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Triller, Holyfield, and Trump: Did Evander Get Hustled? (Part 2)

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Triller, Holyfield, and Trump: Did Evander Get Hustled? Part Two of a Two-Part Story

The last thing a fighter loses isn’t his legs, speed, or power. It’s his ego.

Evander Holyfield was a great fighter. His victories over Mike Tyson, Riddick Bowe, Buster Douglas, George Foreman, Larry Holmes, and Dwight Muhammad Qwai are the stuff of legend. But Holyfield is 58 years old. Prior to fighting Vitor Belfort on September 11, he hadn’t fought in more than ten years. He had nothing left as a fighter except his ego.

Evander needed money. After the exhibition between Mike Tyson and Roy Jones engendered a reported 1.6 million pay-per-view buys, he thought he knew where to find it. Tyson was a goose that could lay a golden egg. But where fighting Holyfield again was concerned, Iron Mike could have been forgiven for thinking, “Been there, done that. It didn’t work out well the first two times, so why do it again?”

On March 22, 2021, Kris Lawrence (Holyfield’s manager) issued a media release stating that Tyson’s representatives had turned down a $25 million guarantee to fight Evander at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami on May 29. “We thought this was a done deal,” Lawrence said. “But it fell apart when Tyson’s people declined all offers. We were negotiating in good faith all along and it appears we just ended up wasting our time.”

Then Triller came calling.

On April 16, 2021 (one day before Jake Paul vs. Ben Askren), Holyfield and Kevin McBride attended a press conference in Atlanta where it was announced that they would face each other on the undercard of Teofimo Lopez vs. George Kambosos (then scheduled for June 5 at LoanDepot Park in Miami).

McBride – best known as “the conqueror of Mike Tyson” – had last fought in 2011 when he was knocked out by Mariusz Wach at Mohegan Sun in Connecticut. He’d lost six of his final seven fights and was just shy of 48 years old.

After losing to Wach, McBride was placed on an indefinite medical suspension by the Mohegan Tribe Department of Athletic Regulation with the notation “needs neuro and MRI.” There had been no administrative change in his status since then.

Multiple sources say that Holyfield-McBride was to have been an exhibition with neither man using best efforts to hurt the other. Informed sources say that Evander was to receive slightly more than $7,000,000 and McBride $500,000.

Soon after Holyfield-McBride was announced, Triller moved Lopez-Kambosos to June 19. But when the new date was set, Holyfield-McBride had been taken off the card. On May 13, Triller announced that Holyfield-McBride would be rescheduled for an unspecified date in August. At the end of May, as mandated by contract, Triller sent Holyfield a substantial check as an advance. But the fight wasn’t rescheduled.

On September 1, Holyfield filed a demand for arbitration against Triller, alleging breach of contract and demanding the unpaid portion (approximately $5,000,000) of what was to have been his purse for the exhibition against McBride. Then Oscar De La Hoya contracted COVID and Triller concluded that it could salvage its September 11 card and settle its dispute with Holyfield at the same time by making Holyfield-Belfort. McBride was paid $250,000 in step-aside money, and Holyfield-Belfort was on.

Or was it?

On August 11, 2021, Triller had announced a pay-per-view undercard for De LaHoya vs. Belfort consisting of Anderson Silva vs. Tito Ortiz, Andy Vences vs. Jono Carroll, and David Haye vs. Joe Fournier. Then California State Athletic Commission executive director Andy Foster refused to sanction Haye-Fournier as an official fight, which seemed like the right move. Fournier is a London-born entrepreneur (inaccurately described as a “billionaire”) who’d compiled a 9-0 ring record but whose five previous fights had been against opponents with a composite ring record of 2 wins, 40 losses, and 37 KOs by. Also, Fournier and Haye were friends. At that point, there was talk of a split-site event with Haye-Fournier moving to Miami or, alternatively, being clearly labeled an “exhibition.”

Holyfield-Belfort was more troubling to Foster. As a person ages, his or her brain begins to shrink. This means that the veins connecting the brain to its coverings are at increased risk of a brain bleed when the head is struck.

Holyfield is 58 years old and had been hit in the head thousands of times by men who hit much harder than Belfort. But no matter how limited in power Vitor’s punches might be – and no matter what the pre-fight understanding between the fighters might have been – any blows to the head that landed on Evander had the potential to cause serious damage.

