Every Joe Gans Lightweight Title Fight – Part 8: Willie Fitzgerald

Published

3 years ago

July 17, 2021

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Gans is a wonderful fighter, but his showing in his fights during the last five months indicates that he has gone back to some extent. – The New York Evening World, January 9^th, 1904.

A fighter’s prime is a thing of tentative certainty. Whether or not a fighter remains “prime” is a debate that rages on internet messaging boards, twitter and among gamblers in perpetuity – whether a fighter remains within the range of his very best as a boxer is among the most important factors in determining both the future and the past in all matters fistic.

This is because it is not just a matter of predicting the fight or remaining a gambler in the black, but a matter of proper historical contextualisation. Instinctively, we understand that this matters, this is why you never hear people shouting about the ease with which Larry Holmes defeated Muhammad Ali, or with which Rocky Marciano defeated Joe Louis.

Each fighter is different, and each fighter’s prime is different, which is why deciphering it can be so difficult, but if we take a modern great like Manny Pacquiao, we probably see his very best years as being from 2006 when he legitimately got his weaker hand working, to his desperately close fight with Juan Manuel Marquez in 2008 when his calves started to bother him. Boxing is complex. It took eleven years for Pacquiao to reach his technical summit and when he did, he had but twenty-seven short months in which to enjoy it before his body began to betray him.

Every fighter is different, because every fighter relies upon technical acumen, physical capability and experience to a different degree. Bernard Hopkins at his best knows angles, distance and timing as well as any fighter of the last fifty years, and so his prime landed late, as he took advantage of experience to season his expertise. Roy Jones, on the other hand, peaked earlier and dipped off more dramatically because the fountain of his greatness was speed. Pacquiao required a glorious blend. What of Joe Gans?

Gans is not unusual in that he became his best self the day he picked up his title. In the past seven instalments, I hope I have managed to trace Gans from incomplete contender to dominant world-champion, a man whose experience bought him generalship to match his physical gifts and technical acumen. For Gans, make no mistake, was as much Bernard Hopkins as Roy Jones and in this, more like Manny Pacquiao in arc than either. The difference: Gans fought more often and over longer distances than any of them. In the first year of his prime, Pacquiao managed twenty-nine rounds, a lot for an elite fighter this century; Gans, despite winning mostly by knockout, fought a hundred in his. The wear and tear on even a genius like Gans was significant.

It is little wonder then that in the winter of 1903, talk began to turn to Joe Gans having “gone back.” He had by this time been in his prime nearly as many months as Manny Pacquiao would remain in his more than a hundred years later.

So, when he emerged from the breakneck barnburning tour which followed his longest break since he became champion, having suffered indifferent results and even a defeat, questions manifested for the first time since he ended Frank Erne’s championship reign. His next title opponent, in early January 1904, was to be Willie Fitzgerald, an Irishman who had relocated to New York City in pursuit of the riches the new pugilism enjoyed.

Fitzgerald was real. His career had brought him victories over Mike Sullivan, Charley Seiger and Gus Gardner; in April of 1903, he had been matched with the uncomfortably titled “white” lightweight champion and perpetual drawer of the colour-line, Jimmy Britt.

Fitzgerald seemed for a moment on the verge of a genuine upset when he dropped Britt in the final minute of the very first round. Appearing both bigger and stronger, Fitzgerald cut a figure standing over his more prestigious foe; in truth though, Britt was for the most part unharmed. Fitzgerald put a minor hurting on the world’s number one lightweight contender in the twentieth and final round, but in between, Britt was the man in control. He consistently targeted Fitzgerald’s gut and torso with what amounted to lightweight’s finest body attack. Fitzgerald dropped an uncontroversial points loss but Britt was impressed.

“He is a better man than Frank Erne,” he claimed. “He can take a punch and go the pace at a greater speed.”

Now things complicate themselves a little so I’m going to restate the timeline:

In April of 1903, Jimmy Britt defeated Fitzgerald over twenty rounds. Just before this, Gans had fought a title-fight with Steve Crosby, winning in eleven. The rest of 1903 was relatively quiet for Gans and included that three-month layoff before boxing that barnburning tour that included his most indifferent work post his title win. In January of 1904 he was to be matched with Fitzgerald.

