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The Top Ten Middleweights of the Decade: 2010-2019

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Looking over the 160lb division of the last decade was tough. A concrete top three was difficult to order for reasons that will become apparent and no natural number ten presented itself; between ten and three were a series of interchangeable middleweights, none of whom made an irrefutable case over the man above him, this, despite their having a reasonable record of matching one another.

An average decade then, for the sport’s number two division, but no less fascinating for all that.

Rankings are by TBRB excluding 2010 to 2012 when Ring rankings are used.

10 – Dmitry Pirog

Peak Ranking: 5 Record for the Decade: 6-0 Ranked For: 41% of the Decade

Dmitry Pirog appears, at first glance to be an inclusion based upon potential and being frank that is a matter in his ranking. Pirog was slated to meet Gennadiy Golovkin in the summer of 2012 when he ruptured a disc in his back while striking a tire with a sledgehammer in the mountains of his native Russia. He never recovered. While Golovkin probably would have been too much for the man they called “The Grandmaster”, even at just 20-0, he would likely have been one of the better fighters Golovkin would ever have bettered.

For confirmation of this, see Pirog’s graduation night victory over Daniel Jacobs in July of 2010. Jacobs would get better but when the two men fought as elite prospects he was basically outclassed by the Russian. Pirog ran a savage pressure but it was his defense that set him apart. He was not impossible to hit, nor even difficult for the right punch, but he had superb reactive head and upper-body movement that saw him consistently ditch Daniel’s best blows, and in fact the best punches of almost every fighter he ever fought.

Prospect watchers know well the nagging doubt created by a leaky defense; Pirog’s was tighter than that of many more experienced men. It was his offense that marshalled Jacobs, however, who was driven to the ropes over and over again despite the demands of his corner and who, after being out-fought and out-thought for most of the preceding rounds, was terminated by a brutal right hand in the fifth. He remains the only man to have stopped Jacobs despite the kind attentions of Golovkin and Saul Alvarez.

Pirog never recovered from that ruptured disc and was almost certainly cheated of a much more significant legacy as a result. I’ll stick my neck out here and say he’d have landed in the top four had he remained uninjured. As it is, he is as reasonable a pick for the #10 spot as I can muster.

09 – Peter Quillin

Peak Ranking: 2 Record for the Decade: 14-2-1 Ranked For: 46% of the Decade

Peter Quillin survived a rough upbringing to become one of the signature contenders of the decade. For all that he failed to deliver on what seemed legitimate potential before being chased out of the division by Daniel Jacobs in 2015, Quillin had some pretty moments. Chief among them was perhaps his tenth-round stoppage of contender Gabriel Rosado in 2013. Some of this was genuinely gorgeous, feinting with the jab before hooking around the corner, delightful small-increment pressure with sudden two-piece attacks tagged on to the thinking footwork.

Quillin’s best though was his massacre of Hassan N’Dam N’Jikam. That fight had come a year earlier in something of a crossroads fight for both men, each sporting a ledger of 27-0. Quillin dropped N’Jikam over and again with a beautiful array of left hands. N’Jikam visited the canvas on six separate occasions.

Quillin didn’t deliver in the end and given his rags-to-riches story and healthy interest in boxing’s history, that seemed a shame to me; but he did enough and looked well enough to slip in to one of the two contested slots at the bottom of the ten.

08 – Felix Sturm

Peak Ranking: 1 Record for the Decade: 7-3-2-1 Ranked For: 49% of the Decade

At first glance, number eight might seem a tad harsh where Sturm is concerned but look closer.

First, he’s hitting barely 50% for a win ratio for the decade – and his best win in the 10s is Matthew Macklin. Not that this is anything to be ashamed of, Macklin was a good operator and ranked #3 in the world at the time of their meeting, but it’s a tough hook to hang a legacy on.