The California State Athletic Commission refused to approve Holyfield-Belfort.

“I was not agreeable with the match based on a variety of regulatory factors,” Foster later said. “There were issues as to whether it was going to be an exhibition or a fight, and we did not have adequate time for Evander to go through an appropriate licensing process.”

The Florida Athletic Commission allowed what California wouldn’t.

“They tried California,” Association of Boxing Commissions president Mike Mazzulli told this writer. “Andy turned it down, and I commend him for that. I reached out to the Florida commission on several occasions and did not get a call back. I hope they understand the consequences of something like this. It was dangerous and a disgrace to boxing. It was a fiasco and I think it was horrible.”

But was Holyfield-Belfort to be an exhibition or a fight? Evander and Vitor signed separate contracts. It’s unclear what Vitor’s contract said. However, multiple sources say that Holyfield’s contract made it clear that the fighters would not use best efforts to win the fight.

“I knew from the beginning that it wasn’t supposed to be a legitimate boxing match,” Mike Mazzulli says. “You can quote me on that. I’m one hundred percent sure the contract was written as an exhibition.”

“There were meticulous negotiations as to how things would be conducted,” another person familiar with the situation says. “Evander went into the fight thinking that it was an exhibition with each man making an effort to put on a good show for the fans. That was the contractual understanding he had for Kevin McBride and that’s what he had here. Evander’s mindset was ‘we’ll go out, put on a show, and get a good payday.’ I don’t know what Belfort signed. I only know what Evander signed. Evander had no intention of hurting the other guy.”

Multiple sources also say that the contract Holyfield signed contained a confidentiality clause and prohibited him from publicly calling the event an exhibition.

Meanwhile, Triller was promoting the event as a fight. And a compliant Florida Athletic Commission went along with that notion. On September 8 (three days before the event), FAC executive director Patrick Cunningham issued a statement that read, “The Florida Athletic Commission has approved the Evander Holyfield vs. Vitor Belfort bout as a fully regulated professional boxing match. It will be conducted under the Unified Rules of Boxing and scored by three judges on the 10-point must system. All boxers on this card have successfully met all requirements to be licensed by the Florida Athletic Commission.”

Similarly, Triller’s promotional material for Holyfield-Belfort was marketing the event as a “fight,” not an exhibition. And Triller arranged for it to be entered on BoxRec.com (the official registry for the Association of Boxing Commissions) as an official fight. Then Mike Mazzulli stepped in.

“We were not going to allow it to be placed on BoxRec,” Mazzulli says. “We contacted them, explained the situation, and BoxRec removed it from its listing of official fights.”

At the final pre-fight press conference on September 9, both Holyfield and Belfort presented their encounter as a real fight. When asked specifically if it would be an exhibition, Evander responded, “All I know is it’s a fight and they got the rules. If I can get him in one second, I’ll get him in one second. I do what I have to do.”

During fight week for Tyson-Jones, Donald Trump Jr (who has seven million Twitter followers) had sent out five tweets supporting the event and sharing links to promotional videos and pay-per-view ordering information. For Holyfield-Belfort, Triller went one giant step further, offering viewers what it called a “Donald Trump alternative commentary” stream with live onsite “unfiltered boxing commentary” at no extra charge on top of the $49.99 pay-per-view buy.

At the September 9 press conference, Donald Trump Jr talked for thirteen minutes, noting his father’s “total recall” of fights from decades ago and voicing the view that it was “really cool” that he and his father would be commentating on the fights. He also opined, “Americans are learning the hard way that they’ve been lied to and manipulated by the media. You’re seeing the results of that every day. I wake up every day, I go to sleep, thinking that we’ve hit rock bottom and then you see another thing. It goes on and on.”

Later in the proceedings, Donald Trump Sr came on an audio feed and answered pre-screened questions for seven minutes, ending with the thought that, if he had to fight somebody or box somebody, “I think probably my easiest fight would be Joe Biden. I think he would go down very very quickly.”

