Bob Arum Takes Another Dip Into The Heavyweight Pond

Published

8 years ago

August 15, 2017

The secret of Bob Arum’s incredible longevity in boxing, a voracious, cannibalistic sport that tends to devour its young and weak and casually gnaw on the remnants of its old and infirm, is the 85-year-old’s ability to recognize and take advantage of coming changes before they happen, almost before anyone else knows those changes are needed.

It is that remarkable sense of intuition, perhaps more than anything else, that has enabled Arum – a Harvard Law School graduate and former member of U.S. Attorney General Bobby Kennedy’s Justice Department in the 1960s – to outsmart and outlast a couple of generations of promotional competitors who made the mistake of assuming this old, or at least aging, dog was incapable of learning new tricks.

“Everybody looks for the easy money and the easy way out, including myself,” the Top Rank founder and chairman said in the spring of 2007, when he still was a relatively spry pup of 75. “But I find it doesn’t work anymore. You have to fish where the fish are.”

This Saturday night, with the pond in Lincoln, Neb., stocked with trout eager to be hooked by another in-state appearance by Nebraska’s own Terence Crawford, that particular bit of Arumesque sagacity again will be certified. Crawford (31-0, 22 KOs), the WBC and WBO super lightweight champion, will attempt to fully unify the 140-pound title against IBF and WBA ruler Julius Indongo (22-0, 11 KOs), and he figures to do so before a raucous, pro-Crawford sellout crowd of 15,500 in the Pinnacle Bank Arena. That the favored Crawford figures to make an even stronger case for himself as a superstar attraction with a TV audience in the millions, thanks to the scheduled 12-round bout being shown on basic-cable ESPN instead of HBO, is another testament to Arum’s master plan of going back to the future. From 1980 to ’95, 767 of the 2,000-plus fight cards staged by Arum’s company were televised via Top Rank Boxing on ESPN, which served to make any number of his client-fighters primed and ready to graduate to premium-cable and pay-per-view.

But it is the presence of a non-televised, eight-round heavyweight bout on the undercard that signals another potentially bold move into a different but still somehow familiar direction by Arum, whose promotional career began with arguably the greatest of all heavyweights, Muhammad Ali, and featured a nice run with comebacking elder statesman George Foreman. While he has taken occasional fliers on other heavyweights (Ray Mercer, Hasim Rahman), Arum otherwise has been mostly known for his showcasing of fighters in lower weight classes (Sugar Ray Leonard, Manny Pacquiao, Thomas Hearns, Floyd Mayweather Jr., Marvelous Marvin Hagler, Oscar De La Hoya, Miguel Cotto and Michael Carbajal, among others). In recent years, the Top Rank lineup has been primarily dotted with Hispanic fighters, an acknowledgment of Arum’s belief that that fan base is the deepest and most ardent in boxing.

No one is ready to pronounce the return to action, after a 20-month period of inactivity, of Arum’s recent signee, Bryant Jennings, as a cannonball splash into the deep end of the heavyweight pool by a promoter who occasionally makes impetuous statements but does virtually nothing else without first assessing the risk-reward factor and possible down-the-road ramifications. Indeed, Arum isn’t even Jennings’ sole promoter; the 32-year-old Philadelphian, who is coming off two consecutive losses in addition to the long layoff, is co-promoted by Antonio Leonard. But should Jennings (19-2, 10 KOs) look good in dispatching journeyman Daniel Martz (15-4-1, 12 KOs), and follows that up with another tuneup victory in November or December … well, who knows? Arum also co-promotes (with Dean Lonergan and David Higgins of Duco Events) Joseph Parker (23-0, 18 KOs), the New Zealander who defends his WBO belt against Hughie Fury (20-0, 10 KOs) on Sept. 23 in Manchester, England.

It is no great stretch of the imagination to foresee a title bout between Parker and a resuscitated Jennings in the spring of 2018, or possibly even a rematch between Parker and Andy Ruiz Jr. (29-1, 19 KOs), an American of Mexican descent and third member of Top Rank’s heavyweight troika who lost a majority decision for the vacant WBO crown on Dec. 10, 2016.

