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Maidana CANNOT Be Better This Time Against Mayweather

It’s the oldest, but also the truest cliché in the sport of boxing. “Styles make fights.”
And if we take it a little further it can be said that styles also determine the outcome of most fights. In boxing you have fighters who fight as boxers/technicians, boxer/punchers, counter-punchers, swarmers/maulers and sluggers.
This weekend welterweight Floyd Mayweather 46-0 (26) will fight a rematch with former junior welterweight title-holder Marcos Maidana 35-4 (31). When they last tangled four months ago, Mayweather won a 12-round majority decision which in reality should’ve been unanimous. After eight rounds Maidana was getting the better of it against Mayweather. Maidana’s non-stop reckless aggression was suffocating Mayweather and totally nullified his ability to move, box and counter-punch. Floyd was under duress and didn’t have the time or needed space to box or set any traps for Maidana. In the main, Mayweather, in-spite of tagging Marcos with some big shots, was basically fighting for his life and just hoping to fight Maidana off of him with the intent of stabilizing the action and tempo.
In essence, Maidana was fighting his fight almost to the letter. His aggression was effective and because of it along with his unorthodox mauling tactics, Floyd was out of his comfort zone. That said, Maidana was paying a price and getting nailed with some of Mayweather’s Sunday best in the process. And as much as Maidana was dictating the pace and had Mayweather uncomfortable, he wasn’t physically strong enough to break his will or shut down his skill. Even after getting worked over for the better part of eight rounds, Mayweather was able to box and pot-shot Maidana during the last third of the bout because Marcos needed a breather after trying to sustain his all-out assault. And once Maidana was forced to take his foot off the gas a little so he could conserve his energy in order to make it through the final four rounds, that was all Mayweather needed to fight his fight and pick his spots and go on to win three of the last four rounds to seal the decision in his favor.
Think of it like this: as long as Maidana was fighting full throttle and wide open, you could say he more or less got the better of it. But he’s just a man and is only so strong. Asking him to fight all out for 12 complete rounds is not realistic for anybody. He recently said that he did tire and was forced to conserve his energy during the final third of the fight. And this was against a version of Mayweather who I believe took him a little lightly and didn’t train and prepare with the needed urgency he will in training for the rematch.
What many have missed regarding their last fight is how much it took out of Maidana physically hitting Floyd and trying to beat him up. And if you’re honest, as hard as Maidana hit Mayweather, he never really had him in real trouble or badly shaken during the entire bout. Again, this was against Mayweather who didn’t go into the fight on alert mode and who probably viewed Maidana as nothing more than a crude and unorthodox mauler who he could side step and counter at will. This time Floyd will be much more focused and purposeful. I also believe that like it was the case when he fought Miguel Cotto, Mayweather held his ground a little more than usual and wanted to prove he could beat the rough and tough aggressor at his own game.
Obviously, what Maidana did during the last fight worked, but not enough for him to leave the ring as the winner. Marcos Maidana is an attacker/swarmer. His style and pressure are only effective when he’s forcing the fight and pushing his opponent back to the ropes or into one of the corners. As long as he had Mayweather on the defense, he was in the fight. Nothing bothers a boxer or technician like being cut off and forced to fight and trade. However, there is a price to pay if you’re the attacker pushing the fight – and that is you are walking directly into the firestorm. If the boxer cannot hurt you, then it’s worth the price so you can get inside and work him over……But if he’s cable of blunting and stunting your pressure, you’ve got to be more judicious with your aggression if you’re the attacker. And we saw during the first fight, Maidana did pay a price for taking it to Mayweather, and eventually it slowed him down right at the point to where the fight was being decided.
Maidana also said that you have to respect Floyd’s punch, which is really code for saying Mayweather hits hard enough that he can’t just go at him like he’s handcuffed and unload the kitchen sink on him. He’ll be reminded of this when Mayweather catches him real good for the first time in the rematch. Couple that with Maidana tiring during the last fight because he was worn down by the constant strain of trying to force the fight on the inside, which will more than likely be the case against a more focused Mayweather.