Thereafter, Jerry Izenberg (the dean of American sportswriters who, unlike either Trump, actually served in the Armed Forces), noted that Joe Biden, Barack Obama, and George W. Bush would all commemorate the twentieth anniversary of 9/11 by visiting attack sites and closed his column with a thought regarding Holyfield-Belfort: “The bad news: It will cost you $50 to see this farce. The good news: You can save every penny of it by simply not watching.”

When fight night came, Ray Flores and Shawn Porter carried the regular (sans Trump) blow-by-blow commentary. Mario Lopez was the emcee. Ashley Haas served as a roving interviewer. References to a “sold-out arena” were somewhat disingenuous. The Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino theater has three levels. Two of them were curtained off.

Todd Grisham and a series of rotating mixed martial artists were on the alternative commentary desk with Donald Trump Sr and Donald Trump Jr. Trump Sr’s comments often centered on himself. Trump Jr’s comments often centered on himself or his father.

Trump Sr began his commentary by attacking “some very bad decisions” made by Joe Biden with regard to Afghanistan. Later, in a tribute to America, scantily-clad women carried American flags around the ring prior to the singing of the National Anthem after which the crowd chanted “We want Trump” and “Knock out Biden.”

Trump Sr also expressed delight at being in Florida: “We had a tremendous result in Florida. We love Florida. And they ran the election clean. That’s very important . . . You have a lovely crowd here. You’ve got so many [pro-Trump] signs. I love the signs . . . If you do a lot of talking, you have to back it up. I do a lot of talking and I won.”

After one fight, Trump Sr cautioned, “Let’s see what happens with the scoring. It’s like elections. It could be rigged.”

Trump Jr once again praised his father’s recall of fights. But that recall failed Trump Sr when he started talking about George Foreman vs. Michael Moorer and couldn’t remember Moorer’s name. Then, in going off on a tangent to show off his great knowledge of boxing, Trump Sr and Grisham confused Gennady Golovkin with Sergey Kovalev. Trump Sr also voiced the view on several occasions that changing championship fights from fifteen to twelve rounds “really hurt boxing.”

The first “fight” of the evening matched David Haye against Joe Fournier in an encounter that had all the credibility of a WWE confrontation but wasn’t choreographed nearly as well. Haye fought like a boxing instructor who was sparring with a pupil of limited ability and had promised ahead of time that he wouldn’t hurt him. Fournier boxed with the confidence of a man who had an understanding with his opponent that all would be well. This lasted for eight long two-minute rounds after which the judges rendered an 80-71, 79-72, 79-72 verdict in Haye’s favor.

Next up, Jono Carroll won a 97-93, 97-93, 95-95 majority decision over Andy Vences in a tedious affair that saw thirty seconds of action spread over ten rounds. After that, in a match-up of previously-retired, 46-year-old MMA fighters, Anderson Silva knocked out Tito Ortiz in 81 seconds.

Then it was time for Holyfield-Belfort. The contest was scheduled for eight two-minute rounds. Holyfield had weighed in at 225 pounds, Belfort at 206.

Watching Evander in the ring was sad. His balance was poor. His reflexes were shot. He pawed with his jab and seemed to have no defense against punches. Fifty-five seconds into the contest, Belfort landed a straight left to the body that knocked Holyfield off balance and pushed him back into the ropes. Then he attacked. Evander covered up and, seeming to understand at this point that he was in a real fight, threw a wild left hook that looked like it was designed to hurt. But it missed by a wide margin and his momentum caused him to plummet into the bottom ring strand and then to the canvas.

Holyfield rose. Belfort attacked again and, at the 1:22 mark, dropped Evander with a left uppercut to the jaw. Evander beat the count but was in trouble. Showing no mercy, Belfort threw eighteen unanswered punches. One minute 49 seconds into the round, referee Sammy Burgos stopped the fight.

When it was over, Holyfield complained to Todd Grisham about the stoppage and said he’d still like to fight Mike Tyson. Belfort said he’d like to fight Jake Paul next and called him “a little bitch.” Ryan Kavanaugh and Triller executive chairman Bobby Sarnevesht then told Grisham that Triller would put up a $30 million winner-take-all purse for Belfort vs. Jake Paul on Thanksgiving. That bout is unlikely to come to pass since Paul has an exclusive multi-fight contract with Showtime.

