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Heavy-Hitting Trash Talk From Deontay Wilder
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Deontay Wilder is a world-class trash talker, but is he a world-class fighter? The undefeated heavyweight challenges WBC heavyweight champion Bermane Stiverne on Saturday night at the MGM in Las Vegas. The bout will air live on Showtime Championship Boxing.
Wilder has knocked out every opponent he’s faced so far in his professional career. If he does that to Stiverne, he might just be the next great American heavyweight.
And Wilder predicts exactly that to happen on Saturday.
“I’ve got so much power that it’s even scary for me. One thing I really feel is that I’m going to hit somebody, and it’s going to really hurt them. I think this fight is going to be the start of it, because I really want to hurt him. Like I said, I want to beat him to within an inch of his life. No, I don’t want to kill him, but I do want to beat him to the end of it. I want him to feel like he went there and then came back.”
Sheesh. This Wilder guy can talk.
But the 29-year-old can punch, too. He’s separated all 32 opponents from their senses since turning professional in 2008. I don’t care who you’re fighting. If you can knock 32 people in a row out, all within four rounds I might add, you can freaking punch.
Wilder won the 2008 Olympic bronze medal. He calls himself “The Bronze Bomber” and said his alter-ego is a knockout machine.
“On the outside, I’m Deontay Wilder. I’m calm, cool and collected. But on the inside, I’m the Bronze Bomber. He’s not in there to make friends. He’s in there to take somebody’s head off.”
Wilder said he knows how to transform from the nice guy he is outside of the ring to the ruthless mercenary he becomes once the bell rings. If you’ve watched Wilder fight in the past, you’ve seen him demolish his opponents seemingly at will, almost as if a switch goes off inside of him.
“I transform into something else, something not nice—something real evil. And when I win, I come back with that million dollar smile.”
Wilder is the likeable sort. Even though he says outrageous things, he does so with good humor. You can almost hear him smiling through the phone at you as he comes up with these crazy things.
But Stiverne doesn’t like him. When I talked to him a couple of months ago, he told me “trash belongs in the trash,” implying that both Wilder and his trash talk belong in the garbage can.
Whatever the case, Saturday’s fight is the most intriguing heavyweight battle in recent memory. Stiverne is an accomplished and battle-tested veteran who can punch. Wilder is a talented phenomenon who might be the next big thing in boxing.
Wilder dismissed the idea that he’s never been punched by someone with as heavy hands as Stiverne. He said he’s sparred with lineal champion Wladimir Klitschko, among others, and took shots from the world’s best on numerous occasions. He’s not worried about Stiverne’s power.
“This is the heavyweight division. All the heavyweights have power. There are just different levels of power. Not everybody is going to have that extremely explosive power.”
Wilder believes he has the kind of power and athleticism Stiverne has never seen and can’t prepare for.
“I think my level is at the top of it. Whatever power he has, I’m not intimidated by it. Look, I’ve been in the ring with some of the best guys in sparring and training camps and stuff like that. Whether he has power or not, that’s none of my concern. For one thing, you might have power, but you have to hit me. He’s going to find real soon that my athletic skills alone are going to win the fight.”
Wilder said his speed and movement will be too much for Stiverne. He said he’s been an athlete his entire life and that what he does in the ring on fight night cannot be recreated in the gym with sparring partners.
“He’s never, ever, ever been in the ring with a guy like me. They can’t train for me. Who do they have to train for me? They can’t. The only thing they can do is train for how to get knocked out and how to manage my height. There’s nobody out there like me. I’m different.”
It’s hard to tell just how good Wilder might be on film. He obviously has power, but he’s yet to be in a fight where his skill level was tested. He’s yet to show he’s a complete fighter simply because no one he’s faced has made him do so.
Wilder said that theories about how to beat him that are not based on any actual evidence.
“Even on video, you can’t really see anything because none of my fights have gone past four rounds. People think they can hit me on the chin and maybe I’ll go down. But these are all assumptions about me. You can’t prepare for the unknown. That’s the scariest part for [Stiverne] and his camp. How do you prepare for Deontay Wilder?”
