Sky Sports
Pound-for-pound king Manny Pacquiao has hinted he could be ready to retire from boxing.
The 31-year-old recently retained his WBO welterweight title against Ghana's Joshua Clottey with a unanimous points decision in Texas.
The Filipino took on Clottey after an eagerly-anticipated showdown with Floyd Mayweather Jr fell through over a dispute about drug-testing procedures.
There are still hopes the duo will meet in the future, but Pacquiao insists his plans do not hinge exclusively on Mayweather.
Indeed, he revealed that he is even contemplating quitting the sport due to the concerns for his health of his mother.
"I might retire," Pacquiao told reporters on his return to the Philippines on Monday. "My mother has been begging me to stop fighting, so we'll talk about this.
"After my fight with (Miguel) Cotto, I asked her to allow me to fight one last time and she agreed. Now, she's asking me again to retire, what will I tell her now?
"She kneels down and cries every time (she asks me to quit). That's a heavy burden when it's my mother doing that.
Retirement
"It may not reach a point where I will fight Mayweather. I may announce retirement, I will talk with my family about it.
"I came this far in my boxing career without Mayweather, so I see no need to call him out. He needs me to bolster his career. I do not need him, they are the ones who need me.
"I am open to him fighting me anytime he wants to."
Pacquiao is standing for election in his homeland when the country goes to the polls on May 10, but insists his political ambitions would not be a contributing factor in any decision he took.
"I have been in boxing for a long time and I have given so many honours to my country," he added. "Even without the elections and the politics, my retirement will largely depend on my family's decision."
Source: skysports.com
Monday, 22 March 2010
Pacquiao may retire from boxing to please his worried mother -- CNN
CNN.com
(CNN) -- Filipino boxing legend Manny Pacquiao has dropped a shock hint that he might quit the ring -- because his mother does not want him to fight anymore.
Pacquiao is widely expected to fight Floyd Mayweather Jr. in a much-hyped showdown later this year, but the 31-year-old claims his place in boxing history is already assured following the successful defense of his WBO welterweight crown against Joshua Clottey last week.
"I reached my dream as a boxer without Floyd Mayweather in my career. I do not need him, they are the ones who need me," he told reporters as he returned home to his customary hero's welcome in the Philippines on Monday.
The fighter, known as "Pacman" by his fans, is now concentrating on his political career. He is standing for election in the Sarangani province on May 10, on the platform of opposition senator Manuel Villar's Nacionalista Party.
Pacquiao's personal Web site has carried media reports detailing how his mother Dionesia has implored him not to fight anymore, prompted by the ear injury he picked up in his battle against Miguel Cotto last year.
"She kneels down and cries every time [she asks me to quit]. That's a heavy burden when it's my mother doing that," he told reporters after meeting Filipino President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo in Malacanang on Monday morning.
"I have been boxing since I was 12 years old. Now I'm 31, so I'm seriously thinking about it. I will discuss it with my family.
"I have been in boxing for a long time and I have given so many honors to my country. Even without the elections and the politics, my retirement will largely depend on my family's decision."
Villa, a millionaire property developer, met Pacquiao at the airport and the boxer was quick to sing his praises.
"What we need now is a man who rose from poverty, who understands the call of the poor like myself," Pacquiao said.
Pacquiao has now won 12 straight fights and titles at seven different weights to establish himself, according to the rankings by respected boxing magazine Ring, as the best pound-for-pound boxer in the world.
A money-spinning fight against the undefeated Mayweather fell through earlier this year when the American insisted on Olympic-style drug testing, leading to a war of words and a stalemate in negotiations.
Pacquiao opted to fight Ghana's Clottey, whom he beat in 12 rounds, while Mayweather will take on fellow American Shane Mosley on May 1.
Any likely meeting between the two would probably be the richest in box office history and be staged at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, although Pacquiao filled the home stadium of the Dallas Cowboys NFL team -- where the Mayweather fight was initially scheduled to be held -- for his bout with Clottey.
Source: edition.cnn.com
(CNN) -- Filipino boxing legend Manny Pacquiao has dropped a shock hint that he might quit the ring -- because his mother does not want him to fight anymore.
Pacquiao is widely expected to fight Floyd Mayweather Jr. in a much-hyped showdown later this year, but the 31-year-old claims his place in boxing history is already assured following the successful defense of his WBO welterweight crown against Joshua Clottey last week.
"I reached my dream as a boxer without Floyd Mayweather in my career. I do not need him, they are the ones who need me," he told reporters as he returned home to his customary hero's welcome in the Philippines on Monday.
The fighter, known as "Pacman" by his fans, is now concentrating on his political career. He is standing for election in the Sarangani province on May 10, on the platform of opposition senator Manuel Villar's Nacionalista Party.
Pacquiao's personal Web site has carried media reports detailing how his mother Dionesia has implored him not to fight anymore, prompted by the ear injury he picked up in his battle against Miguel Cotto last year.
"She kneels down and cries every time [she asks me to quit]. That's a heavy burden when it's my mother doing that," he told reporters after meeting Filipino President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo in Malacanang on Monday morning.
"I have been boxing since I was 12 years old. Now I'm 31, so I'm seriously thinking about it. I will discuss it with my family.
"I have been in boxing for a long time and I have given so many honors to my country. Even without the elections and the politics, my retirement will largely depend on my family's decision."
Villa, a millionaire property developer, met Pacquiao at the airport and the boxer was quick to sing his praises.
"What we need now is a man who rose from poverty, who understands the call of the poor like myself," Pacquiao said.
Pacquiao has now won 12 straight fights and titles at seven different weights to establish himself, according to the rankings by respected boxing magazine Ring, as the best pound-for-pound boxer in the world.
A money-spinning fight against the undefeated Mayweather fell through earlier this year when the American insisted on Olympic-style drug testing, leading to a war of words and a stalemate in negotiations.
Pacquiao opted to fight Ghana's Clottey, whom he beat in 12 rounds, while Mayweather will take on fellow American Shane Mosley on May 1.
Any likely meeting between the two would probably be the richest in box office history and be staged at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, although Pacquiao filled the home stadium of the Dallas Cowboys NFL team -- where the Mayweather fight was initially scheduled to be held -- for his bout with Clottey.
Source: edition.cnn.com
David Haye has the class to end the Klitschkos' reign of passivity -- The Guardian
Guardian.co.uk
Until the final 15 seconds of his sham participation in what was supposed to be a challenge for Wladimir Klitschko's collection of world heavyweight titles, I was of the view boxing should make an example of Eddie Chambers and withhold his purse.
There have been too many of these passive efforts in world heavyweight title fights in recent years, a lot of them featuring the Klitschkos. No wonder the Americans won't watch them.
Well, there was one American with a very good view of the action in Düsseldorf on Saturday night and he completely wasted the journey. "Fast" Eddie, he calls himself. Minnesota Fats would have thrown more punches.
He was round, cumbersome, unambitious and spent most of the night with his gloves around his ears and retreating towards the ropes, where he ducked under Klitschko's long-range, safety-first head shots. His most memorable act of aggression was to lift the champion off the canvas on his shoulders in round one.
Once he'd been tagged in round two, saved from a knockout there and then only by Klitschko's in-built caution, he ran like a rabbit, poking out the odd limp right hand to the body and pathetically waving Wlad forward.
Lennox Lewis used to cop flak for boxing like Klitschko, but he was a virtual windmill compared to the crane from Kiev. Klitschko should have been back in the showers after 10 minutes but he couldn't finish Chambers off.
Actually he could have. He just couldn't be bothered. Wlad was happy to poke out that telegraph pole of a left jab and keep his own right hand up to look after his dodgy chin.
You could compare this fight to David Haye's hit-and-run effort to bamboozle Nikolai Valuev in Nuremberg last November, because of the disparity in size, reach and height – but the Londoner actually won the rounds against a freak of an opponent with a brilliant if eccentric strategy. Chambers's only plan was not to get hurt. At no point in the "fight" did he try to win a round or even a single exchange.
It was one of the easiest fights of Klitschko's 57-fight career and probably one of the worst, although there are plenty of candidates on that list. Even his adoring German public must have been bored by this.
I'm coming round to the view that Haye will knock Klitschko out if they ever meet. The Ukrainian never does anything different. Jab, right cross and occasionally a left hook – that's it. The rest of the time he stands off, waiting to counter, legs spread for power but not mobility. If a fast puncher – and Haye is probably the fastest in the division – goes over the top of Wlad's jab, which dips after he throws it, the Klitschko chin and his titles are there for the taking.
The more of these fights the authorities allow – and there were representatives of three ruling bodies there, the IBF, WBO and IBO, as well as the man from The Ring – the more damage they allow to be inflicted on the sport. As long as they get their flights and fancy hotels paid for, they couldn't care less.
The end when it came was merciful relief for those of us foolish enough to expect some action. With about 15 seconds left, Wlad impaled Eddie on the end of a cracking left hook to the temple and left him in a heap, hanging over the ropes and seriously out of it.
Fast Eddie took his licks, then. So, let him keep his money. But we should never be tempted to watch such a poor world title fight again.
Amateurs with attitude
You rarely see such lack of action in the amateurs, and the Great Britain team, by the sounds of it, were involved in plenty of that at the Commonwealth championship in India last week, bringing home a swag of medals.
So, as promised, here is Scott Cardle's blog on what was another encouraging tournament for the national team. Cardle not only picked up a gold medal, but he got a call from his idol Mike Tyson and met up with him when he got home to the UK. Not a bad way to celebrate.
Hats off to Ricky
Ricky Hatton is coming out of hiding – to play football with Robbie Williams.
The singer has persuaded Hatton, who trialled with Manchester City in his youth, to play in a Unicef charity match at Old Trafford on 6 June, alongside Alan Shearer and Jamie Redknapp as well as the usual celebrities who turn out for these games.
The previous two Unicef matches raised £4m.
Say it ain't so, Manny
A report from the Philippines suggests Manny Pacquiao's mother is prepared to get down on bended knee and beg him to quit boxing.
And Manny is said to be considering it. I'm not so sure. There are so many rumours about Pacquiao in the Filipino media you don't know which to believe. A story picked up around the world last year said the little hero had seen God and was on a mission to do his work.
For all his religious fervour and respect for his mum, I can't see Pacquiao walking away from a fight with Floyd Mayweather Jr.
Source: guardian.co.uk
Until the final 15 seconds of his sham participation in what was supposed to be a challenge for Wladimir Klitschko's collection of world heavyweight titles, I was of the view boxing should make an example of Eddie Chambers and withhold his purse.
There have been too many of these passive efforts in world heavyweight title fights in recent years, a lot of them featuring the Klitschkos. No wonder the Americans won't watch them.
Well, there was one American with a very good view of the action in Düsseldorf on Saturday night and he completely wasted the journey. "Fast" Eddie, he calls himself. Minnesota Fats would have thrown more punches.
He was round, cumbersome, unambitious and spent most of the night with his gloves around his ears and retreating towards the ropes, where he ducked under Klitschko's long-range, safety-first head shots. His most memorable act of aggression was to lift the champion off the canvas on his shoulders in round one.
Once he'd been tagged in round two, saved from a knockout there and then only by Klitschko's in-built caution, he ran like a rabbit, poking out the odd limp right hand to the body and pathetically waving Wlad forward.
Lennox Lewis used to cop flak for boxing like Klitschko, but he was a virtual windmill compared to the crane from Kiev. Klitschko should have been back in the showers after 10 minutes but he couldn't finish Chambers off.
Actually he could have. He just couldn't be bothered. Wlad was happy to poke out that telegraph pole of a left jab and keep his own right hand up to look after his dodgy chin.
You could compare this fight to David Haye's hit-and-run effort to bamboozle Nikolai Valuev in Nuremberg last November, because of the disparity in size, reach and height – but the Londoner actually won the rounds against a freak of an opponent with a brilliant if eccentric strategy. Chambers's only plan was not to get hurt. At no point in the "fight" did he try to win a round or even a single exchange.
It was one of the easiest fights of Klitschko's 57-fight career and probably one of the worst, although there are plenty of candidates on that list. Even his adoring German public must have been bored by this.