If you’re Marcos Maidana, what adjustments can you realistically make in order to tilt the rematch in your favor? The only way he can be effective is if he can turn the bout into a street fight. I’ve heard some say he has to jab and be more measured this time in order to set up his power shots. To that I say – yeah, in the cookbook world that sounds plausible. But in the ring it won’t be so easily applied. Mayweather is the boxer, there’s nothing he’d love more than for Maidana to try and wait and react to what he does. In that scenario Maidana would get off second and lose every exchange during the fight. If Marcos tries to fight measured, that’s not who he is. He has one advantage over Floyd if you discount that he’s a few years younger, and that he is the bigger puncher. The problem is, he can’t deliver his punch to where he needs to if he’s watching and waiting to see what Mayweather is going to do. Furthermore, we saw that even his Sunday punch didn’t detonate enough to drop or stop Mayweather. If he waits there’s much less of a chance of him ever landing anything consequential because if Floyd isn’t fighting for his life, despite Maidana’s unconventional delivery, Mayweather will see everything Maidana lobs at him.
Conversely, Mayweather can change a little stylistically like he did versus Jose Luis Castillo in their rematch. This time Floyd will try to keep Maidana more in ring center and look to get off first while there’s a lull in the action. He’ll also look to get off first instead of countering this time because he knows Marcos can’t handle the effects of continuously getting tagged and stunned on the way in. And once Maidana starts to think and become slightly hesitant with his aggression, it’s over.
Attackers have to attack and go for the knockout three minutes a round to be effective. That’s the only way their style works. If Maidana tries to all of the sudden be a thinking fighter, he’ll be a fish out of water against a sharp assassin like Mayweather. Think of it this way, what if Joe Frazier waited and reacted to Muhammad Ali, or if Roberto Duran didn’t bring it to Sugar Ray Leonard? Under that scenario, both Joe and Roberto would be second every time thus they’d lose every exchange and probably never land a meaningful punch because they’d be fighting more as a boxer or counter-puncher. Well, Mayweather would love for the fight to come down to speed and reflexes, because without pressure, his superior speed and reflexes will shine.
The bottom line for Mayweather-Maidana II is, Floyd can adjust a little or fight the same style he did last time and win. As opposed to Maidana, who can only hope to bring a little more of what didn’t work the last time but still gives him his only chance to win. Maidana must go for the knockout from bell-to-bell as long as he can. Either he goes all out and stops Floyd, or he runs out of gas and maybe gets stopped in the process. However, it’s better to fight your fight and give yourself the best chance to win and getting stopped, than it is just watching Floyd waiting for the ideal time to cut loose. If Maidana’s been convinced that he can do better this time by boxing and fighting more measured, Mayweather will eat him up and never experience one close call during the fight and will win going away.
There’s a reason why if the better boxer or technician beats the attacker the first time, the rematch is usually a rerun of the first meeting. Fighters who adopt the mauling/swarming style like Marcos Maidana do so for a reason, and that’s because they can’t box and be effective. Maidana’s only chance to beat Mayweather is for him to fight like he always does and hope that Freddie Roach was right when he suggested that Floyd’s legs are gone and he’s showing physical signs of a fighter on the decline.
That, I wouldn’t bet on. No, not this weekend.
Frank Lotierzo can be contacted at GlovedFist@Gmail.com
Photo credits:Stephanie Trapp/Mayweather Promotions
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Avila Perspective, Chap. 326: San Diego Smoke

Years ago, I worked at a newsstand in the Beverly Hills area. It was a 24-hour a day version and the people that dropped by were very colorful and unique.
One elderly woman Eva, who bordered on homeless but pridefully wore lipstick, would stop by the newsstand weekly to purchase a pack of menthol cigarettes. On one occasion, she asked if I had ever been to San Diego?
I answered “yes, many times.”
She countered “you need to watch out for San Diego Smoke.”
This Saturday, Top Rank brings its brand of prizefighting to San Diego or what could be called San Diego Smoke. Leading the fight card is Mexico’s Emanuel Navarrete (39-2-1, 32 KOs) defending the WBO super feather title against undefeated Filipino Charly Suarez (18-0, 10 KOs) at Pechanga Arena. ESPN will televise.
This is Navarrete’s fourth defense of the super feather title.
The last time Navarrete stepped in the boxing ring he needed six rounds to dismantle the very capable Oscar Valdez in their rematch. One thing about Mexico City’s Navarrete is he always brings “the smoke.”
Also, on the same card is Fontana, California’s Raymond Muratalla (22-0, 17 KOs) vying for the interim IBF lightweight title against Russia’s Zaur Abdullaev (20-1, 12 KOs) on the co-main event.
