Is the ‘Mayweather Factor’ Stalling the Garcia-Lomachenko Fight?

Published

6 years ago

September 27, 2018

Since WBC/IBF lightweight champ Mikey Garcia soundly defeated IBF titlist Robert Easter, many have been speculating as to why he’s been very guarded talking about WBA title holder Vasyl Lomachenko, his only rival holding a title at 135. A fight between Mikey and Lomachenko for the undisputed lightweight title (assuming Lomachenko beats WBO title holder Jose Pedraza in December) would be the most anticipated lightweight title bout in ages. More than 50 years have elapsed since the last true super fight at lightweight.

As it was stated in this space on July 29th, it looks like, at least from afar, that Garcia has some trepidation pertaining to a showdown with Lomachenko. This is night and day different from saying Garcia actually fears Lomachenko; no, I don’t believe that. And if they were to meet I see it as a 50-50 fight with both presenting the other more questions stylistically than any other opponent they’ve ever faced, with a slight lean to Lomachenko presenting Mikey with a little bigger headache than the reverse.

In Garcia’s defense, for financial and other reasons, there is a strong case for him wanting to drag his feet regarding Lomachenko for as long as he can. And it could be that when he dropped Errol Spence’s name it was only a ruse.

Consider this: Mikey being 30 years old is/was no doubt most influenced by Floyd Mayweather, the most successful fighter financially in boxing history. Garcia learned by watching Mayweather that it doesn’t matter what’s said in the media as long as your name is continually in front of the fans. He watched Mayweather be accused of fearing Manny Pacquiao while being labeled a cherry picker. Floyd didn’t care, he continued to face fighters whose best days had come and gone. Mikey witnessed Floyd tease fans for over five years about fighting Pacquiao and then when the money was near its high water mark and Manny had been knocked out by Juan Manuel Marquez after enduring some strenuous fights, Floyd finally gave it the go-ahead and he and Manny both were paid more for one fight than Muhammad Ali and Sugar Ray Leonard made during their entire careers.

Understanding the above, it’s easy to glean why Garcia doesn’t care if fans and some in the boxing media accuse him of fearing Lomachenko. What he knows for sure is that those same people will be there in droves when he finally does face him. He knows — in much the same way that Mayweather viewed Pacquiao — that this is the fight that fight fans want to see, so unless one gets knocked off before they meet, the fight will always be there. Floyd knew Manny would never decline it after he had strung him along for five-plus years.

Mikey Garcia doesn’t just have one of the highest boxing IQ’s of any active fighter in the ring, he’s no one’s fool out of it pertaining to the business side of boxing and that’s probably why, like Floyd, he left Bob Arum. He’s fully cognizant that he’s never fought on PPV and that is where the big money is. He also observes how some fighters have the media and the establishment behind them. Lomachenko is exhibit A.

Here’s a fighter in Lomachenko who has more experience than his 11-1 (9) record indicates and probably boxed more rounds getting ready for his 397 amateur bouts than Garcia has in his 39 pro bouts. And the funny thing is Lomachenko fought six fights in the “World Series of Boxing.” These fights, amateur in name only, were scheduled for five rounds, one more than the four rounders that entry level pros fight. But saying Lomachenko has won three titles in different divisions in just 12 bouts makes him a bigger monster and star than adding the six bouts before his debut, which would make him 17-1.

Stylistically Garcia is a fundamental boxer. He isn’t flashy, just super-efficient. Purists marvel at him but how many of them are around today? Lomachenko, who looks unlike other fighters past or present, is much better eye candy. Actually he’s sort of a hybrid of Hector Camacho and Pernell Whitaker. And he has the ring presence of a smaller Muhammad Ali. In other words, Lomachenko looks as if he’s in control when nothing is transpiring during a round, and whenever he does do something, it grabs your attention and influences the judges and many fans too.

