Taking On The Ring 100

I'm a sucker for subjective lists. Every time VH1 airs one of its endless lists -- top 100 one-hit wonders, top 100 heavy metal bands -- I rail against its injustices. The Pixies are the 81st best "hard rock band" ever, while Living Colour is the 70th? Screw you, VH1. But I can't stop watching them. Therefore, I = sucker.

As lists go, I'm in substantial agreement with The Ring's annual enumeration of the 100 best fighters, published in the January issue but compiled in September. Theirs is a subjective account, like so many others, of the best active "pound for pound" boxers -- that is, who's best/most accomplished regardless of what weight class they fight in.

My substantial agreement aside, there are two howlers on the list.

Vladimir Klitschko is ranked 55th. Nuh-uh, no they di-int. I'm by no means a Klitschko loyalist. But Klitschko looks to be the best heavyweight by a country mile, with only Sam Peter in shouting distance. And Peter lost in 2005 to the version of Klitschko whose confidence was in the dumpster and was far more mentally fragile than the Klitschko who is fighting now, while Peter looked shaky in his most recent outing. This Klitschko is very, very good, if flawed -- I suspect he's one really nasty punch away from wondering whether he will get knocked out and fighting scared again. But no matter. He's top-25 "pound for pound" material on a great many lists. A recent poll of top boxing writers at Yahoo! Sports won him enough votes for top-10 status that he placed, in effect, 13th. Yeah, 55 is way too low.

Another big man, Jean-Marc Mormeck, gets ranked at just 48th, another robbery. Now, granted, Mormeck just lost his cruiserweight (200 lbs.) crown this month to David Haye. But this list was compiled well before that defeat. Prior to that in 2007, he'd avenged his loss to O'Neil Bell, ranked 40th last year, to resume his reign as Ring Magazine's official 200-pound champ. And prior to that, he'd whooped the cream of the cruiserweight division. I'm not sure if Mormeck cracks the top 25 on my list, but he's significantly higher than 48th.

My complaints would be totally lame unless I suggested moving someone down. I can name a few. My first nominee is Nobuo Nashiro, ranked 42nd. The junior bantamweight (115 lbs.) is a mere 9-1, with his only significant victory coming via upset over Martin Castillo this year. That's a very nice win, but the next time Nashiro faced a high-caliber opponent, he lost to Alexander Munoz. So how is this guy better than Mormeck, let alone Klitschko, both of whom stood atop their respective divisions when the magazine went to print and both of whom are significantly more accomplished (26-2-1 and 49-3, respectively) over their careers and have proven themselves more than once against top competition? Want another? How about Zsolt Erdei, ranked 43rd? The light heavyweight (175 lbs.) titlist defeated absolute nobodies since last year, yet he moved up in the mag's rankings from 49th. Even Ring acknowledged that he fought nobodies. So far as I can tell, Erdei only has one good win in his career, too.

The discrepancy may be a result of Ring's explanation that its rankings incorporate "perceived potential" as one measure. "So a semi-unproven fighter with a tantalizing upside may get the nod over a proven veteran whose limits have already been established." That's fine to consider, but I don't think it much applies to picking Nashiro and Erdei over Klitschko and Mormeck. How can anyone assess the perceived potential of Nashiro after just 10 fights with one good win and one loss against proven opponents? The magazine even concedes that: "Hard to say how good he really is after going 1-1 against Castillo and Munoz, and at 25, hard to say how good the Japanese fighter can be." I'm not knocking the kid, I'm just saying nobody, not even The Ring, has a feel for whether he's really good or not. And amazingly, they ranked him 37th last year. Meanwhile, Erdei "gets points for consistency," because he's successfully defended the WBO's title belt eight straight times, according to The Ring. Which is weird, because Erdei's mediocre title reign seems to me like an indictment of the very "alphabet soup" belt system which The Ring is in mortal combat against. There's not even any mention of Erdei's "perceived potential."

