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THE RASKIES: Raskin's Rants, From A. Ward to Awards

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02 Weigh-inAs you may have noticed, I haven’t had a byline here within the TSS universe in about three weeks. Time to come clean: I did 21 days in county for beating up one of Floyd Mayweather’s ex-girlfriends. For what it’s worth, she had her hands up and wasn’t looking at Joe Cortez at the time. I feel good about that part, at least.

Anyway, I’m back now, finding time for a final “Rants” column of 2011, except it doesn’t feature the usual bullet-pointed random Rants. Instead, I’ll do a one-email mailbag and then bust out a few year-end awards, since that’s what us boxing writers do in late-December. (And since Editor Mike specifically asked all of his contributors to do something awardsy.)

But first, the mini-mailbag, which in this case functions as an excuse for me to comment on the Andre Ward-Carl Froch fight that I haven’t yet written about:

Hey Eric,

What did you think of the Ward-Froch fight? I ask, because I have a theory regarding the scoring:

1. First, I did think the fight was a little closer than what the broadcasters were telling me. 8-4 really seemed right to me. I thought Froch did win the first round, and, if that fight was in England, he would have. So when I heard 115-113, which I agree seems closer than reality, I wasn’t that put off by it, because I just didn’t see what Gus Johnson was screaming about most of the time. I mean, Froch has a world class chin, so that was going to keep him upright all night, but didn’t Ward look tired down the stretch? He even got his mouthpiece knocked out, which may indicate it was a little harder in there than the Showtime guys were telling me it was. The 10-point system is incredibly flawed; either a close round or a dominant round minus a knockdown are still 10-9, so until that changes, we could have seen a very clear, “close” win for Ward, even if Andre Ward’s rounds were much more dominant and clear.

2. Just saw that it was the English judge who had Ward up the most, 118-110, while the American actually had it 115-113 for Ward (along with the Canadian’s card). I think we saw this because of what have been perceived as “hometown” decisions recently, particularly with such an international focus on this fight (I’m using international loosely, just referencing the Europeans in this tournament, not that the world was watching, lol). Favoritism in this tournament would wreck any chance at doing another one of these types of tournaments again, and I think the American judge gave Froch every possible close call, while the Englishman went the other direction, whereas of course it’s usually the other way around. Not that we should expect another one of these tournaments in the future. It’s a little too drawn out, and let’s face it, why would these Euros come over to fight in front of empty arenas where they lose their hometown advantage, especially after seeing the tournament winner, Ward, get unbelievable preferential treatment? (It’s okay, he was probably going to win this thing if it was on the moon.)

Anyway, now we can all turn our attention to not seeing Pac-May later next year.

–Nathan Branson

Nathan,

First off, thank you for writing half my column for me.

I didn’t see as close a fight as you did. I gave the first round to Ward—and didn’t hesitate at all on the scoring of that one—and ended up with a score of 118-110, though I could easily see 117-111. At 116-112, I think you were stretching a bit, but not beyond the bounds of reason. 115-113, however, was not an acceptable scorecard to me. And the interesting thing to note here is that not all 115-113 cards are created equal. Canadian judge Craig Metcalfe got there by having Froch rally to win three of the last five rounds and make it close—an only slightly ridiculous premise. American judge John Stewart apparently removed the “h” from his first name and thought he was working for Comedy Central, as he scored FOUR OF THE FIRST FIVE ROUNDS FOR FROCH. Then he had Ward dominating the rest of the way, winning six of the last seven to eke out the decision with an inspired rally. That is, simply put, as bad a scorecard as you will ever see, even if it ultimately tabbed the correct winner.