Another issue Garcia might have is that he probably knows going in that he won’t get any of the borderline rounds since Lomechenko is perceived as the bigger star. More than likely, Garcia feels that he has to stop him to come out with the win and that certainly isn’t something he can bank on.

Lomachenko’s style is rooted more in athleticism and speed than boxing brilliance. Vasyl breaks a lot of rules and as he ages, his effectiveness — like Ali and Roy Jones — will decline. Conversely, Garcia’s supreme fundamentals and technique travel better with age. And with both being 30 years old, Mikey is the one who just may have more years ahead of him fighting near his peak. So the longer he keeps the fight from happening, the more it works in his favor.

The reasons for Garcia acting as if Lomachenko doesn’t exist don’t in any way indicate fear on his part. Mikey surely knows that Lomachenko is a very tough man for him to fight stylistically, but it’s not like he cannot be decoded and if there was a fighter at or near Vasyl’s weight to crack his code, it’s Garcia. But it’s a tough fight, and knowing that all the close calls will go to Lomachenko, Mikey needs to be paid like he’s never been paid before.

It’s plausible Mikey knows the fight with Lomachenko isn’t going to disappear. So it makes sense for him to “Mayweather” it, allowing it to be said he’s fearful of Vasyl as he strings it along. And when the money is right and he feels he’s leveled everything outside the ring as much as he can – then he’ll okay it.

One thing is for sure, Garcia is the more accomplished pro and at age 30 he’s covered more ground than Lomachenko has. Mikey has more leverage fighting Lomachenko than Deontay Wilder does fighting Anthony Joshua. Unlike Wilder, Garcia shouldn’t agree to anything less than a 50-50 purse split, whereas Wilder should kiss the ground if he can get 40 percent when he fights Joshua.

No, Mikey Garcia doesn’t lose sleep over Vasyl Lomachenko – he just believes he’s probably not going to get a level playing field going in without playing games, mixed in with a little subterfuge and actually fighting at the bargaining table. My feeling is when Garcia is confident he’s worked out the best deal he can and maybe Loma has eroded slightly – we’ll see maybe the biggest lightweight championship fight ever with all the meaningful hardware on the line.

Super fights in the lightweight division have been few and far between. Garcia-Lomachenko just could be the most anticipated lightweight title fight ever and if it never comes to fruition I sincerely doubt Mikey Garcia will be the reason. Those who have followed boxing for a long time know it’s just not a matter of two guys wanting to face each other. Gamesmanship and leverage have always been a part of boxing. Floyd Mayweather took it to a new level and it’s hard not to believe his influence isn’t in play here regarding Garcia’s approach to fighting Lomachenko.

It’s really shortsighted to think Mikey fears Vasyl, but it’s not bad business to let fight fans believe it.

Between 1977 and 1982, Frank Lotierzo had over 50 fights in the middleweight division. He trained at Joe Frazier’s gym in Philadelphia under the tutelage of the legendary George Benton. Before joining The Sweet Science his work appeared in several prominent newsstand and digital boxing magazines and he hosted “Toe-to-Toe” on ESPN Radio. Lotierzo can be contacted at GlovedFist@gmail.com

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Avila Perspective, Chap. 289: East LA, Claressa Shields and More

Published

1 day ago

July 25, 2024

David A. Avila

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Avila Perspective, Chap. 289: East LA, Claressa Shields and More

East Los Angeles has long been a haven for some of the best fighters around if you can keep them out of trouble. For every Oscar De La Hoya or Seniesa Estrada there are thousands derailed by crime, drugs or drinking.

Boxing has always been a favorite sport of East L.A. Every family has an uncle or two who boxes.

On Friday, 360 Promotions’ Omar Trinidad (15-0-1) fights Viktor Slavinskyi (15-2-1) in the main event at Commerce Casino, in Commerce, CA. UFC Fight Pass will stream the fight card.

The City of Commerce used to be part of East L.A. until 1960 when it incorporated. It’s still considered to be part of East Los Angeles, but informally.