However, before his three-month break but after he defeated Crosby, before he dropped points losses to welterweights Jack Blackburn and Sam Langford, Gans met Fitzgerald for a first time.

This is an intriguing move on the part of Joe Gans. As we discussed in Part 6, Britt’s anointing himself the “white lightweight champion” was problematic for Gans. It offered the public a choice in champions, and it was very possible that the public might conclude that Britt was to be preferred. Further muddying the waters was Britt’s outright refusal to meet the true champion on the grounds of his race. So just four weeks after the Britt fight, Gans met Fitzgerald on a clear mission to do what the white champion had been unable to do: stop him inside the distance.

On May 29^th, 1903 on Britt’s turf in San Francisco, Gans did just that, taking Fitzgerald out in ten rounds having failed to make weight for what was billed in some quarters as a title fight. No titles were going to change hands with the champion weighing in at just under 140lbs though, and the first real sign of indiscipline on the part of the champion manifested. Not in the ring though. He took the unsporting advantage and turned it into perhaps the most beautiful knockout of his career.

The San Francisco Call described “A jolty left which travelled but a few inches…Gans landed [the short left] then a right to the jaw with the precision and power of a steam hammer, turning Fitzgerald completely around.”

Fitzgerald then “sank slowly to his knees and then lay prone on the matt” while ten was intoned over his still form.

The press were besides themselves in praise for this performance. Gans was a “wonder” who fought “aggressively throughout” although “all styles of going seemed to suit him.”

Gans had the result he wanted, and it was straight up reported that Fitzgerald had been less impressive against Gans than he had been against Britt. Britt was piqued. Surrounded by pressmen he repeatedly stated that he felt Gans would not be able to land upon him as he had Fitzgerald and, eventually, yes, he would meet the champion but only if Gans would agree to make 133lbs.

Gans then, had succeeded in baiting Britt into a commitment, for all that it called for Gans to make a weight he did not favour. Furthermore, he had proven himself ahead of Britt insofar as the wider lightweight field went; referee Eddie Graney named Gans “in a class of his own.” This opinion was echoed behind this fight.

It is worth noting down Joe’s own opinion on the fight, summarised here from several different accounts:

“There was never a time in the fight I thought I would lose…He can hit hard with either glove and I was there to prevent his glove landing on my jaw…He did not hurt me at any stage of the battle…I did not find him hard to hit.”

This then, was the problem Gans had when it came to his first defence of 1904: he had already proven himself the direct superior to his challenger. Not three years before – months before. It underlined the problem a fighter of Joe’s class was faced with, how to find challenges on a landscape he had scorched free of all resistance. It was little wonder, perhaps, that his interest had begun to wane.

The fight was made at 135lbs at the Light Guard Armory, Detroit, on January 12^th, 1904. To the satisfaction of nobody, the fight was to be staged over ten rounds which was all that the law then permitted in these parts.

Gans stalked into Detroit on the 4^th; he seemed in no mood, maintaining silence while eager Detroit pressmen peppered him with questions. “He says little,” reported The Detroit Free Press, “leaving his manager to do the talking…in street attire Gans does not look like a lightweight. On close inspection, however, one can note his strong build.” The following day, Gans was in training, sparring a local middleweight at the Media Baths. Fitzgerald, meanwhile, set up at Cameron Cottage, accompanied by the famed Italian Iron Man Joe Grim who appeared to be coaching him as well as feeding him copious servings of spaghetti which he insisted reduced his chances of being knocked out. Harry Tuthill, who trained Young Corbett, arrived a few days later to finish up his training.

It snowed that week, the temperature dropping as far as fourteen degrees below zero; Gans took to the road, putting in five miles every day, not excessive but enough to keep him well in sight of 135lbs. For his part, and despite the preponderance of pasta in his diet, Fitzgerald curtailed his training on the seventh, finding himself below the required weight and a little sore from apparent over-training. Gans trained publicly that same day, impressing onlookers with the quickness of his work. There seemed indecision as to whether his “eastern critics” were off the mark in suggesting his decline was at hand, but it is equally clear that many of the Detroit newspapermen were seeing the champion in the flesh for the first time.