Your theory about judges bending over backward not to hand in regionally biased scorecards is a theory I’ve tossed out there from time to time myself, and there might be some truth to it. I remember thinking before the Lennox Lewis-Evander Holyfield rematch that, with the way the Madison Square Garden judges screwed Lewis the first time and created a full-on taxpayer-dollar-wasting “investigation,” the judges for the second fight could be expected to give anything close to Lennox just in case. Sure enough, in a fight I scored 114-114 from ringside at the Thomas & Mack Center, all three judges had Lewis winning. I don’t mean to imply any of them did a bad job scoring the fight; their tallies of 117-111, 116-112, and 115-113 were all reasonable reflections of reality. But the truth is that boxing judges, like anyone else, can either consciously or subconsciously try not to look biased and thereby end up presenting a reverse-bias. It’s possible that happened with the two judges who gave Froch five rounds.

In any case, I’m glad you pointed out that Ward would have won the Super Six on any continent or any sphere within our solar system. Sure, he got to fight exclusively in the U.S. and primarily in Oakland. But that didn’t make a damned bit of difference in the outcome, except to prevent him from being robbed in the other guy’s hometown.

As for Pacquiao vs. Mayweather, I actually wrote a small blurb for Grantland.com that was supposed to run this week, predicting that the superfight was going to happen in 2012. I really felt the stars were beginning to align, that Mayweather now had the 99 percent confidence in winning required to make him sign any contract, and that Bob Arum might see Pacquiao’s career winding down and be willing to gamble (while banking countless millions for his company and his family). Then Floyd got 90 days in the slammer. My prediction blurb had to be yanked, and I honestly have no idea whether Pacquiao-Mayweather is a possibility for the fall of 2012. And frankly, I can think of few things I want to do less right now than speculate about that subject.

Now, let’s move along to my 2011 year-end awards picks. Some of these were discussed on last weekend’s season finale episode of Ring Theory (http://ringtheory.podbean.com), but I’m beefing it up with a few extra awards. For the last dozen years or so, I always compiled the “Unofficial Official” awards for a certain magazine that is now dead to me, so I’ll borrow a handful of categories that I used to acknowledge on that two-page spread and note them here:

Fighter Of The Year: Andre Ward. There were no spectacular candidates this year. The 2007 runner-up campaign from Kelly Pavlik would have gotten him named Fighter of the Year for 2011 in a landslide. Giving the award to Ward is a little bit of a by-default judgment, and also an acknowledgement of his body of work required since 2009 to win the Super Six. Even on their own, his wins over Arthur Abraham and Froch are enough to edge out my runner up Brandon Rios, who hurt his case by failing to make weight for this third and final fight of the year.

Fight Of The Year: Akira Yaegashi KO 10 Pornsawan Porpramook. I’ve already written about this YouTube gem plenty. If you haven’t watched it, then you have no right to vote on the Fight of the Year.

Round Of The Year: James Kirkland vs. Alfredo Angulo, Round One. You can find a lot of rounds from 2011 that featured thrilling two-way action. You can even find a few other rounds this year that featured both guys hitting the canvas. But there was no round this year as staggeringly unpredictable—while offering bone-crunching action and multiple knockdowns—as these three minutes in Cancun.

Knockout Of The Year: Nonito Donaire KO 2 Fernando Montiel. Left hook. Dented head. End of discussion. Sure, ref Russell Mora failing to stop the fight scuffed up the aesthetics, but balancing that out is the fact that Montiel was an elite fighter coming in and he got absolutely wrecked. No other fighter anywhere near Montiel’s quality got obliterated half as violently in 2011.

Upset Of The Year: Orlando Salido KO 8 Juan Manuel Lopez. Talk about a loaded category: Nobuhiro Ishida KO 1 James Kirkland, Lamont Peterson W 12 Amir Khan, Marco Antonio Rubio KO 7 David Lemieux, Jorge Arce KO 12 Wilfredo Vazquez Jr., Antonio DeMarco KO 11 Jorge Linares, and Kirkland KO 6 Angulo all could have won this category in past years. But Salido outslugging Lopez in a thriller that saw the guy with 11 losses defeat the guy with zero losses stands above the rest.

