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Naoya Inoue Was Sensational; Crawford and Spence Have a Tough Act to Follow
Imagine, if you can, three modern-day art critics being transported back in time to the early 16th century and being afforded the privilege of watching Michelangelo paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in Vatican City. That would be roughly the level of awe espoused by ESPN+’s blow-by-blow commentator Joe Tessitore and analysts Timothy Bradley Jr. and Mark Kriegel in unanimously critiquing the masterwork crafted by Japan’s miniature “Monster,” Naoya Inoue, who demolished previously undefeated WBC/WBO super bantamweight champion Stephen Fulton Tuesday in Tokyo’s Ariake Arena. From the opening bell for round one to his two-knockdown KO sequence of Fulton in the eighth stanza, Inoue treated the highly regarded, and naturally larger, Philadelphian almost as if he were some semi-anonymous sparring partner.
“We sometimes overuse the word `greatness’ in boxing, but not here, not now,” Tessitore said gushingly from Las Vegas, where he and his cohorts have a Top Rank show to cover on Friday on the eve of the welterweight unification megafight pitting unbeaten champions Errol Spence Jr. and Terence “Bud” Crawford at the T-Mobile Arena. “You are watching greatness (in the person of Inoue), in his absolute prime … That’s the best fighter in the world right now.”
Added Bradley: “I never thought that the boxing world would bring another Manny Pacquiao type of person. But when you look at Inoue, how he’s traveled up these distances (he’s now a four-division world champion, from 108 pounds to his current – for now — 122), I feel like he can travel up as many weight classes as he likes.”
And this, from Kriegel: “I don’t know what’s going to happen Saturday night, but I do know that right now there is a best fighter in the world, and it’s that man right there, Inoue. (Fulton was) an undefeated fighter, a master boxer, a versatile guy, and (Inoue) made him look ordinary.”
In an era where indisputably special matchups of elite fighters are all too rare, this was Christmas in July week for fight fans famished for the sort of pairings that brought, first, Inoue (now 25-0, 22 KOs) and Fulton (21-1, 8 KOs) together and, in a few days, IBF/WBA/WBC 147-pound champ Spence (28-0, 22 KOs) and WBO titlist Crawford (39-0, 30 KOs). But it is perhaps the bruised knuckle incurred by Inoue in training in May that not only made this diamond-tinged double-dip in the same five-day period possible, but considerably raised the stakes for the welterweight kingpins who now might feel obliged to try to match or even exceed the bravura performance turned in by the little Japanese dynamo. It can be argued that Inoue might already have vaulted past not only the winner of that fight, but fellow pound-for-pound aspirant Oleksandr Usyk (20-0, 13 KOs), who defends his IBF, WBA and WBO straps against Daniel Dubois (19-1, 18 KOs) on Aug. 26 in Wroclas, Poland.
Had Inoue squared off against Fulton in May and done precisely what he did Tuesday morning (in the Eastern time zone in America) or Tuesday night (10 p.m. start time in Tokyo), the passage of time might have somewhat lessened the impact of that bout. But now, the manner in which he accomplished that triumph has been elevated to a “Can you top this?” gauntlet flung at the feet of Spence and Crawford, both of whom have insisted that the winner of their much-anticipated showdown almost certainly will have to be anointed as the fight’s game’s unrivaled No. 1 guy.
“It’s the furthest thing from what either guy can be thinking, but how can Spence and Crawford top that?” Kriegel asked, rhetorically.
Well, maybe it would be too much to ask of either superstar welterweight to be more dominant on Saturday night than was Inoue, but nobody will care much if each at least tries to score a comparable grade in an effort to look especially impressive. Of such give-and-take matchups are great fights made, and, let’s face it, some of those pairings in the past have been closer to exercises in tedium than rip-roaring action-fests.
“I have so much admiration for Bud Crawford and Errol Spence. I think the world of those two guys,” Tessitore confessed. “But when I think of the pound-for-pound list … What this guy (Inoue) does for his size, I don’t care. That’s the best fighter in the world right there.
