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Pacquiao-Bradley: Another Travesty
The fighters managed a smile afterwards..but the fans still fume, and head for the exits. Too many think the sport is riddled with corruption. (Chris Farina-Top Rank photo)
Let’s get one thing straight right off the bat to avoid further disappointment. Nobody is going to do anything about it.
Of all the sad things you can say about what happened at the MGM Grand Garden Arena Saturday night that is the surest and the saddest of all. Nobody is going to investigate a robbery conducted in front of over 14,000 eyewitnesses. Nobody is going to make it right. Nobody is even going to try.
Manny Pacquiao has been the recipient of a gift decision or two during his career, including in my opinion the draw and two razor-thin wins Las Vegas judges awarded him over the years against Juan Manuel Marquez. Frankly, I don’t believe he won any of those fights nor more than about a third of the 36 rounds fought between them.
Having said that, those decisions were at the worst only petty theft. They were at least in the first two cases, debatable. What was done to Pacquiao by Duane Ford and CJ Ross however was grand larceny at the Grand.
Ford and Ross were the two judges who committed robbery using a lead pencil, ruling that Timothy Bradley had defeated Pacquiao 115-113 when most observers, including prize fighters like George Foreman, Roy Jones, Jr., Evander Holyfield and even Floyd Mayweather’s father, saw a one-sided win for Pacquiao.
Ford tried to defend his score the following day in the Las Vegas Review-Journal by claiming Bradley had “given Pacquiao a boxing lesson.’’ Then in the next breath he admitted most of the rounds were close. The lesson in that is the 74-year-old Ford has seen his better days…and apparently not much of that fight.
There are two ways to look at the split decision win those judges gave Bradley. You can simply shrug your shoulders, holler about unproven corruptness and buy the next pay per view when it comes along or you can do what discerning shoppers do.
When the product turns bad you stop buying. That is what fight fans need to do until this matter is thoroughly investigated. Not that that will change anything but at least the people allegedly in charge will be on notice that someone is watching because Saturday night no one was – including the three judges at ringside.
The fault does not lie with Bradley or Pacquiao. Both fought bravely and well. They entertained, took risks and rewarded the fans with their efforts. But the result demeaned those efforts, the sport and the fans who pay everyone – including those judges and Nevada State Athletic Commission executive director Keith “I Know Nothhhing’’ Kizer.
In less than 24 hours Kizer admitted he thought Pacquiao won but in the next breath said the officials’ work would not be reviewed. The chairman of the commission said it would not “second guess’’ the officials.
Then what are they there for? They don’t do an adequate job on medical exams, especially in the area of performance enhancing drugs. If they catch anyone it’s always after the fact until Dr. Margaret Goodman started actually using tests that might catch someone before hand and almost immediately forced the cancellation of two straight big-money fights as a result of positive tests for PEDs.
They allow endless mismatches as well. Hell, in California Antonio Margarito was allowed to slip two bricks in his gloves without anyone but Shane Mosley’s trainer noticing. So what are the regulators doing in the locker room? Having a Coke?
Now, worst of all, Kizer concedes they won’t even regulate the work of their own officials. So what does Kizer get paid for? Watching?
When an arena of over 14,000 people, nearly the entire Internet world, most professional fighters and commentators and almost the entire boxing press corps agree Pacquiao won somewhere between eight and 10 of the 12 rounds and CompuBox stats argue loudly against the decision how do you come out and say you’re not even going to look at it?
Because it’s boxing which despite the presence of guys like Kizer is the most under regulated business this side of Wall Street’s investment banks and hedge funds.
In sports, one understands how a referee or umpire can miss a call from time to time. But how do you miss an entire fight? Ford even got the 11th round wrong, which he gave to Pacquiao. That was the round after which Pacquiao’s trainer Freddie Roach was so angry at him for taking it off he ordered him to go for a knockout in the 12th. And Ford thought he won it? Even the two blind mice in the other judging chairs disagreed on that one.
As for Ford’s statement that “Bradley gave him a boxing lesson’’ one needed only to listen to Tim Bradley to know otherwise. After his hand had been raised he said he’d have to go home and watch a tape to see “if I won the fight or not.’’