Several days after Holyfield-Belfort, a source with knowledge of what transpired told this writer, “Evander was fighting Belfort like David Haye fought Fournier. Then Belfort started unloading on him, and Evander realized it was for real and threw a left hook to put him in his place. But he missed, fell into the ropes, and went down.

“I was with Evander in his suite after the fight,” the same source continued. “One of the first things he said was, ‘I couldn’t believe how hard the guy was throwing. When I realized he was trying to hurt me, I threw back. But before I could change my mindset and put things together, I got knocked down. I got up and was covering up the way you’re supposed to and the referee stopped the fight.”

So . . . Where does all of this leave boxing?

First, Holyfield got a lot of money and that’s good. I hope it’s invested wisely so he can live off the income and be financially secure for the rest of his life.

Second, to quote Mark Kriegel, “Boxing can’t survive, much less grow, if it keeps pushing out its past at the expense of its present and its future.”

And as Matt Christie wrote, “I don’t care how many new eyes they bring to the sport; creating this new precedent, which essentially says it’s okay for boxers who long ago realized they shouldn’t be boxing anymore to come back and take more punches is not just irresponsible. It’s deadly.”

Holyfield-Belfort seems to have performed poorly in the marketplace. A well-placed source says that FITE (which had exclusive streaming rights) chalked up approximately 50,000 buys. Add on cable and, most likely, the total number of buys will be in the neighborhood of 125,000.

That’s bad news for Triller. Counting fighter purses, music acts, Donald Trump Sr and Jr and other talent costs, production, publicity, travel, and the like, the promotion is estimated to have cost between $15 million and $20 million to mount. And unlike some past events that Triller might have classified as loss leaders, this one brought far more bad publicity than good. And no! Not all publicity is good publicity. Triller got dragged over the coals on this one.

Sports have always been about entertainment, and sports are monetized as entertainment. Boxing, at the moment, isn’t very entertaining. It isn’t giving the public the fights that the public wants. To fill this void, a wave of trash boxing is flooding the market.

But trash boxing won’t save the sweet science. Sports don’t thrive on sideshow events. The NBA slam-dunk contest and three-point competition enliven All-Star Weekend, but the league is built around regular-season games and the play-offs. Football fans might be intrigued by the idea of a punt-pass-kick competition between Peyton Manning and Brett Favre, but that competition would never outdraw an NFL playoff game. Boxing can’t be healthy if sideshows are the main event.

Keep in mind though; the proliferation of trash boxing is a symptom of boxing’s problems, not the cause. Trash boxing in and of itself isn’t bad for boxing. In recent years, boxing has been bad for boxing.

Photo credit: Amanda Westcott / Triller Fight Club

This is Part Two of a two-part series. Part One can be found HERE.

 Thomas Hauser’s email address is thomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His next book – Broken Dreams: Another Year Inside Boxing – will be published this autumn by the University of Arkansas Press. In 2004, the Boxing Writers Association of America honored Hauser with the Nat Fleischer Award for career excellence in boxing journalism. In 2019, he was selected for boxing’s highest honor – induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

Check out more boxing news on video at the Boxing Channel

To comment on this story in the Fight Forum CLICK HERE

Thomas Hauser is the author of 52 books. In 2005, he was honored by the Boxing Writers Association of America, which bestowed the Nat Fleischer Award for career excellence in boxing journalism upon him. He was the first Internet writer ever to receive that award. In 2019, Hauser was chosen for boxing's highest honor: induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame. Lennox Lewis has observed, “A hundred years from now, if people want to learn about boxing in this era, they’ll read Thomas Hauser.”

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The Hauser Report: What’s Going On With Premier Boxing Champions?

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Eight years ago, Al Haymon unveiled what many thought would be the future of boxing. The boxing community had been awash in rumors for months. Haymon was amassing a war chest totaling hundreds of millions of dollars with the help of a venture capital fund in an effort to take over the sport . . . Haymon was signing hundreds of fighters to managerial and advisory contracts . . . Haymon was planning some sort of TV series . . . Time-buys on multiple networks for an entity called Premier Boxing Champions (PBC) were confirmed.

On March 7, 2015, Haymon began the rollout of his plan when NBC televised the inaugural PBC offering – a fight card featuring Keith Thurman and Adrien Broner in separate bouts. Free boxing. On network television.

