Evander Holyfield’s Las Vegas Episodes (Part Two)

Published

4 years ago

April 27, 2021

Evander-Holyfield's-Las-Vegas-Episodes-Part-Two

Seven weeks after announcing his retirement, Evander Holyfield had an about-face. The impetus was a two-day rally he attended in Philadelphia led by controversial televangelist Benny Hinn. During the services, Hinn “touched” Holyfield and pronounced him healed.

The reaction in the boxing community was overwhelmingly sarcastic. “I have a bum knee,” said New York State Athletic Commission chairman Randy Gordon, “that I would like (the faith healer) to look at.” But the wisecracks ceased when Holyfield went to the Mayo Clinic and the doctors there found no evidence of the heart defect. Evander had been misdiagnosed, or the problem had corrected itself organically, or – as Evander chose to believe – he had received a gift from God.

Evander began his comeback in Atlantic City in a 10-round contest with rugged Ray Mercer. Holyfield dominated Mercer in the late rounds, assuaging concerns about his stamina, and won a unanimous decision. Holyfield was too cheap to pay for a cut man (his trainer Don Turner assumed the responsibility), and it almost cost him when he suffered a bad cut over his right eye, but his triumph thrust him back in the heavyweight picture and set the wheels in motion for a rubber match with Riddick Bowe.

Bowe had never been knocked down until Holyfield knocked him to the canvas with a left hook in round six of the rubber match. But by then, Holyfield, out-weighed by 27 pounds, was “bone-tired.” Bowe stopped him two rounds later, reducing Evander’s record to 31-3. Interestingly, this was a non-title fight. Following his loss to Evander in their middle fight, Bowe had gone on to win the lightly-regarded WBO belt, but the promoter refused to pony up a sanctioning fee so no title was at stake.

Holyfield got back on the winning track in his next start, a match with Bobby Czyz at Madison Square Garden, Evander’s first appearance in the Big Apple since his pro debut 11-and-a-half years earlier. This was nothing more than a stay-busy fight. Czyz, 34, had won titles at 175 and 190, but he had begun his pro career as a middleweight and at 5’10” would be the shorter man by four-and-a-half inches.

Czyz retired on his stool after five rounds complaining of a foreign substance in his eyes. Holyfield was comfortably ahead when the bout ended, but he wasn’t impressive.

When it became known that Holyfield had landed a bout with Mike Tyson, it was immediately decried as a mismatch. Evander’s best years were behind him, or so it seemed, whereas Iron Mike had looked like his old self after returning from prison, scoring four fast knockouts while picking up the IBF and WBA belts along the way. In a poll of sportswriters by the Las Vegas Review-Journal, 47 of 48 respondents picked Tyson. (The apostate was Ron Borges of the Boston Globe who reversed course after originally picking Tyson by KO in a Boxing Illustrated survey.)

The Nevada Commission would not approve the fight until Holyfield underwent a more extensive battery of medical tests than he had received at the Mayo Clinic. Their qualms factored into the odds. The Las Vegas bookmakers opened Tyson a 25/1 favorite and suffered a bloodbath when Holyfield was victorious, stopping Iron Mike in the 11^th round before a sell-out crowd at the MGM Grand Garden in a fight that had turned sharply in his favor. With the victory, Evander joined Muhammad Ali as a three-time heavyweight champion.

The rematch, also at the MGM Grand, was the infamous “bite fight,” a fight that has been hashed-over at length and won’t be re-hashed again here. Holyfield’s ears were an expensive comestible for Tyson who was fined three million dollars by the commission for his rampage.

Before the year was out, Holyfield renewed acquaintances with Michael Moorer. They met at the Thomas and Mack Center on the UNLV campus on Nov. 8, 1997.

Moorer, who no longer had Teddy Atlas in his corner, came in at a puffy 223 pounds, nine pounds more than in their first meeting. His recent efforts, although victorious, were lackadaisical and Evander, the would-be avenger, was installed the favorite.

Moorer looked good in the early-going and was winning the fifth until Evander knocked him down in the waning seconds of the round. Holyfield would knock him down twice more in the seventh and twice more in the eighth before the bout was halted on the advice of the ringside physician. This redemptive victory, coupled with his earlier triumph over Tyson, earned Evander The Ring’s Fighter of the Year Award, his third, a number surpassed by only Joe Louis (4) and Muhammad Ali (6).

All three significant belts were at stake when Holyfield squared off with Lennox Lewis at Madison Square Garden on March 13, 1999. This was the first “true” (unified) heavyweight title fight in a New York ring since the 1971 Fight of the Century between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier. Making the match more irresistible, the odds were “pick-‘em.”