Both training camps proceeded efficiently and both men impressed the locals so the line was unmoved by fight night with Joe Gans a 2-1 favourite. This sent Al Herford charging about town offering to bet five-hundred dollars that Gans would win and five hundred dollars that he would do so within the ten scheduled rounds. It is strange to hear of a fighter’s organisation barrelling around during fight week looking for takers but not only was this normal but it was also freely reported by a cheerful press, whose offices were sometimes even the site of large-stake exchanges. Whether or not Herford found a home for his money is unrecorded, but it is known that if he made his bet on Gans inside the distance, he lost that money.

Gans, who hit his mark at the 6pm weigh in with ease, took control of the fight early in a way that must have seemed familiar to both he and Fitzgerald. His specific method was a short left jab to the face, a punch that must have looked dangerous to Fitzgerald given what happened to him in San Francisco, followed by a right hand to the body. It sounds simple, like something an experienced pugilist like Fitzgerald should have been able to solve, but these two punches worked as counters to almost any shot Fitzgerald could muster. “Confidently the aggressor,” reported The Free Press, “he followed the Brooklyn boy about the ring, the latter showing that he feared Gans in every exchange and frequently covering up and allowing the champion to punch at him at will.”

These words will now be familiar to readers of this series, another Gans opponent, another man passive with fear, another easy evening for the great champion. Surely this suggests to all that Gans remained in his prime? It certainly is possible. After flashing Fitzgerald to the canvas in the first with a left hook, Gans spent most of the first half of the fight in complete control. The fight was slow, but in every exchange Gans had the last word, sometimes doubling up with rights to the body. Fitzgerald was criticised for underusing his right hand in the early going, but it is a fact that Gans countered this punch mercilessly, dropping him off a right hand in the fourth.

At the bell to end the fifth though, the two were “swinging wild at the gong” according to The Philadelphia Inquirer, which had Fitzgerald frantically giving way after sucking up a Gans right-uppercut but continuing to fight even as he broke ground. Fitzgerald was dropped again in the eighth, either by a left-hand to the jaw or bundled over underneath that punch in something more akin to a slip; after eight he had yet to win a round on most ringside cards, but in the ninth, something changed.

The round started as any other, Fitzgerald landing meaningless, light punches, Gans landing hurtful ones, staggering his man with one chopping right, but instead of moving back, Fitzgerald closed and landed either three or four hard left hands to the body and a left hand to the jaw. Gans, caught out by an unexpected charge, shipped these punches and immediately began showing signs of distress. The bell spared him further punishment.

According to the Detroit Free Press, Gans returned to his corner “vomiting.” This was reported elsewhere, The Washington Times claiming “Gans went to his corner vomiting and to a certain extent in distress.” This then was the greatest crisis Joe’s ring career had suffered since Erne opened the finishing cut upon him in his very first title fight; he toed the line for the tenth with gritted teeth.

Champions are champions and despite the heavy punches he absorbed in the ninth, Gans contested the tenth. My sense though is that Fitzgerald took it away from him at the bell, The Free Press reporting a “straight left to Gans’s face and right to head and left to body and crosses right to jaw” to punctuate the round.

The Chicago Tribune was unimpressed with Gans, noting that “the champion is backing up” and was “in distress at the final gong, and had the contest been fifteen rounds instead of ten, he would have left the ring a beaten man.”

This is debatable, obviously, and based on the punishment Gans had dished out and the closeness of the tenth my suspicion is that he would have re-emerged as the general, but it is not possible to find this type of criticism of Gans in a title fight before the Fitzgerald rematch.

This was inconvenient for the champion. His greatest challenges, and the fights that would come to define him, still lay ahead, including the fight he most wanted. Joe’s next title defence would be against Jimmy Britt.

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Philly’s Jesse Hart Continues His Quest plus Thoughts on Tyson-Paul and ‘Boots’ Ennis

Published

4 hours ago

November 21, 2024

Luis A. Cortes III

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Jesse Hart (31-3, 25 KOs) returns to the ring tomorrow night (Friday, Nov. 22) on a Teflon Promotions card at the Liacouras Center on the campus of Temple University. During a recent media workout for the show, which will feature five other local fighters in separate bouts, Hart was adamant that fighting for the second time this year at home will only help in his continuing quest to push towards a second chance at a world championship. “Fighting at home is always great and it just makes sense from a business standpoint since I already have a name in the sport and in the city,” said Hart (pictured with his friend and training partner Joey Dawejko).

