Boxing's new unfortunate name?

Sometimes boxers for some reason just have names they shouldn't. The most obvious example is the always fun Eric Crumble whose record has become a thing of mockery on many boxing forums, though he was a man who lived up to his name and (excuse the pun)...crumbled. Now though he may have a rival in the form of American Cruiserweight D'Quan Morgan...yes his name starts with "DQ".

Although D'Quan Morgan has yet to be DQ'd in a bout (going 1-0-1, 1 so far) the headlines write themselves for all us boxing writers who are waiting for the day we can open up the treasure chest of puns based on his name.

http://boxrec.com/list_bouts.php?human_id=573103&cat=boxer

Have Box Nation dropped the ball (again)

In Germany this evening we have one of the first stand out cards of the year with the following fights:
Ruslan Chagaev (27-2-1, 17) v Kerston Manswell (22-3, 17)
Denis Boytsov (29-0, 24) v Darnell Wilson (24-13-1, 20)
Rakhim Chakhkiev (11-0, 9) v Alexander Kotlobay (21-2-1, 15)
Juergen Braehmer (36-2, 19) v Jose Maria Guerrero (29-2-1, 11)

The card also features Ina Menzer, Vitali Tajbert, Firat Arslan, Marcel Meyerdiercks and the debut of Evgeny Tishchenko (a 6'5 Cruiserweight). To me this is a card that should be getting shown on British TV. Sky have a good excuse not to show it, they have Carl Frampton's card on instead (nowhere near as good but it does have British interest) though a "specialised" boxing channel which is instead showing repeats hasn't got an excuse at all.

Now I have been incredibly harsh (harsh but fair) on Box Nation since it started but for the "Home of Boxing" not to be picking up THIS card is a disgrace (a big disgrace). Boxnation promised it's subscribers 2 cards a weekend though this weekend has given it's loyal and paying customers NOTHING new (unless you count Steve Bunce's talk show "new", personally I can't stand the jumped up fat man). If you are a paying customer you must be annoyed that they haven't picked up this card, especially considering they didn't have anything on last Saturday either.

In fact (unless I'm making a counting error somewhere) Boxnation have only covered 3 shows all year (and we are 4 weeks into the year), that is less than 1 show a week..in fact rather than paying £1.25 a show as first advertised, the customers have paid £3.33 a show. So when one like this comes along why didn't they do everything they could to snap up the rights? A card like this is genuinely worth £3.33 to boxing fans, many other cards aren't. Here we have 4 interesting fights, a number of former world champions (Chagaev, Arslan, Braehmer, Tajbert and Menzer) and a number of future champions the card is genuinely stacked.

Last weekend Boxnation gave us a single card on Friday night with Derry Matthews facing unheralded Emiliano Marsili for the IBO. The main event was one of the best fights of January (genuinely good fight) but the under-card was a complete joke which saw the chief support being Steve Harkin v Jason Ball in a bout that looked like it could have been 2 drunks outside the Red Lion on a Friday night. I really cannot fathom how that Harkin v Ball fight ever made it's way near TV it was indefensible and shows all the skill levels of some untrained drunks (despite that it was entertaining for all the wrong reasons).

Thankfully it seems I'm no longer the only one sick of the channel promising the world but delivering nothing. Earlier this week James DeGale seemed to say (quite clearly) that he and Frank Warren were done, Frankie Gavin publicly complained about the money he had been offered to fight Jason Cook and the upcoming Tony Bellew v Danny McIntosh fight saw the purse bids won by Dave Caldwell instead of Bellew's promoter Warren. To say the least these have been interesting developments.

Speak out Steve!

I've never been a big fan of Steve Bunce and his over-hyper nature when he has been on TV or even his writing for that matter. At the moment Mr Bunce works basically as the face of subscription TV channel "Box Nation" hosting not only his own weekly magazine show but also featuring on near enough every live card the channel has so far shown.