“You would think so,” Jennings said of the possibility that a matchup of he and Parker could be done with minimum muss and fuss, barring the stubbing of a toe by either somewhere along the way. “Making that fight, to me, is very possible. Don’t be surprised if you see that fight in the next six months to a year.”

Arum, who sounded a bit under the weather during a telephone conversation last weekend, said between coughs that a Parker-Jennings pairing is or fairly soon could be on the drawing board.

“We were doing a fight in New York and Antonio and James Prince (who co-manages Jennings along with attorney Josh Dubin) brought Jennings to see me,” Arum related. “I really took a liking to him. He’s a very intelligent guy, a clean-living guy. We think that if he goes back on the board, he can develop into a real threat. There’s four titles out there. We can make a run with Jennings in the short term for one of those titles.

“Of course, for (Parker-Jennings) to happen, Parker has to get past Hughie Fury. But if we’re successful with Parker, and successful with Bryant, I would match them in the spring on ESPN.”

One has to wonder if Top Rank’s expanded foray back into the big-boy weight class (it should be noted that TR has promoted Ruiz for the duration of his eight-year pro career) owes, at least in part, to the Aug. 2 retirement announcement by 41-year-old Wladimir Klitschko, who joins older sibling Vitali on the sideline after 14 nearly unbroken years of their vise grip on the division. When Wlad was upset on a unanimous decision against Tyson Fury (Hughie’s older brother) to end his second title reign, which had lasted a decade, on Nov. 28, 2015, one smart-alecky boxing writer (uh, that would be me) suggested that the barbarians no longer were pounding in frustration upon the gate, they had at last broken through to the throne room.

Sometimes palaces are just like an ordinary Joe’s apartment in that a new look can be invigorating, even if it involves nothing more than moving the same furniture around. With the Klitschkos gone – the suspicion here is that they’ll be more appreciated as time goes by – the immediate effect is to provide a jolt of energy and hope to a heavyweight division that always had been characterized as the locomotive that powered boxing’s train.

“Maybe,” Arum said when asked if the new heavyweight reality will be better than the one just past, and particularly for Top Rank. “It depends on the fighters we have. We’re not adverse to promoting heavyweights.

“The center has moved from Europe and Germany with the Klitschkos to around the world – London with Anthony Joshua and into the United States and other English-speaking countries, like New Zealand. It’s becoming more relevant and a lot easier to sell in those countries. There’s also the difference in time. An English fighter like Joshua – who’s still fighting exclusively in Europe, obviously, although he’s supposed to do some fights here in the U.S. – is more accessible because the language is the same and the English have a tradition of accommodating American television.

“It’s good to have some Americans out there (most notably WBC champion Deontay Wilder, but also Jennings, rising prospect Jarrell “Big Baby” Miller and several possibly recycled Klitschko victims). But, obviously, our best American (potential) heavyweights are playing in the NFL and the NBA.”

Antonio Leonard, Jennings’ co-promoter, understands why Arum could view the onetime high school football star as a lottery ticket that just might pay off. Leonard considers the heavyweight division to now be “wide-open,” and, well, you can’t win if you don’t play.

“It was a collaboration with all of them,” he said of Top Rank’s decision to climb aboard the Jennings bandwagon, a consensus that involved not only Arum but TR president Todd duBoef, executive Carl Moretti and matchmaker Bruce Trampler. “With as little experience as he had (17 amateur bouts and 19 in the pros), Bryant was able to go the distance with (Wladimir) Klitschko and give a good account of himself. And Klitschko was on the verge of knocking Joshua out. That tells me Joshua can be beaten. They all can. I don’t see any reason why Bryant can’t win twice before the year is out. He’s always in shape. He’s a hell of an athlete, maybe the best athlete in the division.”

And if the current heavyweight experiment flops? Make no mistake, Arum, who was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1999, has taken the requisite steps to ensure that the company he founded in 1973 survives in the long term. He has stayed ahead of the technological curve, for one thing (the Jennings-Martz bout will be streamed live via the Top Rank app) and he has delegated authority as the need arose to trusted and capable lieutenants, the failure to do so being a root cause for the decaying empire of his longtime arch-rival, Don King, whose rise and fall was marked by seat-of-the-pants immediacy. Arum still has an enemies’ list – more recent irritants include Al Haymon and Richard Schaefer, and he remains insistent that fighters who are their own promoters serve neither their athletic nor business best-interests – but he has done it his way throughout a now-51-year promotional journey (the first fight he staged was Ali’s wide, 15-round heavyweight title defense against rugged challenger George Chuvalo on March 29, 1966, in Toronto’s Maple Leaf Gardens).