Hart’s view of where his career currently resides in relation to the landscape in the light heavyweight division leads you to believe that, at the age of 35, Hart is realistic about how far he can go before his career is over.

“Make good fights, win those fights, fight as much as I can and stay busy, that’s the way the light heavyweight division won’t be able to ignore me,” he says. Aside from two losses back in 2017 and 2018 to current unified cruiserweight champion Gilberto Ramirez at super middleweight, Hart’s only other defeat was to Joe Smith during Smith’s most successful portion of his career.

When attempts to make fights with (at the time) up-and-coming prospects like Edgar Berlanga and David Benavidez were denied with Hart being viewed as the typical high risk-low reward opponent, it was time to find another way. So, Hart decided to stay local after splitting with Top Rank Promotions post-surgery to repair his longtime right-hand issues and hooked up with Teflon Promotions, an upstart company that is the latest to take on the noble endeavor of trying to return North Broad Street and Atlantic City to boxing prominence.

In essence, it is a calculated move that is potentially a win-win situation for all parties. Continued success for Hart along with some of the titles at light heavyweight eventually being released from Artur Beterbiev’s grasp due to outside politics, and Jesse Hart just may lift up Teflon Promotions into a major player on the regional scene.

Tickets for Friday’s show are available on Ticketmaster platforms.

As we entered November, a glance at the boxing schedule made me wonder if it was possible for the sport to have a memorable month — one that could shine a light forward in boxing’s ongoing quest to regain relevance in today’s sports landscape. Having consecutive weekends with events that could spark interest in the pugilistic artform and its wonderful characters was what I was hoping for, but what we got instead was more evidence that boxing isn’t immune to modern business practices landing a one-two punch on the action both inside and outside of the ring.

Jaron “Boots” Ennis was expected to make a statement in his rematch with Karen Chukhadzian on Nov. 9, a statement to put the elite level champions around his weight class on notice. What we witnessed, however, was more evidence of how current champions in their prime can be hampered by having to navigate a business that functions through the cooperation of independent contractors. Ennis got the job done – he won – but it was a lackluster performance.

It’s time for Ennis to fight the fighters we already thought we would have seen him fight by now and I do believe there is some truth to Ennis rising to the occasion if there was a more noteworthy name across the ring.

—

Some positives emerged from the Mike Tyson-Jake Paul event the following week. Amanda Serrano, Katie Taylor, and women’s boxing are finally getting the public recognition they deserve. Mario Barrios’s draw against the tough Abel Ramos, also on the Netflix broadcast, was an action-packed firefight. So, mainstream America and beyond got to witness actual fights before being subjected to Paul’s latest circus.

Unfortunately for fans, but fortunately for Paul, the lone true boxing star in the main event dimmed out from an athletic standpoint decades ago. In this instance modern business practices allowed for a social media influencer to stage his largest money grab from a completely unnuanced public.

As Paul rose to the ring apron from the steps and looked around “Jerry’s World,” taking in the moment, it reminded me of an actual fighter when they’re about to enter the ring taking in the atmosphere before they risk their lives after a lifetime of dedication to try and realize a childhood dream. In this case though, this was a natural-born hustler realizing as he made it to the ring apron that his hustle was likely having its moment of glory.

In boxing circles, Jake Paul is viewed as a “necessary evil.” What occurs in his fights are merely an afterthought to the spectacle that is at the core of the social media realm that birthed him. Hopefully the public learned from the atrocity that occurred once the exhibition started that smoke and mirrors last for only so long. Hopefully Paul’s moment of being a boxing performer and acting like a true fighter comes to its conclusion. But he isn’t going away anytime soon, especially since his promotional company is now in bed with Netflix.

