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Takeaways from Last Week’s ‘Criminal’ Knockout in Ekaterinburg

Earlier this month, 365 boxers from 78 countries gathered in Ekaterinburg, Russia for the 2019 AIBA men’s world championships. Prior to 2016, this annual event was restricted to amateurs but the rules have been loosened and now a few pros and semi-pros are sprinkled among the entrants.
In the United States, amateur boxing, except in an Olympics year, is about as mainstream as professional handball. But this year there was an incident that caused a great brouhaha, giving the tournament a much larger presence, although not in the way the organizers had hoped.
In a quarter-final match at super heavyweight, Bakhodir Jalolov scored a vicious first round knockout over Richard Torrez Jr of the USA. A combination climaxed by a devastating left hook sent Torrez crashing to the canvas where he lay flat on his back, out cold. He was stretchered out of the ring and taken to a hospital to be evaluated.
Jalolov (pictured) is a 25-year-old, six-foot-seven southpaw from Uzbekistan. A 2016 Olympian, he turned pro in May of last year at the Foxwoods Resort in Connecticut. He’s had six professional fights, all in the Unites States, winning all by knockout, three in the very first round. His U.S. promoter is Lou DiBella.
WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman was indignant. “Brutal and criminal to allow a professional boxer Jalolov from Russia with 6-0 as a pro to fight outclassed, outweighed and far smaller USA 20-year-old amateur Torrez AIBA world championship in Russia,” Sulaiman howled in a tweet that would be widely circulated on the web.
It should be noted that there is no love lost between AIBA and the superintendents of professional boxing’s world sanctioning bodies. Alterations muscled into practice by C.K. Wu, the Taiwanese architect who served as president of AIBA from 2006 until he was forced out in 2017, inflamed what was always a tenuous relationship. (Wu officially resigned, but would have been impeached if he had not done so.)
Wu believed that the best boxers in every country, whether amateur or professional, should be allowed to compete in the Olympics, similar to basketball. And he succeeded in opening the Olympics to professional fighters. But the honchos at the world sanctioning bodies perceived an ulterior motive. They believed that Wu was bursting with visions of grandeur and merely looking to consolidate his power by knotting all boxers, amateur and pro, under the AIBA umbrella, his personal fiefdom, as it were.
Several bloggers who commented on Sulaiman’s tweet noted that Richard Torrez is no spring chicken, notwithstanding his tender age. Torrez (read more about him here) racked up a first-place finish in virtually every national tournament he has entered going back to 2013 and has fared well in international competition, finishing first in a tournament in Bulgaria and two tournaments in Germany. He wasn’t favored to win the super heavyweight competition in Ekaterinburg — that distinction went to Jalolov, the eventual winner – but Torrez was seeded third in his bracket and none of his teammates were seeded any higher.
Heading into the world championships, no team looked as strong as Cuba. The Cuban delegation included four medalists from the 2016 Rio games including gold medal winners Julio Cesar La Cruz, a 30-year-old light heavyweight, and Arlen Lopez, a 26-year-old middleweight. But Cuba left Ekaterinburg with only three medals; one gold (lightweight Andy Cruz), one silver (featherweight Lazaro Alvarez, a two-time OIympic bronze medalist), and one bronze (La Cruz).
The Eastern bloc countries of Uzbekistan, Russia, and Kazakhstan dominated the affair, winning seven of the eight gold medals. (The number of Olympic weight classes for male boxers was recently truncated from 10 to eight. Gone are the bantamweight/123 pounds and light welterweight/141 pounds classifications. Concomitantly, the number of weight classes for female boxers was increased from three to five.)
Uzbekistan, a Central Asian country, home to about 33 million people, topped the leaderboard with five medals, including three gold. The performance echoed the country’s surprising performance in Rio where Uzbekistan won the team title, emerging with seven medals – three gold, two silver, and two bronze. This from a country that had won only four medals total (one gold, three bronze) in the five prior Olympiads in which it participated.
Step aside Cuba, there’s a new sheriff in town.
The U.S. won only one medal in Ekaterinburg, that a silver medal won by Keyshawn Davis, a 20-year-old lightweight from Norfolk, Virginia. One might infer, considering this paltry haul, that the U.S. Olympic boxing team is doomed to another shabby showing when the summer games come around again in Tokyo next year. But that assessment may be premature.