Still, when the standard is "perceived potential" versus "established limits," Klitschko and Mormeck rank pretty well. Both have navigated their faults to the top of their respective divisions, with Klitschko the consensus best heavyweight and Mormeck having twice taken the cruiserweight crown. Would that everyone's limits be "best in class." Apparently, though, their most established limits are in The Ring 100.




















Next I will take on this totally bogus list about why I should buy a University of Waterloo Food Services Meal Plan.

Two Winners, Two Worries

On Saturday night, Manny Pacquiao picked up another big win against one of the best in boxing history, and Sam Peter returned for his own victory that, due to the peculiarities of title belt politics, means he made his first defense of an "interim" championship. Were the circumstances different, this might be cause for celebration for what were, going in, one of boxing's biggest superstars in Pacquiao and a potential savior of the desert-like heavyweight division in Peter. But circumstances matter.

What their opponents do next is moot. Marco Antonio Barrera is retiring following his second loss to Pacquiao, and Jameel McCline -- well, I don't really care what McCline does. Having watched the fight on replay, it was maddening to watch him backpedal in the fourth round after dropping Peter twice in the third, then refuse to throw the uppercut considering that Peter was practically begging for it by leaning down.

What Pacquiao did Saturday may very well have been about what he does next. All agree that Pacquiao fought cautiously, nothing like the whirlwind of fists we've come to love. Likewise, all agree he looked gaunt at the weigh-in the day before. One of his promoters, Bob Arum, is talking about Pacquiao fighting at lightweight (135 lbs.), up from the junior lightweight division (130) that he's dominated for the last couple years. His trainer, Freddie Roach, said: "We're trying to make him a better overall fighter, with a longer, better career." That goes hand in hand with Roach's confession that he knows Pacquiao, at lightweight, won't have the same power edge. Usually, I'd be in favor of a fighter having a longer, better career, but there are thought undercurrents here that have my furrowing my brow. I must start by saying the only fight I want to see Pacquiao in next is a rematch with Juan Manuel Marquez who fought Pacquiao to a dramatic draw in 2004. That's assuming Marquez gets through his Nov. 3 meeting with Rocky Juarez, it almost goes without saying. Not only do Pacquiao and Marquez have unfinished business, but they're two of the sport's five best fighters, pound for pound. Marquez only recently moved up to junior lightweight, so it could be a stretch to move up again soon at all if ever, no matter what Arum is saying about a possible Pacquiao-Marquez rematch in that division. No, I don't think this is about whether Pacquiao can make 130 anymore. I think it's about whether Pacquiao wants to make 130 anymore. Middleweight Jermain Taylor recently showed that his main problem making 160 lbs. was how hard he wanted to train making it, since he did it easily after concentrating full-time on doing so for one of the first times in his career. I think Pacquiao is in a similar situation; his distractions outside the ring prior to this weekend are well-documented. Worse still than the likelihood that a Marquez rematch may not happen anytime soon is the possibility that we've now seen the last of the Pacquiao who tries to blast out everyone he fights, replaced by a heavier, less powerful, more tactical thinker. Barrera pulled off the whole brawler-turned-boxer thing, but I doubt it will suit Pacquiao as well. Explosiveness is what made Pacquiao special. If he abandons it, 2007 won't just be the year we witnessed the ending for great warriors like Barrera, Diego Corrales, Jose Luis Castillo, Eric Morales and Fernando Vargas. We can add Pacquiao to the list, if only figuratively.