But the plan fell short of expectations. Advertisers didn’t come onboard. DAZN and then Saudi Arabia became the flavor of the month. Now PBC is seeking to reassert itself through an alliance with Amazon. The first “PBC on Prime Video” offering will be a pay-per-view event on March 30 from the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. But PBC isn’t the power it once was. No one talks about Al Haymon taking over boxing anymore.

Amazon will distribute the PBC show. It wants to build a live pay-per-view platform for multiple events, and this is an early foray into that realm. It has no interest in playing the sort of role that HBO and Showtime played in boxing. Amazon (like In Demand) will take and distribute the product it’s given.

The PBC pay-per-view events that are streamed on Prime Video will also be available to viewers through other streaming platforms like PPV.com as well as linear-TV cable and satellite PPV distributors.

In addition, Prime Video has said that it will stream a series of “free” (with a subscription to Amazon Prime) PBC Championship Boxing events in the United States and other designated countries on an exclusive basis.

The degree to which Amazon will provide a marketing push for PBC’s shows is unclear at the present time.

Four fights will be on the March 30 PPV stream. The main event was to have matched Keith Thurman vs. Tim Tszyu. Eight years ago when he headlined PBC’s inaugural telecast on NBC, Thurman was young and fresh. Now he’s 35 years old and has won only one fight in the preceding five years (a ten-round decision over Mario Barrios). Tszyu (the son of Kostya Tszyu) was eased into the WBO 154-pound title through an “interim” portal and is being groomed for a big-money fight down the road.

Then, earlier today (March 18), it was reported that Thurman had been injured in training camp and Sebastian Fundora (who’d been slated to fight Serheii Bohachuk on the undercard) will likely face Tszyu. Fundora was speeding along a fast track until his most recent fight which saw him pitching a shutout against Brian Mendoza when a one-punch knockout in round seven derailed his dream.

Sebastian Fundora

Sebastian Fundora

The primary supporting bouts on the pay-per-view stream are expected to be Erislandy Lara vs. Michael Zerafa and Rolly Romero vs. Isaac Cruz.

Lara is forty years old. During the past five years, he has fought Ramon Alvarez, Greg Vendetti, Thomas LaManna, and Gary O’Sullivan (which somehow enabled him to claim the WBA 160-pound belt). Zerafa’s primary qualification seems to be that (like Tszyu) he’s from Australia.

Romero is a tiresome loudmouth who often fails to back up his talk. He was knocked out by Gervonta Davis and was trailing Ismael Barroso on all three judges’ scorecards when a premature stoppage by referee Tony Weeks gifted him the WBA 140-pound belt. Cruz went the distance in a losing effort against Davis.

Former Showtime Sports president Stephen Espinoza has been consulted with regard to production on the March 30 PPV stream. As of this writing, the commentating team hasn’t been announced (which is odd since the event is less than two weeks away).

Meanwhile, the rest of the sports landscape is rapidly changing.

On January 23, it was announced that Netflix (Prime Video’s most formidable competitor with 247 million subscribers) had signed a deal to stream WWE’s flagship wrestling show – Raw. The ten-year deal will cost Netflix roughly five billion dollars. Netflix can opt out of the deal after five years or, if it chooses, extend it for another ten years.

Then, on March 7, Netflix furthered its commitment to “trash sports” when it announced that Mike Tyson and Jake Paul will meet in the ring in Texas on July 20 in an encounter to be streamed live on Netflix. It’s unclear whether the encounter will be a “fight” or a glorified sparring session.

Adding to the mix; Disney, Fox, and Warner Brothers announced on February 6 that they will launch a joint subscription streaming service later this year that will bundle sports content from ESPN and affiliated networks (such as ABC, ESPN2, ESPNU, SECN, ACCN, ESPNEWS), the Warner Brothers’ Discovery networks that showcase sports (TNT, TBS, TruTV), and Fox (the Fox broadcast network in addition to FS1, FS2 and BTN).

But back to PBC on Prime Video. If the March 30 fight card were streamed as part of the Amazon Prime membership package, it would be a plus for boxing fans. But it won’t be. It’s a pay-per-view event. And even before Thurman’s injury, it wasn’t pay-per-view-worthy as that term was once understood.