The United States brought only seven boxers to Ekaterinburg; the featherweight hole was empty. For whatever reasons, three of America’s top-ranked amateurs – heavyweight Jared Anderson, light heavyweight Rahim Gonzalez, and welterweight Freudis Rojas – did not make the trip. Also, the locale obviously favored teams from Eastern bloc countries to the detriment of teams from other parts of the world. In few other sports is scoring as subjective as in amateur boxing and throughout its history hometown decisions have been the norm.
Richard Torrez, thankfully, is okay. He told his fans in an instagram posting that all tests came back perfect. But one has to wonder if this incident will affect his psyche.
If Torrez were to go on to win a gold medal in Tokyo, he would command the largest signing bonus in history when he turned pro. What promoter wouldn’t want to latch hold of this well-mannered, clean-cut kid from Tulare, California, who was the valedictorian of his high school class?
Another takeaway from the Ekaterinburg tournament concerns Bakhodir Jalolov. A big star in Uzbekistan with reportedly 175,000 followers on social media, he was yet a virtual unknown in the western world until his smashing knockout of Torrez lit up the internet. Now folks are wondering just how good he may be.
Those in the know, I am told, believe that he is special.
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More ‘Dances’ in Store for Derek Chisora after out-working Otto Wallin in Manchester

Tonight’s fight at Co-op Live Arena in Manchester between Derek Chisora and Otto Wallin bore the tagline “Last Dance.” The reference was to Chisora who at age 41 was on the cusp of his last hurrah. However, when the IBF went and certified the match as an eliminator, that changed the equation and, truth be told, Chisora would have likely soldiered on regardless of the outcome.
The UK boxing fans have embraced Chisora, an honest workman, never an elite fighter, but always a tough out. They certainly hope to see him in action again and they will get their wish. Tonight, he made more fans with a hard-earned, unanimous decision over 34-year-old Swedish southpaw Otto Wallin who went to post a small favorite.
Chisora came out fast, pressuring the Swede while keeping his hands busy. He was comfortably ahead after five rounds, but was seemingly ripe for a comedown after cuts developed above and below his right eye. Fortunately for him, he had the prominent Canadian cutman Russ Amber in his corner.
Chisora scored two knockdowns before the fight was finished. The first came in round nine when Chisora caught Wallin with a punch that landed high on his temple. In a delayed reaction, Wallin went flying backward, landing on his butt. Wallin recovered nicely and had his best round in the next frame.
Wallin appeared to be winning the final round when Chisora put the explanation point on his performance just as the final bell was about to ring, catching the Swede off-balance with a cuffing right hand that sent him to the floor once again. If not for that knockdown, there would have been some controversy when the scores were read. The tallies were 117-109, 116-110, and 114-112, the latter of which was too generous to Wallin (27-3).
“I love the sport and I love the fans,” said Derek Chisora (36-13, 23 KOs), addressing the audience in his post-fight interview. His next bout will likely come against the winner of the match between Daniel Dubois and Joseph Parker happening later this month in Saudi Arabia.
Semi-wind-up
Stoke-on-Kent middleweight Nathan Heaney disappointed his large contingent of rooters when he was upset by French invader Sofiane Khati. The 35-year-old Heaney, who was 18-1-1 heading in, started well and was slightly ahead after six frames when things turned sour.
Both landed hard punches simultaneously in round seven, but the Frenchman’s punch was more damaging, knocking out Heaney’s mouthpiece and putting him on the canvas. When he arose, Khati, a 6/1 underdog, charged after him and forced the referee to intrude, saving Heaney from more punishment. The official time was 1:08 of round seven. It was the sixth win in the last seven tries for Khati (18-5, 7 KOs) who, akin to Chisora, is enjoying a late-career resurgence.
Other Bouts of Note
Lancashire junior welterweight Jack Rafferty was an 18/1 favorite over Morecambe ditch digger Reece MacMillan and won as expected. MacMillan’s corner tossed in the towel at the 1:08 mark of round seven. Rafferty’s record now stands at 25-0 (16 KOs), giving him the longest current unbeaten run of any British boxer. It was the second loss in 19 starts for MacMillan.
In a lackluster performance, Zach Parker, now competing as a light heavyweight, improved his record to 26-1 (19) with a 10-round decision over France’s Mickael Diallo (21-2-2) who took the bout on five days’ notice after Parker’s original opponent Willy Hutchinson suffered a bad shoulder injury in sparring and had to withdraw. The scores were 98-92, 98-93, and 97-94.
Parker’s lone defeat came in a domestic showdown with John Ryder, a match in which he could not continue after four rounds because of a broken hand. The prize for Ryder was a date with Canelo Alvarez. Mickael Diallo has another fight booked in four weeks in Long Beach, California.