The fight went the full 12 and Lewis would be credited with out-landing Evander in every round. There was a great snit when the bout was ruled a draw. The brunt of the vitriol was directed at IBF arbiter Eugenia Williams who had Holyfield winning seven rounds. She was accused of being a puppet of Holyfield’s promoter Don King.

The do-over at the Thomas and Mack was an immense attraction. The fight broke the existing Nevada record for gate receipts and the existing record for pay-per-view buys.

Holyfield did better in the rematch than in the first fight, not that one would have gleaned that from a glance at the scorecards: 117-111, 116-112, and 115-113, all for Lennox Lewis. If this had been the first fight between them instead of the second, and if this bout had been scored a draw, hardly anyone would have complained. Regardless, an injustice was rectified.

Holyfield’s next three fights were against John Ruiz, the first two in Las Vegas. Evander went 1-1-1 against Ruiz who fought out of Chelsea, Massachusetts, but yet their trilogy wasn’t a big story outside New England. Ruiz had a bland personality, manifested in his nickname, “The Quiet Man,” and an awkward style that made for dull fights.

Constantly boring ahead, Ruiz did a good job smothering Holyfield’s punches and exhibited just enough offense to warrant the decision in the minds of many people. But the judges favored Holyfield, two of whom gave him the nod by a single point.

The bout was contested at the Paris Hotel. At stake was the vacant WBA title that Lennox Lewis had forfeited. With the victory, Evander became the first four-time heavyweight champion, not that the fourth title was considered a significant achievement in the alphabet-fractured environment. The prevailing sentiment, articulated by Kevin Iole, was that Holyfield would have carved Ruiz to pieces if the bout had been held five years earlier.

Holyfield conceded that his showing wasn’t up to his standards. He blamed it on a broken eardrum which he said affected his balance and his timing. When the WBA ordered a rematch, Evander was all for it.

Typical of all great champions (with Joe Louis the classic example), Holyfield tended to perform at his best in rematches. But not this time. Despite severe swelling over both eyes and a bloody nose, Ruiz pulled away in the late rounds. He knocked Holyfield down in the 11^th with a right to the temple and Holyfield, who had difficulty putting his punches together, barely survived the round. Many in the crowd left before the scorecards were read; the verdict was a foregone conclusion.

Holyfield was two weeks shy of his 41^st birthday when he locked horns with James Toney on Oct. 4, 2003 at Mandalay Bay.

The 35-year-old Toney, who brought a 66-4-2 record, had won the IBF 190-pound title in his most recent outing, a fierce fight with Vassiliy Jirov. He came in at 217 for Evander, 60 pounds more than he carried when he upset Michael Nunn back in 1991. But Toney was a handful at any weight and he gave Evander the worst beating of his career. The bout was stopped midway through the ninth frame when Holyfield’s trainer Don Turner entered the ring on a mission of mercy.

Evander Holyfield’s last fight in Las Vegas came six-and-half years after his defeat by James Toney and it almost didn’t happen. The Nevada commission debated long and hard before approving his match with 41-year-old Frans Botha, the so-called “White Buffalo.”

The fight was up for grabs after seven rounds with Holyfield trailing on two of the cards. In the eighth, Evander broke through, decking Botha with a big right hand and following up with a barrage of punches after Botha made it to his feet, leading the referee to call it off. It was a messy fight with a lot of clinching and a comical moment when Botha hit both of Evander’s ears simultaneously, a maneuver, said ringside reporter Steve Carp, that the “White Buffalo” borrowed from The Three Stooges playbook.

The fight was at the Thomas and Mack. In his previous fight in this building, Holyfield fought Lennox Lewis before an animated crowd of 17,916 swelled by a large delegation of singing and chanting British fight fans. His purse was $15 million guaranteed but he stood to make even more based on the pay-per-view numbers. His fight with Frans Botha played out before a subdued crowd announced at 3,127. Evander, who was coming off back-to-back losses, reportedly fought for a purse of $150,000.

To his credit, Evander ended his 17-fight Las Vegas run on a winning note. He would fight twice more before calling it quits, leaving the sport with a 44-10-2 record.

—

The word most often used to describe Evander Holyfield is the word warrior, a word that invariably comes prefaced by the verb “great” or a synonym of it.

Former Review-Journal sports editor Jim Fossum authored a nice tribute: “Holyfield displayed heart and conditioning virtually unparalleled in boxing…(He) securely established his place in every boxing book they will print from here to eternity.”