Trainer Of The Year: Robert Garcia. Tragically, after the way Khan and Pacquiao finished their years, we are forced to deprive Freddie Roach of his 24th consecutive Trainer of the Year award. Garcia loses points for his work with the heinous Antonio Margarito, but no other cornerman comes close to what “Grandpa” did with Rios, Donaire, and Mikey Garcia this year.

Female Fighter Of The Year: Anne Sophie Mathis. Holly Holm is the Freddie Roach of this award from the “Unofficial Official Awards” pages, and Mathis went 5-0 this year including a knockout of Holm. Easy enough.

Robbery Of The Year: Paul Williams W 12 Erislandy Lara. It takes a lot to get punished as a boxing judge. All three of the judges for this fight got suspended for the scorecards they handed in. Hirings and firings at a certain boxing magazine aside, Williams over Lara was the most horrendous decision of the year in boxing.

Most Improved Fighter Of The Year: Carlos Molina. This is a tricky one, in that I don’t know if the Chicago-based junior middleweight has technically improved as a fighter—he was pretty good to begin with and had won nine straight coming into 2011. But in terms of recognition and opposition, Molina made the leap. He fought to an impressive draw against Lara, knocked out Allen Conyers, and then upset Kermit Cintron on Showtime. Next up is James Kirkland, which means Molina had better keep improving if he wants this winning streak to continue in 2012.

Facial Monstrosity Of The Year: Pawel Wolak. Since I’m the one who invented this “Unofficial Official” award, I’m going to keep handing it out. And as long as I’m handing it out, how do I not give it to the guy who inspired the Joe Tessitore call, “a left hook to the hematoma”? We didn’t get everything we wanted out of boxing in 2011. But you can’t deny that Wolak and Delvin Rodriguez did their part to make the year as swell as possible.

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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Remembering the Macho Man, Hector Camacho, a Great Sporting Character

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Twelve years ago tomorrow, on Nov. 24, 2012, Hector Camacho was officially declared dead. He was effectively dead before then, having suffered a heart attack in the hospital after his spinal cord had been severed by a bullet, but his attendants at the hospital in Bayamon, Puerto Rico, waited until his mother had arrived from New York to remove him from life support.

At the age of 50, one of the most charismatic personalities in the sporting life of America was silenced forever.

Hector “Macho” Camacho, the Macho Man, was flamboyant – boy was he ever – but he was also a great talent. A three-time New York City Golden Gloves champion, reputedly 96-4 as an amateur, he was undefeated in 31 bouts at 135 pounds and below and went on to conquer some of the sport’s biggest names – Boom Boom Mancini, Vinny Pazienza, Roberto Duran (twice), Sugar Ray Leonard – before the sun set on his long career.

Camacho was born in Bayamon but grew up in Spanish Harlem where his mother moved when he was four. He was 21 years old and 21-0 as a junior lightweight when he was first profiled in Sports Illustrated, then the best medium for enhancing the marketability of a young athlete. At this juncture in his life, Hector, who became a father at age 17, was still living in a Spanish Harlem housing project, sharing an apartment with his 38-year-old mother, his stepfather, three siblings, a niece and a nephew.

By then he had already been expelled from six schools and was no stranger to the legal system, having spent 3 ½ months at New York’s notorious Rikers Island for — as Pat Putnam phrased it — borrowing other people’s automobiles without their permission.

The story in S.I. noted that Camacho’s reflexes were so quick that he could play two video games at once. Among his many physical attributes, it was his hand speed that attracted the most attention. When he ramped up his offense, his fists were a blur. But eventually, when folks thought of Camacho, what they remembered was his choirboy face with the spit curl in the middle of his forehead and his outrageous ring costumes which ran the gamut from a loincloth to a dress.