Peter, also from the seek and destroy school of fisticuffs, never stopped trying to do just that to McCline, even after landing on his back three times early in the fight. The worry about Peter is of a different variety -- that he was on his back to begin with. On one level, that he got back up showed considerable fortitude. Peter is still green, by heavyweight standards. Maybe he will learn lessons from the McCline knockdowns. But a granite chin is one of the traits, with his nasty knockout power, that made Peter such a formidable heavyweight, viewed as no worse than the second best behind Vitali Klitschko, whom Peter barely lost to in 2005. Anyone can "get caught," but regardless of Peter's claims that his knockdowns were mere slips, he was badly hurt in the third, and not by some lucky punch. Peter never figured out that the uppercut was his huckleberry, and never adjusted as such. A less reticent fighter than McCline, or a better conditioned one, would have made Peter pay. Fortunately for us, Peter has shown the ability to learn, as he showed in his rematch against James Toney last year. Nor should a Peter loss as a result of some of these mistakes be the end of him as an upper-tier heavyweight; he's still young, and could rebuild. Just one question: Can anyone still say, after Saturday night, that Peter has a granite chin, badly hurt as he was by a three-time also-ran? I, for one, am worried.
















This is Peter Cushing. His name is Peter, like Sam, and he was gaunt, like Manny was on Friday. How I tied this all together is nothing short of a miracle, but maybe a bit of a stretch.

Once I Was Blind, Now I Can See

There'll be ample boxing to talk about this week -- Marco Antonio Barrera ending his remarkable career, another must-see fight or two coming up Saturday, how the hell Jameel McCline gave Samuel Peter so much trouble when it took harder-hitting Vladimir Klitschko 12 rounds to hit "The Nigerian Nightmare" with a punch that had him reeling -- but there's something much more unimportant I want to address. I'm skipping over the more meaningful topics in part because I won't see the Barrera-Manny Pacquiao fight until next weekend, assuming they'll replay the $50 main event for free on HBO, and because I didn't catch but a few rounds of Peter-McCline despite my best intentions. The other reason is because I'm feeling like less of an idiot these days about the topic at hand, and I want to express my relief about it: Predictions.

Unless you're Las Vegas or a professional gambler, boxing predictions are more art than science. Ultimately, they matter very little. At most, one's prediction accuracy says a tiny amount about what one knows about the sport. But they're part of the fun of being a fight fan, at least for me.

And when I started up this blog, my prediction accuracy started in the gutter, then rolled around in it for a while. I went 1 for 5 in July, my first month online. That's Alex Rodriguez-in-October-level stuff. My confidence in my understanding of boxing was in shambles. Before I started the blog, when I made predictions in my head, my accuracy was damn good. But had I, like the aforementioned Yankee who kills it in the regular season but vaporizes in the playoffs, choked when it really mattered?

As it turns out, nowadays I'm more like a Yankee more famous for his fall performances, Mr. October himself, Reggie Jackson. Since August 1, I've gone 6 for 6. Sometimes, I haven't been right about the exact nature of the victory. Take this weekend, when Peter had to gut out a decision against a three-time also-ran in the form of McCline, rather than knocking him out in the middle rounds as I haughtily scoffed that he would. Other times I've been pretty proud that my going against conventional wisdom ended up being such a dashing move. That would be like this weekend again, when, as I predicted, Barrera reportedly made a better showing than in his 2003 battering from the fists of Pacquiao, even though age and career arc both looked to solidly favor a Pac-Man blowout of the Baby-Faced Assassin. But ultimately, I'd rather be wrong about the reason my pick won, as I have sometimes since August, than right about the reason my pick might lose, as I was pretty consistently before then.

Of course, now that I've brought this to the fore, the fates will observe my hubris and make me pay. Anticipating this, I've got a plan to head them off at the pass. I'm going to predict the exact opposite of what I think will happen for the next few weeks, no matter how crazy I look. Trust me, 13-loss, Federico Catubay will KO Vic Darchinyan in one round! It's going to be a fun October, for a lot of reasons.

Regards,
The "Real" Mr. October















This punk's got nothing on me.

Five About Fighting: D.A.R.E. II, Easy Call, Wussing Out, Getting Selfish And A Telling Diss

Four random thoughts, plus one prediction.