Fossum wrote those words in April of 1994, long before Evander’s two fights with Mike Tyson and 17 years before Holyfield’s final fight!

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Arne K. Lang

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Avila Perspective, Chap. 303: Spotlights on Lightweights and More

Published

17 hours ago

November 1, 2024

David A. Avila

Avila-Perspective-Chap-303-Spotlights-on-Lightweights-and-More

Those lightweights.

Whether junior lights, super lights or lightweights, it’s the 130-140 divisions where most of boxing’s young stars are found now or in the past.

Think Oscar De La Hoya, Sugar Shane Mosley and Floyd Mayweather.

Floyd Schofield (17-0, 12 KOs) a Texas product, hungers to be a star and takes on Mexico’s Rene Tellez Giron (20-3, 13 KOs) in a 12-round lightweight bout on Saturday, Nov. 2, at the Virgin Hotels Las Vegas in Las Vegas, Nevada.

DAZN will stream the Golden Boy Promotion card that includes a female undisputed flyweight championship match pitting Argentina’s Gabriela Alaniz and Gabriela Fundora.

Like a young lion looking to flex, Schofield (pictured on the left) is eager to meet all the other young lions and prove they’re not equal.

“I’ve been in the room with Shakur, Tank. I want to give everyone a good fight. I feel like my preparation is getting better, I work hard, I’ve dedicated my whole life to this sport,” said Schofield naming fellow lightweights Shakur Stevenson and Gervonta “Tank” Davis.

Now he meets Mexico’s Tellez who has never been stopped.

“I’m willing to do whatever it takes,” said Tellez.

Even in Las Vegas.

Verona, New York

Meanwhile, in upstate New York, a WBC junior lightweight title rematch finds Robson Conceicao (19-2-1, 9 KOs) looking to prove superior to former titlist O’Shaquie Foster (22-3, 12 KOs) on Saturday, Nov. 2, at the Turning Stone Resort and Casino in Verona, N.Y. ESPN+ will stream the Top Rank fight card.

Last July, Conceicao and Foster clashed and after 12 rounds the title changed hands from Foster to the Brazilian by split decision.

“I feel that a champion is a fighter who goes out there and doesn’t run around, who looks for the fight, who tries to win, and doesn’t just throw one or two punches and then moves away,” said Conceicao.

Foster disagrees.

“I hope he knows the name of the game is to hit and not get hit. That’s the name of the game,” said Foster.

Also on the same card is lightweight contender Raymond Muratalla (21-0, 16 KOs) who fights Mexico’s Jesus Perez Campos (25-5, 18 KOs).

Perez recently defeated former world champion Jojo Diaz last February in California.

“We’re made for challenges. I like challenges,” said Perez.

Muratalla likes challenges too.

“I think these fights are the types of fights I need to show my skills and to prove I deserve those title fights,” said Fontana’s Muratalla.

Female Undisputed Flyweight Championship

WBA, WBC and WBO flyweight titlist Gabriela “La Chucky” Alaniz (15-1, 6 KOs meets IBF titlist Gabriela Fundora (14-0, 6 KOs) on Saturday Nov. 2, at the Virgin Hotels Las Vegas in Las Vegas, Nevada. DAZN will stream the clash for the undisputed flyweight championship.

Argentina’s Alaniz clashed twice against former WBA, WBC champ Marlen Esparza with their first encounter ending in a dubious win for the Texas fighter. In fact, three of Esparza’s last title fights were scored controversially.

But against Alaniz, though they fought on equal terms, Esparza was given a 99-91 score by one of the judges though the world saw a much closer contest. So, they fought again, but the rematch took place in California. Two judges deemed Alaniz the winner and one Esparza for a split-decision win.

“I’m really happy to be here representing Argentina. We are ready to fight. Nothing about this fight has to do with Marlen. So, I hope she (Fundora) is ready. I am ready to prepare myself for the great fight of my life,” said Alaniz.

In the case of Fundora, the extremely tall American fighter at 5’9” in height defeated decent competition including Maria Santizo. She was awarded a match with IBF flyweight titlist Arely Mucino who opted for the tall youngster over the dangerous Kenia Enriquez of Mexico.

Bad choice for Mucino.

Fundora pummeled the champion incessantly for five rounds at the Inglewood Forum a year ago. Twice she battered her down and the fight was mercifully stopped. Fundora’s arm was raised as the new champion.

Since that win Fundora has defeated Christina Cruz and Chile’s Daniela Asenjo in defense of the IBF title. In an interesting side bit: Asenjo was ranked as a flyweight contender though she had not fought in that weight class for seven years.