Abdullaev has only fought once before in the USA and was handily defeated by Devin Haney back in 2019. But that was six years ago and since then he has knocked off various contenders.
Muratalla is a slick fighting lightweight who trains at the Robert Garcia Boxing Academy now in Moreno Valley, Calif. It’s a virtual boot camp with many of the top fighters on the West Coast available to spar on a daily basis. If you need someone bigger or smaller, stronger or faster someone can match those needs.
When you have that kind of preparation available, it’s tough to beat. Still, you have to fight the fight. You never know what can happen inside the prize ring.
Another fighter to watch is Perla Bazaldua, 19, a young and very talented female fighter out of the Los Angeles area. She is trained by Manny Robles who is building a small army of top female fighters.
Bazaldua (1-0, 1 KO) meets Mona Ward (0-1) in a super flyweight match on the preliminary portion of the Top Rank card. Top Rank does not sign many female fighters so you know that they believe in her talent.
Others on the San Diego fight card include Giovani Santillan, Andres Cortes, Albert Gonzalez, Sebastian Gonzalez and others.
They all will bring a lot of smoke to San Diego.
Probox TV
A strong card led by Erickson “The Hammer” Lubin (26-2, 18 KOs) facing Ardreal Holmes Jr. (17-0, 6 KOs) in a super welterweight clash between southpaws takes place on Saturday at Silver Spurs Arena in Kissimmee, Florida. PROBOX TV will stream the fight card.
Ardreal has rocketed up the standings and now faces veteran Lubin whose only losses came against world titlists Sebastian Fundora and Jermell Charlo. It’s a great match to decide who deserves a world title fight next.
Another juicy match pits Argentina’s Nazarena Romero (14-0-2) against Mexico’s Mayelli Flores (12-1-1) in a female super bantamweight contest.
Nottingham, England
Anthony Cacace (23-1, 8 KOs) defends the IBO super featherweight title against Leigh Wood (28-3, 17 KOs) in Wood’s hometown on Saturday at Nottingham Arena in Nottingham, England. DAZN will stream the Queensberry Promotions card.
Ireland’s Cacace seems to have the odds against him. But he is no stranger to dancing in the enemy’s lair or on foreign territory. He formerly defeated Josh Warrington in London and Joe Cordina in Riyadh in IBO title defenses.
Lampley at Wild Card
Boxing telecaster Jim Lampley will be signing his new book It Happened! at the Wild Card Boxing gym in Hollywood, Calif. on Saturday, May 10, beginning at 2 p.m. Lampley has been a large part of many of the greatest boxing events in the past 40 years. He and Freddie Roach will be at the signing.
Fights to Watch (All times Pacific Time)
Sat. DAZN 11 a.m. Anthony Cacace (23-1) vs Leigh Wood (28-3).
Sat. PROBOX.tv 3 p.m. Erickson Lubin (26-2) vs Ardreal Holmes Jr. (17-0).
Sat. ESPN 7 p.m. Emanuel Navarrete (39-2-1) vs Charly Suarez (18-0); Raymond Muratalla (22-0) vs Zaur Abdullaev (20-1).
Photo credit: Mikey Williams / Top Rank
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“Breadman” Edwards: An Unlikely Boxing Coach with a Panoramic View of the Sport

Stephen “Breadman” Edwards’ first fighter won a world title. That may be some sort of record.
It’s true. Edwards had never trained a fighter, amateur or pro, before taking on professional novice Julian “J Rock” Williams. On May 11, 2019, Williams wrested the IBF 154-pound world title from Jarrett Hurd. The bout, a lusty skirmish, was in Fairfax, Virginia, near Hurd’s hometown in Maryland, and the previously undefeated Hurd had the crowd in his corner.
In boxing, Stephen Edwards wears two hats. He has a growing reputation as a boxing coach, a hat he will wear on Saturday, May 31, at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas when the two fighters that he currently trains, super middleweight Caleb Plant and middleweight Kyrone Davis, display their wares on a show that will air on Amazon Prime Video. Plant, who needs no introduction, figures to have little trouble with his foe in a match conceived as an appetizer to a showdown with Jermall Charlo. Davis, coming off his career-best win, an upset of previously undefeated Elijah Garcia, is in tough against fast-rising Cuban prospect Yoenli Hernandez, a former world amateur champion.