Hot-dogging came natural to Hector Camacho; it was embedded in his DNA. And in common with Muhammad Ali, he could be arrogant without coming across as arrogant. There was an impish quality to his bravado. He was fun to be around and, in his own words, could light up a room like a Christmas tree.

What Camacho lacked was any capacity for embarrassment.

Former WBA super bantamweight champion Clarence “Bones” Adams, who is now the proprietor of a Las Vegas gym that bears his name, became fast friends with the Macho Man when both trained in Las Vegas, the host city for their most lucrative fights. Mention Camacho’s name to Adams and a smile creases his face if he doesn’t burst out laughing.

“One day after Hector and I had gone jogging,” recollects Adams, “we drove over to the old White Cross Drugs [on the north Strip near the Stratosphere] to grab a bite to eat at their lunch counter. When we left and were standing outside by the car, Hector said, ‘Hold on a minute, I have to go pee.’ I said I’ll wait for you but then I noticed he was already peeing. Some cars honked as they passed by.

“Greg Hannely, my manager at the time, and I went to Detroit in 2000 to support Hector who was on the undercard of a show featuring Thomas Hearns. At the weigh-in, Hector wore a long shirt with nothing underneath it. This wasn’t apparent until he stepped off the scale and started doing jumping jacks.

“Hector,” continues Adams, “once had a Ferrari that he misplaced; he couldn’t remember where he parked it. He never did recover that car, but he wasn’t too bothered by it. His attitude was, ‘there’s always more where it came from.’” (Presumably this was the same Ferrari that Camacho was driving when he was ticketed for driving too slow with a suspended license on a Florida highway while being pleasured by a woman sitting astride him.)

Historians would compartmentalize Camacho’s career into two segments. Part One ended with his successful lightweight title defense against Edwin Rosario at Madison Square Garden on June 13, 1986.

Camacho kept his undefeated record intact, prevailing on a split decision, but ended the fight looking as if he had taken all the worst of it. Badly hurt in the fifth round and again in the 11th, he repaired to his dressing room with a swollen nose and two black eyes.

This fight, reads a story in a Canadian paper, “persuaded him to scale back his ultra-aggressive style in favor of a more cerebral, defensive approach.” That’s a diplomatic way of saying that Camacho devolved into a runner.

In his next fight, Camacho proved too clever for Cornelius Boza-Edwards, winning a unanimous decision, but the crowd didn’t like it when Hector spent the last two rounds on his bicycle and there were boos aplenty as the match wended to its conclusion. This would be the Macho Man’s final fight as a lightweight. He moved up to 140 where a slew of attractive match-ups awaited, notably a showdown with Julio Cesar Chavez.

Camacho and Chavez touched gloves in Las Vegas on Sept. 13, 1992, before an announced crowd of 19,100 at the UNLV basketball arena in what reportedly was the fastest sellout in Las Vegas boxing history up to that date. Chavez, widely seen as the top pound-for-pound fighter in the sport, advanced his record to 82-0 with a lopsided decision, winning all 12 rounds on the card of one of the judges. The Macho Man, who had avenged his lone defeat to Greg Haugen, declined to 41-2.

This wasn’t a milquetoast performance by Camacho. He simply couldn’t deal with Chavez’s unrelenting pressure. LA Times scribe Alan Malamud wrote that Hector showed unexpected grit by trading with Chavez after his legs were gone, thereby reducing him to a stationary target. But more brickbats came Camacho’s way following setbacks to Felix Trinidad and Oscar De La Hoya. He lasted the distance in both bouts but was roundly out-pointed. By the third round of the De La Hoya fight, wrote Kevin Iole, it was a foregone conclusion that De La Hoya would win.

Between the Trinidad and De La Hoya fights, staged 44 months apart, Camacho had 21 fights and won them all. His victims were mostly journeyman with two notable exceptions. On June 22, 1996, he scored a 12-round unanimous decision over 45-year-old Roberto Duran. Eight months later, he defeated another faded legend when he stopped Sugar Ray Leonard in the fifth round. Leonard, who had been out of the ring for six years, was forever retiring and unretiring and Camacho retired him for good. Both bouts were in Atlantic City.