1. Revisiting the Shane Mosley drug question, a number of boxing writers want to let this one slide. Mosley, after all, has never behaved like anything but a model citizen and he's a legendary fitness freak, so what would compel him to succumb to the temptation of an extra edge? I don't doubt either of those facts, but Mosley's excuse -- "I didn't know what I was taking" -- is identical to the rote denial offered by less model citizens, and not a particularly good one. It's only value is that, unless someone else brings forth proof otherwise, it can't be debunked automatically. But as Bad Left Hook posed the question, "You're telling me Mosley and his handlers would take something without knowing precisely what it is? Even though the steroids were undetectable, it seems a little too risky." It's even stranger since Mosley is apparently Mr. Goodbody. Whereas Bad Left Hook opts to trust Mosley, I'm going to err in the direction of skepticism.
2. I don't have much to say about Sam Peter fighting Jameel McCline Saturday on Showtime. Peter's going to knock him out around the sixth, confidence 99%, allegiance to Peter. It's not that McCline's a bad fighter, and yes, his height could pose a problem to the relatively tree trunk-like Peter. But McCline's job, so far as I can tell, is to lose against the elite talents of his division, and Peter's no worse than the second best heavyweight. If Zuri Lawrence -- Zuri Lawrence, for chrissakes -- beat McCline, Peter should have no trouble. Still, I'll probably be watching, as it's hard for me to justify the $50 on Manny Pacquiao-Marco Antonio Barrera II, also airing Saturday on HBO PPV. It's going to be expensive over the next few months if I buy every nifty pay per view coming down the pike.
3. I've gone soft on "The Contender," a little. The two contestants last week -- Stubby Lopez and Wayne McCantpunch or whatever their names were -- put on a pretty decent scrap considering neither of them were all that good. I loved the spirit of Stubby, who looked like he was going to be a sitting duck with that frame of his and his late start at the fight game. But as a boxing fan, I really enjoyed some of the behind-the-scenes stuff, I liked watching the fighters get prepared, I thought the scene with Sam Soliman in the icewater tub was great and yes, I even got a little emotional about the family scenes. I still was annoyed by some of the reality show's already-cliched conventions, like the ultra-dramatic music when the fighters come to sit down and review the night before, but the music truly works during the fights, and they've cut back since last I saw on the dopey sound effects. Tonight's episode was OK, too, with a nice fight between Sakio Bika and Donnie McCrary, although man is that Bika an awkward cat. I liked it enough to watch if not much else is on, but it still isn't appointment television for me.
4. There are all kinds of mysterious goings-on surrounding whom David Diaz, a 135-pound beltholder, and Joshua Clottey, a 147-pound contender, will fight next. I won't get into the specifics, but things as they look now suggest that Diaz will fight Michael Katsidis and Clottey will fight Luis Collazo. I'd like both, please. See how selfish I'm getting, after one weekend of being spoiled by excellent fights? Both of those are very intriguing matchups, albeit between people hardly anyone has heard of. Katsidis has star potential, and Diaz is the kind of tough hombre who can bring it out of him if he doesn't beat it out of him. With the other two lightweight Diazes, Juan and Julio, ready to rumble next weekend, it would be an excellent start to attaining some clarity about who's the best in the division. Clottey and Collazo are both peculiar stylists whose contrasts could make for a very interesting bout, and each have the potential to break into the stacked welterweight upper ranks, but they need to earn it against each other.
5. Once more into Taylor-Pavlik: Over at TheSweetScience.com, Jermain Taylor's promoter, Lou DiBella, totally dissed Taylor's trainer, Emmanuel Steward, for his advice between the second and third rounds, just after Taylor nearly had Kelly Pavlik KO'd. I suspect what has been a rocky partnership between Taylor and Steward may not last much longer. Some of the fault lies with Taylor's stubbornness -- how many times has he done the exact opposite of what Steward asked him? -- but I think general bad chemistry is also to blame. Maybe it's time for Taylor to bring in someone new, or the trainer who led him to the middleweight (160 lbs.) championship, Pat Burns.