Usually if you give someone “a boxing lesson’’ you know it. Bradley didn’t but Ford did. If Ford thought he saw someone giving Manny Pacquiao a boxing lesson he must have been watching tape of Pacquiao-Marquez III on an iPad rather than the fight.
“You can hear the boos in the crowd,’’ poor Bradley (29-0, 12 KO) said. “Everybody feels I lost the fight. This is boxing. Nov. 19th we can do the rematch.
“It was a good, competitive fight. Every round was pretty close. Pacquiao won the early rounds. Later rounds I controlled with my jab. Moving.’’
What jab?
According to CompuBox statistics, Bradley landed 12 fewer jabs than Pacquiao (63-51), which meant he averaged 4 ½ jabs per round. He had a connection rate of only 11 per cent because he missed or had blocked nearly all of the pawing, range finder type jabs he threw, none of which came with any sting behind them. They were not offensive in any way except to someone like Larry Holmes or Foreman, whose jabs were lethal weapons. Bradley’s wasn’t even a tracer because seldom did anything come in behind it.
If you throw 449 jabs and miss 398 of them how did that help you control anything? It didn’t. But Keith Kizer sees no problem and Duane Ford says he saw a “boxing lesson.’’ I say we saw another travesty in a sport that long ago cornered the market on them.
Truth be told, even the guy who got it right got it wrong. Roth had the correct winner but that’s all he had right in scoring the bout 115-113 for Pacquiao after giving Bradley the final three rounds. I saw Pacquiao winning 117-111 and felt I’d been exceedingly kind.
HBO’s unofficial scorer Harold Lederman, a former judge of world championship fights himself so unlike everyone else who Ford dismissed as unknowing would seem to have at least a reasonable understanding of Ford’s job, awarded only one round to Bradley, scoring the fight 119-109. So a former professional judge differed with Kizer’s judges by HALF A FIGHT yet he says there’s no need to review it.
That says as much about what’s wrong with boxing as the rest of the sport’s shenanigans. If this were the NFL or major league baseball, league officials would already have reviewed the controversial events and announced publicly what they’d found. If there was wrong doing or human error, they would say so.
Boxing officials? They just shrink back into the cave from which they sprung knowing nobody is going to do anything because, frankly, other than the fighters and a few loyalists, nobody really cares any more.
Boxing is looked upon by most sports fans today the way you look at your kooky uncle: occasionally interesting but seldom to be taken seriously which is how they get away with what happened Saturday night.
What really gave this outcome a stench that left the Twitter world atwitter was that in the weeks leading up to the fight Bradley openly kept talking of a Nov. 10 rematch already been arranged. He had posters made up and a phony ticket to that fight but later insisted it was all just hype.
Surely it was but if boxing regulators think the larger public believes that they are fooling themselves more than Duane Ford was when he said Pacquiao got a boxing lesson.
“When I came into the ring [after the fight], I said to Tim, 'You did very well,' and he said 'I tried hard and I couldn't beat the guy,’’ claimed Bob Arum, who promotes both fighters. “Something like this is so outlandish, it's a death knell for the sport. This is f—— nuts. I have both guys, and I'll make a lot of money in the rematch, but it's ridiculous.
“You have these old f—- who don't know what the hell they're looking at. It's incompetence. Nobody who knows anything about boxing could have Bradley ahead in the fight.
“You all know who won. I hope boxing recovers because this isn’t arguing about a close decision. This is an absurdity. Everybody involved in boxing should be ashamed. Let’s be honest about the situation.”
Why start now?
The placid Pacquiao urged observers “not to be dismayed or be discouraged at the result. I respect the decision but 100 per cent I believe I won the fight. In your heart you know who won but the best attitude is respect and professionalism.’’
No, the best attitude is to not buy any more fights until something forceful is done about this kind of theft. The decision may not be the worst in my memory but it’s the worst I can remember without spending a week thinking about it. Certainly it was worse than both the Pernell Whitaker-Julio Cesar Chavez and Lennox Lewis-Evander Holyfield decisions because at least they were draws so no title changed hands. In this case, the loser got the title and the winner got the shaft.
By Sunday Arum was claiming he would not stage the rematch despite the fact he is contractually obligated to do so if Pacquiao insists upon it until a full investigation into how the judges came to their decision is held. Earlier he hinted if the fight does go off it will likely be taken to Texas instead of back to Nevada, which means the city and the state will lose millions in revenue.