You get only one chance to make a first impression. This isn’t a good first impression for PBC on Prime Video.

***

On December 17, I posted a column in which I urged that Gerry Cooney and Cedric Kushner be included on the ballot for induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame. There’s another, more obvious omission that I’d like to address.

Al Haymon has been at the center of the boxing universe for two decades. He built his power through a series of alliances with HBO (his point person was Kery Davis), Golden Boy (Richard Schaefer), and investors (Waddell & Reed) and maintained it through dealings with Showtime (Stephen Espinoza) and various other networks. There were times when it seemed as though he was on the verge of “taking over boxing.” Now Saudi Arabian oil money is the dominant force. But Haymon is breaking new ground through an association between Premier Boxing Champions and Amazon Video.

Haymon likes to style himself as an “advisor” or “manager.” In reality, he functions as a promoter. But labels are irrelevant. The bottom line is that no one has had a greater influence on boxing over the past twenty years than Al Haymon. He belongs in the International Boxing Hall of Fame, and the first step toward that end is to put his name on the ballot for induction.

Thomas Hauser’s email address is thomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His next book — “MY MOTHER and me” — is a personal memoir that will be published by Admission Press this spring and is available for pre-order at Amazon.com. https://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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Dillian Whyte Returns from Purgatory and Brushes Away a Wimpy Opponent in Ireland

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Dillian Whyte Returns from Purgatory and Brushes Away a Wimpy Opponent in Ireland

Tomorrow (Monday) is a national holiday in Ireland which is always the case whenever Saint Patrick’s Day happens to fall on a Sunday. That explains why today’s fight card in the County Mayo town of Castlebar is being staged on a Sunday. After the show, the attendees with regular jobs can stay up late quaffing down a few pints at their favorite pub knowing they can sleep-in tomorrow. (And they likely needed a few pints to wash away the pain of paying good money to see this craphole show.)

All of the A-Side fighters were Irishmen including the headliner Dillian Whyte, a Londoner of Jamaican extraction who claims that one of his grandparents was born in Ireland. The “Body Snatcher” was matched against German-Romanian slug Christian Hammer.

Whyte, who turns 36 next month, last fought in November of 2022 when he won a lackluster decision over Jermaine Franklin. His rematch with Anthony Joshua in August of last year fell out when an “adverse analytical finding” turned up in his VADA test. Whyte bellowed loudly that he was innocent, but there was the presumption of guilt because he had served a two-year ban for illegal substances earlier in his career. But lo and behold, in a curious development, Whyte was cleared this month when a forensics expert associated with the Texas Boxing Commission asserted that the adverse result was caused by a nutritional supplement that contained a contaminent that wasn’t disclosed on the supplement’s list of ingredients. (Whyte was training in the United States and licensed to fight in Texas when the random drug test was administered.)

Hammer brought a 27-10 (17) record but had been stopped five times, most recently by Joe Joyce who blew him away in four rounds. He was in Castlebar just for the payday and retired on his stool after three frames. He was never down in the fight, but was tattooed with a bunch of punches on his flabby midsection. (The weights were not announced.)

With the win, Dillian Whyte advanced his record to 30-3 (20 KOs). More relevantly, he is back in the mix in the heavyweight picture. His American trainer Buddy McGirt hopes to have him back in the ring in a couple of months.

Other Bouts of Note

Roy Moylette, a 33-year-old junior welterweight from the nearby town of Islandeady, made the locals happy when he got off the deck to win the decision in an 8-round bout with Argentine journeyman Requen Facundo (17-15-2). Moylette (14-2-1) entered the pro ranks with a wealth of international amateur experience, but his pro career never took off. Heading into this match, he announced it would be his farewell fight.

The Argentine, a late sub who had begun his pro career as a featherweight, had Moylette on the canvas in the second round but couldn’t sustain the momentum. The referee, who had the unusual but unmistakably Irish name of Padraig O’Reachtagain, scored it 76-75.

In what was likely his final pro fight, 39-year-old Cork super middleweight Gary “Spike” O’Sullivan left on a downbeat note, losing an 8-round decision to Sofiane Khati. O’Reachtagain had it 77-76 for the outsider.