It’s a fair question. He’s certainly an imposing physical specimen, and whatever one might believe about his boxing ability, there’s no doubt that he has concussive power.
Moreover, Wilder is always lean and muscular. Like former heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield, or current lineal champion Klitschko, Wilder takes boxing seriously and always remains in shape.
“One thing about me is that you’ll never find me out of shape. I’m in shape. I’m always at the gym. I consider the gym my job. It’s my nine-to-five. Most heavyweights only get to the gym when they have a fight coming up.”
Wilder said he was at the gym year-round and that Stiverne wasn’t the same type. He believes his dedication to staying in peak condition at all times will also give him an edge on fight night.
“I’ve heard many times, even from the people coaching him, that Bermane is a lazy guy.”
Man, this guy can trash talk. Wilder told me Stiverne would realize once they got in the ring together just how much trouble the WBC titlist had gotten himself into by taking the fight.
“But then it’s too late.”
And what of the naysayers, those who believe Wilder is only a world-class trash talker? That he doesn’t have the talent and ability to back up all these things he says?
“I’m super anxious! Come January 17, I’m looking forward to proving them wrong.”
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Steven Navarro is the TSS 2024 Prospect of the Year
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“I get ‘Bam’ vibes when I watch this kid,” said ESPN ringside commentator Tim Bradley during the opening round of Steven Navarro’s most recent match. Bradley was referencing WBC super flyweight champion Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez, a precociously brilliant technician whose name now appears on most pound-for-pound lists.
There are some common threads between Steven Navarro, the latest fighter to adopt the nickname “Kid Dynamite,” and Bam Rodriguez. Both are southpaws currently competing in the junior bantamweight division. But, of course, Bradley was alluding to something more when he made the comparison. And Navarro’s showing bore witness that Bradley was on to something.
It was the fifth pro fight for Navarro who was matched against a Puerto Rican with a 7-1 ledger. He ended the contest in the second frame, scoring three knockdowns, each the result of a different combination of punches, forcing the referee to stop it. It was the fourth win inside the distance for the 20-year-old phenom.
Isaias Estevan “Steven” Navarro turned pro after coming up short in last December’s U.S. Olympic Trials in Lafayette, Louisiana. The #1 seed in the 57 kg (featherweight) division, he was upset in the finals, losing a controversial split decision. Heading in, Navarro had won 13 national tournaments beginning at age 12.
A graduate of LA’s historic Fairfax High School, Steven made his pro debut this past April on a Matchroom Promotions card at the Fontainebleau in Las Vegas and then inked a long-term deal with Top Rank. He comes from a boxing family. His father Refugio had 10 pro fights and three of Refugio’s cousins were boxers, most notably Jose Navarro who represented the USA at the 2000 Sydney Olympics and was a four-time world title challenger as a super flyweight. Jose was managed by Oscar De La Hoya for much of his pro career.
Nowadays, the line between a prospect and a rising contender has been blurred. Three years ago, in an effort to make matters less muddled, we operationally defined a prospect thusly: “A boxer with no more than a dozen fights, none yet of the 10-round variety.” To our way of thinking, a prospect by nature is still in the preliminary-bout phase of his career.
We may loosen these parameters in the future. For one thing, it eliminates a lot of talented female boxers who, like their Japanese male counterparts in the smallest weight classes, are often pushed into title fights when, from a historical perspective, they are just getting started.
But for the time being, we will adhere to our operational definition. And within the window that we have created, Steven Navarro stood out. In his first year as a pro, “Kid Dynamite” left us yearning to see more of him.
Honorable mention: Australian heavyweight Teremoana Junior (5-0, 5 KOs)
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The Challenge of Playing Muhammad Ali
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There have been countless dramatizations of Muhammad Ali’s life and more will follow in the years ahead. The most heavily marketed of these so far have been the 1977 movie titled The Greatest starring Ali himself and the 2001 biopic Ali starring Will Smith.
