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Semi-Silent Hopkins Saying Less, Meaning More

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HopkinsDawsonIINYPC Fusco18The April 28 do-over with Chad Dawson might or might not be one of the more difficult fights for Bernard “The Executioner” to prepare for, but there is little doubt it has placed certain restrictions on Kelly Swanson, Hopkins’ usually harried personal publicist.

In the 47-year-old Hopkins, Swanson and her assistant, Lisa Milner, have boxing’s ultimate Chatty Cathy, a nonstop quote machine that spews opinions and anecdotes like no fighter since Muhammad Ali was filling reporters’ notebooks and tape recorders nearly four decades ago. Hopkins has always responded to even the most innocuous questions with rambling responses that are alternately entertaining and outrageous. Maybe even more so than he busts up opponents in the ring, he filibusters the media during press gatherings.

But in the wake of the Oct. 15 no-decision in his first matchup with Dawson (30-1, 17 KOs) in Los Angeles’ Staples Center — a fight that initially ruled by referee Pat Russell to be a second-round technical-knockout victory for Dawson when Hopkins (52-5-2, 32 KOs) was unable (or unwilling) to continue after injuring his left shoulder upon being picked up and hurled to the canvas — the WBC and (ital)The Ring(end ital) magazine light heavyweight champion has withdrawn into a self-imposed cocoon of isolation, declining virtually every interview request. He participated in a teleconference yesterday afternoon (Dawson was on earlier) only because his contract obligated him to do so, and his curt demeanor suggested two things. One, B-Hop wasn’t enjoying this question-and-answer session even a little, and two, he might not available too often or too long for similar grillings up to and including the night of the HBO-televised fight in Atlantic City Boardwalk Hall.

Make of that what you will. You can be sure that Gary Shaw, Dawson’s promoter, does. He regards Hopkins’ vow of semi-silence to be an admission of fear, that he faked the shoulder injury to wiggle out of a bout he knew he was destined to lose.

“I just want to say I never thought Hopkins was hurt,” Shaw reiterated during the teleconference. “We never heard anything about his rehabbing or anything else. My only fear is that Hopkins will not go through with the entire fight (on April 28), that at some point, when he’s taking a beating from Chad, he’ll find another way to get out.

“Chad is a much superior fighter. He’s younger, stronger, more aggressive and eager, once and for all, to put the legend where he belongs – retired and into the (International) Boxing Hall of Fame.”

And what of Hopkins’ unusual reticence, or his refusal to go on one of those obligatory press tours with his 29-year-old opponent?

“Hopkins won’t even do a real press conference with Chad,” Shaw said. “That tells you all you need to know about this fight.”

Shaw also suggested that Hopkins and Golden Boy CEO Richard Schaefer did everything in their power to avoid Hopkins having to again share a ring with Dawson, and that the only reason he is doing so is because the WBC required that he do so as a condition of retaining his green, bejeweled WBC championship belt.

“They didn’t want the (rematch),” Shaw said. “They lobbied against it. The (second) fight was mandated on the floor of the WBC convention. That’s why Hopkins is taking it. Without that belt, Hopkins is just an old fighter. He needs that belt to be someone.”

An indignant Schaefer reacted to that charge as expected, pointing out that Hopkins “has more belts than people have to hold up their pants. Bernard at 47 doesn’t need belts. He could have fought (Beibut) Shumenov for the WBA belt, (Nathan) Cleverly for the WBO belt. This is the fight that Bernard wanted. He never turns down a challenge.”

So the war of words continues, with Dawson, Shaw and Dawson’s trainer, John Scully, depicting Hopkins as a once-great champion who knows his time has passed and is hesitant, if not exactly afraid, of the beatdown he can expect from “Bad” Chad, and Schaefer offering strong counterpoints in the debate.

“He’s beaten pretty much everyone who is anyone in and around his weight class over the last 20 years, from (Oscar) De La Hoya to (Antonio) Tarver to (Felix) Trinidad to Winky (Wright) to (Kelly) Pavlik to (Roy) Jones, and on and on and on,” Schaefer said of Hopkins. “Yet there are those are still doubting him! It’s amazing. I guess some people never learn.”

It was, of course, left to Hopkins to get in the last sound bite. And the words he uttered – defiant, proud, hinting at a dark conspiracy against him by the fight game’s powers-that-be – did not sound like something a fearful old man would have hurled at skeptics who, let’s face it, too often have made the mistake of writing him off.

If B-Hop is to disappear for a time into another self-imposed media blackout, he made sure his parting comments repudiated the Dawson/Shaw allegations in the strongest possible terms. He has been written off before against fighters he insists are as good or better than Dawson – Trinidad, Tarver, Pavlik, Wright and others – and exposed them as comparative neophytes unable to cope with his ring genius.

“I will continue to kick the naysayers’ ass,” Hopkins said. “But when I win this fight, they’ll find some excuse to say what Chad Dawson wasn’t.

“When you see me reenact what I did in Oct. 2008 (when he pitched a virtual 12-round shutout at Pavlik, who went off as a 6-1 favorite), but even better, then I’ll think about what I want to do – not what they want me to do.”