It turns out that if you examine Slim Goodbody's insides closely, you can see he has a hematocrit level of 52.2, "off the charts," according to experts.

Due to High Expectations, Seven Punch Combo Is Providing Needles for Your Balloons

Robbed of the ability to make predictions on a handful of big fights that were recently postponed, and feeling the anxiety all boxing fans are feeling these days that more postponements could tarnish the outstanding fall and winter lineup of exciting matches, I decided to turn my predictive powers (such as they are) to possible future postponements.

This is not intended to be some totally flippant exercise. Partially flippant, maybe, but there's reason for partial seriousness about this, too. In August, the season ahead raised expectations of fight fans, including myself, to unrealistic heights. Those expectations have been punctured by the delay of three major, or at least meaningful, bouts: Vargas-Mayorga, Klitschko-McCline and Marquez-Juarez. Two have been moved to other dates, with Marquez-Juarez landing on free Showtime, a blessing in disguise since I wasn't planning on buying it for $44.95 on HBO PPV as originally scheduled. Klitschko-McCline is gone for good, with Vitali and Jameel, respectively, heading their separate ways.

But perhaps they need a little extra puncturing, these expectations. I've always found myself better off with low expectations exceeded, rather than high expectations diminished. After they graduated from cult favorites to one-hit wonders in the 1990s, my favorite music group, the Flaming Lips, churned out a quick EP entitled "Due to High Expectations, the Flaming Lips are Providing Needles for Your Balloons." A few years later, they delivered an all-time great album, "The Soft Bulletin." I'm rooting for things to go the way of the Flaming Lips -- expectations exceeded -- but since a number of these stellar fights ahead stand a decent (or greater) chance of postponement, I hereby provide needles for your balloons.

Joe Calzaghe-Mikkel Kessler
Nov. 3
Super middleweight (168 lbs.)
Risk factors: There may not be a more brittle fighter than Calzaghe. It's amazing that someone who can take such blows in the ring, and deliver them with hands that are serially broken, is so prone to match-canceling injuries.
Chances of postponement: Slightly worse than even. To the point that one writer -- I can't remember whom -- was recently pining for Calzaghe to be hermetically sealed until November. But Joe has been more stable of late, so maybe hermetic sealing is a step too far.

Jermain Taylor-Kelly Pavlik
Sept. 29
Middleweight (160 lbs.)
Risk factors: Both men are tall middleweights -- Taylor stands at 6'1" and Pavlik tops 6'2" -- who have complained they suffer tremendously trying to chop themselves down to 160. The weight problem is such that they almost had this one at super-middleweight. If this fight is postponed, it would be disenchanting, since it's the first truly big fight of the season.
Chances of postponement: Minor, but significant. Reports out of the camps that both guys on track to make weight by next Saturday are positive. But Fernando Vargas was bragging about how good he felt trying to get down to his proper weight just days before he postponed his battle with Ricardo Mayorga.

Fernando Vargas-Ricardo Mayorga
Nov. 23
Between middleweight and super middleweight (162 lbs.)
Risk factors: That it's already been postponed once ain't good. Vargas turned up anemic along the way to losing about 100 lbs. Mayorga isn't a model of reliability himself, since he almost bailed out of his fight with Oscar De La Hoya at the last minute last year.
Chances of postponement: Awfully likely, although a second postponement would probably equal cancellation. Is anyone making sure Fernando isn't blimping out right now? I wouldn't be surprised if he still looks like Eddie Murphy in a fat suit come late October.

Roy Jones, Jr.-Felix Trinidad
Jan. 26
Between super middleweight and light heavyweight (175 lbs.)
Risk factors: Jones is erratic as hell. He's constantly pulling out of proposed fights, even eschewing big paydays.
Chances of postponement: Meh. Jones needs this payday more than any other, since he's on the downside of his career. I doubt he'll risk it, but I don't count out the possibility.