Edwards’ other hat is that of a journalist. His byline appears at “Boxing Scene” in a column where he answers questions from readers.
It’s an eclectic bag of questions that Breadman addresses, ranging from his thoughts on an upcoming fight to his thoughts on one of the legendary prizefighters of olden days. Boxing fans, more so than fans of any other sport, enjoy hashing over fantasy fights between great fighters of different eras. Breadman is very good at this, which isn’t to suggest that his opinions are gospel, merely that he always has something provocative to add to the discourse. Like all good historians, he recognizes that the best history is revisionist history.
“Fighters are constantly mislabled,” he says. “Everyone talks about Joe Louis’s right hand. But if you study him you see that his left hook is every bit as good as his right hand and it’s more sneaky in terms of shock value when it lands.”
Stephen “Breadman” Edwards was born and raised in Philadelphia. His father died when he was three. His maternal grandfather, a Korean War veteran, filled the void. The man was a big boxing fan and the two would watch the fights together on the family television.
Edwards’ nickname dates to his early teen years when he was one of the best basketball players in his neighborhood. The derivation is the 1975 movie “Cornbread, Earl and Me,” starring Laurence Fishburne in his big screen debut. Future NBA All-Star Jamaal Wilkes, fresh out of UCLA, plays Cornbread, a standout high school basketball player who is mistakenly murdered by the police.
Coming out of high school, Breadman had to choose between an academic scholarship at Temple or an athletic scholarship at nearby Lincoln University. He chose the former, intending to major in criminal justice, but didn’t stay in college long. What followed were a succession of jobs including a stint as a city bus driver. To stay fit, he took to working out at the James Shuler Memorial Gym where he sparred with some of the regulars, but he never boxed competitively.
Over the years, Philadelphia has harbored some great boxing coaches. Among those of recent vintage, the names George Benton, Bouie Fisher, Nazeem Richardson, and Bozy Ennis come quickly to mind. Breadman names Richardson and West Coast trainer Virgil Hunter as the men that have influenced him the most.
We are all a product of our times, so it’s no surprise that the best decade of boxing, in Breadman’s estimation, was the 1980s. This was the era of the “Four Kings” with Sugar Ray Leonard arguably standing tallest.
Breadman was a big fan of Leonard and of Leonard’s three-time rival Roberto Duran. “I once purchased a DVD that had all of Roberto Duran’s title defenses on it,” says Edwards. “This was a back before the days of YouTube.”
But Edwards’ interest in the sport goes back much deeper than the 1980s. He recently weighed in on the “Pittsburgh Windmill” Harry Greb whose legend has grown in recent years to the point that some have come to place him above Sugar Ray Robinson on the list of the greatest of all time.
“Greb was a great fighter with a terrific resume, of that there is no doubt,” says Breadman, “but there is no video of him and no one alive ever saw him fight, so where does this train of thought come from?”
Edwards notes that in Harry Greb’s heyday, he wasn’t talked about in the papers as the best pound-for-pound fighter in the sport. The boxing writers were partial to Benny Leonard who drew comparisons to the venerated Joe Gans.
Among active fighters, Breadman reserves his highest praise for Terence Crawford. “Body punching is a lost art,” he once wrote. “[Crawford] is a great body puncher who starts his knockouts with body punches, but those punches are so subtle they are not fully appreciated.”
If the opening line holds up, Crawford will enter the ring as the underdog when he opposes Canelo Alvarez in September. Crawford, who will enter the ring a few weeks shy of his 38th birthday, is actually the older fighter, older than Canelo by almost three full years (it doesn’t seem that way since the Mexican redhead has been in the public eye so much longer), and will theoretically be rusty as 13 months will have elapsed since his most recent fight.
Breadman discounts those variables. “Terence is older,” he says, “but has less wear and tear and never looks rusty after a long layoff.” That Crawford will win he has no doubt, an opinion he tweaked after Canelo’s performance against William Scull: “Canelo’s legs are not the same. Bud may even stop him now.”
Edwards has been with Caleb Plant for Plant’s last three fights. Their first collaboration produced a Knockout of the Year candidate. With one ferocious left hook, Plant sent Anthony Dirrell to dreamland. What followed were a 12-round setback to David Benavidez and a ninth-round stoppage of Trevor McCumby.
