, he was too pig-headedly defensive to earn back a measure of public support by saying, “Boy, you know, now that I see it in slo-mo, yep, that was a low blow. My mistake. I missed it.” His behavior in the interview matched his behavior in the fight; he was locked into a singular mindset, and he just couldn’t accept that it was the wrong one. The “Buster Douglas of awful referees,” as you called him, should probably go eat himself into a diabetic coma and come out of it in two or three years, when this has all blown over.

EVEN STEVEN: ABNER MARES

Mares’ stock goes neither up nor down. He remains a definite top-five bantamweight who can’t quite win definitively against other top-five bantamweights. He’s an entertaining fighter, but we already knew that. I’d estimate he went low about 15 times over the course of the fight (a few of the shots the Showtime crew claimed were low appeared to me to be on the beltline), but he didn’t seem to be fouling on purpose. He was just throwing one borderline shot after another and figuring, “If I’m not going to lose points for it, why stop?” You can’t hold Mora’s ineptitude against Mares. That said, you can’t really call Mares a winner just because he got his hand raised.

OTHER WINNERS: JIM GRAY, AL BERNSTEIN, INSTANT REPLAY ADVOCATES

Gray is a winner because his boorish interview style was directed at the villain of the moment and therefore was well-received by the public for once. Bernstein is a winner because he (a) identified that Mora was blowing it very early in the proceedings, and (b) criticized him in a rational, even reluctant manner, coming off as the genuine pro that he is. And instant-replay advocates win because the 11th-round knockdown would have been easy to reverse between rounds if the powers-that-be in boxing would finally get into the 20th century—you know, now that we’re 11 years into the 21st.

OTHER LOSERS: ADALAIDE BYRD & OREN SHELLENBERGER, BOXING FANS, OSCAR DE LA HOYA

Byrd and Shellenberger are mild losers for their slightly-too-wide 115-111 scorecards (though you could argue they’re winners because Mora’s atrocious officiating made their questionable scoring barely worth mentioning). The fans are losers because they got an unsatisfying result and because an attractive 118-pound opponent for Nonito Donaire failed to emerge (Donaire thumps either Mares or Agbeko). And De La Hoya is a loser for pulling the ol’ tweet-n-delete with a disgusting comment about Showtime’s broadcasters having bet on Agbeko. You would think after getting sued for slander once, Oscar might have learned his lesson. Not so much. Time to put child locks on that Twitter account, Richard.

That wraps up this week’s mini-mailbag. Now here are a handful of bullet-pointed bloviations to get you through your Monday:

• Sure, I’m curious to hear what the investigators have to say about what they think really happened the night Arturo Gatti died. But mostly, I’m sad to be thinking about this again.

• Speaking of sad, what the hell happened to Kermit Cintron? It’s not just that he seems to have hit the wall so suddenly and without a punishing fight to blame it on; it’s that he’s emerged as the least interesting fighter on the planet. As flawed as he always was, he used to be fun on several levels, whether he was landing sensational knockout blows, shaving the NBC peacock into his hair, or even diving out of the ring like Mick Foley. Now he’s just kinda hanging around. But, hey, it could be worse. He could be David Tua.

• I’ve been away from television access most Friday nights and Saturday mornings this summer, so I’m very thankful indeed for ESPN3.com. However, I can’t begin to figure out how it’s determined which clips the website is legally blocked from showing. This past Friday, they cut out Joe Tessitore’s tribute to Scott LeDoux and the audio of an ESPN Radio interview. I would have thought ESPN-owned materials would be fair game. Then again, Lennox Lewis is currently on his second premium-cable broadcasting gig, so there’s a lot I don’t understand about this business.

• When a fighter goes down and Steve Smoger doesn’t even start to count, you know it was a sensational punch. Dannie Williams made himself a prospect worth watching with a right hand that proved not all fighters named Antonio Cervantes are created equal.

• TBS’ Lopez Tonight, a talk show that frequently welcomed boxers as guests, has been cancelled due to low ratings. The lesson: All of the Americans without senses of humor are already watching Jay Leno, making it hard for other unfunny hosts to attract an audience.