Also
Featherweight Zak Miller scored the biggest win of his career, capturing a pair of regional trinkets with a 12-round majority decision over Masood Abdulah. The judges had it 115-113, 115-114, and 114-114.
Heading in, Miller was 15-1 but had defeated only one opponent with a winning record. It was the first pro loss for Abdulah (11-1), an Afghanistan-born Londoner.
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Avila Perspective, Chap. 313: The Misadventures of Canelo and Jake Paul (and More)

Avila Perspective, Chap. 313: The Misadventures of Canelo and Jake Paul (and More)
Boxing news has taken a weird arc.
For the past 20 years or so, social media has replaced newspapers, radio and television as a source for boxing news.
And one thing is certain:
You cannot truly rely on many social media accounts to be accurate. Unless they are connected to actual reputable journalists. There are not that many.
Claims of Saul “Canelo” Alvarez and Jake Paul reaching an agreement to fight each other this year were rampant on social media sites. No contracts had been signed between the two parties, but several social media accounts claimed the fight was happening. One claimed: “it was official.”
It is not happening as of Friday Feb. 7. 10 a.m. Pacific Time.
A statement by Most Valuable Promotions was sent Friday Feb. 7, to various boxing publications that emphasized the Canelo-Paul fight is not official.
“MVP was deep in negotiations for a blockbuster fight between Jake Paul and Canelo Alvarez on Cinco de Mayo weekend in Las Vegas…This situation is a reminder not to believe everything you read.”
The past few days numerous social media accounts were posting erroneously that Paul and Canelo Alvarez were fighting on a certain date and place. It was jumped on by other social media accounts like Piranhas and gobbled up and spit out as actual verified news.
Fake news is happening more and more. I hate that term but it’s becoming more common.
Many accounts on social media sites are not trained journalists. They don’t understand that being the first to spit out news is not as important as being accurate.
Also, there is no such thing as using the term “according to sources” without naming the source. Who made the claim?
Third, verification of a fight comes from the promoters. They are the most reliable methods of verifying a pending fight. It’s their job. Don’t rely on a fighter, a trainer or somebody’s friend. Call the promoter involved and they will verify.
Otherwise, it’s just rumor and exaggeration.
There are social media accounts with trained journalists. Find out which social media accounts are connected to actual news media sources and established by trained journalists. A real journalist verifies a story before it is published.
R.I.P. Michael Katz
Recently, a highly respected journalist, Michael Katz, passed away. He wrote for various newspapers including the New York Times and for various boxing web sites such as Maxboxing.com and a few others.
Katz covered prize fights beginning in 1968 with the heavyweight fight between Floyd Patterson and Jimmy Ellis. Read the full story in www.TheSweetscience.com by Arne Lang.
I first came across Katz probably in 1994 when I began covering boxing events as a writer for the L.A .Times. During media press conferences Katz was one of the more prominent writers and very outspoken.
The New York-bred Katz could tell you stories about certain eras in boxing. I happened to overhear one or two while sitting around a dinner buffet in the media rooms in Las Vegas. He always had interesting things to say.
Boxing writers come in waves during each era. Today this new era of boxing writers has dwindled to almost nothing. Writing has been overtaken by boxing videographers. The problem is during an actual fight, videographers cannot record the fight itself. The media companies sponsoring the fight cards don’t allow it. So, after a fight is completed, very few descriptions of a fight exist. Only interviews.
Written journalism is shrinking due to the lack of newspapers, magazines and periodicals. The only sure way to know what happened is by seeing the fight on tape. You won’t see many stories on a bulletin board at a boxing gym because there are fewer boxing writers today. The written history of a championship fight has shrunk to almost nothing.
Katz was one of the superb writers from the 1960s to the 2000s. It’s a shrinking base that gets smaller every day. It’s a dying breed but there are still some remaining.
Fights in SoCal
All Star Boxing returns with two female fights on the card on Saturday Feb. 8, at Commerce Casino in Commerce, Calif.
Stephanie Simon (1-0) and Archana Sharma (3-2) are scheduled to headline the boxing card in a super lightweight main event. Others on the boxing event include Ricardo De La Torre, Bryan Albarran and Jose Mancilla to name a few.
Doors open at 6 p.m. No one under 14 will be admitted. For more information call (323) 816-6200.
Fights to Watch
Sat. DAZN 10:30 a.m. Derek Chisora (35-13) vs Otto Wallin (27-2).