Personally I feel that Steve often comes across much like a child who has been eating sweets all day then been told to sit on TV. His hyper-activity and crazy rants are often misconstrued as enthusiasm for the sport rather than one mans love affair with his own vocal chords and more tellingly his views are all to often see through. Be it Bunce's pro-British stance or negative views towards certain fighters (notably a rant on Ismayl Sillahk) his opinion is shouted out at the TV...much like a fan of the sport. In fact it's because Steve is a fan of the sport that I'm writing this entry on the blog. First and foremost Steve comes across as a genuine fan, he shares his views an awful lot and comes across as unprofessional as a result. If you will he's a fan and then a journalist, not a straight journalist.

Because Steve Bunce strikes me as a fan of the sport I need to make a public plea, can EVERY British Boxing fan urge Steve to speak out. Bunce is one of the men who has a solid voice on Box Nation and is also one of the fans of the sport, he of all people should know what WE, the fans want to see, we want to see the same thing he wants to see. WE boxing fans, want to see good, 50-50 fights, not mismatches, not cynical attempts to cash in on a fighter and no over the top hyperbole to sell a fight.

Recently we've all heard that unbeaten Nathan Cleverly (23-0, 11), the WBO Light Heavyweight Champion of the World will defend his title against the almost unknown Tommy Karpency (21-2-1, 14). Box Nation will be showing this fight live and yet EVERY boxing fan you can find is happy to tell you that this isn't a fight they want to see. The 25 year old Karpency has shown that he isn't the sort of quality that a world challenger needs to be, he has suffered losses to journeyman Rayco Saunders and former Cleverly victim Karo Murat as well as a draw with journeyman Demetrius Davis, he has yet to beat a fighter of any note at all. Now whilst it's fine for Frank Warren (Nathan Cleverly's promoter) to try and hype the fight, it would be awful for Bunce to push the fight as a good one. If Bunce attempts to pull the wool over our eyes we should just give up with the guy as he would sadly have proven he lacks the integrity that boxing fans deserve.

So again, I call on the boxing world to tell Bunce to Speak out!

Fight of the year? More like Year of the Fights

2011 has been a treat for boxing fans, and seriously you may have seen some stinkers, or felt slightly ripped off about certain things (Wladimir Klitschko v David Haye for example, or the judging in a number of notable fights) but you'll almost certainly have seen some amazing fights. Part way through the year there was a thread on the amazing Budweiser Boxing forum that started talking about the best fights of 2011...I took the thread a bit further than a short list and did more of a...long list...and since then have added more fights, and here is the long list for 2011's fight of the year:

Acosta v Rios
Arce v Vazquez Jr
Berto v Ortiz
Concepcion v Marquez
Lee v McEwan
Lopez v Salido
Maidana v Morales
Odom v Omotoso
Robles v Silva
Rodriguez v Wolak
Berto v Zaveck
Ceda v Narvaez
DeMarco v Sanchez
Murat v Campillo II
Froch v Johnson
Iwasa v Yamanaka
Lujan v Melligen
Mitchell v Murray
Macklin v Sturm
Appleby v Walsh
Aaron v Webb
Diaz v Kennedy
Miranda v Viloria
Chavez Jr v Zbik
Geale v Sylvester
Guerrero v Katsidis
Jamoye v McDonnell
John v Yordan
Lopez v Lundy
Robinson v Sexton I
Chisora v Fury
Conyers v De La Rosa
Antillion v Rios
Crolla v Watson
Gonzalez v Sierra
Gutierrez v Palacios
Hovhannisyan v Marquez
Hernandez v Keb Baas
Lara v Molina
Robinson v Sexton II
Barrett v Tua II
Coleman v Paris
Cotto v Mayorga
Arce v Nongqayi II
Frankel v Molina
Gomez v Granados
Huck v Nakash
Huerta v Martin
Lemieux v Rubio
Martirosyan v Roman 
Firtha v Fury
Hasegawa v Gonzalez
Cleverly v Bellew
Molitor v Gauthier
Theron v Cote
Angulo v Kirkland
Aspera v Silvestri
Vincente v Gonzalez
Porpramook v Yaegashi
Arce v Angkotta II
Helenius v Chisora
Martinez v Castaneda
Murray v Sturm
Murray v Rios

If you've missed any of these, make you sure you try to catch them, they are full of action, bombs and in some cases a fair bit of controversy. If you are a fight fan you need to have watched at least half of these!