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Boxing Odds and Ends: Oscar Collazo, Reimagining ‘The Ring’ Magazine and More

Published

2 days ago

November 19, 2024

Arne K. Lang

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With little boxing activity over the next two weekends, there’s no reason to hold off anointing Oscar Collazo the Fighter of the Month for November. In his eleventh pro fight, Collazo turned heads with a masterful performance against previously undefeated Thammanoon Niyamtrong, grabbing a second piece of the title in boxing’s smallest weight class while ending the reign of the sport’s longest-reigning world title-holder. The match was on the undercard of the Nov. 16 “Latino Night” show in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia headlined by the cruiserweight tiff between Mexico’s Zurdo Ramirez and England’s Chris Billam-Smith.

Collazo was a solid favorite, but no one expected the fight would be as one-sided. Collazo put on a clinic, as the saying goes. He took the starch out of Niyamtrong with wicked body punches before ending matters in the seventh. A left uppercut sent the Thai to the canvas for the third time and the referee immediately stepped in and stopped it.

Collazo, wrote Tris Dixon, “dissected and destroyed a very good fighter.” Indeed. A former Muay Thai champion, Niyamtrong (aka Knockout CP Freshmart) brought a 25-0 record and was making the thirteenth defense of his WBA strap.

A Puerto Rican born in Newark, Jersey, Oscar Collazo turned pro after winning a gold medal in the 2019 Pan American games in Lima, Peru. He was reportedly named after Oscar De La Hoya (we will take that info with a grain of salt), names Hall of Famer Ivan Calderon as a mentor and is co-promoted by Hall of Famer Miguel Cotto.

Collazo, 27, won the WBO version of the 105-pound title in his seventh pro fight with a seven-round beatdown of Melvin Jerusalem. He won a world title faster than any Puerto Rican boxer before him.

His goal now, he says, is to become a unified champion. He would be the first from the island in the modern era. Although Puerto Rico has a distinguished boxing history – twelve Boricua boxers are enshrined in the International Boxing Hall of Fame — there hasn’t been a fully unified champion from Puerto Rico since the WBO came along in 1988.

The other belt-holders at 105 are the aforementioned Jerusalem (WBC) and his Filipino countryman Melvin Taduran (IBF). Both won their belts in Japan with upsets of the Shigeoka brothers, respectively Yudai (Jerusalem) and Ginjiro (Taduran). Collazo would be a massive favorite over either.

A far more attractive fight would pit Collazo against two-time Olympic gold medalist Hasanboy Dusmatov. In theory, this would be an easy fight to make as the undefeated Uzbek trains in Indio, California, a frequent stomping ground of Collazo’s co-promoter Oscar De La Hoya who had a piece of the action when Dusmatov made his pro debut in Mexico. However, it’s doubtful that Dusmatov’s influential advisor Vadim Kornilov would let him take such a treacherous fight until the match-up had been properly “marinated,” by which time they both may be competing in a higher weight class. The Puerto Rican, who began his pro career at 110, is big for the 105-pound division notes the noted boxing historian Matt McGrain who is partial to the little guys.

—

Outside the ropes, the big news in boxing in November was the news that The Ring magazine had been sold to Turki Alalshikh. The self-acclaimed Bible of Boxing, which celebrated its 100^th anniversary in 2022, was previously owned by a subsidiary of Oscar De La Hoya’s company, Golden Boy Enterprises, which acquired the venerable publication in 2007. Alalshikh purportedly paid $10 million dollars.

Alalshikh, the head of Saudi Arabia’s General Entertainment Authority, confirmed the sale on social media on Monday, Nov. 11.

“Earlier this week, I finalized a deal to acquire 100% of The Ring Magazine, and I want to make a few things clear,” he said. “The print version of the magazine will return immediately after a two year hiatus and it will be available in the US and UK markets. The magazine will be fully independent, with brilliant writers and focusing on every aspect in the sport of boxing. We will continue to raise the prestige of The Ring Titles, and plans are already underway to have a yearly extravagant awards ceremony to celebrate the very best in the boxing industry.”

Alalshikh, blessed with an apparently unlimited budget, is already the most powerful man in the sport and more than a few concerns have been raised about his latest venture, especially in light of an incident involving prominent British scribe Oliver Brown.

Brown, the chief sports writer for the Telegraph who had previously covered three of Tyson Fury’s fights in Saudi Arabia, had his credential pulled for the Joshua-Dubois show at Wembley Stadium after calling the event “a grisly conduit for glorifying the Saudi regime.”