The problem, however, is that many observers felt that Sturm was not deserving of the decision against Macklin and it remains one of the most controversially scored fights on the fascinating Eye on the Ring website. What is clear is that Macklin out-landed Sturm, and herein lies the great strength, weakness and the most interesting wrinkle in Sturm’s fighting style. One of the most patient fighters I have ever seen, Sturm covers up, invites pressure, and lets his opponent work. This was a red flag to Macklin’s bullish instincts, and he spent the entire fight pushing forwards, working the body with veracity, bringing volume and aggression. Sturm responded not by running but by staying in the pocket and ceding round after round but looking to set up sneak counters, a double-left-jab, hard uppercuts. In almost every round he landed the quality work, appealing to a certain kind of eye.

It’s easy to find an argument for Macklin but the fight was indisputably close, and Sturm indisputably won the eleventh and twelfth. His style is one of natural economy. Macklin started to look ragged by comparison as early as the eighth. I scored it 115-113 Macklin but have no problem with a close Sturm card.

Still, his number two scalp that decade was either Sam Soliman or Sebastian Zbik, depending upon who you prefer. Sturm belongs here but would have been shaded in a better decade.

07 – Billy Joe Saunders

Peak Ranking: 3 Record for the Decade: 24-0 Ranked For: 35% of the Decade

Billy Joe Saunders spent most of the decade duelling middleweights before departing for 168lbs, but it is for two performances he makes the ten, one desperate, one so smooth as to be comparable to some of the truly great stylists. Such are the vagaries of boxing style and Billy Joe’s own maddening inconsistency.

The smooth was turned in against number four contender David Lemieux in late 2017. This was the fight where Saunders famously made the limited but brave Lemieux miss by such a margin that he was able to take the time to feign looking to the bleachers for a punch that flew wide. There was so much more to this performance than that distilled moment though. Saunders boxed with genuine brilliance, repeatedly making Lemieux miss him behind a southpaw jab by slipping and shifting to his own right, counterintuitive because it opened him up to Lemieux’s square attack. Saunders was never troubled. No puncher, he was never going to stop his rugged opponent, but he won every round. It made him a legitimate opponent for both Daniel Jacobs and Gennadiy Golovkin; neither fight materialized.

Two years earlier, almost to the day, the other Saunders was manifest in Manchester against Irishman Andy Lee. The temptation here is to give Lee, a good fighter who was in contention for the #10 spot, more credit, but Saunders dominated the first three rounds, scoring two beautiful knockdowns. The first, a slip counter of the absolute highest order, was a thing of fistic wonder.

Then he dropped off dramatically, his workrate and his strategic plan both floundering. Saunders got his win by majority decision, those knockdowns the difference.

Now 168lbs has him, but his incomplete legacy at one-sixty enough to scrape him the number seven spot.

06 – Miguel Cotto

Peak Ranking: Ch Record for the Decade: 7-4 Ranked For: 23% of the Decade

Miguel Cotto’s paper record for the decade and his brief sojourn at 160lbs make him the lowest ranked of the dead locks for this list. Cotto unquestionably belongs but can rise no higher.

His keynote victory over world middleweight champion Sergio Martinez has been dismissed by some given how Martinez’s knees had begun to creak but it is worth remembering that Cotto himself had begun to fade having dropped decisions to Floyd Mayweather and Austin Trout in consecutive fights at 154lbs; so his first round performance against even a struggling Martinez was astonishing.

The champion looked unsteady on his feet, yes, but Cotto’s left hand lead was rarely better, whether he was hooking to the body, jabbing upstairs, or feinting and throwing a stealing, cuffing left hook; it was clear from the first that whatever remained of Martinez was not going to be good enough for Cotto; so it proved, and the Puerto Rican legend was king.

Cotto only had one more win at the poundage, but it was over a second man to make this list in Daniel Geale. Geale is a name, less renowned than that of Martinez and with good reason, but in many ways, it was the more important win. Cotto dominated Geale, a legitimate middleweight, physically as well as technically, hurting him throughout with the left and up-ending him in four. It confirmed him a legitimate middleweight.

For all that, Cotto is exactly 2-1 at middleweight, and when he dropped his title to Saul Alvarez in his next contest, his transient visit to the division was over. Both Geale and Martinez were creaking when he got to them but two wins over men on this list, plus the lineal championship make him a lock.