Humberto Soto-Joan Guzman
Nov. 13
Junior lightweight (130 lbs.)
Risk factors: Soto decided, against the advice of everyone, to take a tune-up fight this past weekend, jeopardizing this bout if he lost or even if he endured a deep cut that wouldn't heal in time.
Chances of postponement: Soto-Guzman looks safe. Humberto won his weekend tune-up easily, and reports are that he was hardly scratched. Joan, don't get any bright ideas for your own tune-up.

Juan Manuel Marquez-Rocky Juarez
Nov. 3
Junior lightweight (130 lbs.)
Risk factors: This fight appears cursed. First, Jorge Barrios dropped out with injuries, promoting Juarez to his replacement. Then, Marquez developed an infection on his fist. Seriously, how does that happen? Hasn't anyone in Marquez' camp heard of Neosporin?
Chances of postponement: Depends on your level of superstition. I'm going to say I think this one's had enough misfortune and is going to happen.

Sultan Ibragimov-Evander Holyfield
Oct. 13
Heavyweight (200 lbs. +)
Risk factors: Holyfield's already a replacement for the fishily-injured-then-training-a-couple-weeks-later Ruslan Chagaev, so it, too, has a track record. Holyfield has worked through his endless health problems, from heart conditions to damaged shoulders to freaking hepatitis, for chrissakes, but his history and advanced age are cause for hand-wringing.
Chances of postponement: Not very likely. Ibragimov needs to beat Holyfield in the highest-profile bout of his career to capture the public's imagination, and Holyfield's on something of a holy mission to become a five-time heavyweight champ.

Oleg Maskaev-Sam Peter
Oct 6
Heavyweight (200 lbs. +)
Risk factors: Maskaev and his handlers did virtually everything they could not to take this fight, and conventional wisdom is that they're worried the aging Maskaev is going to get splattered in a high-risk, low-reward battle that could end his marketability just as it had reached its improbable peak.
Chances of postponement: Low. Peter's team played hardball to force this match to happen. Anyone think that if it's postponed any other word besides "lawsuit" is the first to pop into the Peter crew's mind?

Vitali Klitschko-anyone
No date
Heavyweight (200 lbs. +)
Risk factors: The last few years of Vitali's career are marked by fight postponements, cancellations, retirements and un-retirements. That he's returned to training already after screwing up his back may bode well, but I rate...
Chances of postponement: ...at almost certain. Too bad, too. Vitali has always been the more passionate of the formidable Klitschko brother duo, but his big brother Vladimir is just not as fragile. Sorry to say it, but Vitali is an old gray mare in boxing years, and maybe worse, because he just can't climb into the ring anymore come fight night.

Kid Rock-Tommy Lee
No date
No weight limit set
Risk factors: For one, the fight just hasn't been set yet. For another, proposals to put feuding rock stars into the boxing ring have traditionally gone nowhere. Remember Axl Rose-Vince Neil?
Chances of postponement: I don't think this fight is going to happen. I hear tell the little one they had at the Video Music Awards wasn't much to watch anyway.

Miguel Cotto-Shane Mosley; Floyd Mayweather-Ricky Hatton; Jean-Marc Mormeck-David Haye; Juan Diaz-Julio Diaz; Manny Pacquiao-Marco Antonio Barrera
Assorted dates
Assorted weight classes
Risk factors: Thankfully, not very many. All of these guys are pros who have little history or delaying or canceling bouts, even when they've had injuries or weight problems. Could Juan Diaz, college student/boxer, oversleep studying for a test the next week? Could Ricky "Fatton" spend too much time in the pubs? Could Shane Mosley injure his tooth again, the one he wiggled after KOing Vargas as he explained why he couldn't fight Mayweather in the fall? Could Floyd strain an achilles doing the foxtrot on "Dancing With The Stars?" Maybe, but I doubt it. No, I think all these big, exciting fights are pretty close to a sure thing.
Chances that I'll wuss out and end on a positive note: Already did.