If that happens, maybe then somebody in state government will finally take a look at regulators who are unwilling to regulate their own business and unable to see blind incompetence when it’s staring them – and millions of witnesses – in the face.
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The Challenge of Playing Muhammad Ali
There have been countless dramatizations of Muhammad Ali’s life and more will follow in the years ahead. The most heavily marketed of these so far have been the 1977 movie titled The Greatest starring Ali himself and the 2001 biopic Ali starring Will Smith.
The Greatest was fictionalized. Its saving grace apart from Ali’s presence on screen was the song “The Greatest Love of All” which was written for the film and later popularized by Whitney Houston. Beyond that, the movie was mediocre. “Of all our sports heroes,” Frank Deford wrote, “Ali needs least to be sanitized. But The Greatest is just a big vapid valentine. It took a dive.”
The 2001 film was equally bland but without the saving grace of Ali on camera. “I hated that film,” Spike Lee said. “It wasn’t Ali.” Jerry Izenberg was in accord, complaining, “Will Smith playing Ali was an impersonation, not a performance.”
The latest entry in the Ali registry is a play running this week off-Broadway at the AMT Theater (354 West 45th Street) in Manhattan.
The One: The Life of Muhammad Ali was written by David Serero, who has produced and directed the show in addition to playing the role of Angelo Dundee in the three-man drama. Serero, age 43, was born in Paris, is of Moroccan-French-Jewish heritage, and has excelled professionally as an opera singer (baritone) and actor (stage and screen).
Let’s get the negatives out of the way first. The play is flawed. There are glaring factual inaccuracies in the script that add nothing to the dramatic arc and detract from its credibility.
On the plus side; Zack Bazile (pictured) is exceptionally good as Ali. And Serero (wearing his director’s hat) brings the most out of him.
Growing up, Bazile (now 28) excelled in multiple sports. In 2018, while attending Ohio State, he won the NCAA Long Jump Championship and was named Big Ten Field Athlete of the Year. He also dabbled in boxing, competed in two amateur fights in 2022, and won both by knockout. He began acting three years ago.
Serero received roughly one thousand resumes when he published notices for a casting call in search of an actor to play Ali. One-hundred-twenty respondents were invited to audition.
“I had people who looked like Ali and were accomplished actors,” Serero recalls. “But when they were in the room, I didn’t feel Ali in front of me. You have to remember; we’re dealing with someone who really existed and there’s video of him, so it’s not like asking someone to play George Washington.”
And Ali was Ali. That’s a hard act to follow.
Bazile is a near-perfect fit. At 6-feet-2-inches tall, 195 pounds, he conveys Ali’s physicality. His body is sculpted in the manner of the young Ali. He moves like an athlete because he is an athlete. His face resembles Ali’s and his expressions are very much on the mark in the way he transmits emotion to the audience. He uses his voice the way Ali did. He moves his eyes the way Ali did. He has THE LOOK.
Zack was born the year that Ali lit the Olympic flame in Atlanta, so he has no first-hand memory of the young Ali who set the world ablaze. “But as an actor,” he says, “I’m representing Ali. That’s a responsibility I take very seriously. Everyone has an essence about them. I had to find the right balance – not too over the top – and capture that.”
Sitting in the audience watching Bazile, I felt at times as though it was Ali onstage in front of me. Zack has the pre-exile Ali down perfectly. The magic dissipates a bit as the stage Ali grows older. Bazile still has to add the weight of aging to his craft. But I couldn’t help but think, “Muhammad would have loved watching Zack play him.”
****
Twenty-four hours after the premiere of The One, David Serero left the stage for a night to shine brightly in a real boxing ring., The occasion was the tenth fight card that Larry Goldberg has promoted at Sony Hall in New York, a run that began with Goldberg’s first pro show ever on October 13, 2022.
Most of the fights on the six-bout card played out as expected. But two were tougher for the favorites than anticipated. Jacob Riley Solis was held to a draw by Daniel Jefferson. And Andy Dominguez was knocked down hard by Angel Meza in round three before rallying to claim a one-point split-decision triumph.