The “they” Hopkins refers to are those who want to see him drift away into retirement, either by his choice or in the wake of the type of one-sided drubbing he never has sustained in a 22-year professional career. Of his five defeats, only one – the first pairing with Jones, in 1993 – was on a decision clear enough to be considered controversy-free.

“They want to see me on the ground, like Mike Tyson (vs. Buster Douglas), looking for my mouthpiece,” Hopkins said. “It’s no secret they want to get rid of me. But I ain’t that easy to be gotten rid of.

“People are always going to say something bad about me. `Oh, he only fought small guys.’ I heard that. You hear a lot of stuff. I hear more of it than other guys because I’m still here and still succeeding at 47. (Jean) Pascal tried saying I was on steroids.

“I’m only around because I’m special. I worked hard to be special. So why don’t I get the credit that I deserve? I’m the most underrated fighter to achieve what I have that ever walked on the planet Earth.”

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Fury-Usyk Reignited: Can the Gypsy King Avenge his Lone Defeat?

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In professional boxing, the heavyweight division, going back to the days of John L. Sullivan, is the straw that stirs the drink. By this measure, the fight on May 18 of this year at Kingdom Arena in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, was the biggest prizefight in decades. The winner would emerge as the first undisputed heavyweight champion since 1999 when Lennox Lewis out-pointed Evander Holyfield in their second meeting.

The match did not disappoint. It had several twists and turns.

Usyk did well in the early rounds, but the Gypsy King rattled Usyk with a harsh right hand in the fifth stanza and won rounds five through seven on all three cards. In the ninth, the match turned sharply in favor of the Ukrainian. Fury was saved by the bell after taking a barrage of unanswered punches, the last of which dictated a standing 8-count from referee Mark Nelson. But Fury weathered the storm and with his amazing powers of recuperation had a shade the best of it in the final stanza.

The decision was split: 115-112 and 114-113 for Usyk who became a unified champion in a second weight class; 114-113 for Fury.

That brings us to tomorrow (Saturday, Dec. 21) where Usyk and Fury will renew acquaintances in the same ring where they had their May 18 showdown.

The first fight was a near “pick-‘em” affair with Fury closing a very short favorite at most of the major bookmaking establishments. The Gypsy King would have been a somewhat higher favorite if not for the fact that he was coming off a poor showing against MMA star Francis Ngannou and had a worrisome propensity for getting cut. (A cut above Fury’s right eye in sparring pushed back the fight from its original Feb. 11 date.)

Tomorrow’s sequel, bearing the tagline “Reignited,” finds Usyk a consensus 7/5 favorite although those odds could shorten by post time. (There was no discernible activity after today’s weigh-in where Fury, fully clothed, topped the scales at 281, an increase of 19 pounds over their first meeting.)

Given the politics of boxing, anything “undisputed” is fragile. In June, Usyk abandoned his IBF belt and the organization anointed Daniel Dubois their heavyweight champion based upon Dubois’s eighth-round stoppage of Filip Hrgovic in a bout billed for the IBF interim title. The malodorous WBA, a festering boil on the backside of boxing, now recognizes 43-year-old Kubrat Pulev as its “regular” heavyweight champion.

Another difference between tomorrow’s fight card and the first installment is that the May 18 affair had a much stronger undercard. Two strong pairings were the rematch between cruiserweights Jai Opetaia and Maris Briedis (Opetaia UD 12) and the heavyweight contest between unbeatens Agit Kabayal and Frank Sanchez (Kabayel KO 7).

Tomorrow’s semi-wind-up between Serhii Bohachuk and Ismail Madrimov lost luster when Madrimov came down with bronchitis and had to withdraw. The featherweight contest between Peter McGrail and Dennis McCann fell out when McCann’s VADA test returned an adverse finding. Bohachuk and McGrail remain on the card but against late-sub opponents in matches that are less intriguing.

The focal points of tomorrow’s undercard are the bouts involving undefeated British heavyweights Moses Itauma (10-0, 8 KOs) and Johnny Fisher (12-0, 11 KOs). Both are heavy favorites over their respective opponents but bear watching because they represent the next generation of heavyweight standouts. Fury and Usyk are getting long in the tooth. The Gypsy King is 36; Usyk turns 38 next month.

Bob Arum once said that nobody purchases a pay-per-view for the undercard and, years from now, no one will remember which sanctioning bodies had their fingers in the pie. So, Fury-Usyk II remains a very big deal, although a wee bit less compelling than their first go-around.

Will Tyson Fury avenge his lone defeat? Turki Alalshikh, the Chairman of Saudi Arabia’s General Entertainment Authority and the unofficial czar of “major league” boxing, certainly hopes so. His Excellency has made known that he stands poised to manufacture a rubber match if Tyson prevails.

We could have already figured this out, but Alalshikh violated one of the protocols of boxing when he came flat out and said so. He effectively made Tyson Fury the “A-side,” no small potatoes considering that the most relevant variable on the checklist when handicapping a fight is, “Who does the promoter need?”

The Uzyk-Fury II fight card will air on DAZN with a suggested list price of $39.99 for U.S. fight fans. The main event is expected to start about 5:45 pm ET / 2:45 pm PT.