“In a week that is a fight fan’s dream, this is how it starts, with `The Monster,’ Naoya Inoue, making it look easy. That’s what’s so mind-blowing. He goes up in weight against The Guy, the unified champion, and he made it look ridiculously easy.”
You’d never know it from the way he dispatched Fulton, but not every fight involving Inoue has seen him win in a romp. One distinguishing characteristic of the best of the best is the capacity to dig deep and find something within yourself that can turn a potential defeat into a display of inner strength that separates the merely talented from those who have a champion’s dogged refusal to yield to adversity. Just such an acid test was required of Inoue on Nov. 17, 2019, when he took on future Hall of Famer Nonito Donaire in the Fight of the Year, recognized as such by this publication, by The Ring magazine and by the Boxing Writers Association of America. Inoue won by unanimous decision, but in doing so he suffered a broken orbital bone and a broken nose.
It should be noted that in Inoue’s rematch with Donaire, on June 7, 2022, he had a much easier time of it in winning on a second-round stoppage, but “The Monster” having been pushed to the limit in their first fight caused Fulton’s fellow Philly fighter, Jaron “Boots” Ennis, to go with his homeboy on Tuesday because, hey, how impressive can it be for someone supposedly so dominant to squeak past a “45-year-old” guy, as Ennis said in disparaging Donaire, who was then 37.
The truest way of gauging ring greatness, Kriegel allowed, is when a great fighter meets and defeats another great fighter, and by most means of measurement inside the ropes Fulton belonged in that exclusive club. It certainly would seem that he is better than the WBA/IBF 122-pound titlist, Marlon Tapales of the Philippines, who appears to be next on Inoue’s dance card, possibly for the fully unified title, before the end of 2023. But Tapales (37-3, 19 KOs), who entered the ring to pose with Inoue for photos, not only has lost three times, but he has been knocked out twice. Figure him to be another way station on Inoue’s upward ascent to literally bigger and presumably better things.
Can the winner of Spence-Crawford do enough to supplant Inoue as boxing’s man of the moment, and of the foreseeable future? It’s entirely possible, but that fighter would have to be nearly flawless to make that deep of an impression. How could he be anything less to climb past someone whom Tessitore said has “a viper’s striking speed and nearly flawless punching technique,” someone hailed by Joe as “the most complete offensive fighter in the game today,” and mostly excellent on defense as well.
For what it’s worth, my personal scorecard had Inoue winning all seven completed rounds for a 70-63 edge going into the eighth, which he would have won by 10-7 had not referee Hector Afu stepped in after Fulton went down for the second time, after an elapsed time of just one minute and 14 seconds. So also check the box for finishing instincts as far as it applies to Inoue, who clearly knows what to do when he gets his man in trouble.
Like the ESPN+ broadcast crew said, it’s back to you, Errol and Bud. You have a tough act to follow.
Bernard Fernandez, named to the International Boxing Hall of Fame in the Observer category with the Class of 2020, was the recipient of numerous awards for writing excellence during his 28-year career as a sports writer for the Philadelphia Daily News. Fernandez’s first book, “Championship Rounds,” a compendium of previously published material, was released in May of last year. The sequel, “Championship Rounds, Round 2,” with a foreword by Jim Lampley, is currently out. His third boxing anthology, “Championship Rounds, Round 3,” is now out and available from Amazon and other book-selling outlets.
Photo credit: Naomi Fukuda
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Bygone Days: Muhammad Ali at the Piano in the Lounge at the Tropicana
Bygone Days: Muhammad Ali at the Piano in the Lounge at the Tropicana
Among other things, Las Vegas in “olden days” was noted for its lounge shows. Circa 1970, for the price of two drinks, one could have caught the Ike and Tina Turner Review at the International. They performed three shows nightly, the last at 3:15 am, and they blew the doors off the joint.