• Two things very much worth watching this coming weekend: the season finale of ESPN2 Friday Night Fights, with its outstanding short-notice main event of Demetrius Andrade vs. Grady Brewer; and the return of Alfredo Angulo, which will hopefully be viewable somewhere on the internet. Solid stuff as far as the mid-August doldrums go.

• This has nothing to do with boxing, but I’m positing the theory that The Situation’s romantic affection for Snooki is an act, designed to get him more camera time this season after he slipped into a supporting role in Season Three. I’m also not going to rule out the possibility that Sitch went legally blind prior to the fourth season. (That would certainly explain why the normally image-obsessed Situation is suddenly allowing himself to appear on camera with a dead poodle stapled to his head.)

• Look for a new episode of Ring Theory (http://ringtheory.podbean.com) this week. I’m not sure yet what topics we’ll be discussing, but I do know that you won’t hear much talk from Bill Dettloff about the volume of his footsteps.

Eric Raskin can be contacted at RaskinBoxing@yahoo.com. You can follow him on Twitter @EricRaskin and listen to new episodes of his podcast, Ring Theory, at http://ringtheory.podbean.com.

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Bombs Away in Las Vegas where Inoue and Espinoza Scored Smashing Triumphs

Published

22 hours ago

May 4, 2025

David A. Avila

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Japan’s Naoya “Monster” Inoue banged it out with Mexico’s Ramon Cardenas, survived an early knockdown and pounded out a stoppage win to retain the undisputed super bantamweight world championship on Sunday.

Japan and Mexico delivered for boxing fans again after American stars failed in back-to-back days.

“By watching tonight’s fight, everyone is well aware that I like to brawl,” Inoue said.

Inoue (30-0, 27 KOs), and Cardenas (26-2, 14 KOs) and his wicked left hook, showed the world and 8,474 fans at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas that prizefighting is about punching, not running.

After massive exposure for three days of fights that began in New York City, then moved to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia and then to Nevada, it was the casino capital of the world that delivered what most boxing fans appreciate- pure unadulterated action fights.

Monster Inoue immediately went to work as soon as the opening bell rang with a consistent attack on Cardenas, who very few people knew anything about.

One thing promised by Cardenas’ trainer Joel Diaz was that his fighter “can crack.”

Cardenas proved his trainer’s words truthful when he caught Inoue after a short violent exchange with a short left hook and down went the Japanese champion on his back. The crowd was shocked to its toes.

“I was very surprised,” said Inoue about getting dropped. ““In the first round, I felt I had good distance. It got loose in the second round. From then on, I made sure to not take that punch again.”

Inoue had no trouble getting up, but he did have trouble avoiding some of Cardenas massive blows delivered with evil intentions. Though Inoue did not go down again, a look of total astonishment blanketed his face.

A real fight was happening.

Cardenas, who resembles actor Andy Garcia, was never overly aggressive but kept that left hook of his cocked and ready to launch whenever he saw the moment. There were many moments against the hyper-aggressive Inoue.

Both fighters pack power and both looked to find the right moment. But after Inoue was knocked down by the left hook counter, he discovered a way to eliminate that weapon from Cardenas. Still, the Texas-based fighter had a strong right too.

In the sixth round Inoue opened up with one of his lightning combinations responsible for 10 consecutive knockout wins. Cardenas backed against the ropes and Inoue blasted away with blow after blow. Then suddenly, Cardenas turned Inoue around and had him on the ropes as the Mexican fighter unloaded nasty combinations to the body and head. Fans roared their approval.

“I dreamed about fighting in front of thousands of people in Las Vegas,” said Cardenas. “So, I came to give everything.”

Inoue looked a little surprised and had a slight Mona Lisa grin across his face. In the seventh round, the Japanese four-division world champion seemed ready to attack again full force and launched into the round guns blazing. Cardenas tried to catch Inoue again with counter left hooks but Inoue’s combos rained like deadly hail. Four consecutive rights by Inoue blasted Cardenas almost through the ropes. The referee Tom Taylor ruled it a knockdown. Cardenas beat the count and survived the round.