Still, Fundora used her reach and power to easily handle the rugged fighter from Chile.

Immediately after the fight she clamored for a chance to become undisputed.

“It doesn’t get better than this, especially being in Las Vegas. This is the greatest opportunity that we can have,” said Fundora.

It should be exciting.

Fights to Watch

Sat. ESPN+ 2:50 p.m. Robson Conceicao (19-2-1) vs O’Shaquie Foster (22-3).

Sat. DAZN 5 p.m. Floyd Schofield (17-0) vs Rene Tellez Giron (20-3); Gabriela Alaniz (15-1) vs Gabriela Fundora (14-0).

Photo credit: Cris Esqueda / Golden Boy

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Bakhram Murtalaziev was the Fighter of the Month in October

Published

2 days ago

October 31, 2024

Arne K. Lang

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As we close the book on October, let’s look back at the month’s stellar performances. Kenshiro Teraji added another exclamation point to his brilliant career with an 11^th-round stoppage of Cristofer Rosales. England’s Jack Catterall, considered no more than a decent domestic-level talent for most of his career, showed that he had been underrated with a comprehensive 12-round decision over declining Regis Prograis. But the top performance, by a landslide, was delivered by Bakhram Murtalaziev who annihilated Tim Tszyu on Oct. 19 in Orlando, Florida.

Murtalaziev was undefeated (22-0, 16 KOs) and the reigning IBF junior middleweight champion, but he was the underdog and the “B” side. As champions go, and there are roughly five dozen across the 17 weight divisions, the California-based Russian ranked among the least well-known. He had won his title in Berlin with an 11^th-round stoppage of an unexceptional 38-year-old German-Ecuadorian campaigner, Jack Culcay, and he would be making his first defense.

Managed by Egis Klimas who also handles Oleksandr Usyk and Vasiliy Lomachenko, among others, Bakhram Murtalaziev came from a good barn in the vernacular of a horseplayer, but on paper that alone was insufficient to get him over the hump against Tim Tszyu who a few short months earlier was widely considered the best 154-pound boxer in the world.

That was before he met up with Sebastian Fundora who blemished his record, but that setback could have been written off as a fluke.

As we recall, Tszyu was scheduled to fight Keith Thurman in the initial PBC offering on Amazon Prime Video, but Thurman suffered a biceps injury in training and Fundora was bumped up from the undercard to fill the breach. With only 12 days’ notice, Tim Tszyu went from fighting a five-foot-seven fighter who fights out of an orthodox stance to fighting a southpaw who stood almost a full foot taller. The “Towering Inferno” has his limitations, but poses a special problem to anyone, let alone an opponent with little time to formulate a good game plan.

Tszyu was hampered in the Fundora fight by a gash on his hairline that hampered his vision. The injury happened in the second round when he ducked under Fundora and walked into an elbow. The gash bled copiously throughout the fight and yet the best that Fundora could do was win a split (albeit fair) decision.

To say that Tszyu failed to rebound from the Fundora misadventure would be putting it mildly. Murtalaziev steamrolled him, knocking him to the canvas four times in all before Tszyu’s corner tossed in the towel at the 1:55 mark of the third stanza. It was painful to watch. Referee Chris Young was faulted for allowing the match to continue as long as it did. Compounding Tszyu’s misery, his celebrated father, a first ballot Hall of Famer, was ringside. Kostya Tszyu hadn’t seen his oldest son fight in the flesh since Tim’s pro debut in 2016.

Although the dichotomy is imperfect, Tim Tszyu, who turns 30 on Saturday, is more of a puncher than a boxer. That may work against him so far as clawing his way back to a position of prominence. The noted boxing coach Stephen “Breadman” Edwards, a keen student of the history of boxing in the modern era, expressed this sentiment in a Q and A story for Boxing Scene. “Destructive fighters usually don’t come back to full capacity after bad KO losses,” he said, citing John Mugabi, Mike Tyson, George Foreman, Sonny Liston, and Naseem Hamed to illustrate his point. Moreover, added Edwards, “No one will ever be afraid of him again.”

But there were two stories that emerged from the Murtalaziev-Tszyu fight. Tim Tszyu crashed, but Bakhram Murtalaziev emerged from obscurity, announcing his presence (pardon the cliché) as a force to be reckoned with. As for his next assignment, the best guess is that it will come against Sebastian Fundora or Errol Spence Jr. who are expected to meet early next year. And based on Murtalaziev’s stunning performance in Orlando, it will be impossible to bet against him.

