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Three Punch Combo: The York Hall Tournament, Luis Nery Deconstructed and More

Three Punch Combo: The York Hall Tournament, Luis Nery Deconstructed and More
The eyes of the boxing world will be on Las Vegas this week for the rematch between Deontay Wilder (41-0-1, 40 KO’s) and Luis Ortiz (31-1, 26 KO’s). But as with most weeks in the sport, there is plenty of other action taking place that will be widely available on various platforms.
One such event is the Golden Contract tournament that will take place on Friday at York Hall in London and broadcast in the United States on ESPN+. An eight-man, single elimination tournament in three weight divisions, the tournament was organized by boxing management company MTK Global in association with Matchroom.
This particular quarterfinal on Friday features fighters in the 140-pound division. There are also tournaments in the featherweight and light heavyweight divisions. The featherweight quarterfinals kicked off last month and the light heavyweight quarterfinals will take place in December.
The semifinals for each weight division are expected to take place early next year with the finals being planned for some time around the middle of the year.
The “golden ticket” for the winner of each weight division is a five-fight two-year deal that guarantees six figure paydays along with global exposure.
As of this writing, none of the eight fighters in action Friday knows who they will be facing. The draw will take place later this week. Each fighter will pull a ball out of a bag containing four red balls and four blue balls. The fighters who select the blue colored balls will select their opponents from the fighters who pulled the red colored balls. The blue colored balls will be numbered one to four with the fighter selecting number one picking first.
The best way I would describe the field for this tournament is that it is a step up in quality from the recent Boxcino tournaments but a clear step down from the quality of fighters in the WBSS. Basically, we have some up-and-coming fighters participating along with a mix of veterans who are looking to get back into contention.
Some notable participants in the 140-pound division are young undefeated fighters Darren Surtees (12-0, 8 KO’s) and Logan Yoon (16-0, 12 KO’s). Also, Ohara Davies (19-2, 14 KO’s), Tyrone McKenna (19-1-1, 6 KO’s) and Mohamed Mimoune (21-3, 2 KO’s) are scheduled to be in the field.
I love tournaments and am very much looking forward to this event. Based on the field, we are going to see some very compelling fights, either on Friday or down the road as the tournament progresses.
Under The Radar Fight
It is going to be a busy day of boxing on ESPN+ on Friday. In addition to the aforementioned Golden Contract tournament, ESPN+ will be broadcasting a card from Dubai that is headlined by a very intriguing 140-pound crossroads fight between Jack Catterall (24-0, 13 KO’s) and Timo Schwarzkopf (20-3, 12 KO’s).
Catterall, 26, is a fighter that just oozes talent. Fighting from the southpaw stance, he likes to press forward aggressively behind the right jab. Once in range, he likes to fire off fluid heavy handed combinations to the head and body of his opponent. He is also excellent at using his feet to create angles to land his combinations with precision accuracy.
With all the natural talent Catterall showcased coming up the ladder, the expectations got to be very lofty. However, a pair of performances last year caused those expectations to become a little tempered.
In June, Catterall struggled to navigate range against a tall southpaw in Tyrone McKenna and was fortunate to eke out a close 10-round unanimous decision. Later in October, Catterall stepped in against Ohara Davies. Many expected a breakout performance from Catterall. Instead, fans were presented with][ 12 rounds of listless action in a fight that may have seen more clinches than punches landed. In the end, although Catterall got the nod on the scorecards, his stock took a major hit.
After a stay-busy knockout win against sub.-500 fighter Oscar Amador this past April, Catterall looks to get his career back on track against Schwarzkopf.
Schwarzkopf, 28, is a tough gritty aggressive fighter with proven durability. While he may not have the most talent, he has certainly made the most of all his abilities. Schwarzkopf likes to press forward working behind the left jab from the orthodox stance. He is not afraid to throw all sorts of punches behind that jab, often times loading up looking to land one big punch. True to his nature, he is also not afraid to eat some leather pressing forward while looking for his own opportunities to land clean punches.
There is a lot to like about this fight in my opinion. Catterall is motivated to make a statement coming off two high profile lackluster performances last year. He is going to try to be the first to stop Schwarzkopf.
Given that Catterall is naturally aggressive and may be even more so in this fight, I think that gives Schwarzkopf opportunities to land some shots. Schwarzkopf will not be afraid to stand his ground and exchange. It is his nature.
The best fights are not always the most high-profile fights. Yes, the attention of the boxing world will be in mostly other places this weekend but Catterall-Schwarzkopf could be the fight that steals the show.
Should Luis Nery Be On Upset Alert?
I really like the Wilder-Ortiz II undercard, especially the bantamweight contest between Luis Nery (30-0, 24 KO’s) and Emmanuel Rodriguez (19-1, 12 KO’s). And though most sportsbooks have Rodriguez a solid underdog, I think his chances of springing an upset are quite good.
A big part of the reason why most oddsmakers are so down on Rodriguez is that he was knocked out in his last fight. But Rodriguez wasn’t knocked out by just any fighter. He was knocked out by Naoya Inoue who is not only considered to be one of boxing’s top pound for pound fighters but also may be boxing’s top pound for pound puncher.