In the eighth round Inoue looked eager to attack and at the bell launched across the ring and unloaded more blows on Cardenas. A barrage of 14 unanswered blows forced the referee to stop the fight at 45 seconds of round eight for a technical knockout win.

“I knew he was tough,” said Inoue. “Boxing is not that easy.”

Espinoza Wins

WBO featherweight titlist Rafael Espinosa (27-0, 23 KOs) uppercut his way to a knockout win over Edward Vazquez (17-3, 4 KOs) in the seventh round.

“I wanted to fight a game fighter to show what I am capable,” said Espinoza.

Espinosa used the leverage of his six-foot, one-inch height to slice uppercuts under the guard of Vazquez. And when the tall Mexican from Guadalajara targeted the body, it was then that the Texas fighter began to wilt. But he never surrendered.

Though he connected against Espinoza in every round, he was not able to slow down the taller fighter and that allowed the Mexican fighter to unleash a 10-punch barrage including four consecutive uppercuts. The referee stopped the fight at 1:47 of the seventh round.

It was Espinoza’s third title defense.

Photo credit: Mikey Williams / Top Rank

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Undercard Results and Recaps from the Inoue-Cardenas Show in Las Vegas

Published

1 day ago

May 4, 2025

Arne K. Lang

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The curtain was drawn on a busy boxing weekend tonight at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas where the featured attraction was Japanese superstar Naoya Inoue appearing in his twenty-fifth world title fight.

The top two fights (Inoue vs. Roman Cardenas for the unified 122-pound crown and Rafael Espinoza vs. Edward Vazquez for the WBO world featherweight diadem) aired on the main ESPN platform with the preliminaries streaming on ESPN+.

The finale of the preliminaries was a 10-rounder between welterweights Rohan Polanco and Fabian Maidana. A 2020/21 Olympian for the Dominican Republic, Polanco was a solid favorite and showed why by pitching a shutout, punctuating his triumph by knocking Maidana to his knees late in the final round with a hard punch to the pit of the stomach.

Polanco improved to 16-0 (10). Argentina’s Maidana, the younger brother of former world title-holder Marcos Maidana, fell to 24-4 while maintaining his distinction of never being stopped.

Emiliano Vargas, a rising force in the 140-pound division with the potential to become a crossover star, advanced to 14-0 (12 KOs) with a second-round stoppage Juan Leon. Vargas, who turned 21 last month, is the son of former U.S. Olympian Fernando Vargas who had big money fights with the likes of Felix Trinidad and Oscar De La Hoya. Emiliano knocked Leon down hard twice in round two – both the result of right-left combinations — before Robert Hoyle waived it off.

A 28-year-old Spaniard, Leon was 11-2-1 heading in.

In his U.S. debut, 29-year-old Japanese southpaw Mikito Nakano (13-0, 12 KOs) turned in an Inoue-like performance with a fourth-round stoppage of Puerto Rico’s Pedro Medina. Nakano, a featherweight, had Medina on the canvas five times before referee Harvey Dock waived it off at the 1:58 mark of round four. The shell-shocked Medina (16-2) came into the contest riding a 15-fight winning streak.

Lynwood, California junior middleweight Art Barrera Jr, a 19-year-old protégé of Robert Garcia, scored a sixth-round stoppage of Chicago’s Juan Carlos Guerra. There were no knockdowns, but the bout had turned sharply in Barrera’s favor when referee Thomas Taylor intervened. The official time was 1:15 of round six.

Barrera improved to 9-0 (7 KOs). The spunky but outclassed Guerra, who upset Nico Ali Walsh in his previous outing, declined to 6-2-1.

In the lid-lifter, a 10-round featherweight affair, Muskegon Michigan’s Ra’eese Aleem improved to 22-1 (12) with a unanimous decision over LA’s hard-trying Rudy Garcia (13-2-1). The judges had it 99-01, 98-92, and 97-93.

Aleem, 34, was making his second start since June of 2023 when he lost a split decision in Australia to Sam Goodman with a date with Naoya Inoue hanging in the balance.

Check back shortly for David Avila’s recaps of the two world title fights.