The Greatest was fictionalized. Its saving grace apart from Ali’s presence on screen was the song “The Greatest Love of All” which was written for the film and later popularized by Whitney Houston. Beyond that, the movie was mediocre. “Of all our sports heroes,” Frank Deford wrote, “Ali needs least to be sanitized. But The Greatest is just a big vapid valentine. It took a dive.”
The 2001 film was equally bland but without the saving grace of Ali on camera. “I hated that film,” Spike Lee said. “It wasn’t Ali.” Jerry Izenberg was in accord, complaining, “Will Smith playing Ali was an impersonation, not a performance.”
The latest entry in the Ali registry is a play running this week off-Broadway at the AMT Theater (354 West 45th Street) in Manhattan.
The One: The Life of Muhammad Ali was written by David Serero, who has produced and directed the show in addition to playing the role of Angelo Dundee in the three-man drama. Serero, age 43, was born in Paris, is of Moroccan-French-Jewish heritage, and has excelled professionally as an opera singer (baritone) and actor (stage and screen).
Let’s get the negatives out of the way first. The play is flawed. There are glaring factual inaccuracies in the script that add nothing to the dramatic arc and detract from its credibility.
On the plus side; Zack Bazile (pictured) is exceptionally good as Ali. And Serero (wearing his director’s hat) brings the most out of him.
Growing up, Bazile (now 28) excelled in multiple sports. In 2018, while attending Ohio State, he won the NCAA Long Jump Championship and was named Big Ten Field Athlete of the Year. He also dabbled in boxing, competed in two amateur fights in 2022, and won both by knockout. He began acting three years ago.
Serero received roughly one thousand resumes when he published notices for a casting call in search of an actor to play Ali. One-hundred-twenty respondents were invited to audition.
“I had people who looked like Ali and were accomplished actors,” Serero recalls. “But when they were in the room, I didn’t feel Ali in front of me. You have to remember; we’re dealing with someone who really existed and there’s video of him, so it’s not like asking someone to play George Washington.”
And Ali was Ali. That’s a hard act to follow.
Bazile is a near-perfect fit. At 6-feet-2-inches tall, 195 pounds, he conveys Ali’s physicality. His body is sculpted in the manner of the young Ali. He moves like an athlete because he is an athlete. His face resembles Ali’s and his expressions are very much on the mark in the way he transmits emotion to the audience. He uses his voice the way Ali did. He moves his eyes the way Ali did. He has THE LOOK.
Zack was born the year that Ali lit the Olympic flame in Atlanta, so he has no first-hand memory of the young Ali who set the world ablaze. “But as an actor,” he says, “I’m representing Ali. That’s a responsibility I take very seriously. Everyone has an essence about them. I had to find the right balance – not too over the top – and capture that.”
Sitting in the audience watching Bazile, I felt at times as though it was Ali onstage in front of me. Zack has the pre-exile Ali down perfectly. The magic dissipates a bit as the stage Ali grows older. Bazile still has to add the weight of aging to his craft. But I couldn’t help but think, “Muhammad would have loved watching Zack play him.”
****
Twenty-four hours after the premiere of The One, David Serero left the stage for a night to shine brightly in a real boxing ring., The occasion was the tenth fight card that Larry Goldberg has promoted at Sony Hall in New York, a run that began with Goldberg’s first pro show ever on October 13, 2022.
Most of the fights on the six-bout card played out as expected. But two were tougher for the favorites than anticipated. Jacob Riley Solis was held to a draw by Daniel Jefferson. And Andy Dominguez was knocked down hard by Angel Meza in round three before rallying to claim a one-point split-decision triumph.
Serero sang the national anthem between the second and third fights and stilled the crowd with a virtuoso performance. Fans at sports events are usually restless during the singing of the anthem. This time, the crowd was captivated. Serero turned a flat ritual into an inspirational moment. People were turning to each other and saying “Wow!”