“I frankly do not trust Alalshikh to keep his personal aims from influencing the publication’s content,” says boxing writer Patrick Stumberg. One thing is certain: So long as the publication remains in the hands of the Saudis, the word “sportswashing” will never appear in the pages of The Ring magazine.

The Ring is the second major online boxing magazine to change hands this year. In February, Boxing Scene, one of the most heavily-trafficked sites in the ecosystem, was sold to Canadian-American entrepreneur Garry Jonas, best known as the founder of ProBox, a promotional entity headquartered in Plant City, Florida.

—

Mike Tyson’s showing against Jake Paul was mindful of something that Jimmy Cannon once wrote: “…the flesh was corrupted by time. The mind operated as if it was in another man’s head…the talent has been contaminated by age.”

Cannon was describing Joe Louis in Louis’s farewell fight against Rocky Marciano.

True, Jake Paul is no Rocky Marciano. To include their names in the same sentence borders on sacrilege. But the fabled Brown Bomber was 37 years old when he was rucked into retirement by Marciano on that October night at Madison Square Garden. At age 58, Mike Tyson was old enough to be Joe Louis’s father and yet human lemmings by the thousands couldn’t resist betting on him.

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The Hauser Report: Some Thoughts on Mike Tyson vs. Jake Paul

Published

4 days ago

November 17, 2024

Thomas Hauser

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Jake Paul boxed his way to a unanimous decision over Mike Tyson at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, on Friday night. The bout, streamed live on Netflix, was one of the most-watched fights of all time and, in terms of the level of competition, boxing’s least-consequential mega-fight ever.

We’re living in a golden age for spectator sports. Sports generate massive amounts of money from engaged fan bases and are more popular now than ever before. Today’s athletes are more physically gifted, better conditioned, and more skilled than their predecessors. Their prowess is appreciated and understood by tens of millions of fans.

Not so for boxing. For the sweet science, this is an era of “fools’ gold.” Yes, fighters like Oleksandr Usyk, Canelo Alvarez, Terence Crawford, and Naoya Inoue bring honor to the sport. But boxing’s fan base has dwindled to the point where most people have no idea who the heavyweight champion of the world is. The sport’s dominant promoter has a business model that runs hundreds of millions of dollars a year in the red. And most fights of note are contested behind a paywall that shrinks the fan base even more. Few sports fans understand what good boxing is.

Mike Tyson is 58 years old. Once upon a time, he was the most destructive boxer in the world and “the baddest man on the planet.” Prior to last Friday night, he hadn’t fought in nineteen years and hadn’t won a fight since 2003.

Jake Paul is a 27-year-old social media personality who wasn’t born when Tyson lost his aura of invincibility at the hands of Buster Douglas. Paul began boxing professionally three years ago and, before fighting Tyson, had compiled a 10-1 (7 KOs) record against carefully chosen opponents.

Netflix has roughly 283 million subscribers globally, 84 million of them in North America. Recently, it made the decision to move into live sports. On December 25, it will stream the National Football League’s two Christmas games on an exclusive basis.

Netflix took note of the fact that Tyson’s 2020 exhibition against Roy Jones drew 1.6 million pay-per-view buys and concluded that Tyson-Paul had the potential to be the most-viewed fight of all time. It purchased rights to the fight as an attention grabber and subscription seller for (a best-estimate) $40 million.

Tyson-Paul was originally scheduled for July 20. A compliant Texas Department of Licensing and Regulations sanctioned the bout as an official fight, not an exhibition. In deference to Tyson’s age, the fighters agreed that the match would be contested over eight two-minute rounds (women’s rules) with 14-ounce gloves (heavyweight gloves normally weigh ten ounces).

But on May 26, Tyson became nauseous and dizzy while on a flight from Miami to Los Angeles and needed medical assistance for what was later described as a bleeding ulcer. The fight was rescheduled for November 15. Later, Tyson described the incident on the plane as follows: “I was in the bathroom throwing up blood. I had, like, eight blood transfusions. The doctor said I lost half my blood. I almost died. I lost 25 pounds in eleven days. Couldn’t eat. Only liquids. Every time I went to the bathroom, it smelled like tar. Didn’t even smell like shit anymore. It was disgusting.”