05 – Daniel Geale

Peak Ranking: 1 Record for the Decade: 10-4 Ranked For: 51% of the Decade

This was an extremely close call.  Essentially the coin was in the air and it came down “Daniel Geale”.

Geale was defeated by Miguel Cotto, albeit at the end of his career, and Cotto was the legitimate champion whereas Geale was a strapholder and ranked the #1 contender. But Geale was a career middleweight; while Cotto’s relationship with 160lbs was fleeting, Geale fought two generations of middles and in his purple patch in 2011 and 2012 bears scrutiny.

He traveled to Germany in 2011 and in front of a partisan crowd outworked a game Sebastian Sylvester to a deserved decision victory over the world’s #3 contender, and better yet, returned there for a showdown and unification bout with Felix Sturm. Here too he came away a winner in a fight so close as to come down to the eleventh and twelfth, both bagged by Geale. Had Sylvester been blessed with Sturm’s jab, or Sturm with Sylvester’s work-rate, Geale could have lost either fight, but as it was he found the gaps in both styles to take decisions on enemy territory. Probably Geale was less than elite in everything that mattered, he was quick but not fast, a stinging puncher but not a powerful one, organized but not dynamic; for grit and work, however, there is no better middle on this list.

Like all fighters who rely upon stamina to get there, once he lost a step he was a hugely diminished fighter and that he lost three of his last five fights is a reflection of that. Geale is not a top five decadal fighter in sense of class and is reflective of what was a middling decade at 160lbs, but despite his past-prime loss to Cotto it is hard to see him ranked below the transient Puerto Rican here.

04 – Daniel Jacobs

Peak Ranking: 2 Record for the Decade: 18-3 Ranked For: 48% of the Decade

Another coin flip: the difference between Danny Jacobs and Geale wound up being not his wins, but his losses, two brave showings against the two pre-eminent middleweights of his era, Gennady Golovkin and Saul Alvarez. He met Golovkin in March of 2017 in a fight that was close, controversial and absorbing, Jacobs keeping a seemingly tentative Golovkin honest with a combination of size and power that the great Kazakhstani had perhaps not seen before. Two years later he entertained Alvarez and once again dropped a close decision, though on this occasion there was less controversy; Jacobs then bid farewell to 160lbs for super-middleweight.

The key victories that make him a legitimate if uninspiring number four were also fascinating, none more so than his single round dispatch of the world’s #2 contender, Peter Quillin. Jacobs, perfectly capable of engaging in and winning a technical fight, as he proved in 2018 in edging out Sergiy Derevyanchenko over twelve, chose against Quillin a shoot-out. Chasing Quillin back to the ropes with a sound jab he then forced the referee’s hands (arguably a little prematurely) with a mix of looping and compact right-hands.

These two contrasting victories and these two losses describe for us Daniel’s strengths and limitations. They make him difficult to rank below the likes of Geale and Cotto, and impossible to rank above any of the members of the undisputed middleweight top three of the 2010s.

03 – Sergio Martinez

Peak Ranking: Ch. Record for the Decade: 7-1 Ranked For: 50% of the Decade

Sergio Martinez moved up from 154lbs just in time for the beginning of the decade. Eight contests comprised the remainder of his career, but Martinez did some damage.

His definitive decadal performance was his title winning effort against Kelly Pavlik. Martinez won the first four rounds with his low-handed, circling style, prioritizing movement, hitting when the opportunity presented itself and forcing Pavlik to reset over and again. Pavlik dominated the middle rounds with faster pressure, accepting that he would be hit but allowing it in order to deliver his own offense. The final adaption was Sergio’s, and it was impressive. Instead of running, he elongated his visits to the pocket, shoe-shining a bit but throwing four and five punches where he had previously thrown one or two. He thrashed Pavlik in the final third, reducing him to a mask of gore, a desperate two-step flinching misses. Re-watching that fight, I was impressed by Sergio’s marked superiority over a reigning middleweight champion of the world. It was not insignificant.