O’Sullivan (31-6, 21 KOs) will be remembered as the Irishman who wore a handlebar mustache during his fighting days in Boston, a look that harked to John L. Sullivan who Spike believed to be a distant relative. In his previous bout in May of 2022 he was stopped in eight frames by Erislandy Lara in Brooklyn, his fourth setback inside the distance and third in his last six.

A 31-year-old French-Algerian, Khati improved to 15-4 (5).

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Boxing Notes and Nuggets from Thomas Hauser: ‘The Blue Corner’

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Boxing, like all sports, is more fun to watch when the viewer has a rooting interest. That interest can spring from a variety of factors. Some people like or dislike a particular fighter on a personal level. Others – let’s be honest – root for or against a fighter based on ethnicity.

If I don’t know either of the fighters in a fight, I root for the underdog.

That can be dispiriting. Too many fight cards today consist largely of A-side vs. B-side fights. As a general rule, the A-side fighter comes out of the red corner and the B-side fighter is seated in the blue corner. Upsets are few and far between.

Tom Loeffler’s March 15 fight card at Madison Square Garden’s Hulu Theater is a case in point. There are underdogs and then there are hopeless underdogs. I went to the fights hoping something that wasn’t supposed to happen would happen. But a look at the opponents’ records told me that was unlikely.

BoxRec.com is a wonderful tool for scoping out how competitive a fight is likely to be. Here’s what I learned from BoxRec.com before the fights and how things unfolded in the ring.

Fight #1: Giovanni Scuderi (9-0, 4 KOs) vs. Brandon Carmack – Scuderi’s last opponent had 57 losses. And that opponent might have beaten Carmack. I’m sure Brandon could decimate most people in a bar fight. But he lumbered around the ring like a heavybag with feet. Scuderi telegraphs every righthand he throws. But he has a basic jab. The match had the appearance of a picador sticking lances into a slow sluggish bull. W4 for Scuderi.

Fight #2: Nisa Rodriguez (0-0) vs. Jozette Cotton – Rodriguez is a 33-year-old New York City police officer with an extensive amateur background who was making her pro debut. Cotton was winless in four pro fights. Rodriguez fought tentatively. Cotton had a roll of flab around her waist (which spoke to her conditioning) and fought like she didn’t know how to box. W4 for Rodriguez.

Fight #3 Joseph Ward (10-1, 6 KOs) vs. Derrick Webster – Webster is 41 years old and has now won one of six fights since 2018. KO 2 for Ward.

Fight #4: Reshat Mati (14-0, 8 KOs) vs. Irving Macias – Macias has lost three of his last four fights, and the guy he beat during that stretch has 19 losses (including his last seven fights in a row). W8 for Mati.

Fight #5: Cletus Seldin (27-1, 23 KOs) vs. Jose Angulo – Angulo has lost six of his last eight fights, including four KOs by. W8 for Seldin, Here, I should note that, after the fight, Seldin took the ring announcer’s microphone, dropped to one knee, opened a small box containing a diamond engagement ring, and asked one Jessica Ostrowski to marry him. The future Mrs. Seldin (who was clad in black leather) said yes, and the happy couple paraded around the ring together.

Fight #6: Feargal McCrory (15-0, 7 KOs) vs. Carlos Carlson –  Carlson has had ten fights since 2016 and lost seven of them. The three guys he beat during that stretch have 92 losses between them. And he hadn’t fought in more than two years. Referee David Fields did the fans a favor by stopping the bout prematurely in round three. If Carlson had fought as vigorously during the fight as he complained about the stoppage afterward, it would have been a better fight.

Fight #7: The main event matched Callum Walsh (9-0, 7 KOs) against Dauren Yeleussinov. Walsh is a 23-year-old junior-middleweight who UFC CEO Dana White is trying to build as a boxing version of Conor McGregor. Yeleussinov has lost three of his last four fights (including a first-round KO by). And the opponent Dauren beat during that stretch has 22 losses (including a current losing streak of 19 a row). Yeleussinov was tailor-made for Walsh – slow on his feet with slow hands and not much of a punch. Callum got off first all night. KO 9.

In six of the seven fights, the underdog lost every round.