A wag wrote that Sugar Ray was 40 years old going on 41 and that Camacho was 35 years old going on puberty.

Camacho’s advisors kept him busy to keep his name in the news and Hector did his part by making the news for bad behavior outside the ring. In January of 2005, he was arrested for the November 2004 burglary of a computer store in Gulfport, Mississippi. He went there to retrieve a laptop that was being repaired but entered the property after hours by way of the ceiling. An illegal drug, ecstasy, was found in his hotel room when he was placed under arrest.

After serving five months in jail, Camacho was released with the understanding that he would be placed under house arrest for one year when he returned to Puerto Rico but, by all accounts, the authorities in Puerto Rico were never notified of this arrangement.

Camacho’s frequent misdeeds, once seen as the amusing antics of a fun-loving man-child, came to be seen in a different light as he grew older; as a pattern of behavior that betrayed a dark side in his personality.

In a 1985 conversation with New York Times boxing writer Michael Katz, Camacho’s estranged manager Billy Giles said, “someday he’ll wind up like Tyrone Everett, maybe worse,” the reference to a talented junior lightweight from Philadelphia who was murdered under sordid circumstances.

That proved to be eerily prophetic.

Camacho had 20 more fights after his hollow performance against Oscar De La Hoya, ending his career as a bloated middleweight. His only noteworthy opponent during this final phase of his boxing career was Duran who was then 50 years old when they clashed in Denver. In a bout that echoed their first meeting, Hector won a unanimous decision. This was Roberto Duran’s farewell fight. Camacho soldiered on for eight more bouts, winning five.

In November of 2012, thirty months after his last ring assignment, Hector Camacho and a companion were ambushed as they sat in a car in the darkened parking lot of a Bayamon, Puerto Rico bar. The companion died instantly in the hail of bullets. Police found nine packets of cocaine on the decedent and an open packet of cocaine in the car.

Camacho’’s funeral was held at Harlem’s landmark Saint Cecilia’s Church. Hundreds of mourners stood in the cold outside the church as his casket was being placed in the funeral car. They cheered and shouted Camacho’s battle cry, “Macho Time,” as the hearse pulled away.

They say you shouldn’t speak bad about the dead, so we will let Bones Adams have the last word. “Hector had his demons,” says Adams, “but he was a great friend, a nice, kind, and caring guy.”

Editor’s note: For more on Hector Camacho, check out Christian Giudice’s biography, “Macho Time: The Meteoric Rise and Tragic Fall of Hector Camacho,” published by Hamilcar in 2020.

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Avila Perspective, Chap. 304: A Year of Transformation in Boxing and More

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A subtle transformation in professional boxing is taking place with the biggest fights no longer placed in Las Vegas, New York or Los Angeles. Instead, they are heading to the Middle East.

Golden Boy Promotions joined the crowd last week with one of their stronger fight cards taking place in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The main attractions were new unified cruiserweight champion Gilberto “Zurdo” Ramirez of Mexico along with Puerto Rico’s diminutive Oscar Collazo unifying the minimumweight division.

And there is more to come.

Matchroom Boxing seemed to lead the way in this rerouting of major boxing events. It goes as far back as December 2019 when Anthony Joshua fought Andy Ruiz in a rematch for the heavyweight championship in Diriyah, Saudi Arabia.

Little by little major fights are being rerouted to Saudi Arabia.

Is it a good thing or not?

For promoters looking to cut costs it’s definitely welcomed. But what does it do for the fan base accustomed to saving their money to buy tickets for one or two major events?

Now there is talk of Shakur Stevenson, Devin Haney and Terence Crawford heading to the Middle East to fight on major cards sponsored by “Riyad Spring.” It’s a new avenue for the sport of pro boxing.

