ARUM’S CHINESE ADVENTURE BEGAN WITH MARCO POLO

Published

11 years ago

July 24, 2013

Bob Arum marco polo2

Even with modern jet travel, it takes nearly a full day to journey the 7,321 miles from Bob Arum’s headquarters in Las Vegas to Macao, China, where the 81-year-old founder of Top Rank is doing his 21st-century replication of the legendary Marco Polo.

Polo was the 13th-century Italian merchant whose adventures in the faraway lands of Central Asia and China, recounted in his book, The Travels of Marco Polo, did much to introduce Europeans of his day to exotic destinations they previously knew little or nothing about. It is said that Marco Polo even served as the inspiration for another Italian with wanderlust, Christopher Columbus , to set sail across the Atlantic Ocean in 1492. Columbus’ intention was to more easily facilitate his nation’s lucrative spice trade with Asia, principally Japan, but he “discovered” the New World instead. Of such mistakes is history sometimes made.

Or maybe Arum’s growing fascination with China, the world’s most populous nation (1.34 billion), and an increasingly important player on the world economic stage, also owes to other, more recent influences. You could say that Saturday’s six-round matchup in Macao of the newest and most intriguing addition to the Top Rank stable, Chinese flyweight Zou Shiming (1-0), and Mexico’s Jesus Ortega (3-1, 2 KOs) is as attributable to Ping-Pong diplomacy, NBA commissioner David Stern and former Houston Rockets center Yao Ming as it is to Marco Polo.

Heck, you might even include the Boxer Rebellion, which took place in China from 1899 to 1901 and pitted the secret society of “Boxers” – a common reference to the martial artists who were members of something known as the Society of Righteous and Harmonious Fists – against foreign imperialism and Christianity. The particulars of that scrap were recounted in a 1963 film, 55 Days at Peking, which starred Charlton Heston as a steadfast American Marine officer.

But while the 5-5, 112-pound Zou Shiming, a two-time Olympic gold medalist and three-time world amateur champion, represents the home front in a vast country Arum views as rich and fertile territory from which massive profits can be reaped, the notion of the People’s Republic of China as a preferred boxing destination will really gain traction if the Nov. 23 pairing in Macao of Top Rank’s longtime superstar, Manny Pacquiao (54-5-2, 38 KOs), and Brandon Rios (31-1-1, 23 KOs) sets off box-office fireworks.

If Pacquiao’s appearance in China is a resouding bottom-line success, and if Zou Shiming proves to be the pugilistic and financial success envisioned by Arum, don’t be surprised if more and more megafights wind up in China’s opulent gambling palaces (the anti-imperialist Boxers are already spinning in their graves) instead of the MGM Grand, Boardwalk Hall, Staples Center and Madison Square Garden. The money-hemorrhaging United States is on the hook for $1.1 trillion in public debt to China, one of its largest creditors, a fact that Arum and his bookkeepers no doubt are aware of.

“Zou is an incredible talent who is beloved in the People’s Republic of China,” Arum said of Saturday’s second appearance on familiar turf by the Chinese bell cow he expects will do for his company what the 7-6, 311-pound Yao Ming did for the NBA. “We at Top Rank will make every effort to make certain that he has a spectacular career as a professional boxer.”

The idea of some enterprising boxing entrepreneur establishing a foothold on the Chinese mainland has been floated for some time, predating even Arum’s expansionary vision for his Top Rank empire. But someone had to take the bold step of converting theory to reality, which is always the hard part, isn’t it?

On Jan. 25, 2000, when Mike Tyson was in London to hype his bout with England’s Julius Francis four nights later in Manchester, Tyson’s adviser, Shelly Finkel, dreamily spoke of a “world tour” in which the former heavyweight champion would travel the globe, for fun and profit, like a latter-day Marco Polo.

“South Africa and China want Mike, too,” Finkel said of his plans for the fading but still-popular Tyson. “The list is endless.” But Tyson, who had already fought twice in Tokyo and would later ply his trade in Scotland and Denmark, never got around to a business trip to China. Maybe the timing wasn’t quite right then.

Arum’s then-archrival, Don King, also publicly announced his intention to go to China right after Evander Holyfield reclaimed his WBA heavyweight title from John Ruiz in the second of their three bouts, on March 2, 2001, at Las Vegas’ Mandalay Bay. His Hairness’ plan was for the Holyfield-Ruiz rubber match to be promoted as the “Brawl at the Great Wall.”

“I’m going to do what I did in Zaire, Africa, 26 years ago,” King harrumphed, a reference to the Oct. 30, 1974, “Rumble in the Jungle” in which Muhammad Ali scored a stunning, eighth-round knockout of George Foreman. “We’re going to the great People’s Republic of China, where there hasn’t been a heavyweight bout of this magnitude in 5,000 years!” But while there was a third pairing Holyfield and Ruiz, it instead was staged at the Foxwoods Resort, in Mashantucket, Conn.

The slight opening of doors from the outside world to China, which had been mostly closed since the eight Western legations withdrew after the Boxer Rebellion, and were further locked down as a result of Mao Zedong’s establishment of Communism as mainland China’s official governmental organ on Oct. 1, 1949, probably can be traced to something which has come to be known as “Ping-Pong diplomacy.” It was major news when the U.S. Table Tennis team, which was on tour in Nagoya, Japan, in April 1971, surprisingly received an invitation to visit China. The trip to the PRC made by American ping-pongers and accompanying journalists helped thaw icy relations between the U.S. and China, and led to that now-famous handshake between American President Richard Nixon and Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai in 1972, in Beijing.