Arum is still having fun re-inventing the wheel. When some of his mainstays exited their respective primes or retired, and when De La Hoya and Mayweather bolted, he simply plugged in a Cotto or a Pacquiao and kept rolling. If that wheel that keeps going round and round again has come around to another go with heavyweights, so be it. It won’t – can’t — be like the good old days with the young Ali and the ancient Foreman, but so what?

The future always has belonged to the adventurous, even if the adventurer is an octogenarian.

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Avila Perspective, Chap. 317: Callum Walsh, Dana White and More

Published

9 hours ago

March 14, 2025

David A. Avila

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As Callum Walsh stood on the observation deck at the top of the Empire State Building with fists clenched, it harked back to actor Jimmy Cagney, an actor of Irish descent, yelling “Top of the world, ma,” in the 1949 motion picture White Heat.

The Irish-born Walsh brings that kind of attitude.

Once again Walsh (12-0, 10 KOs) returns to New York City and this time faces Scottish warrior Dean Sutherland (19-1, 7 KOs) in a super welterweight match set for 10 rounds on Sunday, March 16, at Madison Garden Theater.

UFC Fight Pass will stream the 360 Promotions event.

Flanked by master trainer Freddie Roach and managed by Dana White it brings questions as to the direction that Walsh will be steered. It was just revealed that White will head a new boxing promotion outfit with big plans to make a more UFC type of organization.

Is Walsh part of the plans?

It’s a lot to digest as the hot prospect from Cork, Ireland proceeds toward world championship dreams. Can he cleanse his mind of this major distraction?

Walsh and Sutherland are both southpaws who are meeting at the crossroads in the heart of New York City. At this point of their careers a loss can mean rebooting and taking a few steps backward. The winner moves on to the next crucial step.

Sutherland, 26, hails from Aberdeen and has never fought outside of his native Scotland. It’s a lot to ask of someone whose country’s population of 5 million is dwarfed by New York City’s 8.2 million inhabitants all packed together.

Ireland’s population is also 5 million. So basically, both Walsh and Sutherland are on even terms when they enter the prize ring on Sunday.

Who knows what kind of competition Sutherland faced in Scotland. He beat two undefeated fighters and also conquered two foes who each had more than 100 losses on their resumes.

Meanwhile, Walsh has faced only one undefeated fighter but handled veterans like Benjamin Whitaker, Ismael Villareal and Carlos Ortiz Cervantes. But you never know until they meet face to face. Anything can happen in a prize ring.

Walsh has a three-fight knockout streak. Sutherland has slept two out of his last three foes. They will be joined by several Irish fighters on the card plus Cletus “The Hebrew Hammer” Seldin.

Dana, Turk and TKO

The announcement earlier in the week that Turki Alalshikh together with TKO Group Holdings that include Dana White and Nick Khan formed a new boxing promotion company.

White, who does not own UFC but guides the MMA ship, works for Endeavor, the parent company of UFC and WWE. Their events are all shown on ESPN, the powerful sports network (albeit WWE’s flagship weekly show “Raw” recently moved to Netflix). It seems Endeavor has decided to allow White to guide its boxing program too.

Where does that leave Top Rank?

It seems the partnership plans to rid boxing of the many sanctioning organizations and have only one champion per division. The champion will be given a Ring Magazine belt. Recently, Turki Alalshikh purchased The Ring magazine from Golden Boy Promotions. This seems to have been the plan all along.

Is this good for boxing?

Mark Shapiro, the president of TKO Group Holdings, said:

“This is a strategic opportunity to re-imagine the sport of boxing globally. TKO has the deep expertise, promotional prowess, and longstanding relationships. HE Turki Alalshikh and Sela share our passion and vision for evolving the current model. Together, we can bring the sweet science back to its rightful place in the forefront of the global sports ecosystem.”