Plenty of fighters come out of East L.A. but few make it all the way like De La Hoya and Estrada. Will Trinidad be the one?

The first world champion from East L.A. or “East Los” as some call it, was Solly Garcia Smith back in the late 1800s. Others were Richie Lemos, Art Frias and Joey Olivo. There is also 1984 Olympic gold medalist Paul Gonzalez.

Once again 360 Promotions brings its popular brand of fights to the area. On this fight card includes two female bouts. One features Roxy Verduzco (1-0) the former amateur star fighting Colleen Davis (3-1-1) in a featherweight fight.

All that action takes place on Friday.

Elite Boxing

The next day, also in East L.A., Elite Boxing stages another boxing card at Salesian High School located at 960 S. Soto Street in the Boyle Heights area of East Los Angeles.

Elite Boxing has promoted several successful boxing cards at the Catholic high school grounds. The area is saturated by many of the best eateries in Los Angeles. Don’t take my word for it. Check it out yourself and grab some of that delicious food.

Boxing has long been a favorite sport of anyone who lives in East L.A. It’s a fight town equal to Philadelphia, Brooklyn or Detroit. There’s something different about the area. For more than 100 years some of the best fighters continue to come out of its boxing gyms. Some will be performing on these club shows.

For tickets or information go to www.eliteboxingusa.com

Claressa Shields in Detroit

Speaking of fight towns, pound-for-pound best Claressa Shields who won two Olympic Gold Medals in boxing, moves up another weight division to tackle the WBC heavyweight world champion Vanessa Lepage-Joanisse on Saturday, July 27, at Little Caesars Arena in Detroit, Michigan.

DAZN will stream the heavy-duty fight card.

Shields (14-0) cleaned out the super welterweight, middleweight and super middleweight divisions and now wants to add the big girls to her conquests. She will be facing Canada’s Lepage-Joanisse (7-1) who holds the WBC belt.

The last time Shields gloved up was more than a year ago when she fought Maricela Cornejo. Don’t blame Shields. She loves to fight. She loves to win. The last time Shields lost a fight was in the amateurs and that was three presidential administrations ago.

Shields doesn’t lose.

I wonder if Las Vegas even takes bets on her fights?

The only fight she may have been an underdog was against Savannah Marshall who was the last opponent to defeat her. And that was in 2012 in China. When they met as pros two years ago, Shields avenged her loss with a blistering attack.

Don’t get Shields mad.

Perhaps her toughest foe as a pro was in her pro debut when she clashed with Franchon Crews-Dezurn in Las Vegas. It was four rounds of fists and fury as the two pounded each other on the undercard of Andre Ward and Sergey Kovalev in November 2016.

That was a ferocious debut for both female pugilists.

Assisting Shields on this fight card will be several intriguing male bouts. One guy you should pay special attention is Tito Mercado (15-0, 14 KOs) a super lightweight prospect from Pomona, California.

Many excellent fighters have come out of Pomona including Sugar Shane Mosley, Shane Mosley Jr., Alberto Davila and Richie Sandoval who just passed away this week.

Sandoval was best known for his 15-round war with Philadelphia’s Jeff Chandler for the bantamweight world title in 1984. Read the story by Arne K. Lang on this link: https://tss.ib.tv/boxing/featured-boxing-articles-boxing-news-videos-rankings-and-results/81467-former-world-bantamweight-champion-richie-sandoval-passes-away-at-age-63 .

Fights to Watch

Fri. UFC Fight Pass 7 p.m. Omar Trinidad (15-0-1) vs Viktor Slavinskyi (15-2-1).

Sat. ESPN+ 12:30 p.m. Joe Joyce (16-2) vs Derek Chisora (34-13).

Sat. DAZN 3 p.m. Claressa Shields (14-0) vs Vanessa Lepage-Joanisse (7-1), Michel Rivera (25-1) vs Hugo Roldan (22-2-1); Tito Mercado (15-0) vs Hector Sarmiento (21-2).