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Unheralded Bruno Surace went to Tijuana and Forged the TSS 2024 Upset of the Year

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Unheralded Bruno Surace went to Tijuana and Forged the TSS 2024 Upset of the Year

The Dec. 14 fight at Tijuana between Jaime Munguia and Bruno Surace was conceived as a stay-busy fight for Munguia. The scuttlebutt was that Munguia’s promoters, Zanfer and Top Rank, wanted him to have another fight under his belt before thrusting him against Christian Mbilli in a WBC eliminator with the prize for the winner (in theory) a date with Canelo Alvarez.

Munguia came to the fore in May of 2018 at Verona, New York, when he demolished former U.S. Olympian Sadam Ali, conqueror of Miguel Cotto. That earned him the WBO super welterweight title which he successfully defended five times.

Munguia kept winning as he moved up in weight to middleweight and then super middleweight and brought a 43-0 (34) record into his Cinco de Mayo 2024 match with Canelo.

Jaime went the distance with Alvarez and had a few good moments while losing a unanimous decision. He rebounded with a 10th-round stoppage of Canada’s previously undefeated Erik Bazinyan.

There was little reason to think that Munguia would overlook Surace as the Mexican would be fighting in his hometown for the first time since February of 2022 and would want to send the home folks home happy. Moreover, even if Munguia had an off-night, there was no reason to think that the obscure Surace could capitalize. A Frenchman who had never fought outside France,  Surace brought a 25-0-2 record and a 22-fight winning streak, but he had only four knockouts to his credit and only eight of his wins had come against opponents with winning records.

It appeared that Munguia would close the show early when he sent the Frenchman to the canvas in the second round with a big left hook. From that point on, Surace fought mostly off his back foot, throwing punches in spurts, whereas the busier Munguia concentrated on chopping him down with body punches. But Surace absorbed those punches well and at the midway point of the fight, behind on the cards but nonplussed,  it now looked as if the bout would go the full 10 rounds with Munguia winning a lopsided decision.

Then lightning struck. Out of the blue, Surace connected with an overhand right to the jaw. Munguia went down flat on his back. He rose a fraction-of-a second before the count reached “10,”, but stumbled as he pulled himself upright. His eyes were glazed and referee Juan Jose Ramirez, a local man, waived it off. There was no protest coming from Munguia or his cornermen. The official time was 2:36 of round six.

At major bookmaking establishments, Jaime Munguia was as high as a 35/1 favorite. No world title was at stake, yet this was an upset for the ages.

Photo credit: Mikey Williams / Top Rank

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Steven Navarro is the TSS 2024 Prospect of the Year

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“I get ‘Bam’ vibes when I watch this kid,” said ESPN ringside commentator Tim Bradley during the opening round of Steven Navarro’s most recent match. Bradley was referencing WBC super flyweight champion Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez, a precociously brilliant technician whose name now appears on most pound-for-pound lists.

There are some common threads between Steven Navarro, the latest fighter to adopt the nickname “Kid Dynamite,” and Bam Rodriguez. Both are southpaws currently competing in the junior bantamweight division. But, of course, Bradley was alluding to something more when he made the comparison. And Navarro’s showing bore witness that Bradley was on to something.

It was the fifth pro fight for Navarro who was matched against a Puerto Rican with a 7-1 ledger. He ended the contest in the second frame, scoring three knockdowns, each the result of a different combination of punches, forcing the referee to stop it. It was the fourth win inside the distance for the 20-year-old phenom.

Isaias Estevan “Steven” Navarro turned pro after coming up short in last December’s U.S. Olympic Trials in Lafayette, Louisiana. The #1 seed in the 57 kg (featherweight) division, he was upset in the finals, losing a controversial split decision. Heading in, Navarro had won 13 national tournaments beginning at age 12.

A graduate of LA’s historic Fairfax High School, Steven made his pro debut this past April on a Matchroom Promotions card at the Fontainebleau in Las Vegas and then inked a long-term deal with Top Rank. He comes from a boxing family. His father Refugio had 10 pro fights and three of Refugio’s cousins were boxers, most notably Jose Navarro who represented the USA at the 2000 Sydney Olympics and was a four-time world title challenger as a super flyweight. Jose was managed by Oscar De La Hoya for much of his pro career.

Nowadays, the line between a prospect and a rising contender has been blurred. Three years ago, in an effort to make matters less muddled, we operationally defined a prospect thusly: “A boxer with no more than a dozen fights, none yet of the 10-round variety.” To our way of thinking, a prospect by nature is still in the preliminary-bout phase of his career.

We may loosen these parameters in the future. For one thing, it eliminates a lot of talented female boxers who, like their Japanese male counterparts in the smallest weight classes, are often pushed into title fights when, from a historical perspective, they are just getting started.

But for the time being, we will adhere to our operational definition. And within the window that we have created, Steven Navarro stood out. In his first year as a pro, “Kid Dynamite” left us yearning to see more of him.

Honorable mention: Australian heavyweight Teremoana Junior (5-0, 5 KOs)

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