DAZN all day

Three boxing cards take place on Saturday beginning with WBA featherweight titlist Nick Ball (21-0-1) the human cannonball, defending against former champion TJ Doheny from Liverpool, England. The first bout begins around 9:30 a.m. (Pacific Coast Time). Ball likes to charge forward and punch. Doheny is no slouch and has experience.

Later, Matchroom Boxing presents a show from Florida that features Edgar Berlanga (22-1) fresh off a solid contest against Canelo Alvarez. He fights undefeated Jonathan Gonzalez-Ortiz (20-0-1) in a super middleweight match. Also, Ammo Williams (17-1) returns to face dangerous Patrice Volny (19-1) in a middleweight clash. The card starts at 3:30 p.m. (Pacific Coast Time.

Saturday evening MarvNation presents Amado Vargas (11-0) meeting Eduardo Hernandez (8-2) in a super lightweight contest at Thunder Studios in Long Beach, California. Start time is set for 8 p.m. (Pacific Coast Time). The son of the great Fernando Vargas remains undefeated.

Fights to Watch

Sat. DAZN 11:30 a.m. Nick Ball (21-0-1) vs TJ Doheny (26-5).

Sat. DAZN 3:30 p.m. Edgar Berlanga (22-1) vs Jonathan Gonzalez-Ortiz (20-0-1) ; Ammo Williams (17-1) vs Patrice Volny (19-1).

Sat. DAZN 8 p.m. Amado Vargas (11-0) vs Eduardo Hernandez (8-2).

Sun. UFC Fight Pass 3 p.m. Callum Walsh (12-0) vs Dean Sutherland (19-1).

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A Fresh Face on the Boxing Scene, Bryce Mills Faces His Toughest Test on Friday

Published

1 day ago

March 13, 2025

Luis A. Cortes III

A-Fresh-Face-on-the-Boxing-Scene-Bryce-Mills-Faces-His-Toughest-Test-on-Friday

“He wants to test himself and find out just how good he really is,” said International Boxing Hall of Fame promoter Russell Peltz regarding super lightweight Bryce Mills. Peltz, who has dealt with a wide range of fighters throughout his lifetime in boxing, recognized the fire that burned inside Mills at a local show in Philadelphia in early 2022. At the time Mills had less than ten professional fights under his belt.

Mills hails from Liverpool in upstate New York and trains in nearby Syracuse. Currently 17-1 (6 KOs), he’s undefeated in his last 11 since losing a split decision to a Puerto Rican fighter from the Bronx who had fought much stiffer competition.

The fight in question that caught Peltz’s eye was arranged by the well-known and respected matchmaker Nick Tiberi who paired Mills in an intriguing fight against Daiyaan Butt, a tough and skilled fighter from the Philadelphia area. They fought at LIVE Casino in South Philadelphia on Feb. 24, 2022.

Although the crowd on hand that night favored Butt, Mills, although then only 20 years old, wasn’t intimidated and was the clear-cut winner at the end of their exciting, back-and-forth battle. This showed Peltz that Mills was serious about seeing just how far his ability could take him.

That’s why Peltz decided to join forces with Mills. Despite being semi-retired, Peltz is still active enough to help guide fighters through the ever-changing wild west landscape that is boxing. Since their union after Mill’s victory over Butt, Mills has been on a nine-fight winning streak heading into what Peltz believes is the toughest test of his career this Friday against Alex Martin 18-6 (6 KOs) of Chicago.

“I didn’t want him to take this fight, it’s a dangerous fight for him. Martin is a southpaw and is tricky, he’s a veteran and is experienced. His father (Mills’s father) called me and said that Bryce wanted the fight, to his credit,” says Peltz. One look at Martin’s resume and it confirms what Peltz stated. All six of Martin’s losses came against fighters with outstanding records including a former world title challenger. Martin also holds some quality wins over undefeated prospects that were at similar points in their careers to where Mills currently is in his development.

Bryce Mills looks like a fighter (he’s always in shape), acts like a fighter (testing his craft against all comers), walks the walk of a fighter, and fights with a fan-friendly pedal-to-the-metal style. That is a winning combination that could be the breath of fresh air the boxing world could surely use and on Friday night at the Wind Creek Events Center in Bethlehem, PA, live on DAZN, Mills is going to have the opportunity to put the boxing world on notice.