Omar Trinidad photo by Lina Baker

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Arne’s Almanac: Jake Paul and Women’s Boxing, a Curmudgeon’s Take

Published

2 days ago

July 24, 2024

Arne K. Lang

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Jake Paul can fight more than a little. The view from here is that he would make it interesting against any fringe contender in the cruiserweight division. However, Jake’s boxing acumen pales when paired against his skill as a flim-flam artist.

Jake brought a 9-1 record into last weekend’s bout with Mike Perry. As noted by boxing writer Paul Magno, Jake’s previous opponents consisted of “a You Tuber, a retired NBA star, five retired MMA stars, a part-time boxer/reality TV star, and two undersized and inactive fall-guy boxers.”

Mike Perry, a 32-year-old Floridian, was undefeated (6-0, 3 KOs) as a bare-knuckle boxer after forging a 14-8 record in UFC bouts. In pre-fight blurbs, Perry was billed as the baddest bare knuckle boxer of all time, but against Jake Paul he proved to have very unrefined skills as a conventional boxer which Team Paul undoubtedly knew all along. Perry lasted into the eighth round in a one-sided fight that could have been stopped a lot sooner.

Jake Paul is both a boxer and a promoter. As a promoter, he handles Amanda Serrano, one of the greatest female boxers in history. That makes him the person most responsible (because the buck stops with him) for the wretched mismatch in last Saturday’s co-feature, the bout between Serrano and Stevie Morgan.

Morgan, who took up boxing two years ago at age 33, brought a 14-1 record. Nicknamed the Sledgehammer, she had won 13 of her 14 wins by knockout, eight in the opening round. However, although she resides in Florida, all but one of those 13 knockouts happened in Colombia.

“We found that in Colombia there were just more opportunities for women’s boxing than in the United States,” she told a prominent boxing writer whose name we won’t mention.

The truth is that, for some folks, Colombia is the boxing equivalent of a feeder lot for livestock, a place where a boxer can go to fatten their record. The opportunities there were no greater than in Hot Springs, Arkansas, in 1995. It was there that Peter McNeeley prepped for his match with Mike Tyson with a 6-second knockout of professional punching bag Frankie Hines. (Six seconds? So it would be written although no one seems to have been there to witness it.)

Serrano vs Morgan was understood to be a stay-busy fight for Amanda whose rematch with Katie Taylor was postponed until November. Stevie Morgan, to her credit, answered the bell for the second round whereas others in her situation would have remained on the stool and invented an injury to rationalize it. Thirty-eight seconds later it was all over and Ms. Morgan was free to go home and use her sledgehammer to do some light dusting.

The Paul-Perry and Serrano-Morgan fights played out in a sold-out arena in Tampa before an estimated 17,000. Those without a DAZN subscription paid $64.95 for the livestream. Paul’s next promotion, where he will touch gloves with 58-year-old Mike Tyson (unless Iron Mike pulls a Joe Biden and pulls out; a capital idea) with Serrano-Taylor II the semi-main, will almost certainly rake in more money than any other boxing promotion this year.

Asked his opinion of so-called crossover boxing by a reporter for a college newspaper, the venerable boxing promoter Bob Arum said, “It’s not my bag but folks who don’t like it shouldn’t get too worked up over it because no one is stealing from anybody.” True enough, but for some of us, the phenomenon is distressing.

—

The next big women’s fight happens Saturday in Detroit where Claressa Shields seeks a world title in a third weight class against WBC heavyweight belt-holder Vanessa Lepage-Joanisse.

A two-time Olympic gold medalist, undefeated in 14 fights as a pro, Shields is very good, arguably the best female boxer of her generation which makes her, arguably, the best female boxer of all time. But turning away Lepage-Joanisse (7-1, 2 KOs) won’t elevate her stature in our eyes.