Serero sang the national anthem between the second and third fights and stilled the crowd with a virtuoso performance. Fans at sports events are usually restless during the singing of the anthem. This time, the crowd was captivated. Serero turned a flat ritual into an inspirational moment. People were turning to each other and saying “Wow!”
****
The unexpected happened in Tijuana last Saturday night when 25-to-1 underdog Bruno Surace climbed off the canvas after a second-round knockdown to score a shocking, one-punch, sixth-round stoppage of Jaime Munguia. There has been a lot of commentary since then about what happened that night. The best explanation I’ve heard came from a fan named John who wrote, “The fight was not over in the second round although Munguia thought it was because, if he caught him once, he would naturally catch him again. Plus he looked at this little four KO guy [Surace had scored 4 knockouts in 27 fights] the way all the fans did, like he had no punch. That is what a fan can afford to do. But a fighter should know better. The ref reminds you, ‘Protect yourself at all times.’ Somebody forgot that.”
photo (c) David Serero
Thomas Hauser’s email address is thomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His most recent book – MY MOTHER and me – is a personal memoir available at Amazon.com. https://www.amazon.com/My-Mother-Me-Thomas-Hauser/dp/1955836191/ref=sr_1_1?crid=5C0TEN4M9ZAH&keywords=thomas+hauser&qid=1707662513&sprefix=thomas+hauser%2Caps%2C80&sr=8-1
In 2004, the Boxing Writers Association of America honored Hauser with the Nat Fleischer Award for career excellence in boxing journalism. In 2019, Hauser was selected for boxing’s highest honor – induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.
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L.A.’s Rudy Hernandez is the 2024 TSS Trainer of the Year
L.A.’s Rudy Hernandez is the 2024 TSS Trainer of the Year
If asked to name a prominent boxing trainer who operates out of a gym in Los Angeles, the name Freddie Roach would jump immediately to mind. Best known for his work with Manny Pacquaio, Roach has been named the Trainer of the Year by the Boxing Writers Association of America a record seven times.
A mere seven miles from Roach’s iconic Wild Card Gym is the gym that Rudy Hernandez now calls home. Situated in the Little Tokyo neighborhood in downtown Los Angeles, the L.A. Boxing Gym – a relatively new addition to the SoCal boxing landscape — is as nondescript as its name. From the outside, one would not guess that two reigning world champions, Junto Nakatani and Anthony Olascuaga, were forged there.
As Freddie Roach will be forever linked with Manny Pacquiao, so will Rudy Hernandez be linked with Nakatani. The Japanese boxer was only 15 years old when his parents packed him off to the United States to be tutored by Hernandez. With Hernandez in his corner, the lanky southpaw won titles at 112 and 115 and currently holds the WBO bantamweight (118) belt. In his last start, he knocked out his Thai opponent, a 77-fight veteran who had never been stopped, advancing his record to 29-0 (22 KOs).
Nakatani’s name now appears on several pound-for-pound lists. A match with Japanese superstar Naoya Inoue is brewing. When that match comes to fruition, it will be the grandest domestic showdown in Japanese boxing history.
“Junto Nakatani is the greatest fighter I’ve ever trained. It’s easy to work with him because even when he came to me at age 15, his focus was only on boxing. It was to be a champion one day and nothing interfered with that dream,” Hernandez told sports journalist Manouk Akopyan writing for Boxing Scene.
Akin to Nakatani, Rudy Hernandez built Anthony Olascuaga from scratch. The LA native was rucked out of obscurity in April of 2023 when Jonathan Gonzalez contracted pneumonia and was forced to withdraw from his date in Tokyo with lineal light flyweight champion Kenshiro Teraji. Olascuaga, with only five pro fights under his belt, filled the breach on 10 days’ notice and although he lost (TKO by 9), he earned kudos for his gritty performance against the man recognized as the best fighter in his weight class.
Two fights later, back in Tokyo, Olascuaga copped the WBO world flyweight title with a third-round stoppage of Riku Kano. His first defense came in October, again in Japan, and Olascuaga retained his belt with a first-round stoppage of the aforementioned Gonzalez. (This bout was originally ruled a no-contest as it ended after Gonzalez suffered a cut from an accidental clash of heads. But the referee ruled that Gonzalez was fit to continue before the Puerto Rican said “no mas,” alleging his vision was impaired, and the WBO upheld a protest from the Olascuaga camp and changed the result to a TKO. Regardless, Rudy Hernandez’s fighter would have kept his title.)