Martinez did not rest on his laurels as a champion. He visited the top five on two further occasions, his terrifying knockout of Paul Williams perhaps the definitive stoppage win of the whole decade, middleweight or otherwise; his twelve-round domination of Julio Cesar Chavez Jnr. was almost as impressive in its own way but also signaled the beginning of the end. Martinez broke his left hand in the fourth and damaged his knee during a shocking visit to the canvas in the twelfth. Sergio had tipped over into the realms of the veteran.

He did a fine job on a duo of British contenders in Matthew Macklin and Martin Murray, but there was perhaps a feeling that he had come for a payday in his final fight against Miguel Cotto. Sure enough, his knees betrayed him, and he was pulled from the fight in the tenth round of a fight Cotto was dominating.

02 – Saul Alvarez

Peak Ranking: Ch. Record for the Decade: 24-1-1 Ranked For: 37% of the Decade

Squeaking in in front of Argentine Sergio Martinez is Mexican Saul Alvarez, who took the championship from the man who usurped Martinez, Miguel Cotto. Cotto was absolutely superb in defeat that night, boxing as he had against the menace of Shane Mosley some years earlier and actually pulling out the win on some cards, although the majority saw it for Alvarez. Personally, I was underwhelmed by Saul’s performance and expected a series of shallow defenses followed by his ceding the title to either Gennadiy Golovkin or the emerging Daniel Jacobs.

Instead, Alvarez got the embarrassing defense out of the way early via a smearing of Amir Khan then defeated both Golovkin and Jacobs in 2018 and 2019 respectively. What this means is that Alvarez has the scalps of three men from this list dangling from his waist, which is the gold standard at middleweight.

The devil, of course, is in the detail.

Alvarez first met Golovkin in September 2017, in a fight that was rendered a draw, most, but not all ringsiders seeing the fight for Golovkin, Boxing Scene and the Associated Press both seeing it a draw.  Undeniably it was close, and because it was close, I honor it here. 115-113 Golovkin was my own card and that’s certainly nothing like enough to cry robbery. The drawn fight stands.

A rematch was staged almost a year to the day after the first fight and if anything, it was even more controversial. The jab appeared to have just slipped Golovkin over the line, but, once again, most observers scored it a very close fight. The majority of cards fell into the range 115-113 to 113-115; those with wider cards tended to be outliers. I was something of an outlier myself here in having the fight a draw (though I was not alone – Sports Illustrated, Ring Magazine, Forbes and the BBC were among the numerous drawn cards). Once more, then, for the purposes of this list, the win stands.

His win over Daniel Jacobs certainly stands, though even this was a fight not without controversy and controversy too stalks the Mexican at 154lbs. What is Alvarez then? Is he a fighter of great talent who fights down to his opponent’s level? Something less than that, somehow manages to squeeze wins out by the barest of margins against opponents with serious physical advantages?  Something darker, a favored son of an industry that favors the cash cow above all?

Whatever else, he is the number two middleweight for the decade gone by.

01 – Gennadiy Golovkin

Peak Ranking: 1 Record for the Decade: 23-1-1 Ranked For: 83% of the Decade

First thing’s first: Alvarez’s victory over Gennadiy Golovkin is acknowledged for the purposes of the list but Alvarez is ranked below Golovkin; how does that work?

Although Alvarez defeated Golovkin, the fight was close enough that it could have, and perhaps should have, been scored for the Kazakhstani. This is not the key though. Even if Alvarez had knocked Golovkin out, Golovkin would still have outranked him for the decade. There are two reasons for this. The lesser of these is time served: Golovkin spent the entire decade battling middleweight and Alvarez was but a blink in his eye, for all that he did great work in his brief visit.  More than that is the destruction that Golovkin wrought between January first 2010 and December thirty-first 2019. It is surprising to me how quickly the terrible damage done to the middleweight division has been forgotten in favor of arguments over what “really happened” in the Saul Alvarez fight.

It began, for me, with Gregorsz Prokosa, the #4 contender and a unique, riffing southpaw who on paper appeared to be an enormous challenge for a technician, even one who seemed as composed as Golovkin. It was a slaughter. The stoppage itself was glorious but Golovkin’s pressure, jab, shepherding footwork and most of all, his calmness of demeanor, heralded the coming of royalty.