Does that sound like a 58-year-old man who should be fighting?

As Eliot Worsell noted, Tyson-Paul contained all the elements of a successful reality show. “There are for a start,” he wrote, “celebrities involved, two of them. One is ‘old famous’ and the other ‘new famous’ and both bring large audiences with them. They need only tap something on their phone to guarantee the entire world pays attention. And that, in this day and age, is all you really need to green light a project like this.”

But Worsell added a word of caution, observing, “This has been the story of Jake Paul’s pro boxing career to date; one of smoke and mirrors, one of sycophants telling him only what he wants to hear. He has been fed a lie just as Mike Tyson is now being fed a lie, and on November 15 they will both play dress-up and be watched by millions. They will wear gloves like boxers and they will move like boxers – one hampered in this quest by old age and the other by sheer incompetence – and they will together make ungodly sums of money.”

There was early talk that 90,000 fans would jam AT&T Stadium on fight night. Initially, ticket prices ranged from $381 to $7,956. And those prices were dwarfed by four tiers of VIP packages topped by a two-million-dollar “MVP Owner’s Experience” that included special ringside seating at the fight for six people, luxury hotel accommodations, weigh-in and locker room photo ops, boxing gloves signed by Tyson and Paul, and other amenities.

But by Monday of fight week, ticket prices had dropped to as little as $36. Ringside seats were available for $900. And the press release announcing the eventual MVP Owner’s Experience sale backtracked a bit, saying the package was “valued at $2 million” – not that the actual sale price was $2 million. It also appeared that the purchase price included advertising for the law firm that purchased the package since the release proclaimed, “Just as every fighter in the ring stands to represent resilience, grit, and the pursuit of victory, TorkLaw stands in the corner of the people, fighting for justice and empowering those who need it most.”

That said, the fight drew 72,300 fans (inclusive of giveaway tickets) to AT&T Stadium. And the live gate surpassed $18 million making it the largest onsite gate ever in the United States for a fight card outside of Las Vegas. More than 60 million households watched the event live around the world.

The undercard featured a spirited fight between Mario Barrios and Abel Ramos that ended in a draw. Then came the second dramatic showdown between Katie Taylor and Amanda Serrano.

Taylor-Serrano II was for all four major sanctioning body 140-pound belts. Two years ago, Katie and Amanda did battle at Madison Square Garden on a historic night that saw Taylor emerge with a controversial split-decision win. Katie is now 38 years old and her age is showing. Amanda is 36. Taylor was an early 6-to-5 betting favorite in the rematch but the odds flipped late in Serrano’s favor.

Amanda began Taylor-Serrano II in dominating fashion and wobbled Katie just before the bell ending round one. That set the pattern for the early rounds. Serrano looked like she could hurt Taylor, and Taylor didn’t look like she could hurt Serrano.

Then in round four, Serrano got hurt. A headbutt opened a gruesome gash on her right eyelid. As the bout progressed, the cut became more dangerous. From an armchair perspective, it looked as though the fight should have been stopped and the result determined by the judges’ abbreviated scorecards. But the ring doctor who examined Serrano allowed it to continue even though the flow of blood seemed to handicap Amanda more and more with each passing round.

In round eight, referee Jon Schorle took a point away from Taylor after the fourth clash of heads that he thought Katie had initiated. By then, Serrano’s face resembled a gory Halloween mask and the bout had turned into a non-stop firefight. Each woman pushed herself as far as it seemed possible to go.

In the eyes of most observers, Serrano clearly won the fight. This writer scored the bout 96-93 in Amanda’s favor. Then the judges had their say. Each one favored Taylor by a 95-94 margin.

“My God!” blow-by-blow commentator Mauro Ranallo exclaimed after the verdict was announced. “How does one rob Amanda Serrano after a performance like that?”

In keeping with the hyperbole of the promotion, one might say that it was the most-watched ring robbery (although not the worst) in boxing history.

CompuBox is an inexact tabulation. But there’s a point at which the numbers can’t be ignored. According to CompuBox, Serrano outlanded Taylor in nine of ten rounds with an overall 324-to-217 advantage in punches landed.