Hernandez, 62, is the brother of the late Genaro “Chicanito” Hernandez. A two-time world title-holder at 130 pounds who fought the likes of Azumah Nelson, Oscar De La Hoya and Floyd Mayweather Jr., Chicanito passed away in 2011, a cancer victim at age 45.
Genaro “Chicanito” Hernandez was one of the most popular fighters in the Hispanic communities of Southern California. Rudy Hernandez, a late bloomer of sorts – at least in terms of public recognition — has kept his brother’s flame alive with own achievements. He is a worthy honoree for the 2024 Trainer of the Year.
Note: This is the first in our series of annual awards. The others will arrive sporadically over the next two weeks.
Photo credit: Steve Kim
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A Shocker in Tijuana: Bruno Surace KOs Jaime Munguia !!
It was a chilly night in Tijuana when Jaime Munguia entered the ring for his homecoming fight with Bruno Surace. The main event of a Zanfer/Top Rank co-promotion, Munguia vs. Surace was staged in the city’s 30,000-seat soccer stadium a stone’s throw from the U.S. border in the San Diego metroplex.
Surace, a Frenchman, brought a 25-0-2 record and a 22-fight winning streak, but a quick glance at his record showed that he had scant chance of holding his own with the house fighter. Only four of Surace’s 25 wins had come by stoppage and only eight of his wins had come against opponents with winning records. Munguia was making the first start in the city of his birth since February 2022. Surace had never fought outside Europe.
But hold the phone!
After losing every round heading into the sixth, Surace scored the Upset of the Year, ending the contest with a one-punch knockout.
It looked like a short and easy night for Munguia when he knocked Surace down with a left hook in the second stanza. From that point on, the Frenchman fought off his back foot, often with back to the ropes, throwing punches only in spurts. Munguia worked the body well and was seemingly on the way to wearing him down when he was struck by lightning in the form of an overhand right.
Down went Munguia, landing on his back. He struggled to get to his feet, but the referee waived it off a nano-second before reaching “10.” The official time was 2:36 of round six.
Munguia, who was 44-1 heading in with 35 KOs, was as high as a 35/1 favorite. In his only defeat, he had gone the distance with Canelo Alvarez. This was the biggest upset by a French fighter since Rene Jacquot outpointed Donald Curry in 1989 and Jacquot had the advantage of fighting in his homeland.
Co-Main
Mexico City’s Alan Picasso, ranked #1 by the WBC at 122 pounds, scored a third-round stoppage of last-minute sub Yehison Cuello in a scheduled 10-rounder contested at featherweight. Picaso (31-0-1, 17 KOs) is a solid technician. He ended the bout with a left to the rib cage, a punch that weaved around Cuello’s elbow and didn’t appear to be especially hard. The referee stopped his count at “nine” and waived the fight off.
A 29-year-old Colombian who reportedly had been training in Tijuana, the overmatched Cuello slumped to 13-3-1.
Other Bouts of Note
In a ho-hum affair, junior middleweight Jorge Garcia advanced to 32-4 (26) with a 10-round unanimous decision over Uzbekistan’s Kudratillo Abudukakhorov (20-4). The judges had it 97-92 and 99-90 twice. There were no knockdowns, but Garcia had a point deducted in round eight for low blows.
Garcia displayed none of the power that he showed in his most recent fight three months ago in Arizona and when he knocked out his German opponent in 46 seconds. Abudukakhorov, who has competed mostly as a welterweight, came in at 158 1/4 pounds and didn’t look in the best of shape. The Uzbek was purportedly 170-10 as an amateur (4-5 per boxrec).
Super bantamweight Sebastian Hernandez improved to 18-0 (17 KOs) with a seventh-round stoppage of Argentine import Sergio Martin (14-5). The end came at the 2:39 mark of round seven when Martin’s corner threw in the towel. Earlier in the round, Martin lost his mouthpiece and had a point deducted for holding.
Hernandez wasn’t all that impressive considering the high expectations born of his high knockout ratio, but appeared to have injured his right hand during the sixth round.
Photo credit: Mikey Williams / Top Rank
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