Canelo the fraud?

When it comes to boxing superstars it's obvious that both Manny “Pacman” Pacquiao and Floyd “Money” Mayweather are by far the two biggest names. The third most popular fighter in the world however is quite likely to be Saul “Canelo” Alvarez, the 21 year old Mexican who currently holds the WBC Light Middleweight title and has an unbeaten record of 39-0-1 (29KO's). Whilst the young, red headed fighter is popular and a real emerging star of Mexican boxing, he has left some fans with real doubts.

“Canelo” turned professional aged just 15 and won his debut via 4^th round TKO and in fact would pick up a number of KO's early in his career despite struggling against Miguel Vazquez (the current WBC Lightweight champion) and scoring a draw against Jorge Juarez. Between 2005 and 2008 Canelo would pick up a number of easy wins before stepping up his opposition and beating guys like Gabriel Martinez, Raul Pinzon and Larry Mosley.

It was maybe in 2010 that the major first questions were asked of Canelo as he beat up the much smaller Jose Miguel Cotto. It wasn't just that Canelo had effectively been matched with a guy several weights smaller than himself but he was also visibly shaken when Cotto caught him in the opening round and seemed to open up questions regarding Canelo's chin. Although Canelo would weather the storm and eventually stop Cotto it was a worry that he was even shaken.

In 2011 however bigger and more revealing questions have been asked about both Canelo's opponents and his out of the ring character. Whilst Canelo has won a world title, he did face the smaller Matthew Hatton to win the title, and in 2 of his 3 defences since he has faced smaller men (both Alfonso Gomez and Kermit Cintron are natural Welterweights). It seems to be a bit of a pattern of Canelo's career, facing smaller men. To date his “best” wins have all been against smaller men (Vazquez, Cotto, Hatton, Gomez, Cintron) though it seems that it's not just in the ring that he likes to pick on the little man.

If stories are to be believed then Alvarez, a man who fights at 154lbs beat up the much smaller Ulises “Archie” Solis (who fights at 108lbs) due to Solis getting close to Canelo's ex girlfriend. This resulted in Solis suffering a broken jaw (broken in 3 places), losing several teeth and having bruises. Whilst this case does seem to be heading towards court Canelo has denied the attack (pointing the finger at one of his brothers), if found to be guilty the long term damage to Canelo's career may be massively damaging. The worrying thing about the story though is that WBC president Jose Sulaiman is quoted as saying “We at the WBC will pay the expenses on the damages that Ulises ‘Archie’ Solís has received not knowing who caused these damages”, a bit strange that the WBC would offer to pay Solis' damages regardless of whether they knew who caused it or not. If the WBC are making this payment, do they maybe know something that Saul Alvarez isn't telling us?

Whilst Canelo has the world at his feet, he may end up being one of the fighters who becomes a true “bad boy” of the sport, or gets a reputation as either a hot head (something we've seen from him in a number of fights) or a man who will only fight smaller men. Until Canelo faces a true threat (and there is a number of them out there) such as Carlos Molina, Erislandy Lara, Lukas Konecny, James Kirkland or even Javier Maciel there has to be doubts about his ability to fight someone who isn't smaller.

Is Canelo a fraud? It's hard to say either way, though it's obvious that he's yet to really face a solid threat his own size. Whilst I'd lean towards him being over-rated it's hard to say just how long he will remain at the top. If he continues to face relative nobodies and smaller men he could easily remain at the top until he grows grey and WBC president Jose Sulaiman passes away due to old age. If he however fights the best fighters out there I'll be honest, I don't see his reign lasting long at all.

99 not out for Yori Boy Campas

Luis Ramon Campas is well known to boxing fans, he was, at one point, a genuine world champion (IBF light middleweight champion 1997-1998)., he rubbed shoulders with some of the best fighters of the 1990's. In fact in a career that goes back to 1987 Campas has faced the following well known names: Felix "Tito" Trinidad, Raul "El Diamante" Marquez, Fernando "El Feroz" Vargas, Daniel Santos, Oscar "Golden Boy" De La Hoya and Daniel "El Pillin" Santos as well as a huge number of title challengers.