I'm coming round to the view that Haye will knock Klitschko out if they ever meet. The Ukrainian never does anything different. Jab, right cross and occasionally a left hook – that's it. The rest of the time he stands off, waiting to counter, legs spread for power but not mobility. If a fast puncher – and Haye is probably the fastest in the division – goes over the top of Wlad's jab, which dips after he throws it, the Klitschko chin and his titles are there for the taking.
The more of these fights the authorities allow – and there were representatives of three ruling bodies there, the IBF, WBO and IBO, as well as the man from The Ring – the more damage they allow to be inflicted on the sport. As long as they get their flights and fancy hotels paid for, they couldn't care less.
The end when it came was merciful relief for those of us foolish enough to expect some action. With about 15 seconds left, Wlad impaled Eddie on the end of a cracking left hook to the temple and left him in a heap, hanging over the ropes and seriously out of it.
Fast Eddie took his licks, then. So, let him keep his money. But we should never be tempted to watch such a poor world title fight again.
Amateurs with attitude
You rarely see such lack of action in the amateurs, and the Great Britain team, by the sounds of it, were involved in plenty of that at the Commonwealth championship in India last week, bringing home a swag of medals.
So, as promised, here is Scott Cardle's blog on what was another encouraging tournament for the national team. Cardle not only picked up a gold medal, but he got a call from his idol Mike Tyson and met up with him when he got home to the UK. Not a bad way to celebrate.
Hats off to Ricky
Ricky Hatton is coming out of hiding – to play football with Robbie Williams.
The singer has persuaded Hatton, who trialled with Manchester City in his youth, to play in a Unicef charity match at Old Trafford on 6 June, alongside Alan Shearer and Jamie Redknapp as well as the usual celebrities who turn out for these games.
The previous two Unicef matches raised £4m.
Say it ain't so, Manny
A report from the Philippines suggests Manny Pacquiao's mother is prepared to get down on bended knee and beg him to quit boxing.
And Manny is said to be considering it. I'm not so sure. There are so many rumours about Pacquiao in the Filipino media you don't know which to believe. A story picked up around the world last year said the little hero had seen God and was on a mission to do his work.
For all his religious fervour and respect for his mum, I can't see Pacquiao walking away from a fight with Floyd Mayweather Jr.
Source: guardian.co.uk
Manny Pacquiao and the Essence of Boxing -- SecondsOut
By Thomas Hauser, SecondsOut.com
“Boxing,” Hugh McIlvanney has written, “is a sport in which two men try to batter each other senseless. No matter how you dress it up, the basic objective is to render the opponent unconscious. You can say that more people are killed in motorcycle racing, that more people are killed in mountaineering. But in neither of those two activities is the fundamental objective to knock the other guy out. Motive, not statistics, will always separate boxing from other sports.”
On the night of March 13, 2010, Manny Pacquiao readied for battle in the futuristic city known as Cowboys Stadium. The gate that divides the visiting team’s dressing room had been lowered, cutting the room in half. Eight “red corner” undercard fighters were on the other side of the gate. Pacquiao’s opponent and the “blue corner” fighters were in smaller quarters.
Pacquiao had arrived at the stadium at 7:50pm. The earliest he would be called to the ring was 10:00 o’clock. For the better part of an hour, he talked on his cell phone and sent text messages to friends. Then he readied for battle.
One day earlier, Manny had weighed in at 145-3/4 pounds. His opponent, Joshua Clottey, had tipped the scales at the maximum contract weight of 147. The assumption was that Clottey now weighed at least 160. Pacquiao weighed 150. His body was sculpted without an ounce of superfluous fat. It was hard to imagine that, less than two years before, he’d fought after weighing in at 130 pounds.
Football, like boxing, is a violent game. In this same dressing room, gridiron warriors had suited up for battle. Forty-five players on each team that confronted the Dallas Cowboys had donned rib protectors, shoulder pads, arm pads, knee pads, hip pads, thigh pads, and helmets with face-masks. When the competition began, they’d protected each other and helped teammates off the turf after they’d been knocked down.
Pacquiao would enter the ring for combat naked from the waist up. A protective cup to safeguard his genitals would be his only shield. There would be no one to block for him. His head would be completely exposed.
The rules of football are designed to minimize direct blows to the head. Boxing requires them.
Pacquiao knows that there’s a dark side to his trade. Before each fight, he asks the people closest to him to “pray for me.”
Two centuries ago, William Hazlitt wrote of the hour before a fight begins, “It is then the heart sickens as you think what the two champions are about and how a short time will determine their fate.”
As the clock ticked down, Pacquiao shadow-boxed, moving around the center of the room.
There were final instructions from trainer Freddie Roach.
Then it was time. Manny left the dressing room and walked through the subterranean depths of the stadium. A tunnel of humanity lined by Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders – sexual icons of our time – lay ahead. The inside of the stadium was bathed in a silver other-worldly glow. Spotlights moved back and forth. Fifty thousand fans were screaming.
A smile played across Pacquiao’s face. He seemed to be without fear. In many respects, this fight in this stadium was about the future of boxing. But boxing is timeless. The essence of the competition he was about to engage in was the same as John L. Sullivan experienced on a barge towed up-river to avoid New York law enforcement authorities in 1881. After the bell rang, it would be no different, really, from what Joe Louis and Max Schmeling did at Yankee Stadium or the encounter between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman in the heart of Africa. It was the same as the competition among unarmed combatants at the first Olympiad in Greece thousands of years ago. A boy who once fought on the streets of the Philippines for pocket change also knew it well.
2010 began with the collapse of the proposed mega-fight between Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr. Then, on January 10th, Bob Arum (Pacquiao’s promoter) announced an alternative plan. Manny would fight Joshua Clottey of Ghana at Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Texas.
Thereafter, Bart Barry observed, “We come to the end of our Pacquiao-Mayweather mourning season. Fun as it is to gnash teeth and tremble at the future of prizefighting, the sun has risen anew, men still don gloves to resolve conflicts in manly ways, and a major venue awaits a major event.”
Pacquiao-Clottey was for Pacquiao’s World Boxing Organization 147-pound championship. As expected, the World Boxing Council tried to get into the act. “Jose [WBC president Jose Sulaiman] wanted to sell me a diamond schmata [a Yiddish term for a raggedy piece of clothing],” Arum confided. “I told him I wasn’t interested. I paid the WBC US$41,000 for the belt we gave Manny after he beat Miguel Cotto. Enough is enough.”
Three themes were central to the promotion. The first, of course, was the persona of Manny Pacquiao.
Manny came to Dallas on fire, both as a fighter and as an attraction. Three times during the previous fifteen months, he had moved up in weight to challenge bigger men. Each time, there was widespread doubt as to what the outcome would be. And each time, after the fight, it looked as though the result had been preordained.
“It’s not just about beating opponents,” former featherweight champion Barry McGuigan, now a television commentator, observed. “It’s the way that you beat them. Pacquiao went through Oscar De La Hoya like a sparring partner. The way he knocked out Ricky Hatton was staggering. He just pole-axed him. Then he systematically took apart Miguel Cotto in a way none could have predicted.”
Pacquiao’s journey from abject poverty in an impoverished land to iconic status and wealth beyond his imagination has captivated his followers. “The broad outlines of his legend,” Time Magazine declared, “have made him a projection of the migrant dreams of the many Filipinos who leave home and country for work. Some spend decades abroad for the sake of the ones they love. Everyone in the Philippines knows a person who has made the sacrifice or is making it. Pacquiao gives that multitude a champion’s face of selflessness; the winner who takes all and gives to all.”
The second promotional story-line revolved around Freddie Roach.
Roach turned pro at age eighteen and began his career with ten consecutive wins. After losing a decision, he ran his record to 26-and-1. The legendary Eddie Futch was his trainer.
“I look at old tapes of myself now,” Roach says, “and I know I could have been better. In the gym, I listened to what Eddie taught me and I could do it. But then the fight would come and I’d fight instead of box. I’d get hit and I had to hit back, which wasn’t always good. And I was stubborn. If something wasn’t working, instead of adjusting to something else, I’d keep trying the same thing. There’s a line between being courageous and being foolish. But when I was young, I was too aggressive to see it.”
There’s an old adage that says, if a fighter isn’t getting better, he’s getting worse. Roach peaked young. He was 13-and-12 after the age of twenty two. By the end of his career, he was an opponent. He retired at age twenty-six, never having made more than $7,500 for a fight.
“I remember when Eddie took me to his office and told me that I was taking too many punches and my performance wasn’t what it used to be and I should retire,” Roach says. “I started to cry. I had no idea what I was going to do with my life.”
Then life got tougher.
“All the people who said to me when I was winning fights, ‘You’re a great guy; when you finish boxing, come to me and I’ll give you a job,’ all of a sudden, they weren’t around.”
Roach worked for a telemarketing company and drank heavily for the better part of a year. Then, at Futch’s suggestion, Virgil Hill (who Eddie trained) asked Roach to work with him because Futch was focusing heavily on his more-established fighters.
“When Virgil asked me,” Roach recalls, “the first thing I said was, ‘I don’t know how to train fighters.’ But he and Eddie talked me into it. After that, Eddie, grew me as a trainer, step by step, the same way he grew me as a fighter. I remember when he let me go to a rules meeting alone for the first time. It was when Virgil fought Leslie Stewart [in 1987] and won the light-heavyweight championship. I felt so good, that Eddie trusted me like that.”
Roach, like his mentor, can take a good fighter and make him better. “You have to have patience,” he explains. “You have to be a psychiatrist. You have to be a problem solver. You have to know boxing. And you need a good fighter. That part about having a good fighter is the key.”
“Over time,” Roach continues, “I realized that I could be a better trainer than I was a fighter. Now my goal is to make as many world champions as possible. It’s not as good as being a champion myself would have been, but that’s the way life is. There are still times when something is difficult and I say to myself, ‘Boy; I wish Eddie was around.’ But someone told me not long ago, ‘Eddie would be proud of you.’ And I said, ‘I know.’”
Roach has risen to the top of his profession. “There are a lot of people who blew me off who are very nice to me now,” he notes. “I don’t hold grudges, but I remember. A couple of years ago, when I started training Oscar, Bob Arum called me an idiot.”
Freddie smiles. “It comes and it goes. I like Bob. Everything is good between us now.”
Pacquiao-Clottey was marketed as “The Event.” That led to the third promotional hook. This was the first fight card ever in Cowboys Stadium.
In late 2009, Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones had offered a US$25,000,000 ticket-sale guarantee for Pacquiao-Mayweather that was rejected out of hand by Golden Boy (Mayweather’s promoter). “I wanted that fight between those two fighters worse than my next breath,” Jones acknowledged.
From Jones’s point of view, Pacquiao-Clottey was branding for his stadium. "I’m certainly a fan of boxing,” he explained. “But that’s not what this fight is about. This is a very logical way to introduce our stadium to the world and lift its aura.”
In other words; Jones wasn’t in boxing to be in boxing. He was in the sport to build his stadium as a venue. Just as the Dallas Cowboys style themselves as “America’s Team,” he wants Cowboys Stadium to become “America’s Stadium.”
Toward that end, Jones hosted the 2010 NBA All-Star Game. A record 108,713 fans attended. Cowboys Stadium will also be the site for the 2011 Super Bowl and the 2014 NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship Final Four.
The stadium is awesome. Built at a cost of US$1.2 billion, it seats 80,000 fans for football with space for additional standing-room attendees and can accommodate twenty thousand more fans for boxing. There’s a retractable roof and a four-sided HDTV video board that’s 160 feet long, 72 feet high, and weighs six hundred tons. The video board, Jones is fond of saying, is the largest in the world.
Ticket prices for Pacquiao-Clottey ranged from US$700 down to $35 (for standing room “party passes”). On fight night, 50,994 fans filed into Jones’s palace; the third-largest attendance for an indoor fight card ever in the United States.
Bob Arum spent most of fight week walking around with a smile on his face like the proverbial cat that had swallowed a canary. “This is going to be one of the biggest events in the history of boxing,” he proclaimed. “If you think the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders are pretty, wait until you see them on that forty-million-dollar video screen.”
There was a buzz to the promotion. Jones radiates intensity and he said it like he meant it when he told the media, “This will be a fight to remember. We’re going to promote this like it was the Super Bowl.”