From a boxing standpoint, Taylor-Serrano II made the evening special. Casual fans who don’t know much about the sweet science saw a very good fight. But they also saw how bad judging undermines boxing.

Meanwhile, as good as Taylor-Serrano II was, that’s not what Netflix was selling to the public. Jake Paul’s most recent events had engendered disappointing viewer numbers. This one was a cultural touchstone because of Tyson.

Paul has worked hard to become a boxer. In terms of skills, he’s now a club fighter (which is more than 99.9 percent of the population could realistically dream of being). So, what happens when a club fighter fights a 58-year-old man who used to be great?

Jack Johnson fought until the age of 53, losing four of his last six bouts. And the two he won were against opponents named Rough House Wilson (who was disqualified in what would be his only recorded professional fight) and Brad Simmons (who was barred from fighting again in Kansas because he was believed to have thrown the fight against Johnson).

Larry Holmes fought until age 52, knocking out 49-year-old Mike Weaver at age 51 and winning a unanimous decision over Eric Esch (aka Butterbean) in his final bout.

Paul was a 2-to-1 betting favorite. Serious PED testing for the fight was a murky issue but seems to have been minimal. Taylor and Serrano underwent VADA testing in advance of their bout. Tyson and Paul didn’t.

Tyson weighed in for the contest at 228.4 pounds; Paul at 227.2 (well over his previous high of 200). Following the weigh-in, Mike and Jake came face to face for the ritual staredown and Mike slapped Jake. But the incident was self-contained with no ripple effect and had the feel of a WWE confrontation.

That raised a question that was fogging the promotion: “Would Tyson vs. Paul be a ‘real’ fight or a pre-arranged sparring session (which was what Tyson vs. Roy Jones appeared to be)?”

That question was of particular note because sports betting is legal in 38 states and 31 of them were allowing wagers on the fight.

Nakisa Bidarian (co-founder of Paul’s promotional company) sought to lay that issue to rest, telling ESPN, “There’s no reason for us to create a federal fraud, a federal crime. These are pro fights that consumers are making legal bets on. We have never and we’ll never do anything that’s other than above board and one hundred percent a pro fight unless we come out clearly and say, ‘Hey, this is an exhibition fight that is a show.'”

Tyson looked old and worried during his ring walk and wore a sleeve on his right knee. The crowd was overwhelmingly in his favor. But it’s an often-repeated truism that the crowd can’t fight. And neither could Mike.

Once upon a time, Tyson scored nine first-minute knockouts in professional fights. Not first-round. First-minute.

Against Paul, “Iron Mike” came out for round one as hard as he could (which wasn’t very hard) while Jake kept a safe distance between them. Then Tyson tired and took all the air out of the fight. By round three, he was in survival mode with his head tucked safely behind his 14-ounce gloves. And Jake didn’t have the skills to hurt him.

The CompuBox numbers favored Paul by a 78-to-18 margin in punches landed. In other words, Tyson landed an average of two punches per round. The judges’ scores were 80-72, 79-73, 79-73 in Jake’s favor. It was a “real” fight but a bad one.

“I love Mike Tyson,” Terence Crawford posted on X afterward. “But they giving him too much credit. He looked like trash.”

Prior to the bout, Tris Dixon wrote, “Tyson-Paul is a weird event, and I can’t think of anything even remotely like it in terms of the level of fighters, celebrity, and their ages. The event is unique, and morally and ethically it is questionable. It is a cynical cash grab. I can’t see it being particularly entertaining as a high-level sporting event. But I’m sure once it starts you won’t be able to take your eyes off it.”

All true. But let’s remember that there was a time when Mike Tyson was universally recognized as the best fighter in the world. Not many people in history have been able to say that.

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Thomas Hauser’s email address is thomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His most recent book – MY MOTHER and me – is a personal memoir available at www.amazon.com/My-Mother-Me-Thomas-Hauser/dp/1955836191/ref=sr_1_1?crid=5C0TEN4M9ZAH&keywords=thomas+hauser&qid=1707662513&sprefix=thomas+hauser%2Caps%2C80&sr=8-1

In 2004, the Boxing Writers Association of America honored Hauser with the Nat Fleischer Award for career excellence in boxing journalism. In 2019, Hauser was selected for boxing’s highest honor – induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

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