The Hauser Report: Thurman – Lopez and More

Published

5 years ago

January 28, 2019

The January 26 Premier Boxing Champions fight card at Barclays Center offered fans a mixed bag. There were thirteen bouts live and on various viewing platforms. Fans on site saw the predictable one-sided undercard bouts with one notable exception. In the second fight of the evening, Marsellos Wilder (Deontay’s younger brother) fought a late replacement from Kearney, Nebraska, named – depending on where one looks – William Deets or William Quintana.

Deets/Quintana came into the bout with 6 wins, 12 losses, and a meager two knockouts to his credit. Further burnishing his resume, he’d been out of action from mid-2013 through mid-2018 and, according to the Lincoln Journal Star, spent two years in prison after pleading no contest to charges that he sexually assaulted two women that he met online. Three additional women also came forward and made similar allegations against him. At his sentencing, the judge noted that Deets seemed to have “a low regard for women.”

Wilder dominated the early going to the point where the fight was almost stopped after two rounds. Then, in the fourth stanza, Marsellos got lazy. Deets-Quintana whacked him with a left-right combination, and Wilder went down. He rose on unsteady legs, fell into the ring ropes, and referee Al LoBianco properly stopped the contest with 25 seconds left in the bout.

That’s why they fight the fights instead of just mailing in the results.

Three bouts were televised on the Fox broadcast network.

Mongolian-born Tugstsogt Nyambayer (10-0, 9 KOs), who fights out of Los Angeles, announced his presence on the boxing scene with a 116-111, 115-112, 114-113 verdict over Claudio Marrero (23-2, 17 KOs) in a WBC featherweight elimination bout. Boxing writers and fans who spent years learning how to spell “Pacquiao” will track Tugstsogt’s career with trepidation.

Then it was time for Adam Kownacki (18-0, 14 KOs) vs. Gerald Washington (19-2-1, 12 KOs).

Kownacki looks as though his 260 pounds (give or take a few donuts) have been sculpted out of wet pancake mix. He’s a big, strong, affable man whose heart is unquestioned and defensive skills are suspect. Washington is a big, strong, better-sculpted fighter whose chin and punching power are in doubt. That combination made Kownacki a 5-to-1 betting favorite in what promised to be an entertaining fight.

A large vocal contingent of Polish-American fans made its feelings known as the fighters entered the ring. During the pre-fight introductions, Kownacki seemed happy to be there; Washington, not.

Adam came to fight. Gerald came to box. But Washington’s boxing wasn’t good enough to keep Kownacki off. There’s very little subtlety in the way Adam fights. It’s full speed ahead, throwing punches (mostly right hands), hit, get hit, and punch some more.

Kownacki staggered Washington with a series of right hands in round one. Fighting aggressively at the start of round two, Gerald opened a cut over Adam’s left eye. Then Kownacki dropped him with a right. Washington rose on wobbly legs, took a few more punches, and referee Harvey Dock stopped the bout at the 1:09 mark.

It was a statement win for Kownacki and his most impressive victory to date.

Two years ago, Washington lasted into the fifth round against Deontay Wilder and the eighth round against Jarrell Miller. Comparisons will be made, although that’s a bit like comparing apples and oranges.

Adam was able to walk through Washington’s jab. He won’t be able to do that against a world-class heavyweight.

The main event matched Keith Thurman (28-0, 22 KOs) against Josesito Lopez (36-7, 19 KOs).

Thurman, age 30, turned pro in 2007 and established himself as a champion in the true sense of the word when he decisioned Shawn Porter and Danny Garcia to claim the WBA and WBC titles. But he has been plagued by injuries in recent years, needing elbow surgery after his March 4, 2017, victory over Garcia and then suffering a deep bone bruise on his left hand during training. Those injuries kept Keith on the shelf for almost 23 months and led some to question his commitment to boxing.

“I can care less what people say and what they think about Keith Thurman,” Thurman noted during a February 24 media conference call. “‘Oh, he’s ducking guys. He’s getting injured to avoid people.’ There’s a lot of people that don’t understand what it means to be a world-class fighter. So a lot of opinions just really don’t get to me. If anything, some of them were humorous. You know – I’m Keith ‘One-Time’ Thurman. I’m Keith ‘Run-Time’ Thurman, Keith ‘Sometime’ Thurman, Keith ‘Once-Upon-a-Time’ Thurman. That was pretty amusing.”