This was September of 2012. What followed over the next five years was nothing short of a reign of terror. Golovkin dispatched six middleweights from the top five; a total of nine contenders from the top ten. This is not normal. It is difficult to exaggerate how difficult it is for a fighter to pick off nine ranked contenders from one weight division in a given decade. If we see it twice more in the entirety of this series, I will be surprised, but it’s certainly unequalled between heavyweights and middleweights.

For a marquee win, Golovkin is looking at Daniel Jacobs, which is a little unsatisfactory, deepening the frustration surrounding the Alvarez result; but it is worth reiterating that Golovkin just doesn’t need it. He dominated the field for better than half of the decade and the decade is what we are interested in here.

Golovkin is number one.

For the other decadal number ones ranked so far, see the heavyweights, cruiserweights, light-heavyweights and super-middleweights accordingly.

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Ebanie Bridges Poised to Defend Her Title and Boost Her Brand in SanFran This Weekend

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Ebanie Bridges opposes late sub Miyo Yoshida on the undercard of Saturday’s Matchroom card in San Francisco featuring the WBC lightweight title fight between Regis Prograis and Devin Haney. It’s doubtful that Bridges vs. Yoshida will steal the show (Prograis vs Haney is a compelling match-up), but it’s a stone-cold lock that Bridges vs. Yoshida will steal the weigh-in. It goes at 1 pm Friday at the Chase Center and is open to the public.

This is all Bridges’ doing. She can fight more than a little, as Damon Runyon would have phrased it, but is best known for turning up at weigh-ins in lingerie so sexy that Matchroom honcho Eddie Hearn averts his eyes to keep from blushing. Others can’t keep their eyes off the 37-year-old, well-endowed Australian and on Friday the paparazzi will crash the scene to capture images that will be all over the internet within hours.

This doesn’t sit well with a lot of people. Former opponent Shannon Courtenay, who saddled Bridges (9-1, 4 KOs) with her only defeat, chastised her for selling their fight for the wrong reasons and disrespecting the sport. Her most recent opponent, Shannon O’Connell, called her a skank and other terms of derision unfit for a family newspaper.

Bridges stopped her in the eighth round in what is her most gratifying win to date. “She made it personal,” says Ebanie. “It felt good to make her eat her words.”

Bridges, who set a withering pace, was making the first defense of the IBF bantamweight title she won with a comprehensive 10-round decision over Argentina’s long-reigning Maria Cecilia Roman. Shannon O’Connell, a fellow Aussie, entered that bout on an 8-fight winning streak that included hard-earned decisions over Australian standouts Taylah Robertson and Cherneka Johnson.

So, although Bridges vs O’Connell was contested in Leeds, England, it was something of the culmination of an Australian round-robin tournament, and it would be Ebanie Bridges that emerged as the Queen Bee.

Bridges has a platform on Only Fans. Known for its “adult” content, the web site is also a place where B-list celebrities go to monetize their fan base by promising a closer look into their personal lives. For attractive female celebs, that usually means displaying more skin that can be found in generic publicity photos, but well short of hard-core. Current Only Fans performers include recording artist Cardi B, actress Denise Richards, the former spouse of Charlie Sheen, actress Drea de Matteo, best known for portraying Adriana on “The Sopranos,” former “Baywatch” sex symbol Carmen Electra, boxer Mikaela Mayer, and former Miss USA Shanna Moakler who shares a daughter with Oscar de la Hoya.

Women that profit from cheesecake, to use an old word for racy photos, aren’t known for having the brightest bulbs between their ears but Bridges, despite embracing her nickname, the Blonde Bomber, doesn’t fit the stereotype. She’s no bimbo.

Ms. Bridges has two college degrees, an undergraduate degree in math and a master’s in secondary education. In her spare time, she finds solace in playing the piano and in drawing, a skill that she inherited from her father, a painter and commercial artist.

In her drawings, she is partial to British soccer coaches and athletes, in particular boxers. Some of her photos are embedded in her smart phone. These, I can attest, are very good. There was no mistaking her drawing of Sugar Ray Robinson. It ranked right up there with Stanley Weston whose illustrations adorned the covers of 57 issues of The Ring magazine.