I’m tired of fighters who talk tough and posture at press conferences but won’t fight an opponent who’s remotely competitive. And yes; I know that prospects can’t go in tough every time out. But a prospect’s opponent should pose some kind of challenge.

And let’s be honest; most of the fighters on the March 15 card were there because they were local ticket-sellers, not prospects. Only Walsh has world-class potential. He’s 23 years old with skills and is getting better. Right now, he’s a very good club fighter. Let’s see if he becomes something more.

*        *        *

One moment from promoter Larry Goldberg’s March 7 club-fight card at Sony Hall in New York stands out in my mind.

In the second fight of the evening, Jason Castanon and Luis Rivera-Reyes squared off against one another in a scheduled four-round junior-welterweight bout. Each man was making his pro debut. Castanon’s opponent had pulled out the previous week, leaving matchmaker Eric Bottjer scrambling for a new opponent. Rivera-Reyes had been scheduled to fight on the undercard of a show in Puerto Rico but his opponent had also fallen out, so he was available.

Bottjer thought that Castanon vs. Rivera-Reyes would be a competitive fight. Each man was old for a boxer making his pro debut. Castano is 30; Rivera-Reyes is 35. But they had comparable amateur backgrounds.

Rivera-Reyes held his own in round one. But Castanon was the stronger, better-schooled fighter. In round two, Luis started getting beaten up. The punishment mounted in round three. Rivera-Reyes was still trying to win but it was a futile effort. With seconds left in the third stanza, a righthand staggered Luis and a second righthand put him down hard. He rose through an incredible act of will because that’s what real fighters do. But he was badly hurt and on wobbly legs. Referee Eddie Claudio asked if he wanted to continue.

Rivera-Reyes shook his head. No.

Afterward, an uncharitable observer said that Luis “quit.”

I think that Luis acted with honor. Sitting several feet from the ring, I had a perfect view of the pain and despair etched on his face as he confronted the reality that he was a beaten man. He didn’t jump to his feet at the count of ten-and-a-half, pretending that he was ready to keep fighting. He didn’t ignore the referee’s question and feign outrage when the fight was stopped. He acknowledged that he had given his all and was beaten. Fighters aren’t video-game figures. They get hurt. And sometimes they just can’t take anymore.

The moment reminded me of the 1983 rematch between Alexis Arguello and Aaron Pryor. Pryor had won their classic first encounter with a brutal knockout that left Arguello unconscious on the ring canvas. In round ten of Pryor-Arguello II, Alexis found himself on the canvas again. He was a warrior, one of the greatest fighters of all time. He could have gotten up. But he didn’t. He had done the best he could and realized that it was over. He sat with tears streaming down his face and later acknowledged. “It’s hard to accept, but it’s good to accept. I did it with grace and just accepted that the guy beat me. Even though I did my best, in the tenth round I accepted it right there. I said, ‘This is too much. I won’t take it. I‘ll just sit and watch Richard Steele count to ten.'”The look in Luis Rivera-Reyes’s eyes when he shook his head will stay with me for a long time. He had been beaten into submission in his first pro fight. And I wondered, how long will he hold onto the dream.

*          *          *

A nod to “March Madness” which begins this week . . .

College basketball has a problem – court storming.

It’s now in vogue for fans of the home team to surge onto the court after a big win. Tearing down the goal posts in football endangers fans who are tearing down the goal posts. Court storming endangers the players.

On January 21, Caitlin Clark (Iowa’s superstar guard) was knocked to the floor when Ohio State fans stormed the court after a big win.

On February 24, Kyle Fitzpatrick (Duke’s All-American center) injured his knee when Wake Forest fans stormed the court after a dramatic upset.

To date, the NCAA has done nothing about the problem. Several conferences have taken action on their own, the most notable example being the SEC which instituted an escalating fine that begins at $100,000 for the first incident. By contrast, the ACC has no penalty for court-storming; the Big Ten has no penalty until the third incident; and the Big East penalizes offending schools the paltry sum of $5,000.

It shouldn’t be hard to end court storming.

The NCAA should institute a rule – and fans should be advised late in each contest – that court storming will result in forfeiture of the game.

***

Thomas Hauser’s email address is thomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His next book – MY MOTHER and me – is a personal memoir that will be published by Admission Press on April 2 and is available for pre-order at Amazon.com.https://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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