The weirdest “lounge show” in Las Vegas wasn’t a late-night offering, but an impromptu duet performed in the mid-afternoon for a select standing-room audience in the lounge at the Tropicana. Sharing the piano in the Blue Room in a concert that could not have lasted much more than a minute were Muhammad Ali and world light heavyweight champion Bob Foster. The date was June 25, 1972, a Sunday.
What brought about this odd collaboration was a weigh-in, not the official weigh-in, which would happen the next day, but a dress rehearsal conducted for the benefit of news reporters and photographers and a few invited guests such as the actor Jack Palance who would serve as the color commentator alongside the legendary Mel Allen on the closed-circuit telecast. On June 27, Ali and Foster would appear in separate bouts at the Las Vegas Convention Center. Ali was pit against Jerry Quarry in a rematch of their 1970 tilt in Atlanta; Foster would be defending his title against Jerry’s younger brother, Mike Quarry.
In those days, whenever Las Vegas hosted a prizefight that was a major news story, it was customary for the contestants to arrive in town about three weeks before their fight. They held public workouts, perhaps for a nominal fee, at the hotel-casino where they were lodged.
Muhammad Ali and Bob Foster were sequestered and trained at Caesars Palace. The Quarry brothers were domiciled a few blocks away at the Tropicana.
The Trop, as the locals called it, was the last major hotel-casino on the south end of the Strip, a stretch of road, officially Highway 91, the ran for 2.2 miles. When the resort opened in 1957, it had three hundred rooms. Like similar properties along the famous Strip, it would eventually go vertical, maturing into a high-rise.
In 1959, entertainment director Lou Walters (father of Barbara) imported a lavish musical revue from Paris, the Folies Bergere. The extravaganza with its topless showgirls became embedded in the Las Vegas mystique. The show, which gave the Tropicana its identity, ran for almost 50 full years, becoming the longest-running show in Las Vegas history.
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Although the Quarry brothers were on the premises, Ali and Foster arrived at the Blue Room first. After Dr. Donald Romeo performed his perfunctory examinations, there was nothing to do but stand around and wait from the brothers to show up. It was then that Foster spied a grand piano in the corner of the room.
Taking a seat at the bench, he tinkled the keys, producing something soft and bluesy. “Move over man,” said Ali, not the sort of person to be upstaged at anything. Taking a seat alongside Foster at the piano, he banged out something that struck the untrained ear of veteran New York scribe Dick Young as boogie-woogie.
When the Quarry brothers arrived, Ali went through his usual antics, shouting epithets at Jerry Quarry as Jerry was having his blood pressure taken. “These make the best fights, when you get some white hopes and some spooks,…er, I mean some colored folks,” Young quoted Ali as saying.
This comment was greeted with a big laugh, but Jerry Quarry, renowned for his fearsome left hook, delivered a better line after Ali had stormed out. Surveying the room, he noticed several attractive young ladies, dressed provocatively. “I can see I ain’t the only hooker in here,” he said.
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The doubleheader needed good advance pub because both bouts were considered mismatches. In the first Ali-Quarry fight, Quarry suffered a terrible gash above his left eye before his corner pulled him out after three rounds. Ali was a 5/1 favorite in the rematch. Bob Foster, who would be making his tenth title defense, was an 8/1 favorite over Mike Quarry who was undefeated (35-0) but had been brought along very carefully and was still only 21 years old. (In his syndicated newspaper column, oddsmaker Jimmy “The Greek” Snyder said the odds were 200/1 against both fights going the distance, but there wasn’t a bookie in the country that would take that bet.)
The Fights
There were no surprises. It was a sad night for the Quarry clan at the Las Vegas Convention Center.
Muhammad Ali, clowning in the early rounds, took charge in the fifth and Jerry Quarry was in bad shape when the referee waived it off 19 seconds into the seventh round. In the semi-wind-up, Bob Foster retained his title in a more brutal fashion. He knocked the younger Quarry brother into dreamland with a thunderous left hook just as the fourth round was about to end. Mike Quarry lay on the canvas for a good three minutes before his handlers were able to revive him.