***

DAZN will televise the Mills-Martin fight along with a main event that features undefeated middleweight Euri Cedeno (10-0-1, 9 KO’s) against Ulices Rivera (11-1, 7 KO’s). Knockout artist Joseph Adorno (20-4-1, 17 KOs) and undefeated Reading, PA super featherweight Julian Gonzalez (15-0-1, 11 KOs) appear in separate bouts on the undercard. Tickets for the Marshall Kauffman’s Kings Promotion show are still available through Ticketmaster. Lobby doors open at 5:00 pm. First bell is at 7:00.

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High Drama in Japan as ‘Amazing Boy’ Kenshiro Teraji Overcomes Seigo Yuri Akui

Published

1 day ago

March 13, 2025

Arne K. Lang

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Overshadowed by countrymen Naoya Inoue and Junto Nakatani, Kenshiro Teraji embossed his Hall of Fame credentials in Tokyo tonight with a dramatic 12^th-round stoppage of Seigo Yuri Akui. At stake were two pieces of the world flyweight title. A two-time world title-holder a division below (108), Teraji (25-1, 16 KOs) was appearing in his 16^th world title fight.

This Japan vs. Japan matchup will go down in Japanese boxing lore as one of the best title fights ever on Japanese soil. Through the 11 completed rounds, Akui was up 105-104 on two of the cards with Teraji up 106-103 on the third. However, judging by his appearance, Akui was more damaged. The stoppage by Japanese referee Katsuhiko Nakamura, which came at the 1:31 mark of the final round with Akui still standing, struck some as premature but the gallant Akui was well-beaten.

A second-generation prizefighter, Kenshiro Teraji, 33, came bearing the WBC 112-pound belt which he acquired this past October with an 11^th round TKO of Nicaraguan veteran Cristofer Rosales. The 29-year-old Akui (21-3-1) was making the second defense of the WBA strap he won with a wide decision over previously undefeated Artem Dalakian.

Although Teraji keeps on rolling – this was his seventh straight win which began with a third-round blast-out of Masamichi Yabuki, avenging his lone defeat – things aren’t getting any easier for the so-called “Amazing Boy.” In his last three fights, which include a hard-earned majority decision over Carlos Canizales, he answered the bell for 35 rounds.

By and large, fighters in his weight class don’t age well. While Teraji is starting to slip, he has no intention of retiring any time soon. His goal, he says is to unify the title and eventually move up a notch to pursue a world title in a third weight class. The other pieces of the 112-pound title are currently the property of Mexico’s Angel Ayala who defends his IBF diadem against Yabuki later this month and LA’s Anthony Olascuaga who was in action on tonight’s undercard.

Other Bouts of Note

Olascuaga, a stablemate of Junto Nakatani, trained by 2024 TSS Trainer of the Year Rudy Hernandez, advanced to 9-1 (6) with a hard-earned unanimous decision over Hiroto Kyoguchi. The judges had it 118-110 and 117-111 (scores condemned as too wide) with the third judge having it 6-6 in rounds but scoring it 114-113 in acknowledgement of the knockdown credited to Olascuaga in round 11, the result of a short left that produced a delayed reaction.

Olascuaga was making the second defense of his WBO belt in his fifth straight trip to Japan. In his lone defeat, he was thrust against the formidable Teraji as a late sub, acquitting himself well in defeat (L TKO 9) despite having only five pro fights under his belt and having only 10 days to prepare. Kyoguchi (19-3) had previously held titles in the sport’s two smallest weight classes.

In a big upset, Puerto Rico’s Rene Santiago, thought to be well past his prime at age 32, wrested the WBO light flyweight title with a unanimous decision over Shokichi Iwata who was making the first defense of the title he won with a third-round stoppage of Spain’s previously undefeated Jairo Noriega. Tokyo’s Iwata was a consensus 9/1 favorite.

Santiago, who advanced to 14-4 (9), won by scores of 118-110, 117-111, and 116-112. It was the second loss for Iwata who had knocked out 11 of his first 15 opponents.

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