This past week Golden Boy and its roster of Latino fighters took its turn and showed off their brand of aggressive fights. Some like Collazo and Arnold Barboza made the best of their moments. And, of course, Zurdo proved he should have moved up in weight years ago. He could be the Comeback Fighter of the Year.

Benavidez vs Morrell

Interim light heavyweight champion David Benavidez accepted a challenge from WBA light heavyweight titlist David Morrell to meet on Feb. 1 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.

Bad blood between the two tall fighters already exists.

Morrell claims Benavidez is over-rated.

“I’m getting the knockout. 100%. He’s all talk and no bite. He can’t do what he thinks he’s gonna do,” said Morrell. “He has no idea what he’s talking about, but he’s provoking me and now I want to go out there and beat the crap out of him. I’m here now and none of that talk matters.”

Benavidez begs to differ.

“Here we are again. I told you that I was going to give you the fights you want to see, and now we’re here,” Benavidez said while in Los Angeles. “Morrell has been talking about me for a while and disrespecting me. He wanted to make it personal with me, so I’m personally going to break his mouth. That’ll give him something to remember me by.”

Also scheduled to fight on the fight card are Isaac Cruz, Stephen Fulton, Brandon Figueroa and Jesus Ramos Jr.

Netflix

No surprise for me with the massive success of the Jake Paul and Mike Tyson event on the Most Valuable Promotions boxing card last week.

According to Netflix there were 108 million people tuned into the event last Friday that also featured the incredible Amanda Serrano and Katie Taylor rematch. Another exciting card was the men’s welterweight clash between Mario Barrios and Abel Ramos that ended in a draw.

If fans weren’t satisfied with the Paul fight, they certainly got their fulfillment with the world title fights, especially Serrano and Taylor who were estimated to be viewed by more than 72 million people. No female fight in history can touch those numbers.

So, what’s next for Netflix in terms of boxing?

West Coast Blues

Southern California is usually a hotbed for boxing events no matter what time of the year. But this year only a few boxing cards are taking place within a driving distance until the end of the year.

Las Vegas is in slumber and Southern California has a few smaller boxing cards still on schedule. Arizona has a significant Top Rank fight card in a few weeks as does Golden Boy Promotions in the Inland Empire.

Here are some upcoming fight events worth noting:

Dec. 5 – at OC Hangar in Costa Mesa, Calif. Vlad Panin vs Sal Briceno by SOCA Fights.

Dec. 7 – at Footprint Center in Phoenix, Rafael Espinoza vs Robeisy Ramirez and Oscar Valdez vs Emanuel Navarrete by Top Rank.

Dec. 13, at Chumash Casino 360 in Santa Ynez, Calif. Carlos Balderas vs Cesar Villarraga by 360 Promotions.

Dec. 14 at Toyota Arena in Ontario, Calif. Alexis Rocha vs Raul Curiel by Golden Boy Promotions.

Turkeys in East L.A.

The 25th annual Turkey Giveaway by Golden Boy takes place on Saturday Nov. 23, at Oscar De La Hoya Animo High School starting at 11 a.m.

It’s incredible that 25 years have passed since the inception of this yearly event. Many current and past fighters for the promotion company will be passing out turkeys and meeting fans. Among those expected to appear are Alexis Rocha, Victor Morales, Joel Iriarte, Bryan Lua and others.

Photo: Eddie Hearn, Frank Warren, and HE Turki Alalshikh at the Joshua-Dubois fight

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Philly’s Jesse Hart Continues His Quest plus Thoughts on Tyson-Paul and ‘Boots’ Ennis

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Jesse Hart (31-3, 25 KOs) returns to the ring tomorrow night (Friday, Nov. 22) on a Teflon Promotions card at the Liacouras Center on the campus of Temple University. During a recent media workout for the show, which will feature five other local fighters in separate bouts, Hart was adamant that fighting for the second time this year at home will only help in his continuing quest to push towards a second chance at a world championship. “Fighting at home is always great and it just makes sense from a business standpoint since I already have a name in the sport and in the city,” said Hart (pictured on the left).