The National Football League is an entity unto itself. It goes to great lengths to preclude other sports from poaching on its cachet and marketing power. Jones acknowledged as much on a March 9th teleconference call, saying, “The NFL is reluctant to cross over with other sports.” But then he added, “In a very obvious way, people will recognize there is a crossover in interest for this fight. I’m not trying to be presumptuous about boxing and the NFL. But we all know how popular the NFL is right now. It raises all boats and it will raise boxing.”
HBO got a taste of the Jerry Jones style during production planning when the discussion turned to whether or not the pay-per-view telecast would include live overhead shots of Cowboys Stadium on fight night. The cost was beyond HBO’s budget. Jones indicated he would see to it that the cost would be covered. “I’m not known for following budgets,” he said.
Thereafter, Arum noted, “Don King and I are lucky this guy didn’t get in boxing when we did. He would have run us both out of the business.”
Freddie Roach, for his part, took one look at the inside of Cowboys Stadium and told Jones, “You’ve got a lot of balls, building this place.”
Meanwhile, there was a fight to be fought, although it began as a fistic rendition of the old Broadway song Mutual Admiration Society.
Clottey told the media, “Pacquiao is my favorite fighter. He has been for a long time. He is a very nice guy and I feel comfortable around him.”
Pacquiao responded in kind, saying, “Clottey is a very good boxer. He is big and strong. I like this match because both sides, there is no trash talk. We are setting a good example for everybody.”
That said; for most of the promotion, Team Clottey was treated by the media as an afterthought. Pacquiao was a 6-to-1 betting favorite. Clottey’s manager (Vinny Scolpino) and trainer (Lenny DeJesus) went almost unnoticed during fight week as they strolled around the Gaylord Texan Hotel, which served as event headquarters.
Still, within the boxing community, Clottey was considered a live underdog. “I’m not a flyweight,” he reminded people, referencing Pacquiao’s climb up the ladder through seven weight divisions. “I am not a bantamweight. I am a welterweight. I can throw shots that land and cause damage.”
“We have the perfect game plan,” Roach countered. “Clottey is a big strong guy and we respect him. But he is what he is. He fights the same way whether he fights southpaws or right-handers. He’s predictable. He’s good at what he does, but he does the same thing over and over again. I feel that Manny is going to overwhelm him with speed and combinations. Clottey has a good chin but he doesn’t protect his body that well. I think Manny will break him down with body shots. I don’t know if Manny can knock him out. But I think he can make Clottey quit or take things to a point where the referee or Clottey’s corner stops it.”
On the day of the weigh-in, Roach elaborated on that theme, saying, “I’m not worried about Clottey’s size. Manny weighed 144 pounds when he woke up this morning. That meant he could eat breakfast and a small lunch. He’s happy and strong, and Clottey is starving himself to make weight. I know Clottey will go into the ring ten pounds heavier than Manny. But size doesn’t win fights. Skill does. And I’ve got the better fighter.”
Roach might have added that boxing’s traditional “tale of the tape” doesn’t measure the size of a fighter’s heart.
On fight night, Pacquiao proved Roach right. The biggest problem that Team Pacquiao faced came in the dressing room before the fight. When it was time for Manny to hit the pads in his final warm-up prior to leaving for the ring, Freddie realized that there were no pads.
Roach brings two sets of mitts from his home base in Los Angeles to out-of-town fights. The night before Pacquiao-Clottey, he’d worked the corner of Jose Benavides (a promising young prospect in his stable) on a FoxSportsNet telecast. After the fight, he gave the pads he’d warmed Benavides up with to a friend as a memento. He forgot that, earlier in the week, he’d donated the other pair of mitts to a charity auction.
The solution was simple. At age fifty, Freddie warmed Pacquiao up by catching the punches of the best fighter in the world on his bare palms.
As Pacquiao walked to the ring to face Clottey, the atmosphere was electric. But whether a boxing ring is in Cowboys Stadium, the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, or a small union hall in Pennsylvania, it’s still a boxing ring. Two fighters are necessary for a great fight. The public doesn’t pay to watch shadow-boxing.
The early rounds established the pattern of the fight. Clottey stood with his hands held high, both fists in front of his face, elbows protecting his body. Pacquiao attacked, getting off first, darting in and out, looking for openings. His speed intimidated and befuddled Clottey. Joshua was reluctant to abandon his defensive posture. When he did, Manny responded with pinpoint violence, firing straight left-hands that came at their target as fast as jabs.
That’s the way it was all night. The fifth round was Clottey’s best. Other than that, Pacquiao pitched a shutout.
As the fight progressed, round after round, Lenny DeJesus implored his charge, “Come on, we gotta take chances. What are you waiting for? . . . The kid’s ahead. Let’s throw punches. Hurt this guy . . . Let’s create openings now, okay? Let’s take a chance . . . Let’s be creative. Let’s throw punches. We’re losing every round, so get to it . . . We’re losing every damn round. Come on. You’re taking a whipping, baby . . . What’s going on? Come on. We haven’t won a round, baby. We’ve got to do something.”
When it was over, Pacquiao had thrown 1,231 punches to Clottey’s 399. He outlanded Clottey in every round, highlighted by a 232 to 82 edge in power punches landed.
The judges were on the mark with a 120-108, 119-109, 119-109 verdict. Clottey managed to avoid winding up as a featured attraction on Pacquiao’s highlight reel. But a fighter in a championship bout should have a loftier goal.
“Clottey didn’t come to fight,” Roach said afterward. “He came to survive. I know it was hard for him. Most fighters can’t adjust to Manny’s speed. They see him on television and say, ‘Oh, he looks fast.’ But you don’t really know how fast he is until you’re in the ring with him. And once you’re there, when you feel his power and his punches are coming from all angles . . .”
Roach’s voice trailed off, then picked up again. “An opportunity like this comes along for a fighter once in a lifetime, if he’s lucky. If Clottey was my fighter, I’d be very upset with him. I’d rather get knocked out trying to win a championship than do what he did.”
A half-century ago, A. J. Liebling wrote, “The desire to punch other boys in the nose will survive in our culture. The spirit of self-preservation will induce some boys to excel. Those who find they excel will try to turn a modest buck by it. It is an art of the people, like making love.”
In rare instances, the best practitioners of the art of boxing are embraced by their country, an entire ethnic group, or believers in a given religion. Once in a generation, if that generation is fortunate, a fighter is embraced by the world.
Pacquiao is ascending to the summit. It’s ironic that he practices the most unforgiving of sports. Cruelty seems foreign to his nature. Like Joe Louis and Muhammad Ali before him, he has come to symbolize caring and compassion.
Meanwhile, it’s a joy to watch Pacquiao ply his trade. He’s the most exciting fighter in the world today and everything that an athlete should be: awesomely talented, a great competitor, respectful toward opponents, and appreciative of his fans. He’s also the best show in boxing.
Where Pacquiao goes from here is an open issue. His immediate priority is a run for Congress in the Philippines against the scion of a wealthy political family. It’s an uphill battle with the odds against him; more so than for any of his fights in the ring.
Win or lose, Pacquiao is likely to return to the sweet science before the end of the year. When he does, he will remind us all once again of the essence of boxing.
“Life,” Matthew Wells wrote several years ago, “rarely comes at you in short bursts of wild mayhem. More often than not, it is a long drawn-out grind that forces you to make thousands of small adjustments in order to keep pointed in the right direction. Boxing, more than any other sport, is emblematic of this struggle. It reminds us that life can be hard and even unfair, but with hard work and dedication, you can, once in a while, achieve something truly brilliant.”
Thomas Hauser can be reached by e-mail at thauser@rcn.com. His most recent book (“An Unforgiving Sport”) was published by the University of Arkansas Press.
Source: secondsout.com
“Boxing,” Hugh McIlvanney has written, “is a sport in which two men try to batter each other senseless. No matter how you dress it up, the basic objective is to render the opponent unconscious. You can say that more people are killed in motorcycle racing, that more people are killed in mountaineering. But in neither of those two activities is the fundamental objective to knock the other guy out. Motive, not statistics, will always separate boxing from other sports.”
On the night of March 13, 2010, Manny Pacquiao readied for battle in the futuristic city known as Cowboys Stadium. The gate that divides the visiting team’s dressing room had been lowered, cutting the room in half. Eight “red corner” undercard fighters were on the other side of the gate. Pacquiao’s opponent and the “blue corner” fighters were in smaller quarters.
Pacquiao had arrived at the stadium at 7:50pm. The earliest he would be called to the ring was 10:00 o’clock. For the better part of an hour, he talked on his cell phone and sent text messages to friends. Then he readied for battle.
One day earlier, Manny had weighed in at 145-3/4 pounds. His opponent, Joshua Clottey, had tipped the scales at the maximum contract weight of 147. The assumption was that Clottey now weighed at least 160. Pacquiao weighed 150. His body was sculpted without an ounce of superfluous fat. It was hard to imagine that, less than two years before, he’d fought after weighing in at 130 pounds.
Football, like boxing, is a violent game. In this same dressing room, gridiron warriors had suited up for battle. Forty-five players on each team that confronted the Dallas Cowboys had donned rib protectors, shoulder pads, arm pads, knee pads, hip pads, thigh pads, and helmets with face-masks. When the competition began, they’d protected each other and helped teammates off the turf after they’d been knocked down.
Pacquiao would enter the ring for combat naked from the waist up. A protective cup to safeguard his genitals would be his only shield. There would be no one to block for him. His head would be completely exposed.
The rules of football are designed to minimize direct blows to the head. Boxing requires them.
Pacquiao knows that there’s a dark side to his trade. Before each fight, he asks the people closest to him to “pray for me.”
Two centuries ago, William Hazlitt wrote of the hour before a fight begins, “It is then the heart sickens as you think what the two champions are about and how a short time will determine their fate.”
As the clock ticked down, Pacquiao shadow-boxed, moving around the center of the room.
There were final instructions from trainer Freddie Roach.
Then it was time. Manny left the dressing room and walked through the subterranean depths of the stadium. A tunnel of humanity lined by Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders – sexual icons of our time – lay ahead. The inside of the stadium was bathed in a silver other-worldly glow. Spotlights moved back and forth. Fifty thousand fans were screaming.
A smile played across Pacquiao’s face. He seemed to be without fear. In many respects, this fight in this stadium was about the future of boxing. But boxing is timeless. The essence of the competition he was about to engage in was the same as John L. Sullivan experienced on a barge towed up-river to avoid New York law enforcement authorities in 1881. After the bell rang, it would be no different, really, from what Joe Louis and Max Schmeling did at Yankee Stadium or the encounter between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman in the heart of Africa. It was the same as the competition among unarmed combatants at the first Olympiad in Greece thousands of years ago. A boy who once fought on the streets of the Philippines for pocket change also knew it well.
*
2010 began with the collapse of the proposed mega-fight between Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr. Then, on January 10th, Bob Arum (Pacquiao’s promoter) announced an alternative plan. Manny would fight Joshua Clottey of Ghana at Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Texas.
Thereafter, Bart Barry observed, “We come to the end of our Pacquiao-Mayweather mourning season. Fun as it is to gnash teeth and tremble at the future of prizefighting, the sun has risen anew, men still don gloves to resolve conflicts in manly ways, and a major venue awaits a major event.”
Pacquiao-Clottey was for Pacquiao’s World Boxing Organization 147-pound championship. As expected, the World Boxing Council tried to get into the act. “Jose [WBC president Jose Sulaiman] wanted to sell me a diamond schmata [a Yiddish term for a raggedy piece of clothing],” Arum confided. “I told him I wasn’t interested. I paid the WBC US$41,000 for the belt we gave Manny after he beat Miguel Cotto. Enough is enough.”
Three themes were central to the promotion. The first, of course, was the persona of Manny Pacquiao.
Manny came to Dallas on fire, both as a fighter and as an attraction. Three times during the previous fifteen months, he had moved up in weight to challenge bigger men. Each time, there was widespread doubt as to what the outcome would be. And each time, after the fight, it looked as though the result had been preordained.
“It’s not just about beating opponents,” former featherweight champion Barry McGuigan, now a television commentator, observed. “It’s the way that you beat them. Pacquiao went through Oscar De La Hoya like a sparring partner. The way he knocked out Ricky Hatton was staggering. He just pole-axed him. Then he systematically took apart Miguel Cotto in a way none could have predicted.”