****
The unexpected happened in Tijuana last Saturday night when 25-to-1 underdog Bruno Surace climbed off the canvas after a second-round knockdown to score a shocking, one-punch, sixth-round stoppage of Jaime Munguia. There has been a lot of commentary since then about what happened that night. The best explanation I’ve heard came from a fan named John who wrote, “The fight was not over in the second round although Munguia thought it was because, if he caught him once, he would naturally catch him again. Plus he looked at this little four KO guy [Surace had scored 4 knockouts in 27 fights] the way all the fans did, like he had no punch. That is what a fan can afford to do. But a fighter should know better. The ref reminds you, ‘Protect yourself at all times.’ Somebody forgot that.”
photo (c) David Serero
Thomas Hauser’s email address is thomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His most recent book – MY MOTHER and me – is a personal memoir available 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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L.A.’s Rudy Hernandez is the 2024 TSS Trainer of the Year
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L.A.’s Rudy Hernandez is the 2024 TSS Trainer of the Year
If asked to name a prominent boxing trainer who operates out of a gym in Los Angeles, the name Freddie Roach would jump immediately to mind. Best known for his work with Manny Pacquaio, Roach has been named the Trainer of the Year by the Boxing Writers Association of America a record seven times.
A mere seven miles from Roach’s iconic Wild Card Gym is the gym that Rudy Hernandez now calls home. Situated in the Little Tokyo neighborhood in downtown Los Angeles, the L.A. Boxing Gym – a relatively new addition to the SoCal boxing landscape — is as nondescript as its name. From the outside, one would not guess that two reigning world champions, Junto Nakatani and Anthony Olascuaga, were forged there.
As Freddie Roach will be forever linked with Manny Pacquiao, so will Rudy Hernandez be linked with Nakatani. The Japanese boxer was only 15 years old when his parents packed him off to the United States to be tutored by Hernandez. With Hernandez in his corner, the lanky southpaw won titles at 112 and 115 and currently holds the WBO bantamweight (118) belt. In his last start, he knocked out his Thai opponent, a 77-fight veteran who had never been stopped, advancing his record to 29-0 (22 KOs).
Nakatani’s name now appears on several pound-for-pound lists. A match with Japanese superstar Naoya Inoue is brewing. When that match comes to fruition, it will be the grandest domestic showdown in Japanese boxing history.
“Junto Nakatani is the greatest fighter I’ve ever trained. It’s easy to work with him because even when he came to me at age 15, his focus was only on boxing. It was to be a champion one day and nothing interfered with that dream,” Hernandez told sports journalist Manouk Akopyan writing for Boxing Scene.
Akin to Nakatani, Rudy Hernandez built Anthony Olascuaga from scratch. The LA native was rucked out of obscurity in April of 2023 when Jonathan Gonzalez contracted pneumonia and was forced to withdraw from his date in Tokyo with lineal light flyweight champion Kenshiro Teraji. Olascuaga, with only five pro fights under his belt, filled the breach on 10 days’ notice and although he lost (TKO by 9), he earned kudos for his gritty performance against the man recognized as the best fighter in his weight class.
Two fights later, back in Tokyo, Olascuaga copped the WBO world flyweight title with a third-round stoppage of Riku Kano. His first defense came in October, again in Japan, and Olascuaga retained his belt with a first-round stoppage of the aforementioned Gonzalez. (This bout was originally ruled a no-contest as it ended after Gonzalez suffered a cut from an accidental clash of heads. But the referee ruled that Gonzalez was fit to continue before the Puerto Rican said “no mas,” alleging his vision was impaired, and the WBO upheld a protest from the Olascuaga camp and changed the result to a TKO. Regardless, Rudy Hernandez’s fighter would have kept his title.)
Hernandez, 62, is the brother of the late Genaro “Chicanito” Hernandez. A two-time world title-holder at 130 pounds who fought the likes of Azumah Nelson, Oscar De La Hoya and Floyd Mayweather Jr., Chicanito passed away in 2011, a cancer victim at age 45.
Genaro “Chicanito” Hernandez was one of the most popular fighters in the Hispanic communities of Southern California. Rudy Hernandez, a late bloomer of sorts – at least in terms of public recognition — has kept his brother’s flame alive with own achievements. He is a worthy honoree for the 2024 Trainer of the Year.
Note: This is the first in our series of annual awards. The others will arrive sporadically over the next two weeks.
Photo credit: Steve Kim
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