I think too many people are judging Rodriguez based off that loss. Before that fight, Rodriguez had proven to be a very capable fighter, good enough to capture a world title belt.
Rodriguez, 27, is just entering the prime of his career. He is a boxer-puncher by trade who likes to work behind a well-schooled left jab from the orthodox stance. Naturally very athletic, Rodriguez will work fast handed, fluid combinations behind that jab. He is also very technically sound which should not be all that surprising given his multitude of accomplishments as an amateur.
I know a lot of people in boxing are very high on Luis Nery but I see a lot of flaws in his game that I believe will one day be exposed. Nery falls in love too much with his power and often forgets how to properly set up those power shots. This was very evident in his last fight against Juan Carlos Payano.
Nery, 24, also lacks focus on defense. He does not move his head and often stands in front of his opponent after throwing his power shot with his hands down admiring his work.
I see this as the perfect storm for an upset. An athletic and technically sound fighter like Rodriguez can expose the flaws of a one-dimensional fighter like Nery. We have seen it happen plenty of times throughout boxing history and I for one will be betting on it happening again this weekend.
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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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Bombs Away in Las Vegas where Inoue and Espinoza Scored Smashing Triumphs

Japan’s Naoya “Monster” Inoue banged it out with Mexico’s Ramon Cardenas, survived an early knockdown and pounded out a stoppage win to retain the undisputed super bantamweight world championship on Sunday.
Japan and Mexico delivered for boxing fans again after American stars failed in back-to-back days.
“By watching tonight’s fight, everyone is well aware that I like to brawl,” Inoue said.
Inoue (30-0, 27 KOs), and Cardenas (26-2, 14 KOs) and his wicked left hook, showed the world and 8,474 fans at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas that prizefighting is about punching, not running.
After massive exposure for three days of fights that began in New York City, then moved to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia and then to Nevada, it was the casino capital of the world that delivered what most boxing fans appreciate- pure unadulterated action fights.
Monster Inoue immediately went to work as soon as the opening bell rang with a consistent attack on Cardenas, who very few people knew anything about.
One thing promised by Cardenas’ trainer Joel Diaz was that his fighter “can crack.”
Cardenas proved his trainer’s words truthful when he caught Inoue after a short violent exchange with a short left hook and down went the Japanese champion on his back. The crowd was shocked to its toes.
“I was very surprised,” said Inoue about getting dropped. ““In the first round, I felt I had good distance. It got loose in the second round. From then on, I made sure to not take that punch again.”
Inoue had no trouble getting up, but he did have trouble avoiding some of Cardenas massive blows delivered with evil intentions. Though Inoue did not go down again, a look of total astonishment blanketed his face.
A real fight was happening.
Cardenas, who resembles actor Andy Garcia, was never overly aggressive but kept that left hook of his cocked and ready to launch whenever he saw the moment. There were many moments against the hyper-aggressive Inoue.
Both fighters pack power and both looked to find the right moment. But after Inoue was knocked down by the left hook counter, he discovered a way to eliminate that weapon from Cardenas. Still, the Texas-based fighter had a strong right too.
In the sixth round Inoue opened up with one of his lightning combinations responsible for 10 consecutive knockout wins. Cardenas backed against the ropes and Inoue blasted away with blow after blow. Then suddenly, Cardenas turned Inoue around and had him on the ropes as the Mexican fighter unloaded nasty combinations to the body and head. Fans roared their approval.
“I dreamed about fighting in front of thousands of people in Las Vegas,” said Cardenas. “So, I came to give everything.”
Inoue looked a little surprised and had a slight Mona Lisa grin across his face. In the seventh round, the Japanese four-division world champion seemed ready to attack again full force and launched into the round guns blazing. Cardenas tried to catch Inoue again with counter left hooks but Inoue’s combos rained like deadly hail. Four consecutive rights by Inoue blasted Cardenas almost through the ropes. The referee Tom Taylor ruled it a knockdown. Cardenas beat the count and survived the round.
In the eighth round Inoue looked eager to attack and at the bell launched across the ring and unloaded more blows on Cardenas. A barrage of 14 unanswered blows forced the referee to stop the fight at 45 seconds of round eight for a technical knockout win.
“I knew he was tough,” said Inoue. “Boxing is not that easy.”
Espinoza Wins
WBO featherweight titlist Rafael Espinosa (27-0, 23 KOs) uppercut his way to a knockout win over Edward Vazquez (17-3, 4 KOs) in the seventh round.
“I wanted to fight a game fighter to show what I am capable,” said Espinoza.
Espinosa used the leverage of his six-foot, one-inch height to slice uppercuts under the guard of Vazquez. And when the tall Mexican from Guadalajara targeted the body, it was then that the Texas fighter began to wilt. But he never surrendered.
Though he connected against Espinoza in every round, he was not able to slow down the taller fighter and that allowed the Mexican fighter to unleash a 10-punch barrage including four consecutive uppercuts. The referee stopped the fight at 1:47 of the seventh round.
It was Espinoza’s third title defense.
Photo credit: Mikey Williams / Top Rank
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