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In the ensuing years, the Tropicana was far less invested in boxing than many of its rivals on the Strip, but there was a wisp of activity in the mid-1980s. A noteworthy card, on June 30, 1985, saw Jimmy Paul successfully defend his world lightweight title with a 14th-round stoppage of Robin Blake. Freddie Roach, a featherweight with a big local following and former U.S. Olympic gold medalist Henry Tillman appeared on the undercard. The lead promoter of this show, which aired on a Sunday afternoon on CBS (with Southern Nevada blacked out) was the indefatigable Bob Arum who seemingly has no intention of leaving this mortal coil until he has out-lived every Las Vegas casino-resort born in the twentieth century.
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I may drive past the Tropicana in the next few hours and give it a last look, mindful that Muhammad Ali once frolicked here, however briefly. But I won’t be there for the implosion.
On Wednesday morning, Oct. 9, shortly after 2 a.m., the Tropicana, shuttered since April, will be reduced to rubble. On its grounds will rise a stadium for the soon-to-be-former Oakland A’s baseball team.
A recognized authority on the history of prizefighting and the history of American sports gambling, TSS editor-in-chief Arne K. Lang is the author of five books including “Prizefighting: An American History,” released by McFarland in 2008 and re-released in a paperback edition in 2020.
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WBA Feather Champ Nick Ball Chops Down Rugged Ronny Rios in Liverpool
In his first fight in his native Liverpool since February of 2020, Nick Ball successfully defended his WBA title with a 10th-round stoppage of SoCal veteran Ronny Rios. The five-foot-two “Wrecking Ball” was making the first defense of a world featherweight strap he won in his second stab at it, taking the belt from Raymond Ford on a split decision after previously fighting Rey Vargas to a draw in a match that many thought Ball had won.
This fight looked like it was going to be over early. Ball strafed Rios with an assortment of punches in the first two rounds, and likely came within a punch or two of ending the match in the third when he put Rios on the canvas with a short left hook and then tore after him relentlessly. But Rios, a glutton for punishment, weathered the storm and actually had some good moments in round four and five.
The brother of welterweight contender Alexis Rocha and a two-time world title challenger at 122 pounds, Rios returned to the ring in April on a ProBox card in Florida and this was his second start after being out of the ring for 28 months. He would be on the canvas twice more before the bout was halted. The punch that knocked him off his pins in round seven wasn’t a clean shot, but he would be in dire straits three rounds later when he was hammered onto the ring apron with a barrage of punches. He managed to maneuver his way back into the ring, but his corner sensibly threw in the towel when it seemed as if referee Bob Williams would let the match continue.
The official time was 2:06 of round ten. Ball improved to 21-0-1 (12 KOs). Rios, 34, declined to 34-5.
Semi-wind-up
A bout contested for a multiplicity of regional 140-pound titles produced a mild upset when Jack Rafferty wore down and eventually stopped Henry Turner whose corner pulled him out after the ninth frame.
Both fighters were undefeated coming in. Turner, now 13-1, was the better boxer and had the best of the early rounds. However, he used up a lot of energy moving side-to-side as he fought off his back foot, and Rafferty, who improved to 24-0 (15 KOs), never wavered as he continued to press forward.
The tide turned dramatically in round eight. One could see Turner’s legs getting loggy and the confidence draining from his face. The ninth round was all Rafferty. Turner was a cooked goose when Rafferty collapsed him with four unanswered body punches, but he made it to the final bell before his corner wisely pulled him out. Through the completed rounds, two of the judges had it even and the third had the vanquished Turner up by 4 points.