Bridges is her own best publicist. It’s an attribute she shares with UFC superstar Conor McGregor.

It comes as no surprise to learn that they are well-acquainted. Bridges and McGregor sat together at the first fight between Katie Taylor and Chantelle Cameron. She is a spokesperson for the latest product that McGregor is pushing, Forged Irish Stout, a brand of beer that debuted at the Black Forge Inn, the Dublin pub that McGregor owns.

“I love Conor,” she says, “he’s lovely,” a rather odd adjective to apply to a man who once attacked a bus with a metal barricade at a UFC media event in Brooklyn, injuring three people.

“He’s great for my brand,” says Bridges of McGregor, “and I’m great for his brand.”

Like it or not, this is the new world order. This reporter is old enough to remember when colleges and universities had football teams. Now they have football franchises, which isn’t quite the same. A franchise requires a well-oiled marketing department to enhance the value of the brand.

Bridges got her first crack at a world title (the WBA version held by Shannon Courtenay) after only five pro fights against opponents who were collectively 12-25-5. Her opponent on Saturday, Miyo Yoshida, sports a 16-4 record and is coming off a loss.

This is fodder for critics of female boxing but, make no mistake, Bridges would be a tough out for any female bantamweight in the world and she has paid her dues. She had 30 amateur fights after previously training in karate, kickboxing, and Muay Thai. (In fairness to Matchroom’s matchmaker, he salvaged Saturday’s date for her, securing Yoshida after three previous opponents fell out.)

Looking ahead to 2024, Bridges envisions fighting England’s Nina Hughes, the WBA belt-holder, and then Denmark’s Dina Thorslund who owns the other two meaningful pieces of the bantamweight title. A match with Thorslund (currently 20-0, 8 KOs) with all four belts on the line would be a blockbuster and, by then, should it transpire, the Blonde Bombshell would undoubtedly be one of the most well-known boxers in the world.

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A Paean to the Great Sportswriter Jimmy Cannon Who Passed Away 50 Years Ago This Week

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“Of all his assignments,” said the renowned sportswriter Dave Anderson, “[Jimmy] Cannon appeared to enjoy boxing the most.”

Cannon would have sheepishly concurred. He dated his infatuation with boxing to 1919 when he stood outside a saloon listening to a man with a megaphone relay bulletins from the Dempsey-Willard fight in faraway Toledo. His father followed boxing as did all the Irishmen in his neighborhood. For him, an interest in the sport of boxing, he once wrote, was like a family heirloom. But it became a love-hate relationship. It was Jimmy Cannon, after all, who coined the phrase “boxing is the red light district of sports.”

This week marks the 50th anniversary of Jimmy Cannon’s death. He passed away at age 63 on Dec. 5, 1973, in his room at the residential hotel in mid-Manhattan where he made his home. In the realm of American sportswriters, there has never been a voice quite like him. He was “the hardest-boiled of the hard-drinking, hard-boiled school of sports writing,” wrote Darrell Simmons of the Atlanta Journal. One finds a glint of this in his summary of Sonny Liston’s first-round demolition of Albert Westphal in 1961: “Sonny Liston hit Albert Westphal like he was a cop.”

In his best columns, Jimmy Cannon was less a sportswriter than an urban poet. Here’s what he wrote about Archie Moore in 1955 after Moore trounced Bobo Olson to set up a match with Rocky Marciano: “Someone should write a song about Archie Moore who in the Polo Grounds knocked out Bobo Olson in three rounds…It should be a song that comes out of the backrooms of sloughed saloons on night-drowned streets in morning-worried parts of bad towns. The guy who writes this one must be a piano player who can be dignified when he picks a quarter out of the marsh of a sawdust floor.”

Prior to fighting in Madison Square Garden the previous year – his first appearance in that iconic boxing arena – Moore had roamed the globe in search of fights in a career that began in the Great Depression. Cannon was partial to boxers like Archie Moore, great ring artisans who toiled in obscurity, fighting for small purses –“moving-around money” in Cannon’s words —  until the establishment could no longer ignore them.