“You always have to be a little worried about new injuries,” Thurman added. “There’s nothing wrong with your car until the day it decides to break down. So at the end of the day, it’s always in the back of my mind. Athletes and their bodies go through a lot of things.”

Thurman-Lopez was viewed in advance by many as a non-competitive showcase fight. Josesito is willing to go in tough. But when he does, the results tend to not be good. He was knocked out by Andre Berto, Marcos Maidana, and Canelo Alvarez, and had four other losses on his record.

When asked about being regarded as a low-level opponent, Lopez responded, “I wouldn’t say it offends me. There’s a lot of casuals that don’t understand the ins and outs and don’t realize what I bring to the table. You can’t really judge a fighter by his wins and losses. I’ve had some tough defeats and some close defeats. Wins and losses aren’t everything. I’m a better fighter than I’ve ever been. So it doesn’t matter how many bumps on the road I might have had throughout my career. It’s going to come as a surprise when I pull off the victory. I’m not new to the game. I know exactly what I have to do. I’ve just got to go out there and execute. People are overlooking me. Does it bother me? Not at all. It motivates me.”

But talk is cheap. Thurman was a prohibitive betting favorite with the odds running as high as 50-to-1 in some quarters.

It turned out to be an entertaining fight. Early in Thurman’s career, observers focused on his power. But he’s also a skilled defensive boxer – always moving and hard to hit – who transitions well from circling out of harm’s way to quick-strike offense.

Against Lopez, Thurman traded blow-for-blow when he had to but preferred to punch and keep moving rather than wait for a receipt. He had an edge in speed, power, and basic ring skills. Lopez kept coming forward, but his efforts were largely ineffective and his punches rarely found the mark the way they were intended to.

Late in round two, a textbook left hook up top deposited Josesito on the canvas.

Round seven saw one of those dramatic shifts that make boxing at its best the most compelling sport of all. Midway through the stanza, Lopez (who fought valiantly throughout the bout) shook Thurman with a straight right hand, then followed up with a left hook and another right.

Suddenly, Thurman was in trouble. “He had me buzzed and shaken up in the seventh round,” Keith admitted afterward.

For the next minute-and-a-half, Thurman backed away as fast as he could, throwing next to nothing and struggling to survive. He stayed on his feet but was on the short end of a 10-8 calculation on each judge’s scorecard.

Then, as suddenly as it had opened, Lopez’s window of opportunity closed.

The overwhelming majority of people at ringside thought Thurman won by a comfortable margin. CompuBox statistics are sometimes wide of the mark. But here, they showed undeniable superiority for Thurman in the form of a 247-to 117 advantage in punches landed.

Inexplicibly, ring judge Don Ackerman scored the bout even at 113-113. Order was restored by Tom Schreck (117-109) and Steve Weisfeld (115-111) who, unlike Ackerman, appeared to have watched the fight and understood what they were watching.

Photo credit: Stephanie Trapp

Thomas Hauser’s new email address is thomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His most recent book – Protect Yourself at All Times – was published by the University of Arkansas Press. In 2004, the Boxing Writers Association of America honored Hauser with the Nat Fleischer Award for career excellence in boxing journalism.

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Thomas Hauser

Thomas Hauser is the author of 52 books. In 2005, he was honored by the Boxing Writers Association of America, which bestowed the Nat Fleischer Award for career excellence in boxing journalism upon him. He was the first Internet writer ever to receive that award. In 2019, Hauser was chosen for boxing's highest honor: induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame. Lennox Lewis has observed, “A hundred years from now, if people want to learn about boxing in this era, they’ll read Thomas Hauser.”

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

Published

1 day ago

July 25, 2024

David A. Avila

Avila-Perspective-Chap-289-East-L.A.-A-Fight-Town-Claressa-Shields-and-More

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

Arne's-Almanac-Jake-Paul-and-Women's-Boxing-a-Curmudgeon's-Take

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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