Campas however seems to be unhappy with his career and wants to achieve more than just rubbing shoulders with some of the best fighters of his era, he wants to have win #100. At the moment Campas' record stands at a rather amazing 99-16-1 (78). Sadly however his most recent fight as a loss, coming this morning at the hands of Mexican prospect Jorge Cota (11-0). Cota managed to score an 8th round TKO over the increasingly shop worn Campas who was stopped for just the 9th time in 116 fights.

Whilst Campas will likely fight on in search of win #100 the loss to Cota is the 4th loss in a little over 2 years for Campas who has gone 7-4-1 in a little over 2 years. Amazingly between 1987 and 1994 Campas started his career with 56 straight wins (prior to his first loss at the hands of Felix Trinidad). Whilst it took just 7 years to rack up 56 wins it has now taken Campas more than 17 years (and counting) to get the next 44 wins.

Sadly for Campas the reasons for continuing may not be win #100 but money, the tough man with fighting blood flowing through his veins has never managed to get the career defining paydays to match up with his who's who record. Whilst Campas was never going to be a brain surgeon or a scientist working at CERN over 100 fights will take their toll on someones motor ability and with the lack of big paydays he may find himself, like many faded stars, looking at the gutter through damaged eyes and slurring whatever words he wishes to say. I'd like to think someone will "offer" themself up to be #100 just to cross the milestone then someone in boxing needs to take him by the hand and offer him another role rather than let him continue to be a human punchbag. Hopefully someone out there manages to get Yori boy out before it's too late.

CompuBox...the ones who can't count?

If you were one of the many, many people who watched HBO's card last Saturday night you'll have seen one of the best rounds of slugging this year as Alfredo "El Perro" Angulo and James "The Mandingo Warrior" Kirkland slugged it out, traded knockdowns and threw 177 punches...or did they?

The official Compubox figures had Angulo throwing 73 punches in the opening 3 minutes whilst they had Kirkland throwing 104. Having watched that opening round a number of times I'm still asking myself how they got to those numbers. Angulo, by my count went not only over 100 but nearly DOUBLE of the official numbers, and Kirkland, whilst throwing a lot himself, certainly DID NOT throw 30 more than Angulo (in fact, from just watching the fight and not counting I'd have said he actually threw less than Angulo).

Rob Day, friend of mine working for the Boxing Tribune, made a very similar point at the start of the year in his article "Compubox – Fact or Fiction?" Rob stated "it should always be remembered that the live figures aren’t completely accurate due to very likely human error". Problem is that human error is only part of the issue, lets be honest for a Compubox judge to miss around 50% of Angulo's punches is more than just human error, it's...somewhat disgraceful.

Dave Allen, another friend posted on a forum posted an excellent point explaining some of the issues with the system:
"Compubox is not 100% correct,it would be more reliable if you had four counters on each side of the ring.But also there are times when the referee would obstruct your view,so as far as i am concerned as long as it do not effect the decision carry on if thats what floats your boat.
 I never take any notice of the punch stats,its what i see with my own eye's which makes up my mind who won the bout.Never had them when i first started my passion for the sport,standing out in the cold watching Tom Sawyers swing his bare fist." (Talking Boxing with Billy C)

And maybe Dave gets it spot on, the referee can get in the way, though their is so many other issues. Did you know CompuBox regards anything other than a jab as a "power punch"? Did you know that each fighter has 1 man counting "thrown and connected" on what is no more than a glorified amateur scoring system?

The well established Billy C (see the above link) actually got asked to stop talking the system when he was giving it a hard time on his radio show but sadly for CompuBox they seemed happier in saying "shut up we're right" rather than "we'll try to improve we see we have problems". Maybe this is the biggest issue, they don't want to improve, they have a cushty deal with HBO to provide "official figures" and lets be honest whilst HBO are paying them for a half assed job, why would they want to put money into creating an ACCURATE system? It seems obvious when Jim Lampley or Mex Kellerman state the CompuBox numbers as fact they they are happy with them being "official" which is just a giant shame.

Whilst it seems unlikely that CompuBox will take their head out of the sand it's be nice if more people did begin to question them.