Jimmy Cannon was born in Lower Manhattan. He left high school after one year to become a copy boy for the New York Daily News. In 1936, at age 26, the News sent him to cover the biggest news story of the day, the Lindbergh Baby kidnapping trial. While there he met Damon Runyon who would become a lifelong friend. At Runyon’s suggestion, he applied for a job as a sportswriter at the New York American, a Hearst paper, and was hired.

During World War II, he was a war correspondent in Europe embedded in Gen. George S. Patton’s Third Army. When he returned from the war, he joined the New York Post and then, in 1959, the Journal-American which made him America’s highest-paid sportswriter at a purported salary of $1000 a week. His articles were syndicated and appeared in dozens of papers.

Cannon was very close to Joe Louis. He was the only reporter that Louis allowed in his hotel room on the morning of the Brown Bomber’s rematch with Max Schmeling. Louis, he wrote, “was a credit to his race, the human race.” It was his most-frequently-quoted line.

In an early story, Cannon named Sam Langford the best pound-for-pound fighter of all time. Later he joined with his colleagues on Press Row in naming Sugar Ray Robinson the greatest of the greats. As for the fellow who anointed himself “The Greatest,” Muhammad Ali, Cannon profoundly disliked him. He persisted in calling him Cassius Clay long after Ali had adopted his Muslim name.

It troubled Cannon that Ali was afforded an opportunity to fight for the title after only 19 pro fights. Ali’s poetry, he thought, was infantile. He abhorred Ali’s political views. And, truth be told, he didn’t like Ali because certain segments of society adored him. Cannon didn’t like non-conformists – hippies and anti-war protesters and such. When queried about his boyhood in Greenwich Village, he was quick to note that he lived there “when it was a decent neighborhood, before it became freaky.”

Cannon’s animus toward Ali spilled over into his opinion of Ali’s foil, the bombastic sportscaster Howard Cosell. “If Howard Cosell were a sport,” he wrote,” it would be roller derby.”

Cannon frequently filled his column with a series of one-liners published under the heading “Nobody Asked Me, But…” His wonderfully acerbic put-down of Cosell appeared in one of these columns. But one can’t read these columns today without cringing at some of his ruminations. He once wrote, “Any man is in trouble if he falls in love with a woman he can’t knock down with one punch.” If a newspaperman wrote those words today, he would be out of a job so fast it would make his head spin.

Similarly, his famous line about Joe Louis being a credit to the human race no longer resonates in the way that it once did. There is in its benevolence an air of racial prejudice.

Jimmy Cannon was a lifelong bachelor but in his younger days before he quit drinking cold turkey in 1948, he was quite the ladies man, often seen promenading showgirls around town. Like his pal Damon Runyon, he was a night owl. As the years passed, however, he became somewhat reclusive. The world passed him by when rock n’ roll came in, pushing aside the Tin Pan Alley crooners and torch singers that had kept him company at his favorite late-night haunts.

Cannon’s end days were tough. He suffered a stroke in 1971 as he was packing to go to the Kentucky Derby and spent most of his waking hours in his last two-plus years in a wheelchair. Fortunately, he could afford to hire a full-time attendant. In 2002, he was posthumously elected to the International Boxing Hall of Fame in the Observer category.

Jimmy Cannon once said that he resented it when someone told him that his stuff was too good to be in a newspaper. It was demeaning to newspapers and he never wanted to be anything but a newspaperman. He didn’t always bring his “A” game and some of his stuff wouldn’t hold up well, but the man could write like blazes and the sportswriting profession lost a giant when he drew his last breath.

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Arne K. Lang is a recognized authority on the history of prizefighting and the history of American sports gambling. His latest book, titled Clash of the Little Giants: George Dixon, Terry McGovern, and the Culture of Boxing in America, 1890-1910, was released by McFarland in September, 2022.

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Ryan “KingRy” Garcia Returns With a Bang; KOs Oscar Duarte

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It was a different Ryan “KingRy” Garcia the world saw in defeating Mexico’s rugged Oscar Duarte, but it was that same deadly left hook counter that got the job done by knockout on Saturday.

Only the quick survive.