Pacquiao’s journey from abject poverty in an impoverished land to iconic status and wealth beyond his imagination has captivated his followers. “The broad outlines of his legend,” Time Magazine declared, “have made him a projection of the migrant dreams of the many Filipinos who leave home and country for work. Some spend decades abroad for the sake of the ones they love. Everyone in the Philippines knows a person who has made the sacrifice or is making it. Pacquiao gives that multitude a champion’s face of selflessness; the winner who takes all and gives to all.”
The second promotional story-line revolved around Freddie Roach.
Roach turned pro at age eighteen and began his career with ten consecutive wins. After losing a decision, he ran his record to 26-and-1. The legendary Eddie Futch was his trainer.
“I look at old tapes of myself now,” Roach says, “and I know I could have been better. In the gym, I listened to what Eddie taught me and I could do it. But then the fight would come and I’d fight instead of box. I’d get hit and I had to hit back, which wasn’t always good. And I was stubborn. If something wasn’t working, instead of adjusting to something else, I’d keep trying the same thing. There’s a line between being courageous and being foolish. But when I was young, I was too aggressive to see it.”
There’s an old adage that says, if a fighter isn’t getting better, he’s getting worse. Roach peaked young. He was 13-and-12 after the age of twenty two. By the end of his career, he was an opponent. He retired at age twenty-six, never having made more than $7,500 for a fight.
“I remember when Eddie took me to his office and told me that I was taking too many punches and my performance wasn’t what it used to be and I should retire,” Roach says. “I started to cry. I had no idea what I was going to do with my life.”
Then life got tougher.
“All the people who said to me when I was winning fights, ‘You’re a great guy; when you finish boxing, come to me and I’ll give you a job,’ all of a sudden, they weren’t around.”
Roach worked for a telemarketing company and drank heavily for the better part of a year. Then, at Futch’s suggestion, Virgil Hill (who Eddie trained) asked Roach to work with him because Futch was focusing heavily on his more-established fighters.
“When Virgil asked me,” Roach recalls, “the first thing I said was, ‘I don’t know how to train fighters.’ But he and Eddie talked me into it. After that, Eddie, grew me as a trainer, step by step, the same way he grew me as a fighter. I remember when he let me go to a rules meeting alone for the first time. It was when Virgil fought Leslie Stewart [in 1987] and won the light-heavyweight championship. I felt so good, that Eddie trusted me like that.”
Roach, like his mentor, can take a good fighter and make him better. “You have to have patience,” he explains. “You have to be a psychiatrist. You have to be a problem solver. You have to know boxing. And you need a good fighter. That part about having a good fighter is the key.”
“Over time,” Roach continues, “I realized that I could be a better trainer than I was a fighter. Now my goal is to make as many world champions as possible. It’s not as good as being a champion myself would have been, but that’s the way life is. There are still times when something is difficult and I say to myself, ‘Boy; I wish Eddie was around.’ But someone told me not long ago, ‘Eddie would be proud of you.’ And I said, ‘I know.’”
Roach has risen to the top of his profession. “There are a lot of people who blew me off who are very nice to me now,” he notes. “I don’t hold grudges, but I remember. A couple of years ago, when I started training Oscar, Bob Arum called me an idiot.”
Freddie smiles. “It comes and it goes. I like Bob. Everything is good between us now.”
Pacquiao-Clottey was marketed as “The Event.” That led to the third promotional hook. This was the first fight card ever in Cowboys Stadium.
In late 2009, Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones had offered a US$25,000,000 ticket-sale guarantee for Pacquiao-Mayweather that was rejected out of hand by Golden Boy (Mayweather’s promoter). “I wanted that fight between those two fighters worse than my next breath,” Jones acknowledged.
From Jones’s point of view, Pacquiao-Clottey was branding for his stadium. "I’m certainly a fan of boxing,” he explained. “But that’s not what this fight is about. This is a very logical way to introduce our stadium to the world and lift its aura.”
In other words; Jones wasn’t in boxing to be in boxing. He was in the sport to build his stadium as a venue. Just as the Dallas Cowboys style themselves as “America’s Team,” he wants Cowboys Stadium to become “America’s Stadium.”
Toward that end, Jones hosted the 2010 NBA All-Star Game. A record 108,713 fans attended. Cowboys Stadium will also be the site for the 2011 Super Bowl and the 2014 NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship Final Four.
The stadium is awesome. Built at a cost of US$1.2 billion, it seats 80,000 fans for football with space for additional standing-room attendees and can accommodate twenty thousand more fans for boxing. There’s a retractable roof and a four-sided HDTV video board that’s 160 feet long, 72 feet high, and weighs six hundred tons. The video board, Jones is fond of saying, is the largest in the world.
Ticket prices for Pacquiao-Clottey ranged from US$700 down to $35 (for standing room “party passes”). On fight night, 50,994 fans filed into Jones’s palace; the third-largest attendance for an indoor fight card ever in the United States.
Bob Arum spent most of fight week walking around with a smile on his face like the proverbial cat that had swallowed a canary. “This is going to be one of the biggest events in the history of boxing,” he proclaimed. “If you think the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders are pretty, wait until you see them on that forty-million-dollar video screen.”
There was a buzz to the promotion. Jones radiates intensity and he said it like he meant it when he told the media, “This will be a fight to remember. We’re going to promote this like it was the Super Bowl.”
The National Football League is an entity unto itself. It goes to great lengths to preclude other sports from poaching on its cachet and marketing power. Jones acknowledged as much on a March 9th teleconference call, saying, “The NFL is reluctant to cross over with other sports.” But then he added, “In a very obvious way, people will recognize there is a crossover in interest for this fight. I’m not trying to be presumptuous about boxing and the NFL. But we all know how popular the NFL is right now. It raises all boats and it will raise boxing.”
HBO got a taste of the Jerry Jones style during production planning when the discussion turned to whether or not the pay-per-view telecast would include live overhead shots of Cowboys Stadium on fight night. The cost was beyond HBO’s budget. Jones indicated he would see to it that the cost would be covered. “I’m not known for following budgets,” he said.
Thereafter, Arum noted, “Don King and I are lucky this guy didn’t get in boxing when we did. He would have run us both out of the business.”
Freddie Roach, for his part, took one look at the inside of Cowboys Stadium and told Jones, “You’ve got a lot of balls, building this place.”
Meanwhile, there was a fight to be fought, although it began as a fistic rendition of the old Broadway song Mutual Admiration Society.
Clottey told the media, “Pacquiao is my favorite fighter. He has been for a long time. He is a very nice guy and I feel comfortable around him.”
Pacquiao responded in kind, saying, “Clottey is a very good boxer. He is big and strong. I like this match because both sides, there is no trash talk. We are setting a good example for everybody.”
That said; for most of the promotion, Team Clottey was treated by the media as an afterthought. Pacquiao was a 6-to-1 betting favorite. Clottey’s manager (Vinny Scolpino) and trainer (Lenny DeJesus) went almost unnoticed during fight week as they strolled around the Gaylord Texan Hotel, which served as event headquarters.
Still, within the boxing community, Clottey was considered a live underdog. “I’m not a flyweight,” he reminded people, referencing Pacquiao’s climb up the ladder through seven weight divisions. “I am not a bantamweight. I am a welterweight. I can throw shots that land and cause damage.”
“We have the perfect game plan,” Roach countered. “Clottey is a big strong guy and we respect him. But he is what he is. He fights the same way whether he fights southpaws or right-handers. He’s predictable. He’s good at what he does, but he does the same thing over and over again. I feel that Manny is going to overwhelm him with speed and combinations. Clottey has a good chin but he doesn’t protect his body that well. I think Manny will break him down with body shots. I don’t know if Manny can knock him out. But I think he can make Clottey quit or take things to a point where the referee or Clottey’s corner stops it.”
On the day of the weigh-in, Roach elaborated on that theme, saying, “I’m not worried about Clottey’s size. Manny weighed 144 pounds when he woke up this morning. That meant he could eat breakfast and a small lunch. He’s happy and strong, and Clottey is starving himself to make weight. I know Clottey will go into the ring ten pounds heavier than Manny. But size doesn’t win fights. Skill does. And I’ve got the better fighter.”
Roach might have added that boxing’s traditional “tale of the tape” doesn’t measure the size of a fighter’s heart.
On fight night, Pacquiao proved Roach right. The biggest problem that Team Pacquiao faced came in the dressing room before the fight. When it was time for Manny to hit the pads in his final warm-up prior to leaving for the ring, Freddie realized that there were no pads.
Roach brings two sets of mitts from his home base in Los Angeles to out-of-town fights. The night before Pacquiao-Clottey, he’d worked the corner of Jose Benavides (a promising young prospect in his stable) on a FoxSportsNet telecast. After the fight, he gave the pads he’d warmed Benavides up with to a friend as a memento. He forgot that, earlier in the week, he’d donated the other pair of mitts to a charity auction.
The solution was simple. At age fifty, Freddie warmed Pacquiao up by catching the punches of the best fighter in the world on his bare palms.
As Pacquiao walked to the ring to face Clottey, the atmosphere was electric. But whether a boxing ring is in Cowboys Stadium, the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, or a small union hall in Pennsylvania, it’s still a boxing ring. Two fighters are necessary for a great fight. The public doesn’t pay to watch shadow-boxing.
The early rounds established the pattern of the fight. Clottey stood with his hands held high, both fists in front of his face, elbows protecting his body. Pacquiao attacked, getting off first, darting in and out, looking for openings. His speed intimidated and befuddled Clottey. Joshua was reluctant to abandon his defensive posture. When he did, Manny responded with pinpoint violence, firing straight left-hands that came at their target as fast as jabs.
That’s the way it was all night. The fifth round was Clottey’s best. Other than that, Pacquiao pitched a shutout.
As the fight progressed, round after round, Lenny DeJesus implored his charge, “Come on, we gotta take chances. What are you waiting for? . . . The kid’s ahead. Let’s throw punches. Hurt this guy . . . Let’s create openings now, okay? Let’s take a chance . . . Let’s be creative. Let’s throw punches. We’re losing every round, so get to it . . . We’re losing every damn round. Come on. You’re taking a whipping, baby . . . What’s going on? Come on. We haven’t won a round, baby. We’ve got to do something.”
When it was over, Pacquiao had thrown 1,231 punches to Clottey’s 399. He outlanded Clottey in every round, highlighted by a 232 to 82 edge in power punches landed.
The judges were on the mark with a 120-108, 119-109, 119-109 verdict. Clottey managed to avoid winding up as a featured attraction on Pacquiao’s highlight reel. But a fighter in a championship bout should have a loftier goal.
“Clottey didn’t come to fight,” Roach said afterward. “He came to survive. I know it was hard for him. Most fighters can’t adjust to Manny’s speed. They see him on television and say, ‘Oh, he looks fast.’ But you don’t really know how fast he is until you’re in the ring with him. And once you’re there, when you feel his power and his punches are coming from all angles . . .”
Roach’s voice trailed off, then picked up again. “An opportunity like this comes along for a fighter once in a lifetime, if he’s lucky. If Clottey was my fighter, I’d be very upset with him. I’d rather get knocked out trying to win a championship than do what he did.”
A half-century ago, A. J. Liebling wrote, “The desire to punch other boys in the nose will survive in our culture. The spirit of self-preservation will induce some boys to excel. Those who find they excel will try to turn a modest buck by it. It is an art of the people, like making love.”
In rare instances, the best practitioners of the art of boxing are embraced by their country, an entire ethnic group, or believers in a given religion. Once in a generation, if that generation is fortunate, a fighter is embraced by the world.
Pacquiao is ascending to the summit. It’s ironic that he practices the most unforgiving of sports. Cruelty seems foreign to his nature. Like Joe Louis and Muhammad Ali before him, he has come to symbolize caring and compassion.
Meanwhile, it’s a joy to watch Pacquiao ply his trade. He’s the most exciting fighter in the world today and everything that an athlete should be: awesomely talented, a great competitor, respectful toward opponents, and appreciative of his fans. He’s also the best show in boxing.