Purportedly 17-4 as an amateur, the Canadian won her title in her second crack at it. Back in August of 2017, she challenged Cancun’s Alejandra Jimenez in Cancun and was stopped in the third round. Entering the bout, Lepage-Joanisse was 3-0 as a pro and had never fought a match slated for more than four rounds.

Vanessa Lepage-Joanisse

True, on the women’s side, the heavyweight bracket is a very small pod. A sanctioning body has to make concessions to harness a sanctioning fee. Nonetheless, how absurd that a woman who had answered the bell for only 11 rounds would be deemed qualified to compete for a world title. (FYI: Alejandra Jimenez was purportedly born a man. She left the sport with a 12-0-1 record after her win over Franchon Crews Dazurn was changed to a no-contest when she tested positive for the banned steroid stanozolol.)

Following her defeat to Jimenez, Vanessa Lepage-Joanisse, now 29 years old, was out of action for six-and-a-half years. When she returned, she was still a heavyweight, but a much slender heavyweight. She carried 231 pounds for Jimenez. In her most recent bout where she captured the vacant WBC title with a split decision over Argentina’s Abril Argentina Vidal, she clocked in at 173 ¼. (On the distaff side, there’s no uniformity among the various sanctioning bodies as to what constitutes a heavyweight.)

Claressa Shields doesn’t need Vanessa Lepage-Joanisse to reinforce her credentials as a future Hall of Famer. She made the cut a long time ago.

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Former World Bantamweight Champion Richie Sandoval Passes Away at Age 63

Published

4 days ago

July 22, 2024

Arne K. Lang

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Richie Sandoval, who won the WBA and lineal bantamweight title in one of the biggest upsets of the 1980s and then, not quite two years later, suffered near-fatal injuries in a title defense, has passed away at the age of 63.

News circulated fast in the Las Vegas boxing community on Monday, July 22, the grapevine actuated by a tweet from Hall of Fame matchmaker Bruce Trampler: “Boxing and the Top Rank family lost one of our own last night in the passing of former WBA bantamweight champion Richie Sandoval. It hurts personally and professionally to know that Richie is gone at age 63. RIP campeon.”

Details are vague but the cause of death was apparently a sudden heart attack that Sandoval experienced while visiting the Southern California home of his son of the same name.

Richie Sandoval put the LA County community of Pomona, California, on the boxing map before Shane Mosley came along and gave the town a more frequently-cited mention in the sports section of the papers. He came from a fighting family. An older brother, Albert “Superfly” Sandoval, became a big draw at LA’s fabled Olympic Auditorium while building a 35-2-1 record that included a failed bid to capture Lupe Pintor’s world bantamweight title.

Richie was a member of the 1980 U.S. Olympic boxing team that was stranded when U.S. President Jimmy Carter (and many other world leaders) boycotted the event as a protest against Russia’s invasion of Afghanistan.

As a pro, Sandoval’s signature win was a 15^th-round stoppage of Jeff Chandler. They fought on April 7, 1984 in Atlantic City. Chandler was making the tenth defense of his world bantamweight title.

Despite being a heavy underdog, Sandoval dominated the fight, winning almost every round until the referee stepped in and waived it off. Chandler, who was 33-1-2 heading in and had avenged his lone defeat, never fought again.

Sandoval made two successful defenses before risking his title against Gaby Canizales on the undercard of Hagler-Mugabi in the outdoor stadium at Caesars Palace. In round seven, Sandoval, who had a hellish time making the weight, was knocked down three times and suffered a seizure as he collapsed from the third knockdown. Stretchered out of the ring, he was rushed to the hospital where doctors reduced the swelling in his brain and beat the odds to save his life. This would be Richie’s lone defeat. He finished his pro career with a record of 29-1 (17 KOs).

Bob Arum cushioned some of the pain by giving Richie a $25,000 bonus and offering him a lifetime job at Top Rank which Richie accepted. And let the record show that Arum was good to his word.

A more elaborate portrait of Richie Sandoval was published in these pages in 2017. You can check it out HERE. May he rest in peace.

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