Garcia (24-1, 20 KOs) used a variety of stances before luring knockout artist Duarte (26-1-1, 21 KOs) into his favorite punch before a sold-out crowd at Toyota Arena in Houston, Texas. That punch should be patented in gold.

It was somewhat advertised as knockout artist versus matinee idol, but those who know the sport knew that Garcia was a real puncher. But could he rebound from his loss earlier this year?

The answer was yes.

Garcia used a variety of styles beginning with a jab at a prescribed distance via his new trainer Derrick James. It allowed both Garcia and Duarte to gain footing and knock the cobwebs out of their reflexes. Garcia’s jab scored most of the early points during the first three rounds. He also snapped off some left hooks and rights.

“He was a strong fighter, took a strong punch,” said Garcia. “I hit him with some hard punches and he kept coming.”

Duarte, an ultra-pale Mexican from Durango, was cautious, knowing full well how many Garcia foes had underestimated the power behind his blows.

Slowly the muscular Mexican fighter began closing in with body shots and soon both fighters were locked in an inside battle. Garcia used a tucked-in shoulder style while Duarte pounded the body, back of the head and in the back causing the referee to warn for the illegal punches twice.

Still, Duarte had finally managed to punch Garcia with multiple shots for several rounds.

Around the sixth round Garcia was advised by his new trainer to begin jabbing and moving. It forced Duarte out of his rhythm as he was unable to punch without planting his feet. Suddenly, the momentum had reversed again and Duarte looked less dangerous.

“I had to slow his momentum down. That softened him up,” said Garcia about using that change in style to change Duarte’s pressure attack. “Shout out to Derrick James.”

Boos began cascading from the crowd but Garcia was on a roll and had definitely regained the advantage. A quick five-punch combination rocked Duarte though not all landed. The danger made the Mexican pause.

In the eighth round Duarte knew he had to take back the momentum and charged even harder. In one lickety-split second a near invisible counter left hook connected on Duarte’s temple and he stumbled like a drunken soldier on liberty in Honolulu. Garcia quickly followed up with rights and uppercuts as Duarte had a look of terror as his legs failed to maintain stability. Down he went for the count.

Duarte was counted out by referee James Green at 2:51 of the eighth round as Garcia watched from the other side of the ring.

“I started opening up my legs a little bit to open up the shot,” explained Garcia. “When I hurt somebody that hard, I just keep cracking them. I hurt him with a counter left hook.”

The weapon of champions.

Garcia’s victory returns him back to the forefront as one of boxing’s biggest gate attractions. A list of potential foes is his to dissect and choose.

“I’m just ready to continue to my ascent to be a champion at 140,” Garcia said.

It was a tranquil end after such a tumultuous last three days.

Other Bouts

Floyd Schofield (16-0, 12 KOs) blitzed Mexico’s Ricardo “Not Finito” Lopez (17-8-3) with a four knockdown blowout that left fans mesmerized and pleased with the fighter from Austin, Texas.

Schofield immediately shot out quick jabs and then a lightning four-punch combination that delivered Lopez to the canvas wondering what had happened. He got up. Then Scholfield moved in with a jab and crisp left hook and down went Lopez like a dunked basketball bouncing.

At this point it seemed the fight might stop. But it proceeded and Schofield unleashed another quick combo that sent Lopez down though he did try to punch back. It was getting monotonous. Lopez got up and then was met with another rapid fire five- or six-punch combination. Lopez was down for the fourth time and the referee stopped the devastation.

“I appreciate him risking his life,” said Schofield of his victim.

In a middleweight clash Shane Mosley Jr. (21-4, 12 KOs) out-worked Joshua Conley (17-6-1, 11 KOs) for five rounds before stopping the San Bernardino fighter at 1:51 of the sixth round. It was Mosley’s second consecutive knockout and fourth straight win.

Mosley continues to improve in every fight and again moves up the middleweight rankings.

Super middleweight prospect Darius Fulghum (9-0, 9 KOs) of Houston remained undefeated and kept his knockout string intact with a second round pounding and stoppage over Pachino Hill (8-5-1) in 56 seconds of that round.

Photo credit: Golden Boy Promotions

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