Where Pacquiao goes from here is an open issue. His immediate priority is a run for Congress in the Philippines against the scion of a wealthy political family. It’s an uphill battle with the odds against him; more so than for any of his fights in the ring.
Win or lose, Pacquiao is likely to return to the sweet science before the end of the year. When he does, he will remind us all once again of the essence of boxing.
“Life,” Matthew Wells wrote several years ago, “rarely comes at you in short bursts of wild mayhem. More often than not, it is a long drawn-out grind that forces you to make thousands of small adjustments in order to keep pointed in the right direction. Boxing, more than any other sport, is emblematic of this struggle. It reminds us that life can be hard and even unfair, but with hard work and dedication, you can, once in a while, achieve something truly brilliant.”
Thomas Hauser can be reached by e-mail at thauser@rcn.com. His most recent book (“An Unforgiving Sport”) was published by the University of Arkansas Press.
Source: secondsout.com
KLITSCHKO-CHAMBERS: "I Thought That Was A Very Funny Way To Fight Me"
By Phil Woolever, The Sweet Science
DUSSELDORF - Wladimir Klitschko scored the most dramatic knockout of his career by creaming "Fast" Eddie Chambers with about 10 seconds left in a contest Klitschko controlled throughout. Chambers, 209 pounds, showed he was a class act throughout the promotion, even in various stages of a damaging defeat, while Klitschko, 244, offered more stinging evidence he has developed into an upper class champion.
Klitschko, now 54-3 (48), was in fantastic condition. He appeared to have reached a new peak, and if this level holds true, it's a whole new argument about his mauling merits.
A near sell out of around 50,000 would have been content to watch Klitschko pile up another typical one-sided decision or TKO, and that's what it looked like would happen before Klitschko scored a probable nomination for knockout of the year.
Referee Genaro Rodriguez waved it off with Chambers splattered across the lower strands in an unkind dreamland for an official time at 2:55 of the 12th, but in reality the fight was pretty much over when Klitschko almost dropped Chambers in the second round with a huge straight right.
Chambers, 35-2 (18), arrived in Dusseldorf ready to back up his claim as the best heavyweight who hailed from the United States. He backed up all right, but not at all how he, nor the many rational observers who felt Klitschko was in for a demanding defense, envisioned.
"I promised a knockout and I'm glad I could deliver it," said an unmarked Klitschko."But I had to take my time and not only try to stop him. Chambers was very fast. I had to work him down."
"The punch landed, that's what happened," said Chambers. "I don't remember much after that. He's a great fighter. A guy his size with his skill. His jab is hard to see coming, even for a guy with my kind of speed, head movement and defensive ability. It's hard to get away from. My corner was telling me I had to pick it up and try to mount some kind of offense instead of just watching him throw punches."
Klitschko couldn't pin Chambers down until the very end, but he controlled the challenger by staying busy with a jab that landed from various tricky distances or forced Chambers around the ring like a cattle prod.
Chambers tried to counter over Klitschko's extended arm or lead to the body, but he could never get past their size disparity.
Chambers immediately showed he planned on being a very physical aggressor when he picked the larger Klitschko up and dumped him on the canvas twice in the early going.
The festive crowd screamed at many Klitschko punches Chambers actually picked off, but even if the whaps didn't get through cleanly, they blasted Chambers into a reeling defensive posture he couldn't escape all night. Chambers sustained a cut eyelid in the opening frame and things went downhill from there.
"I was surprised when he kept taking my punches on his arms," reflected Klitschko. "I thought that was a very funny way to fight me. Because I knew it was hurting him, and I was moving him then hitting him where I wanted to."
Chambers managed to stick around through enough boxing skills to keep him out of danger most of the fight but he never could break even, even for a moment.
By round eight, it was Klitschko who was up on his toes moving well, while Chambers had the look of a beaten fighter.
As the fight wound down, Klitschko actually went into a higher gear and looked like he could go twenty more rounds. The fight got to the point where Chambers' corner must have thought about stopping it.
They did, but not as expected, when Chambers got a few minutes time out to replace a torn glove before the tenth began. The assembled swarm whistled in protest as if Team Chambers was pulling a "fast" one. If so, welcome to Philly. At least they never gave up.
Klitschko had trouble pinning the ducking and dodging Chambers down again for a bit after that, but soon the Kman rights were thudding in again as a desperate Chambers was driven wildly around the ring.
Chambers finally scored with a decent punch but it was a needle in a punchstat haystack as Klitschko blinked it off. Klitschko's dominant performance would have been an impressive if unspectacular triumph anyway, but then the Ukrainian leather lightning struck for a highlight reel conk.
A beautiful, short left hook on the point of the chin draped Chambers into ostrich position across the ropes, out like a light. The crowd went electric then took a considerate breath and paused until Chambers came to before they streamed out into the booming midnight oil.
Chambers was dejected, but still showed good character and seems like the type that will return to top contention.
"I have to think about how I will try and come back and who I want to challenge next," mused Chambers before heading to the hospital for observation.
"I'm very happy with tonight's result and especially my performance," said Klitschko."As they say in this sport, speed kills, and my speed was good tonight. I had good anticipation and I disappeared. I hope Chambers isn't hurt and that he comes back soon. My official mandatory against Alexander Povetkin is due up next, but the only thing that might get in the way could be a unification against David Haye."
"Someone else always is out there. The challenges will exist as long as the sport exists. I'm still thirty three years old. I thought I reached my peak when I was thirty one, but I keep going up and up and up and I feel there is (still) a lot of potential to be proved, and a lot to be accomplished."
The slugging saga is still unfolding, but for now, it was time to savor victory.
After the bout, Klitschko was presented with a local "alt" beer, which he quaffed and poured over his head.
"It isn't Champagne, but it still tastes good," grinned Klitschko as he toasted the howling locals. Klitschko isn't the best heavyweight champion of modern times, but he took a nice step up the ladder tonight.
"I enjoy my time at the top right now," concluded Klitschko. "We'll see how long it will last. Hopefully as long as I want."
Tonight Klitschko proved he could out-maneuver an excellent boxer.
Maybe the most remarkable thing in ESPIRIT Arena was that a fighter criticized for being too mechanical put on a proverbial boxing clinic, Klitschko style.
Source: thesweetscience.com
DUSSELDORF - Wladimir Klitschko scored the most dramatic knockout of his career by creaming "Fast" Eddie Chambers with about 10 seconds left in a contest Klitschko controlled throughout. Chambers, 209 pounds, showed he was a class act throughout the promotion, even in various stages of a damaging defeat, while Klitschko, 244, offered more stinging evidence he has developed into an upper class champion.
Klitschko, now 54-3 (48), was in fantastic condition. He appeared to have reached a new peak, and if this level holds true, it's a whole new argument about his mauling merits.
A near sell out of around 50,000 would have been content to watch Klitschko pile up another typical one-sided decision or TKO, and that's what it looked like would happen before Klitschko scored a probable nomination for knockout of the year.
Referee Genaro Rodriguez waved it off with Chambers splattered across the lower strands in an unkind dreamland for an official time at 2:55 of the 12th, but in reality the fight was pretty much over when Klitschko almost dropped Chambers in the second round with a huge straight right.
Chambers, 35-2 (18), arrived in Dusseldorf ready to back up his claim as the best heavyweight who hailed from the United States. He backed up all right, but not at all how he, nor the many rational observers who felt Klitschko was in for a demanding defense, envisioned.
"I promised a knockout and I'm glad I could deliver it," said an unmarked Klitschko."But I had to take my time and not only try to stop him. Chambers was very fast. I had to work him down."
"The punch landed, that's what happened," said Chambers. "I don't remember much after that. He's a great fighter. A guy his size with his skill. His jab is hard to see coming, even for a guy with my kind of speed, head movement and defensive ability. It's hard to get away from. My corner was telling me I had to pick it up and try to mount some kind of offense instead of just watching him throw punches."
Klitschko couldn't pin Chambers down until the very end, but he controlled the challenger by staying busy with a jab that landed from various tricky distances or forced Chambers around the ring like a cattle prod.
Chambers tried to counter over Klitschko's extended arm or lead to the body, but he could never get past their size disparity.
Chambers immediately showed he planned on being a very physical aggressor when he picked the larger Klitschko up and dumped him on the canvas twice in the early going.
The festive crowd screamed at many Klitschko punches Chambers actually picked off, but even if the whaps didn't get through cleanly, they blasted Chambers into a reeling defensive posture he couldn't escape all night. Chambers sustained a cut eyelid in the opening frame and things went downhill from there.
"I was surprised when he kept taking my punches on his arms," reflected Klitschko. "I thought that was a very funny way to fight me. Because I knew it was hurting him, and I was moving him then hitting him where I wanted to."
Chambers managed to stick around through enough boxing skills to keep him out of danger most of the fight but he never could break even, even for a moment.
By round eight, it was Klitschko who was up on his toes moving well, while Chambers had the look of a beaten fighter.
As the fight wound down, Klitschko actually went into a higher gear and looked like he could go twenty more rounds. The fight got to the point where Chambers' corner must have thought about stopping it.
They did, but not as expected, when Chambers got a few minutes time out to replace a torn glove before the tenth began. The assembled swarm whistled in protest as if Team Chambers was pulling a "fast" one. If so, welcome to Philly. At least they never gave up.
Klitschko had trouble pinning the ducking and dodging Chambers down again for a bit after that, but soon the Kman rights were thudding in again as a desperate Chambers was driven wildly around the ring.
Chambers finally scored with a decent punch but it was a needle in a punchstat haystack as Klitschko blinked it off. Klitschko's dominant performance would have been an impressive if unspectacular triumph anyway, but then the Ukrainian leather lightning struck for a highlight reel conk.
A beautiful, short left hook on the point of the chin draped Chambers into ostrich position across the ropes, out like a light. The crowd went electric then took a considerate breath and paused until Chambers came to before they streamed out into the booming midnight oil.
Chambers was dejected, but still showed good character and seems like the type that will return to top contention.
"I have to think about how I will try and come back and who I want to challenge next," mused Chambers before heading to the hospital for observation.
"I'm very happy with tonight's result and especially my performance," said Klitschko."As they say in this sport, speed kills, and my speed was good tonight. I had good anticipation and I disappeared. I hope Chambers isn't hurt and that he comes back soon. My official mandatory against Alexander Povetkin is due up next, but the only thing that might get in the way could be a unification against David Haye."
"Someone else always is out there. The challenges will exist as long as the sport exists. I'm still thirty three years old. I thought I reached my peak when I was thirty one, but I keep going up and up and up and I feel there is (still) a lot of potential to be proved, and a lot to be accomplished."
The slugging saga is still unfolding, but for now, it was time to savor victory.
After the bout, Klitschko was presented with a local "alt" beer, which he quaffed and poured over his head.
"It isn't Champagne, but it still tastes good," grinned Klitschko as he toasted the howling locals. Klitschko isn't the best heavyweight champion of modern times, but he took a nice step up the ladder tonight.
"I enjoy my time at the top right now," concluded Klitschko. "We'll see how long it will last. Hopefully as long as I want."
Tonight Klitschko proved he could out-maneuver an excellent boxer.
Maybe the most remarkable thing in ESPIRIT Arena was that a fighter criticized for being too mechanical put on a proverbial boxing clinic, Klitschko style.
Source: thesweetscience.com
Female boxing sickens Klitschko -- Edmonton Journal
The Edmonton Journal
World heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko admitted on Sunday he is against women boxing at the Olympics, claiming the spectacle makes him sick.
The International Olympic Committee announced last August that women's boxing will be included on the list of events for London in 2012, but Klitschko said he will not be watching.
"This sport is appropriate for men, but not for women," the Ukrainian told Die Welt newspaper.
"I hope that women will not take it badly, perhaps I am old or conservative, but I consider there are sports much more beautiful for women than boxing," he added.
"When I see two women face to face in a boxing ring, it makes me feel nausea. I am not really a fan female boxing."
Klitschko, who retained his title by knocking out U.S. challenger Eddie Chambers on Saturday, will defend his crown next against Poland's Albert Sosnowski in Gelsenkirchen on May 29.
© Copyright (c) The Edmonton Journal
Source: edmontonjournal.com
World heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko admitted on Sunday he is against women boxing at the Olympics, claiming the spectacle makes him sick.