China is still a communist country, but its leaders of late have discovered there are certain benefits to crass capitalism. David Stern, with his grand plan to widen the NBA’s reach to worldwide proportions, so succeeded that some of the league’s most luminous stars have hailed from such far-flung outposts as Germany, Argentina, Croatia, Spain, Italy and, yes, China. Basketball boomed in popularity behind the erstwhile Bamboo Curtain when Yao Ming was selected as the No. 1 overall pick in the 2002 NBA draft, going on to become an eight-time All-Star Game and five-time All-NBA selection before chronic foot and ankle injuries forced his retirement in July 2011. When he finally bade his farewell , not only were Yao jerseys big sellers in America, but Kobe Bryant jerseys were worn by millions of Chinese kids who had developed a crush on hoops and the NBA’s hip-hop culture.

If Yao proved to be basketball’s strongest link between China and the U.S., why can’t the same hold true for a fighter who is 25 inches shorter and 200 pounds lighter than his gigantic countryman? Isn’t it a maxim that good things often come in small packages?

Zou Shiming is, in his own way, is as much of an ambassador for his sport as Yao was for his. China competed in its first Summer Olympics in 1952, in Helsinki, Finland, but the People’s Republic did not make another such appearance until the 1984 Los Angeles Olympiad. The Chinese, despite being a bit late to the party, have enthusiastically come to view athletics as a means to international prestige and national prosperity; since ’84 they have amassed 201 gold medals, 144 silvers and 128 bronzes, and in 2008 Beijing was the site of the Summer Games.

Among China’s foremost sports figures is Zou, from Zunyi, in southwest China’s Guizhou province, who became his nation’s first Olympic boxing medalist when he took a bronze in the 2004 Athens Games. Since then he has added golds in 2008 and in 2012 in London, each victory expotentially increasing his popularity and prestige in his homeland. Although he is no kid at 32, Zou, who lists his personal heroes as Muhammad Ali and Jackie Chan, presumably has enough tread on his competitive tires to make a run at a professional world championship, which also would be a first for his country.

With Freddie Roach, the Boxing Writers Association of America’s five-time Trainer of the Year, to smooth his transition from the amateurs to the pros, the hope was that Zou could be fast-tracked to a title shot within two years of his signing by Top Rank on Jan. 23, 2013. It still might happen, but his debut in the punch-for-pay ranks met with mixed reviews as he scored a desultory four-round decision over Mexico’s Eleazar Valenzuela on April 6, also in Macao.

“Though I have been in boxing for many years, it was mainly in the Olympics,” Zou said in a story that appeared in the South China Morning Post. “I showed many shortcomings in the first fight, but I think that I will be more mature after more bouts.”

Roach theorized that “the crowd got to him. He didn’t perform as well as I thought he would. He got nervous and a little gun-shy. These things happen, but now we need to see that go away. If he looks sensational in this fight (against Ortega), as he should, then we will talk about moving out (toward a hoped-for title shot before the end of 2014).”

If Zou proves to have the goods, it would mark another breakthrough for Arum regarding the lower weight classes, which typically have had difficulties finding an audience in the U.S. Most fighters from bantamweight on down are almost obliged to seek bouts in Asia or Central America, regardless of their country of origin, because Americans tend to overlook the little guys. But Arum proved it is possible to pound a square peg into a round hole when he promoted the junior flyweight unification showdown between Michael Carbajal and Humberto “Chiquita” Gonzalez on March 13, 1993, at the Las Vegas Hilton. The diminutive dynamos each earned million-dollar purses, become the first fighters in their weight class to do so, and the classic bout – in which Carbajal went on to win on a seventh-round stoppage after twice climbing off the canvas following knockdowns – was named “Fight of the Year” by The Ring. Carbajal also was selected as the magazine’s Fighter of the Year.

As was the case with Yao Ming, Zou’s hope is to make his mark not only in China, but in America. He said it is his dream to fight in places like Vegas, New York or Los Angeles, where the fighters he worshiped as a youth – not to mention the legacy of Marco Polo — taught him that the world is indeed a very large and interesting place.

Post Views: 0

Share The Sweet Science experience!

Bernard Fernandez

The Challenge of Playing Muhammad Ali

Published

57 mins ago

December 18, 2024

Thomas Hauser

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.

To comment on this story in the Fight Forum CLICK HERE

Post Views: 0

Share The Sweet Science experience!

L.A.’s Rudy Hernandez is the 2024 TSS Trainer of the Year

Published

2 days ago

December 16, 2024

Arne K. Lang

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

To comment on this story in the Fight Forum CLICK HERE

Post Views: 0

Share The Sweet Science experience!

A Shocker in Tijuana: Bruno Surace KOs Jaime Munguia !!

Published

3 days ago

December 15, 2024

Arne K. Lang

A-Shocker-in-Tijuana-Bruno-Sarace-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

To comment on this story in the Fight Forum CLICK HERE

Post Views: 0

Share The Sweet Science experience!