Hart’s view of where his career currently resides in relation to the landscape in the light heavyweight division leads you to believe that, at the age of 35, Hart is realistic about how far he can go before his career is over.

“Make good fights, win those fights, fight as much as I can and stay busy, that’s the way the light heavyweight division won’t be able to ignore me,” he says. Aside from two losses back in 2017 and 2018 to current unified cruiserweight champion Gilberto Ramirez at super middleweight, Hart’s only other defeat was to Joe Smith during Smith’s most successful portion of his career.

When attempts to make fights with (at the time) up-and-coming prospects like Edgar Berlanga and David Benavidez were denied with Hart being viewed as the typical high risk-low reward opponent, it was time to find another way.  So, Hart decided to stay local after splitting with Top Rank Promotions post-surgery to repair his longtime right-hand issues and hooked up with Teflon Promotions, an upstart company that is the latest to take on the noble endeavor of trying to return North Broad Street and Atlantic City to boxing prominence.

In essence, it is a calculated move that is potentially a win-win situation for all parties. Continued success for Hart along with some of the titles at light heavyweight eventually being released from Artur Beterbiev’s grasp due to outside politics, and Jesse Hart just may lift up Teflon Promotions into a major player on the regional scene.

Tickets for Friday’s show are available on Ticketmaster platforms.

**

As we entered November, a glance at the boxing schedule made me wonder if it was possible for the sport to have a memorable month — one that could shine a light forward in boxing’s ongoing quest to regain relevance in today’s sports landscape. Having consecutive weekends with events that could spark interest in the pugilistic artform and its wonderful characters was what I was hoping for, but what we got instead was more evidence that boxing isn’t immune to modern business practices landing a one-two punch on the action both inside and outside of the ring.

Jaron “Boots” Ennis was expected to make a statement in his rematch with Karen Chukhadzian on Nov. 9, a statement to put the elite level champions around his weight class on notice. What we witnessed, however, was more evidence of how current champions in their prime can be hampered by having to navigate a business that functions through the cooperation of independent contractors. Ennis got the job done – he won – but it was a lackluster performance.

It’s time for Ennis to fight the fighters we already thought we would have seen him fight by now and I do believe there is some truth to Ennis rising to the occasion if there was a more noteworthy name across the ring.

Some positives emerged from the Mike Tyson-Jake Paul event the following week. Amanda Serrano, Katie Taylor, and women’s boxing are finally getting the public recognition they deserve. Mario Barrios’s draw against the tough Abel Ramos, also on the Netflix broadcast, was an action-packed firefight. So, mainstream America and beyond got to witness actual fights before being subjected to Paul’s latest circus.

Unfortunately for fans, but fortunately for Paul, the lone true boxing star in the main event dimmed out from an athletic standpoint decades ago. In this instance modern business practices allowed for a social media influencer to stage his largest money grab from a completely unnuanced public.

As Paul rose to the ring apron from the steps and looked around “Jerry’s World,” taking in the moment, it reminded me of an actual fighter when they’re about to enter the ring taking in the atmosphere before they risk their lives after a lifetime of dedication to try and realize a childhood dream. In this case though, this was a natural-born hustler realizing as he made it to the ring apron that his hustle was likely having its moment of glory.

In boxing circles, Jake Paul is viewed as a “necessary evil.”  What occurs in his fights are merely an afterthought to the spectacle that is at the core of the social media realm that birthed him. Hopefully the public learned from the atrocity that occurred once the exhibition started that smoke and mirrors last for only so long. Hopefully Paul’s moment of being a boxing performer and acting like a true fighter comes to its conclusion. But he isn’t going away anytime soon, especially since his promotional company is now in bed with Netflix.

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