The International Olympic Committee announced last August that women's boxing will be included on the list of events for London in 2012, but Klitschko said he will not be watching.
"This sport is appropriate for men, but not for women," the Ukrainian told Die Welt newspaper.
"I hope that women will not take it badly, perhaps I am old or conservative, but I consider there are sports much more beautiful for women than boxing," he added.
"When I see two women face to face in a boxing ring, it makes me feel nausea. I am not really a fan female boxing."
Klitschko, who retained his title by knocking out U.S. challenger Eddie Chambers on Saturday, will defend his crown next against Poland's Albert Sosnowski in Gelsenkirchen on May 29.
© Copyright (c) The Edmonton Journal
Source: edmontonjournal.com
Pacquiao: Mayweather needs to challenge me -- USA Today
By Hrvoje Hranjski, Associated Press Writer
MANILA, Philippines — Manny Pacquiao is still open to fighting Floyd Mayweather Jr., but is waiting for the challenge to come from the other side and for promoters to iron out a spat over drug testing.
"I came this far in my boxing career without Mayweather, so I see no need to call him out," Pacquiao told reporters Monday. "He needs me to bolster his career.
"I am open to him fighting me anytime he wants to."
Pacquiao returned to thousands of cheering fans in Manila to celebrate his latest victory over Joshua Clottey in Dallas. He'll now focus on a bid to enter politics, campaigning for a seat in the Philippines' House of Representatives in the May 10 national elections.
Mayweather's insistence on Olympic-style testing was the primary reason negotiations fell through in January for a megafight against Pacquiao. Mayweather wanted blood tests up to 14 days before the fight, while Pacquiao claims he feels weak after drawing blood and would not agree to testing within 24 days.
The negotiations quickly deteriorated, and Pacquiao signed to fight Clottey while Mayweather turned his attention to welterweight champion Shane Mosley.
Mayweather will face Mosley in Las Vegas on May 1 after both agreed to undergo an unlimited number of unannounced blood and urine tests before and after the fight.
"He should win against Mosley. If not, Mosley and I will fight," Pacquiao said.
Pacquiao is now concentrating on the national elections. His 2007 campaign fell short, but this time Pacquiao said he is better prepared.
"I have prepared for my political plans even before I faced Clottey last week," he said. "I am ready to campaign."
The two-month campaign starts later this week. Apart from running for his own seat in southern Sarangani province, Pacquiao is also campaigning for presidential aspirant Manny Villar, a senator and the richest politician in the country.
Villar raised Pacquiao's hand after welcoming him at a hotel Monday, before the boxer headed for a church service and a courtesy call in the presidential palace.
Asked if he plans to retire from boxing if he wins at the election, the 31-year-old Pacquiao said he was undecided.
"My own mother asked me to stop boxing. We'll talk about it," he said.
Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Source: usatoday.com
MANILA, Philippines — Manny Pacquiao is still open to fighting Floyd Mayweather Jr., but is waiting for the challenge to come from the other side and for promoters to iron out a spat over drug testing.
"I came this far in my boxing career without Mayweather, so I see no need to call him out," Pacquiao told reporters Monday. "He needs me to bolster his career.
"I am open to him fighting me anytime he wants to."
Pacquiao returned to thousands of cheering fans in Manila to celebrate his latest victory over Joshua Clottey in Dallas. He'll now focus on a bid to enter politics, campaigning for a seat in the Philippines' House of Representatives in the May 10 national elections.
Mayweather's insistence on Olympic-style testing was the primary reason negotiations fell through in January for a megafight against Pacquiao. Mayweather wanted blood tests up to 14 days before the fight, while Pacquiao claims he feels weak after drawing blood and would not agree to testing within 24 days.
The negotiations quickly deteriorated, and Pacquiao signed to fight Clottey while Mayweather turned his attention to welterweight champion Shane Mosley.
Mayweather will face Mosley in Las Vegas on May 1 after both agreed to undergo an unlimited number of unannounced blood and urine tests before and after the fight.
"He should win against Mosley. If not, Mosley and I will fight," Pacquiao said.
Pacquiao is now concentrating on the national elections. His 2007 campaign fell short, but this time Pacquiao said he is better prepared.
"I have prepared for my political plans even before I faced Clottey last week," he said. "I am ready to campaign."
The two-month campaign starts later this week. Apart from running for his own seat in southern Sarangani province, Pacquiao is also campaigning for presidential aspirant Manny Villar, a senator and the richest politician in the country.
Villar raised Pacquiao's hand after welcoming him at a hotel Monday, before the boxer headed for a church service and a courtesy call in the presidential palace.
Asked if he plans to retire from boxing if he wins at the election, the 31-year-old Pacquiao said he was undecided.
"My own mother asked me to stop boxing. We'll talk about it," he said.
Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Source: usatoday.com
Pacquiao still game for Mayweather megafight but… -- GMA News
GMANews.TV
Following his latest ring conquest, Filipino boxing champ Emmanuel “Manny" Pacquiao is still open to a megafight with Floyd Mayweather Jr., but wants Mayweather to be the one to issue to challenge.
At a press conference after his return home from the United States early Monday, Pacquiao said it is Mayweather who needs him to bolster his own career.
“Di naman ho ako maghahamon dahil siya naman ang may kinakailangan. Ako nakamit ko pangarap ko sa boxing ko without Mayweather in my boxing career, so wala akong dapat kailangang ihamon sa kanya. (I won’t be the one who will challenge him because he needs me to bolster his career. I came this far in my boxing career without Mayweather, so Isee no need to call him out)," he said.
But he stressed he is game to a showdown with Mayweather, saying he will fight him anytime so long as his opponent meets the weight limit and their promoters reach an agreement.
“So anytime pwede ako lumaban basta gusto niya lumaban (I am open to him fighting me anytime he wants to)," he said.
Last week, Pacquiao called out Mayweather to do his part against Shane Mosley so that their aborted megabuck showdown can push through.
Mayweather has to get past fellow American Mosley in their battle for the latter’s World Boxing Association welterweight crown on May 1.
“He should win against Mosley. If not, Mosley and I will fight," Pacquiao said.
The bout between Mayweather and Pacquiao was called off following kinks in negotiations – including a row on drug testing - for the superfight initially scheduled for March 13.
Clottey no boost to political stock
Pacquiao laughed off speculations he used his bout with Joshua Clottey, the fighter who replaced Mayweather in the March 13 card, to boost his political stock.
He said boxing and politics are two different animals.
“Ang boxing walang connection sa pulitika ang boxing iba ang pulitika. Ang boxing nagbibigay ng karangalan sa lahat na Pilipino sa ating bansa. Ang pulitika pagserbisyo sa kapwa tao (Boxing has no connection with politics. In boxing you give honor to your country. In politics, you serve your countrymen)," said Pacquiao, who will vie for a congressional seat in Sarangani in this year's elections.
Source: gmanews.tv
Following his latest ring conquest, Filipino boxing champ Emmanuel “Manny" Pacquiao is still open to a megafight with Floyd Mayweather Jr., but wants Mayweather to be the one to issue to challenge.
At a press conference after his return home from the United States early Monday, Pacquiao said it is Mayweather who needs him to bolster his own career.
“Di naman ho ako maghahamon dahil siya naman ang may kinakailangan. Ako nakamit ko pangarap ko sa boxing ko without Mayweather in my boxing career, so wala akong dapat kailangang ihamon sa kanya. (I won’t be the one who will challenge him because he needs me to bolster his career. I came this far in my boxing career without Mayweather, so Isee no need to call him out)," he said.
But he stressed he is game to a showdown with Mayweather, saying he will fight him anytime so long as his opponent meets the weight limit and their promoters reach an agreement.
“So anytime pwede ako lumaban basta gusto niya lumaban (I am open to him fighting me anytime he wants to)," he said.
Last week, Pacquiao called out Mayweather to do his part against Shane Mosley so that their aborted megabuck showdown can push through.
Mayweather has to get past fellow American Mosley in their battle for the latter’s World Boxing Association welterweight crown on May 1.
“He should win against Mosley. If not, Mosley and I will fight," Pacquiao said.
The bout between Mayweather and Pacquiao was called off following kinks in negotiations – including a row on drug testing - for the superfight initially scheduled for March 13.
Clottey no boost to political stock
Pacquiao laughed off speculations he used his bout with Joshua Clottey, the fighter who replaced Mayweather in the March 13 card, to boost his political stock.
He said boxing and politics are two different animals.
“Ang boxing walang connection sa pulitika ang boxing iba ang pulitika. Ang boxing nagbibigay ng karangalan sa lahat na Pilipino sa ating bansa. Ang pulitika pagserbisyo sa kapwa tao (Boxing has no connection with politics. In boxing you give honor to your country. In politics, you serve your countrymen)," said Pacquiao, who will vie for a congressional seat in Sarangani in this year's elections.
Source: gmanews.tv
Pacquiao hints at retiring -- Philippine Daily Inquirer
By Miko L. Morelos, Philippine Daily Inquirer
MANILA, Philippines—Pound for pound king Manny Pacquiao hinted he might retire any time soon, dashing hopes for a mega-buck fight with the undefeated Floyd Mayweather Jr., who faces Shane Mosley in May.
The Filipino, who held court in the New World Hotel in Makati, said his mother Dionesia has been asking him not to fight anymore considering the dangers of the sport.
“She [Dionesia] told me that she would be on her knees just to make me stop fighting. I don’t want to see my mother like that,” he told reporters at a brief talk in the hotel lobby where he was accompanied by his family and posse.
Among the familiar faces in the welcoming crowd was Nacionalista standard-bearer Manuel Villar, whose hand Pacquiao raised after his talk. Former Ilocos Sur Governor Luis Chavit Singson and former environment secretary Lito Atienza, the come-backing mayoral hopeful in Manila, stood beside Pacquiao.
The Pacquiao entourage arrived in the hotel a couple of minutes past 7 a.m. as its staff, holding small Philippine flags, cheered upon seeing the champion at the doorstep. In the past few years, Pacquiao has been laying-off in the hotel hours prior to his customary hearing of mass at the Quiapo church.
Dancers wearing colorful tight outfits lined up the driveway as the vehicle carrying Pacquiao breezed through traffic coming from the Ninoy Aquino International Airport terminal 2.
Pacquiao is set to hear mass in Quiapo later and afterward, drop by Malacanang for a courtesy call with President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
He will be motoring around Manila and other places starting around noon time.
Source: sports.inquirer.net
MANILA, Philippines—Pound for pound king Manny Pacquiao hinted he might retire any time soon, dashing hopes for a mega-buck fight with the undefeated Floyd Mayweather Jr., who faces Shane Mosley in May.
The Filipino, who held court in the New World Hotel in Makati, said his mother Dionesia has been asking him not to fight anymore considering the dangers of the sport.
“She [Dionesia] told me that she would be on her knees just to make me stop fighting. I don’t want to see my mother like that,” he told reporters at a brief talk in the hotel lobby where he was accompanied by his family and posse.
Among the familiar faces in the welcoming crowd was Nacionalista standard-bearer Manuel Villar, whose hand Pacquiao raised after his talk. Former Ilocos Sur Governor Luis Chavit Singson and former environment secretary Lito Atienza, the come-backing mayoral hopeful in Manila, stood beside Pacquiao.
The Pacquiao entourage arrived in the hotel a couple of minutes past 7 a.m. as its staff, holding small Philippine flags, cheered upon seeing the champion at the doorstep. In the past few years, Pacquiao has been laying-off in the hotel hours prior to his customary hearing of mass at the Quiapo church.
Dancers wearing colorful tight outfits lined up the driveway as the vehicle carrying Pacquiao breezed through traffic coming from the Ninoy Aquino International Airport terminal 2.
Pacquiao is set to hear mass in Quiapo later and afterward, drop by Malacanang for a courtesy call with President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
He will be motoring around Manila and other places starting around noon time.
Source: sports.inquirer.net
Wake up America: The Klitschkos Deserve More Respect -- Huffington Post
By Gordon Marino, Huffington Post
Not that anyone in America noticed, but on Saturday night in Germany Wladimir Klitschko made his eighth successful defense of his IBF heavyweight world title. In the last seconds of their 12 round contest, Klitschko scored a knockout victory over top rated challenger Eddie Chambers. As usual, Klitschko took virtually every round. He has won his last 12 fights and has not been defeated since 2004. Over the last three years, he and his older brother, Vitali (WBC heavyweight champion) have thoroughly dominated the super-size division. And yet, they can barely get on television in the US.