Breadman keeps a hectic schedule. From Monday through Friday, he’s at the DLX Gym in Las Vegas coaching Caleb Plant and Kyrone Davis. On weekends, he’s back in Philadelphia, checking in on his investment properties and, of greater importance, watching his kids play sports. His 14-year-old daughter and 12-year-old son are standout all-around athletes.
On those long flights, he has plenty of time to turn on his laptop and stream old fights or perhaps work on his next article. That’s assuming he can stay awake.
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Arne’s Almanac: The Good, the Bad, and the (Mostly) Ugly; a Weekend Boxing Recap and More

Arne’s Almanac: The Good, the Bad, and the (Mostly) Ugly; a Weekend Boxing Recap and More
It’s old news now, but on back-to-back nights on the first weekend of May, there were three fights that finished in the top six snoozefests ever as measured by punch activity. That’s according to CompuBox which has been around for 40 years.
In Times Square, the boxing match between Devin Haney and Jose Carlos Ramirez had the fifth-fewest number of punches thrown, but the main event, Ryan Garcia vs. Rolly Romero, was even more of a snoozefest, landing in third place on this ignoble list.
Those standings would be revised the next night – knocked down a peg when Canelo Alvarez and William Scull combined to throw a historically low 445 punches in their match in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, 152 by the victorious Canelo who at least pressed the action, unlike Scull (pictured) whose effort reminded this reporter of “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” – no, not the movie starring Paul Newman, just the title.
CompuBox numbers, it says here, are best understood as approximations, but no amount of rejiggering can alter the fact that these three fights were stinkers. Making matters worse, these were pay-per-views. If one had bundled the two events, rather than buying each separately, one would have been out $90 bucks.
****
Thankfully, the Sunday card on ESPN from Las Vegas was redemptive. It was just what the sport needed at this moment – entertaining fights to expunge some of the bad odor. In the main go, Naoya Inoue showed why he trails only Shohei Ohtani as the most revered athlete in Japan.
Throughout history, the baby-faced assassin has been a boxing promoter’s dream. It’s no coincidence that down through the ages the most common nickname for a fighter – and by an overwhelming margin — is “Kid.”
And that partly explains Naoya Inoue’s charisma. The guy is 32 years old, but here in America he could pass for 17.
Joey Archer
Joey Archer, who passed away last week at age 87 in Rensselaer, New York, was one of the last links to an era of boxing identified with the nationally televised Friday Night Fights at Madison Square Garden.

Joey Archer
Archer made his debut as an MSG headliner on Feb. 4, 1961, and had 12 more fights at the iconic mid-Manhattan sock palace over the next six years. The final two were world title fights with defending middleweight champion Emile Griffith.
Archer etched his name in the history books in November of 1965 in Pittsburgh where he won a comfortable 10-round decision over Sugar Ray Robinson, sending the greatest fighter of all time into retirement. (At age 45, Robinson was then far past his peak.)
Born and raised in the Bronx, Joey Archer was a cutie; a clever counter-puncher recognized for his defense and ultimately for his granite chin. His style was embedded in his DNA and reinforced by his mentors.
Early in his career, Archer was domiciled in Houston where he was handled by veteran trainer Bill Gore who was then working with world lightweight champion Joe Brown. Gore would ride into the Hall of Fame on the coattails of his most famous fighter, “Will-o’-the Wisp” Willie Pep. If Joey Archer had any thoughts of becoming a banger, Bill Gore would have disabused him of that notion.
In all honesty, Archer’s style would have been box office poison if he had been black. It helped immensely that he was a native New Yorker of Irish stock, albeit the Irish angle didn’t have as much pull as it had several decades earlier. But that observation may not be fair to Archer who was bypassed twice for world title fights after upsetting Hurricane Carter and Dick Tiger.
When he finally caught up with Emile Griffith, the former hat maker wasn’t quite the fighter he had been a few years earlier but Griffith, a two-time Fighter of the Year by The Ring magazine and the BWAA and a future first ballot Hall of Famer, was still a hard nut to crack.
Archer went 30 rounds with Griffith, losing two relatively tight decisions and then, although not quite 30 years old, called it quits. He finished 45-4 with 8 KOs and was reportedly never knocked down, yet alone stopped, while answering the bell for 365 rounds. In retirement, he ran two popular taverns with his older brother Jimmy Archer, a former boxer who was Joey’s trainer and manager late in Joey’s career.
May he rest in peace.
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