Photo credit: Mikey Williams / Top Rank

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Canelo Alvarez Upends Dancing Machine William Scull in Saudi Arabia

Published

2 days ago

May 3, 2025

Arne K. Lang

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Saul “Canelo” Alvarez, who has acquired a new nickname – “The Face of Boxing” – is accustomed to fighting on Cinco De Mayo weekend, but this year was different. For the first time, Canelo was fighting outside the continent of North America and entering the ring at an awkward hour. His match with William Scull started at 6:30 on a Sunday morning in Riyadh.

In the opposite corner was 32-year-old William Scull, an undefeated (23-0) Cuban by way of Germany, whose performance was better suited to “Dancing With the Stars” than to a world title fight. Constantly bouncing from side to side but rarely letting his hands go, Scull frustrated Canelo who found it near-impossible to corner him, but one can’t win a fight solely on defense and the Mexican superstar was returned the rightful winner in a bout that was a fitting cap to a desultory two days of Saudi-promoted prizefighting. The scores were 115-113, 116-112, and 119-109. In winning, Canelo became a fully unified super middleweight champion twice over.

Terence Crawford was in attendance and HE Turki Alalshikh made it official: Crawford (41-0, 31 KOs) and Canelo (63-2-2, 39 KOs) will meet in the Fight of the Century (Alalshikh’s words) on Sept. 12 in Las Vegas at the home of the city’s NFL team, the Raiders. For whatever it’s worth, each of Canelo’s last seven fights has gone the full 12 rounds.

Semi-wind-up

In a match between the WBC world cruiserweight title-holder and the WBC world cruiserweight “champion in recess” (don’t ask), the former, Badou Jack, brought some clarity to the diadem by winning a narrow decision over Noel Mikaelian. One of the judges had it a draw (114-114), but the others gave the fight to “Jack the Ripper” by 115-113 scores.

A devout Muslim who is now a full-time resident of Saudi Arabia, the Sweden-born Jack, a three-division title-holder, had the crowd in his corner. Now 41 years old, he advanced his record to 29-3-3 (17). It was the first pro loss for Mikaelian (27-1), a Florida-based Armenian who was subbing for Ryan Rozicki.

The distracted CompuBox operator credited Mikaelian with throwing 300 more punches but there was no controversy.

Tijuana’s Jaime Munguia, a former junior middleweight title-holder, avenged his shocking loss to Bruno Sarace with a unanimous 12-round decision in their rematch. This was Munguia’s first fight with Eddy Reynoso in his corner. The scores were 117-111 and 116-112 twice.

Surace’s one-punch knockout of Munguia in mid-December in Tijuana was the runaway pick for the 2024 Upset of the Year. Heading in, Munguia was 44-1 with his lone defeat coming at the hands of Canelo Alvarez. Munguia had won every round against Surace before the roof fell in on him.

Surace won a few rounds tonight, but Munguia was the busier fighter and landed the cleaner shots. It was the first pro loss for Surace (26-1-2) and ended his 23-fight winning streak. The Frenchman hails for Marseilles.

Heavyweights

In a 10-round heavyweight match fought at a glacial pace, Martin Bakole (21-2-1) and Efe Ajagba (20-1-1) fought to a draw. One of the judges favored Ajagba 96-94 but he was outvoted by his cohorts who each had it 95-95.

Bakole, a 7/2 favorite, came in at 299 pounds, 15 more than he carried in his signature win over Jared Anderson, and looked sluggish. He was never able to effectively close off the ring against the elusive Ajagba who fought off his back foot and failed to build on his early lead.

The fight between the Scotch-Congolese campaigner Bakole and his Nigerian-American foe was informally contested for the heavyweight championship of Africa. That “title” remains vacant.

In a 6-rounder, heavy-handed Cuban light heavyweight Brayon Leon, a stablemate of Canelo Alvarez, was extended the distance for the first time while advancing his record to 7-0 at the expense of Mexico’s Aaron Roche (11-4-1). Leon knocked Roche to the canvas in the fourth round with a right-left combination, but the Mexican stayed the course while eating a lot of hard punches.

Photo credit: Leigh Dawney / Queensberry Promotions

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