The knock against these pulverizing boxer/punchers is that they don't take enough chances, don't go for the knockout. Ironically enough, Vitali has the highest knockout percentage in history amongst heavyweight champs, with 37 KOs out of 39 victories. He has two losses. Wladimir is not too far behind, with 48 KO out of 54 victories and 3 losses. George Foreman once confided to me that Wladimir was the hardest puncher that he has seen in 30 years. But it is true: they both commit the cardinal sin of working to set their opponents up. They both joust with their jabs and then, when there is an opening, they pull the lanyard on their explosive rights. To be sure, they don't fight with the reckless abandon of a Frazier, Foreman, or Tyson. But they certainly get the job done! Why do Americans seem to hold the science against these premier sweet scientists? Why the lack of interest in these heavyweights who seem to be a class above everyone in their weight class?
These two, NBA-sized ethnic Ukrainian are a remarkably compelling story. Their father was an air force colonel in the Soviet military. They grew up on far-flung military bases and were absorbed into the Soviet athletic system. Wladimir won the gold medal in the super heavyweight division the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta. The brainy brothers hit their books as hard as their heavy bags, earning doctorates in exercise science from the University of Kiev. Both speak four languages. Indeed, I have been with them at press conferences when they were bombarded with questions in Russian, German, and Ukrainian and cheerfully translated the queries into English for the rest of the press.
In addition to their accomplishments, they are wise and compassionate individuals. While most celebrity athletes are so narcissistic that they can barely spark a care about anything beyond their next contract, these men have pitched in to help people everywhere. Politically hyperactive, both were at the center of the Orange Revolution in Ukraine. Vitali holds a seat in the Kiev City Parliament and will soon run for mayor. They serve together as ambassadors for UNESCO and umpteen other charitable organizations. But who cares?
Europeans -- that's who. The Klitschkos, who enjoy Jordan like fame in much of northern Europe, fill stadiums and areneas every time they fight in Germany. In the US, however, the fact that they crush all of their opponents and every boxing stereotype just elicits a yawn. It is hard to figure. After all, we have always had a fascination with the big guys. It is as though we hold their intelligence, education, and measured aggression against them.
While sports fans complain that they wish boxers would get some smarts and slip the thug life, it seems we are actually more comfortable with gladiators who don't have any other options than the bruising arts. We should learn something from our apathy about the Brothers K. First, that apathy casts light on the fact that there is an ocean of difference between the US and Europe in the way that we watch the sport. Most Europeans are not going to moan about a bout as long as effort and skill are displayed. But Americans go by the thinking, there will be blood, and demand nothing less than a slugfest. One Boston boxing fan recently commented, "Boxing is basically a fistfight. Klitschko makes it a match of pawing." Boxing is basically a fistfight? But more than the way that we assess fights, the indifference towards these two gifted and hardworking heavyweights makes it plain that Europeans and Americans are on a different page when it comes to our cultural understanding and expectations of boxing.
Gordon Marino is a boxing trainer and writes on boxing for the WALL STREET JOURNAL
Source: huffingtonpost.com
Not that anyone in America noticed, but on Saturday night in Germany Wladimir Klitschko made his eighth successful defense of his IBF heavyweight world title. In the last seconds of their 12 round contest, Klitschko scored a knockout victory over top rated challenger Eddie Chambers. As usual, Klitschko took virtually every round. He has won his last 12 fights and has not been defeated since 2004. Over the last three years, he and his older brother, Vitali (WBC heavyweight champion) have thoroughly dominated the super-size division. And yet, they can barely get on television in the US.
The knock against these pulverizing boxer/punchers is that they don't take enough chances, don't go for the knockout. Ironically enough, Vitali has the highest knockout percentage in history amongst heavyweight champs, with 37 KOs out of 39 victories. He has two losses. Wladimir is not too far behind, with 48 KO out of 54 victories and 3 losses. George Foreman once confided to me that Wladimir was the hardest puncher that he has seen in 30 years. But it is true: they both commit the cardinal sin of working to set their opponents up. They both joust with their jabs and then, when there is an opening, they pull the lanyard on their explosive rights. To be sure, they don't fight with the reckless abandon of a Frazier, Foreman, or Tyson. But they certainly get the job done! Why do Americans seem to hold the science against these premier sweet scientists? Why the lack of interest in these heavyweights who seem to be a class above everyone in their weight class?
These two, NBA-sized ethnic Ukrainian are a remarkably compelling story. Their father was an air force colonel in the Soviet military. They grew up on far-flung military bases and were absorbed into the Soviet athletic system. Wladimir won the gold medal in the super heavyweight division the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta. The brainy brothers hit their books as hard as their heavy bags, earning doctorates in exercise science from the University of Kiev. Both speak four languages. Indeed, I have been with them at press conferences when they were bombarded with questions in Russian, German, and Ukrainian and cheerfully translated the queries into English for the rest of the press.
In addition to their accomplishments, they are wise and compassionate individuals. While most celebrity athletes are so narcissistic that they can barely spark a care about anything beyond their next contract, these men have pitched in to help people everywhere. Politically hyperactive, both were at the center of the Orange Revolution in Ukraine. Vitali holds a seat in the Kiev City Parliament and will soon run for mayor. They serve together as ambassadors for UNESCO and umpteen other charitable organizations. But who cares?
Europeans -- that's who. The Klitschkos, who enjoy Jordan like fame in much of northern Europe, fill stadiums and areneas every time they fight in Germany. In the US, however, the fact that they crush all of their opponents and every boxing stereotype just elicits a yawn. It is hard to figure. After all, we have always had a fascination with the big guys. It is as though we hold their intelligence, education, and measured aggression against them.
While sports fans complain that they wish boxers would get some smarts and slip the thug life, it seems we are actually more comfortable with gladiators who don't have any other options than the bruising arts. We should learn something from our apathy about the Brothers K. First, that apathy casts light on the fact that there is an ocean of difference between the US and Europe in the way that we watch the sport. Most Europeans are not going to moan about a bout as long as effort and skill are displayed. But Americans go by the thinking, there will be blood, and demand nothing less than a slugfest. One Boston boxing fan recently commented, "Boxing is basically a fistfight. Klitschko makes it a match of pawing." Boxing is basically a fistfight? But more than the way that we assess fights, the indifference towards these two gifted and hardworking heavyweights makes it plain that Europeans and Americans are on a different page when it comes to our cultural understanding and expectations of boxing.
Gordon Marino is a boxing trainer and writes on boxing for the WALL STREET JOURNAL
Source: huffingtonpost.com
I'll knock you out! Wladimir Klitschko fires warning to David Haye after Germany victory -- Daily Mail
By Nick Parkinson, Daily Mail
Wladimir Klitschko has warned David Haye he will end up like Eddie Chambers if they meet, after the Ukrainian knocked out the American in the last round on Saturday.
The WBO-IBF heavyweight champion flattened Chambers with five seconds remaining in front of 50,000 fans at the Esprit Arena in Dusseldorf, Germany.
The brutal left hook scrambled the challenger’s senses for about a minute, and he was taken to hospital for a check-up.
Klitschko, 33, will next take on Russian Alexander Povetkin in September, while the Ukrainian’s elder brother, Vitali, defends his WBC crown against Essex-based Pole Albert Sosnowski on May 29.
Haye hopes to face one of the brothers if he beats American John Ruiz in the first defence of his WBA title in Manchester on April 3.
But Wladimir Klitschko has told Haye he needs to commit to fighting one of them. He said: ‘Me and Vitali have to fight between ourselves to see who fights Haye and that’s the hardest bit about it.
'The fight against Haye will be the easy bit. David Haye believes he is such a smartass. He has promoted himself smartly, but we need to see some action from him.
'Action speaks louder than words and right now he is a loser because he bitched out twice — me and then Vitali. Let us finish the talk and let’s fight. It is boring now.'
Haye, 29, pulled out of fighting Wladimir at short notice last June due to a back injury before ending talks with Vitali in order to fight Russian Nikolai Valuev, from whom he took his title, in November.
Wladimir Klitschko is still angry at Haye and is confident Britain’s two-weight world champion will end up, like Chambers, flat on his back and unconscious.
He said: ‘I am upset with many things concerning David Haye. I have just had enough and want to fight. Maybe there was a back injury, but twice in a row makes me suspicious.
‘I will do the same to Haye as I did to Chambers if I get him. When I get him I am going to enjoy the process. He criticises my jab, jab, grab. He will eat a lot of jabs.
'I will just beat him up and then knock out Haye in one of the late rounds.’
Klitschko’s trainer, Emanuel Steward, fears a fight against Haye may never happen. Steward, who trained Lennox Lewis and Thomas Hearns, said: ‘Haye showed up to two press conferences, talked rubbish and everyone went crazy about him.
'Then he pulled out. I don’t think David Haye is going to do anything but talk. He became famous by coming up to Wladimir at a press conference with a T-Shirt, then he ran away from Wladimir and Vitali.
'Haye should win against Ruiz but you always worry about him because he’s too chinny. Even Monte Barrett had him down.’
Source: dailymail.co.uk
Wladimir Klitschko has warned David Haye he will end up like Eddie Chambers if they meet, after the Ukrainian knocked out the American in the last round on Saturday.
The WBO-IBF heavyweight champion flattened Chambers with five seconds remaining in front of 50,000 fans at the Esprit Arena in Dusseldorf, Germany.
The brutal left hook scrambled the challenger’s senses for about a minute, and he was taken to hospital for a check-up.
Klitschko, 33, will next take on Russian Alexander Povetkin in September, while the Ukrainian’s elder brother, Vitali, defends his WBC crown against Essex-based Pole Albert Sosnowski on May 29.
Haye hopes to face one of the brothers if he beats American John Ruiz in the first defence of his WBA title in Manchester on April 3.
But Wladimir Klitschko has told Haye he needs to commit to fighting one of them. He said: ‘Me and Vitali have to fight between ourselves to see who fights Haye and that’s the hardest bit about it.
'The fight against Haye will be the easy bit. David Haye believes he is such a smartass. He has promoted himself smartly, but we need to see some action from him.
'Action speaks louder than words and right now he is a loser because he bitched out twice — me and then Vitali. Let us finish the talk and let’s fight. It is boring now.'
Haye, 29, pulled out of fighting Wladimir at short notice last June due to a back injury before ending talks with Vitali in order to fight Russian Nikolai Valuev, from whom he took his title, in November.
Wladimir Klitschko is still angry at Haye and is confident Britain’s two-weight world champion will end up, like Chambers, flat on his back and unconscious.
He said: ‘I am upset with many things concerning David Haye. I have just had enough and want to fight. Maybe there was a back injury, but twice in a row makes me suspicious.
‘I will do the same to Haye as I did to Chambers if I get him. When I get him I am going to enjoy the process. He criticises my jab, jab, grab. He will eat a lot of jabs.
'I will just beat him up and then knock out Haye in one of the late rounds.’
Klitschko’s trainer, Emanuel Steward, fears a fight against Haye may never happen. Steward, who trained Lennox Lewis and Thomas Hearns, said: ‘Haye showed up to two press conferences, talked rubbish and everyone went crazy about him.
'Then he pulled out. I don’t think David Haye is going to do anything but talk. He became famous by coming up to Wladimir at a press conference with a T-Shirt, then he ran away from Wladimir and Vitali.
'Haye should win against Ruiz but you always worry about him because he’s too chinny. Even Monte Barrett had him down.’
Source: dailymail.co.uk
Oli Filimaua’s Ticket To New Zealand -- Scoop
Scoop.co.nz
Oli Filimaua the mandatory challenger for the Samoa welterweight title has an offer to fight in New Zealand in September, but first he needs to win next Tuesday’s main event of the Samoa Pro Am Fights against the title holder Ionatana Pula.
According to Teleiai Edwin Puni of Event Polynesia, Samoa Pro Am Fights promoter, “There are only three senior welterweight boxers locally. For Filimaua to make a career out of boxing, he needs to fight overseas.”