Other Bouts of Note
In a lightweight affair, Jadier Herrera, a highly-touted 22-year-old Cuban who had been campaigning in Dubai, advanced to 16-0 (14 KOs) with a third-round stoppage of Oliver Flores (31-6-2) a Nicaraguan southpaw making his UK debut. After two even rounds, Herrera put Flores on the deck with a left to the solar plexus. Flores spit out his mouthpiece as he lay there in obvious distress and referee Steve Gray waived the fight off as he was attempting to rise. The end came 30 seconds into round three.
In a bantamweight contest slated for 10, Liverpool’s Andrew Cain (13-1, 12 KOs) dismissed Colombia’s Lazaro Casseres at the 1:48 mark of the second round.
A stablemate and sparring partner of Nick Ball, Cain knocked Casseres to the canvas in the second round with a short uppercut and forced the stoppage later in the round when he knocked the Colombian into the ropes with a double left hook. Casseres. 27, brought an 11-1 record but had defeated only two opponents with winning records.
In a contest between super welterweights, Walter Fury pitched a 4-round shutout over Dale Arrowsmith. This was the second pro fight for the 27-year-old Fury who had his famous cousin Tyson Fury rooting him on from ringside. Stylistically, Walter resembles Tyson, but his defense is hardly as tight; he was clipped a few times.
Arrowsmith is a weekend warrior and a professional loser, a species indigenous to the British Isles. This was his twenty-fourth fight this year and his 186th pro fight overall! His record is “illuminated” by nine wins and 10 draws.
A Queensberry Promotion, the Ball vs Rios card aired in the UK on TNT Sports and in the US on ESPN+.
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Alimkhanuly TKOs Mikhailovich and Motu TKOs O’Connell in Sydney
IBF/WBO world middleweight champion Janibek Alimkhanuly, generally regarded as the best of the current crop of middleweights, retained his IBF title today in Sydney, Australia, with a ninth-round stoppage of game but overmatched Andrei Mikhailovich. The end came at the 2:45 mark of round nine.
Favored in the 8/1 range although he was in a hostile environment, Alimkhanuly (16-0, 11 KOs) beat Mikhailovich to a pulp in the second round and knocked him down with one second remaining in the frame, but Mikhailovich survived the onslaught and had several good moments in the ensuing rounds as he pressed the action. However, Alimkhanuly’s punches were cleaner and one could sense that it was only a matter of time before the referee would rescue Mikhailovich from further punishment. When a short left deposited Mikhailovich on the seat of his pants on the lower strand of rope, the ref had seen enough.
Alimkhanuly, a 2016 Olympian for Kazakhstan, was making his first start since October of last year. He and Mikhailovich were slated to fight in Las Vegas in July, but the bout fell apart after the weigh-in when the Kazakh fainted from dehydration.
Owing to a technicality, Alimkhanuly’s WBO belt wasn’t at stake today. Although he has expressed an interest in unifying the title –Eislandy Lara (WBA) and Carlos Adames (WBC) are the other middleweight belt-holders — Alimkhanuly is big for the weight class and it’s a fair assumption that this was his final fight at 160.
The brave Mikhailovich, who was born in Russia but grew up in New Zealand after he and his twin brother were adopted, suffered his first pro loss, declining to 21-1.
Semi-wind-up
Topping the flimsy undercard was a scheduled 8-rounder between Mikhailovich’s stablemate Mea Motu, a 34-year-old Maori, and veteran Australian campaigner Shannon O’Connell, 41. The ladies share eight children between them (Motu, trained by her mother in her amateur days, has five).
A clash of heads in the opening round left O’Connell with a bad gash on her forehead. She had a big lump developing over her right eye when her corner threw in the towel at the 1:06 mark of round four.
Motu (20-0, 8 KOs) was set to challenge IBF/WBO world featherweight champion Ellie Scotney later this month in Manchester, England, underneath Catterall-Prograis, but that match was postponed when Scotney suffered an injury in training. Motu took this fight, which was contested at the catchweight of 125 pounds, to stay busy. O’Connell, 29-8-1, previously had a cup of coffee as a WBA world champion (haven’t we all).
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