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Biyarslanov TKOed Mimoune at Montreal; Jalolov Conspicuous by his Absence

It was a cold and snowy night in Montreal, depressing the turnout at the Montreal Casino where Camille Estephan’s Eye of the Tiger Promotions presented a six-fight card that aired in the U.S. on ESPN+.
The match-up that had the most intrigue, although not the main event and not expected to be remotely competitive, centered around heavyweight Bakhodir Jalolov who would be returning to the professional ranks after an absence of almost 14 months during which he fattened his extraordinary amateur profile. But the Montreal Commission nixed the match, ostensibly because Jalolov took sick after the weigh-in.
Main Event
The main event was a 10-round junior welterweight contest between well-acquainted southpaws Arthur Biyarslanov (pictured) and Mohamed Mimoune. The Toronto-based, Russian-born Biyarslanov, nicknamed the Chechen Wolf, had no trouble with his 37-year-old French opponent, taking Mimoune out in the second round.
Mimoune did not appear to be badly hurt after Biyarslanov knocked him to the canvas, but he had no antidote when Biyarslanov swarmed after him. With nothing come back Biyarslanov’s way, the referee sensibly waived it off. The official time was 2:16 of round two.
Biyarslanov (18-0, 15 KOs) looks like he can make some noise in the talent-rich 140-pound division. Mimoune, who had been stopped five times previously, declined to 24-7.
Co-Feature
Albert Ramirez, a 32-year-old Venezuelan, ranked in the Top Five by all four relevant sanctioning bodies, moved a step closer to a title fight with a third-round stoppage of Marco Calic.
As an amateur, Ramirez, who improved to 20-0 (17 KOs), defeated Cuban stalwarts Erislandy Savon and Julio Cesar La Cruz in 5-round fights. Tonight, he put his opponent away with a fusillade of punches. After rising from a knockdown, Calic got a brief respite when Ramirez was warned for an illegal punch behind the head, but Cacic’s body language informed us that the end was near.
The official time was 2:10 of round three. A 37-year-old Croatian making his North American debut, Calic lost for the second time in 17 starts.
More
In a match-up between former Olympians contested at the catch-weight of 178 pounds, Montreal-based Mehmet Unal, who represented Turkey in the 2016 Games, scored a third-round stoppage of Ezequiel Maderna. The final punch was a looping right hand that knocked Maderna off his pins, leading to what some would argue was a quick stoppage. The official time was 1:41 of round three.
It was the second knockdown scored by Unal, the first coming in the previous round, a knockdown that was more of a push. But Maderna was holding his own in what was an entertaining fight for as long as it lasted. Unal, although rough-around-the-edges, is undefeated (12-0, 10 KOs) as a pro. Maderna, a 38-year-old Argentine, saw his ledger dip to 31-14.
Fast rising welterweight Christopher Guerrero scored the best win of his career with a fourth-round stoppage of Swiss journeyman Dennis Dauti. A two-time Canadian amateur champion, born in Mexico, Guerrero channeled Julio Cesar Chavez and ended the bout with a left hook to the body. Dauti made it to his feet although he was in obvious pain. Guerreo then tossed him to the canvas (officially a slip) and the referee waived it off before Guerrero (13-0, 8 KOs) had the opportunity to land another punch. The 31-year-old Dauti (25-6-2) hadn’t previously been stopped.
Super middleweight Moreno Fendero who has drawn comparisons with stablemate Christian Mbilli, had an easy workout with Edison Demaj, stopping the German-Albanian trial horse in the third round.
The 25-year-old Moreno, a former member of the French Army, scored three knockdowns before the match was halted at the 1:36 mark of the third round. The final knockdown was a looping right hand that landed high on Demaj’s temple. He beat the count, but the referee waived the match off with the approval of Demaj’s corner. Fendero improved to 9-0 (7 KOs). The overmatched Demaj falls to 13-4-1.
In the TV opener, lightweight Avery Martin-Duval, a local product, advanced to 13-0-1 (7) with an 8-round unanimous decision over French import Keshan Koaly (6-1-2) The scores were 77-74 and 77-73 twice
From Nice with roots in the French territory of Guadalupe, Koaly knocked Martin-Duval to his knees in the second frame with a jab to the midsection. Two rounds later, the local lad landed the best punch of the fight, staggering Koaly with a counter right hand that immediately caused a purplish welt to develop under his right eye. From that point on, Martin-Duval controlled the action.
Upsets are extremely rare on Eye of the Tiger events. Tonight was no exception.
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