“At the moment Pula is standing in the way of Filimaua clocking in his first professional fight in New Zealand and Filimaua knows that,” said Teleiai.
Tuesday’s ten rounds by three minutes contest between the veteran champ Pula of Tanugamanono and Filimaua, the new kid on the block from Fagalii and Fa’ala, promises to be a toe to toe explosion of different fight styles.
Pula comes into the fight as the more experienced with nineteen pro fights and the heavy puncher of the two. Filimaua has the advantage of being twelve years younger with a pro record of five fights, winning four with one draw.
According to Filimaua, “After winning my last fight in December, I approached Event Polynesia to discuss my ranking and challenge for the Samoa Welterweight title.”
Teleiai said, “Pula’s return from New Zealand last year made it possible to lock gate this exciting match up. Pula had not defended his title for a while due to the lack of a credible challenger. Filimaua has the merits and has put his hand up.”
Ale Vena Ale, Secretary General of the South Pacific Boxing Incorporated has confirmed that Event Polynesia’s request for the Samoa Welterweight Title to be contested had been granted. The fight will also be sanctioned and officiated by SPBI.
While the heavyweight division had always been the main event attraction of most boxing promotions, Manny Pacquiao ‘Pac Man’ of the Philippines have changed all that by making the light divisions the money fights.
Pacquiao is the current World Boxing Organisation welter weight champion. Has a pro record of fifty six (56) fights, fifty one (51) wins thirty eight (38) by way of KO with two (2) draw and three (3) losses. His last four fights, against Oscar De La Hoya, Ricky Hatton, Miguel Angel Cotto and Joshua Clottey, have earned him the bragging rights to the title ‘The Greatest.’
There you have it Pula and Filimaua, lighter boxers can change the landscape of world boxing.
Tickets to the Samoa Pro Am Fights now sold at JP Fitness (Vaimea), Hennies Sports Bar (Fugalei), Maroon Boy’s Corner (Apia). Group discounts available by contacting Event Polynesia office (+685) 28802.
Source: scoop.co.nz
Oli Filimaua the mandatory challenger for the Samoa welterweight title has an offer to fight in New Zealand in September, but first he needs to win next Tuesday’s main event of the Samoa Pro Am Fights against the title holder Ionatana Pula.
According to Teleiai Edwin Puni of Event Polynesia, Samoa Pro Am Fights promoter, “There are only three senior welterweight boxers locally. For Filimaua to make a career out of boxing, he needs to fight overseas.”
“At the moment Pula is standing in the way of Filimaua clocking in his first professional fight in New Zealand and Filimaua knows that,” said Teleiai.
Tuesday’s ten rounds by three minutes contest between the veteran champ Pula of Tanugamanono and Filimaua, the new kid on the block from Fagalii and Fa’ala, promises to be a toe to toe explosion of different fight styles.
Pula comes into the fight as the more experienced with nineteen pro fights and the heavy puncher of the two. Filimaua has the advantage of being twelve years younger with a pro record of five fights, winning four with one draw.
According to Filimaua, “After winning my last fight in December, I approached Event Polynesia to discuss my ranking and challenge for the Samoa Welterweight title.”
Teleiai said, “Pula’s return from New Zealand last year made it possible to lock gate this exciting match up. Pula had not defended his title for a while due to the lack of a credible challenger. Filimaua has the merits and has put his hand up.”
Ale Vena Ale, Secretary General of the South Pacific Boxing Incorporated has confirmed that Event Polynesia’s request for the Samoa Welterweight Title to be contested had been granted. The fight will also be sanctioned and officiated by SPBI.
While the heavyweight division had always been the main event attraction of most boxing promotions, Manny Pacquiao ‘Pac Man’ of the Philippines have changed all that by making the light divisions the money fights.
Pacquiao is the current World Boxing Organisation welter weight champion. Has a pro record of fifty six (56) fights, fifty one (51) wins thirty eight (38) by way of KO with two (2) draw and three (3) losses. His last four fights, against Oscar De La Hoya, Ricky Hatton, Miguel Angel Cotto and Joshua Clottey, have earned him the bragging rights to the title ‘The Greatest.’
There you have it Pula and Filimaua, lighter boxers can change the landscape of world boxing.
Tickets to the Samoa Pro Am Fights now sold at JP Fitness (Vaimea), Hennies Sports Bar (Fugalei), Maroon Boy’s Corner (Apia). Group discounts available by contacting Event Polynesia office (+685) 28802.
Source: scoop.co.nz
Bigger than Mayweather: Manny Pacquiao meets Pope Benedict XVI -- The Examiner
By Michael Marley, Examiner.com
Forget about Floyd Mayweather Jr. for a moment...and God knows I am trying.
The biggest matchup out there for Manny Pacquiao is not against L'il Floyd.
The biggest, most newsworthy matchup for the Pinoy Idol would be if he can fulfill his longtime dream of meeting the Pope.
Don King, who had an intercession from an Italian boxer, got to go to the Vatican to meet the Holy Father so why not Pacman?
Can't you hear King cackling, if it goes down, "Only in the Vatican!"
Let's face it, when it comes to being a good Catholic and being devout, Pacquiao is that man.
Once upon a time in America, we had the WMFC, World's Most Famous Catholic in the person of presidential candidate John F. Kennedy. I remember, as a boy in Boston, not really getting it when I heard and read that prejudice people might vote against him because of his faith.
A vote for JFK would put control of the United States into the hands of the Pope, ignorant people said, but Kennedy was elected anyway in 1960.
I dare say the WMFC circa 2010 must be Pacquiao, a serious Catholic from a heavily Catholic nation of 97 million.
He goes to Mass--he had a prefight Mass on the day of the Joshua Clottey bout in Dallas and then a Thanksgiving Mass the day after--more than most nuns and altar boys (are they altar children now?).
Sandwiched into his 140 person traveling entourage on the plane he spent $100,000 to rent and which was dubbed "Air Pacquiao," were at last count about four Pinoy priests including my friend, Father Marlon.
This is how important his faith is to Pacquiao.
After the 15 hour flight from Los Angeles to Manila, arriving at 5:30 a.m. Monday morning, Manny, wife and friends will drag themselves to the historic Quiapo Church for the ritual back at home Mass.
Which serves as an opening for this cute story as told to me by Pacman agent/adviser Joe Ramos:
In LA, Pacquiao's church of choice is called Christ The King.
Last time he was there, a gaggle of nuns, clerics and others formed a queque to get autographs, photos, etc., from the boxing superstar. Suddenly, Manny was out of sight.
Ramos heard one nun going into a mild panic about the disappearance. It's okay, Ramos told her in Tagalog, he just stepped into a private conference, he will return to meet, greet, sign and take pictures.
"Oh, spit," the nervoso nun said.
When nuns want your photo, your autograph, it does kind of make you a big deal. (Shoutout to my late aunt, Sister St. Andrew of Nova Scotia.)
I think Christmas time would be a perfect time for Manny to take wife Jinkee and their four kids to the Holy See
So what do you say, Father Marlon and colleagues?
Can't you guys ring your boss and have him call the Big Boss?
This is from Wikipedia on the values Pope Benedict XVI holds dear:
During his papacy, Benedict XVI has emphasized what he sees as a need for Europe to return to fundamental Christian values in response to increasing de-Christianisation and secularisation in many developed countries. For this reason, he proclaims relativism's denial of objective truth—and more particularly, the denial of moral truths—as the central problem of the 21st century. He teaches the importance for the Catholic Church and for humanity of contemplating God's redemptive love and has reaffirmed the "importance of prayer in the face of the activism and the growing secularism of many Christians engaged in charitable work."
The Pope and Pacquiao, it's a match made in heaven.
Maybe Manny can bring Bob Arum along with him. And aspiring rabbi and world junior middleweight champion Yuri Foreman as well.
That would be ecumenical to the core.
I just hope that, when the photos and videos roll out worlwide, we don't get some heathens asking, "Who's the guy with the big white hat standing next to Manny Pacquiao?"
Or, what if, Kelly "Ghost" Pavlik, who I assume to be Catholic, went along?
He is the world middleweight champion and under Arum's aegis.
No, I won't go there. No cracks about the Father, the Son and the (Holy) Ghost.
Better to leave it here.
Manny Pacquiao keeps the faith and, with the Pope's blessing, he might spread it as well.
He is the World's Most Famous Catholic.
(mlcmarley@aol.com)
Source: examiner.com
Forget about Floyd Mayweather Jr. for a moment...and God knows I am trying.
The biggest matchup out there for Manny Pacquiao is not against L'il Floyd.
The biggest, most newsworthy matchup for the Pinoy Idol would be if he can fulfill his longtime dream of meeting the Pope.
Don King, who had an intercession from an Italian boxer, got to go to the Vatican to meet the Holy Father so why not Pacman?
Can't you hear King cackling, if it goes down, "Only in the Vatican!"
Let's face it, when it comes to being a good Catholic and being devout, Pacquiao is that man.
Once upon a time in America, we had the WMFC, World's Most Famous Catholic in the person of presidential candidate John F. Kennedy. I remember, as a boy in Boston, not really getting it when I heard and read that prejudice people might vote against him because of his faith.
A vote for JFK would put control of the United States into the hands of the Pope, ignorant people said, but Kennedy was elected anyway in 1960.
I dare say the WMFC circa 2010 must be Pacquiao, a serious Catholic from a heavily Catholic nation of 97 million.
He goes to Mass--he had a prefight Mass on the day of the Joshua Clottey bout in Dallas and then a Thanksgiving Mass the day after--more than most nuns and altar boys (are they altar children now?).
Sandwiched into his 140 person traveling entourage on the plane he spent $100,000 to rent and which was dubbed "Air Pacquiao," were at last count about four Pinoy priests including my friend, Father Marlon.
This is how important his faith is to Pacquiao.
After the 15 hour flight from Los Angeles to Manila, arriving at 5:30 a.m. Monday morning, Manny, wife and friends will drag themselves to the historic Quiapo Church for the ritual back at home Mass.
Which serves as an opening for this cute story as told to me by Pacman agent/adviser Joe Ramos:
In LA, Pacquiao's church of choice is called Christ The King.
Last time he was there, a gaggle of nuns, clerics and others formed a queque to get autographs, photos, etc., from the boxing superstar. Suddenly, Manny was out of sight.
Ramos heard one nun going into a mild panic about the disappearance. It's okay, Ramos told her in Tagalog, he just stepped into a private conference, he will return to meet, greet, sign and take pictures.
"Oh, spit," the nervoso nun said.
When nuns want your photo, your autograph, it does kind of make you a big deal. (Shoutout to my late aunt, Sister St. Andrew of Nova Scotia.)
I think Christmas time would be a perfect time for Manny to take wife Jinkee and their four kids to the Holy See
So what do you say, Father Marlon and colleagues?
Can't you guys ring your boss and have him call the Big Boss?
This is from Wikipedia on the values Pope Benedict XVI holds dear:
During his papacy, Benedict XVI has emphasized what he sees as a need for Europe to return to fundamental Christian values in response to increasing de-Christianisation and secularisation in many developed countries. For this reason, he proclaims relativism's denial of objective truth—and more particularly, the denial of moral truths—as the central problem of the 21st century. He teaches the importance for the Catholic Church and for humanity of contemplating God's redemptive love and has reaffirmed the "importance of prayer in the face of the activism and the growing secularism of many Christians engaged in charitable work."
The Pope and Pacquiao, it's a match made in heaven.
Maybe Manny can bring Bob Arum along with him. And aspiring rabbi and world junior middleweight champion Yuri Foreman as well.
That would be ecumenical to the core.
I just hope that, when the photos and videos roll out worlwide, we don't get some heathens asking, "Who's the guy with the big white hat standing next to Manny Pacquiao?"
Or, what if, Kelly "Ghost" Pavlik, who I assume to be Catholic, went along?
He is the world middleweight champion and under Arum's aegis.
No, I won't go there. No cracks about the Father, the Son and the (Holy) Ghost.
Better to leave it here.
Manny Pacquiao keeps the faith and, with the Pope's blessing, he might spread it as well.
He is the World's Most Famous Catholic.
(mlcmarley@aol.com)
Source: examiner.com
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