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Foreman-Moorer: 30 Years Later

Published

3 days ago

October 30, 2024

The Sweet Science

Foreman-Moorer: 30 Years Later

By TSS SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT JAMIE REBNER — In sports, middle-aged athletes are not supposed to beat opponents who are half their age and in their athletic primes. Only the greatest ones can use guile, technique, and experience to compensate for the dulling of speed, reflexes, and athleticism that have unavoidably eroded with time.

That is why George Foreman’s feat of reclaiming the heavyweight title at 45 is so impressive. It was thirty years ago this coming Tuesday, Nov 5, 1994, that Foreman scored a monumental upset in knocking out Michael Moorer to win back the title he had lost twenty years prior against Muhammad Ali in The Rumble in the Jungle. In doing so, Big George became the oldest heavyweight champion, breaking the record previously held by Jersey Joe Walcott, who had won the title at 38.

When Foreman beat Moorer, he was in the twilight of his second career, a comeback that began in 1987. George had retired in 1977 after losing to Jimmy Young and experiencing a spiritual awakening in his locker room. That led him to become a minister and devote himself to his family and congregation. During his retirement, he opened a youth center in Houston, which required much financial support, prompting him to return to the ring.

After winning 24 straight fights from 1987-1990, Foreman lost his first title shot by decision to Evander Holyfield in 1991. He rebounded from that loss with three more wins before getting a crack at the WBO title against Tommy Morrison in 1993. But his performance against Morrison was disappointing and he lost another decision. After that, Foreman was out of the ring for 17 months before he was gifted another title shot against Moorer.

Foreman got that gift because Moorer, due to his sullen demeanor and curtness with the media, was not a draw with the fans. He was also an unproven champion, having beaten Holyfield for two belts only seven months prior. So. Moorer needed a name opponent who could bring in the crowds for his first title defense. And the other top heavyweights like Oliver McCall (WBC champ), Lennox Lewis, and Riddick Bowe didn’t have close to Foreman’s drawing power. So. deserving or not, Foreman was chosen as the challenger to make a fight that would be worth the public’s attention and pockets.

Even Foreman was surprised by getting selected to fight Moorer. “I never in my wildest imagination thought I’d get a title shot again,” he told Associated Press sports columnist Tim Dahlberg. Still, George was determined to make his third time a charm.

But as motivated as George was, there was an irrefutable gap in speed between himself and the much younger champion. From the opening bell, Moorer used his superior quickness and reflexes to make Foreman look stiff and slow. And although George landed punches early on, he fired them one at a time while Moorer countered with multiple shots. But despite Moorer’s advantage in connects, his trainer Teddy Atlas advised him from the get-go not to stand in front of Foreman and make himself a stationary target for a right-hand bomb.

But Moorer failed to heed that advice as he continued to outwork Foreman in the middle rounds. Although he was winning, Moorer’s overconfidence kept him at close quarters, and he continued to circle unwisely to his left and into Foreman’s dangerous right hand. And despite absorbing many quality shots, Foreman never appeared hurt or discouraged thanks to his granite chin and unyielding resolve. He was determined to win and he was willing to walk through as many flush shots as he needed to do so.

With Moorer content to stay in range, Foreman gladly returned his firepower and he landed some telling right crosses, uppercuts, and plenty of thudding body blows during the battle. And while Moorer continued to pile up points and rounds, as long as George was marching forward and throwing shots, he had a puncher’s chance.

And with a minute to go in round ten, that punch came. After missing a three-punch combination, Foreman scored with a one-two, with the right hand landing on the forehead. He immediately repeated that combination but this time aimed the right hand lower on Moorer’s jaw. That slight adjustment caused his bulldozer right to collide perfectly with Moorer’s chin, sending the champion crashing to the canvas and sprawled onto his back. The champion couldn’t beat the count, and just like that, the fight was over, Moorer’s short-lived title run ending before it ever truly began.

With a single, shattering blow, Foreman etched his name into boxing history. Wearing the same trunks from Zaire 20 years before, he was now heavyweight champion of the world once again. It was a shocking result that defied conventional wisdom since seldom do 45-year-old boxers score knockouts over champions in their athletic primes. But Foreman reminded us that he was anything but your typical quadragenarian. He was special, and he had two distinct heavyweight championship reigns to prove it.

—

About the author:

Jamie Rebner lives in Toronto, Canada. He has been a freelance boxing writer since 2016 and his writing has appeared in The Fight City, Boxing News Online, The Ring, and Ringside Seat magazine. His Substack blog is Fight Fundamental, and he is currently writing a book about George Foreman’s comeback. He is also a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America. Follow him on Twitter @J_NReb.

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