Well off of the final weekend of June. We have seen world title fights
and wins for Lamont, Roach for Ta Femo Lopez, for Mam Rodriguez,
and we're ready to recap all of it. And speaking of champions, Shakur
Stevenson, the newly crowned lightweight champion of the world right here on this very
podcast, and a conversation with Dan Rayfield coming up. Welcome in. It's
the Fight Freaktion Night recap. I'm the somewhat competent host TJ. Reeves.
He is our insider. Hello, Dan Rayfield. Fight Freaktion Night is his
substack, bigfight Weekend dot Com. How we feelings? We head into July
now July fourth later this week, Baseball, apple Pie fireworks, and a
hot dog eating contest on July fourth minus Joey chest disgusting. Disgusting. I
don't understand why human beings pay attention to people gorging themselves with sixteen hot dogs
in their mouth on national television. But I digress. By the way,
thank you for finding us. I come your way. The peeps always love
this Rayfield. I come your way from the east coast of Florida, about
three hours from my home near Coco Beach, Florida. I am out on
the patio as we speak, trying not to get the side eye from the
twins, et cetera. On vacation while we record the podcast real quick here
recap the fights here from Shakur, et cetera. I don't want to I
don't want to leave the peeps at the altar. I don't want to leave
them jilted. So even on a mini vacate for a few days, we
are here, Petes, we come off the weekend with the recap. You
just want to brag that you're overlooking the ocean from the beach. Yeah,
they have that. They have to visualize that. I'm condo they have they
have a We have a condo that we paid slightly less than an oldsmobile for.
I'm gonna have to do the podcast apparently until I'm ninety to pay all
this stuff off. But we are here for a few days and I'm doing
the pod with Rayfield here to recap the fights. Thank you for finding us.
Rate us in review us a new month. Ratings and reviews help,
five star reviews help. Thank you for doing that. Leave us a nice
review, follow, Subscribe apples, Spotify. Let's get into it. Let's
roll the sleeves up. We're gonna go chronologically. When we left this podcast,
you were discussing world title fights. But why don't we begin first of
all with the most noteworthy one, and that is the match Room Saturday night
show in Phoenix where Bam Rodriguez, who they heard from on the preview podcast
last week in advance of this fight, wiped out Jan Fancisco Strata. Yes,
he got dropped in a flash knockdown, laid in the fight, but
he got right back up, wasn't hurt, and then blasted Estrata to the
body and laid him out. That's gonna lead our recap mode here. Tell
me what you saw from Bam, who has really solidified himself as one of
the top I think it's fair to say one of the top US world champions
right now in any division. That's obvious with the resume that he has.
Dan go ahead, Oh, no question about it. I mean I love
the fight. Number one. It was a fight that everybody figured was going
to provide excitement, entertainment value, fireworks, and it was gonna be a
heck of a fight, and it was all that tremendous fight. I mean,
we haven't had the run of like tremendous Fight of the Year candidates so
far through the first half of twenty twenty four like we did last year.
So I think this fight again through the first six months, I don't think
know if it's the fight of the year, but it's on the short list
for the first six months. Even though it was somewhat at least to myself
and basically everybody else except for the two of the dopey judges, who was
a pretty one sided fight in the cards, but it was a really good
fight. And dam Rodriguez, as you said, is not just one of
the best American champions in the sport whatever the way last he's one of the
best pound for pound fighters in the world. I don't agree with Eddie hearn
All that often, but I listened to his commentary when he was interviewed after
the fight by our buddy Chris Mannix on his own broadcast, and you know,
he made a valid point. He says, Look, you can talk
about Terrence Crawford as a pound for pound guy. He talked about Alexander Usak,
who was the heavyweight champion. He talked ABOUTI in a way, who
was the undisputed champ at one hundred and twenty two pounds. But if you're
going to talk about those three guys, you know you need to throw the
three letters bam, bam into that conversation. I don't. I mean,
he's not ahead of those three guys. But if you wanted to make an
argument and tell me that you feel like he's number four, I mean I
might fight you a little bit because I still have high regard for people like
Bivol and Canelo and others, but I can't argue too strongly against him.
He's a really outstanding fighter. He's got a full arsenal offensively, defensively,
he can go back, go forward, both hands, speed, youth,
really smart, great corner. You know, with Robert Garcia running the show,
he's just a real he's a very cerebral fighter. Also, he really
gets it. There's nothing not to like about the young man he's putting together.
I said it before the fight DJ, he's laying the groundwork for a
Hall of Fame residume. Yes, and so now he's coming into this fight.
He was already a junior bandonweight champion that he had vacated the WBC title
to drop down in Wait at flyweight, he won a title, and then
he beat up on Sonny Edwards to unify two titles. Then he went back
up in Wait to fight Estrada, who had won the vacant WBC belt in
when he vacant although he had been the lineal champion. And he goes in
and he flows through a Strada in a terrific performance to capture the lineal and
the WBC title. And now you look at the resume that he's had.
You know, belts are one thing. If it was all about belts,
and you know, Adrian Broner would be a first bout Hall of Famer.
But it's not just about the belts. You know, Berner won titles in
four weight classes, but never beat a top, top guy. If you
take a look at what this what this guy has done in terms of Damn
Rodriguez. He beats Carlos Squadros, He knocks out Swissa katsar Rung beside.
Granted they were in the toilet of their careers, but no one ever did
them the way he did them. Number One, Now he goes into the
flyweight division, he beats up he doesn't just beats Sony Edwards. He dismantles
him, He batters him, he breaks his face, he pummels him,
he takes away his undefeated record to unify. Then he goes back up and
he takes out the guy Estrada, who was the king of that division,
who never been stopped before, whose losses were against the best buys in the
world, against you know, Roman Gonzales and Uh and Uh and others in
that you know, Sir rungby Side, I mean, those types of opponents.
And he didn't just win. He fucking blew him away in a in
a great action battle, knocked him down in the fourth round, knocked him
out with a devastating body shot in the seventh round, and as you mentioned,
he did take a flash knockdown in round six, but that sort of
added to the to the drama and the excitement of the event. Although I
never for one moment had the impression that he was truly hurt in the sixth
round with thin so I mean he popped up smiling sometimes smiles or to feign
that you're actually hurt. He wasn't hurt, he wasn't stumbling around it.
But it was it was a fight you got, you got your money's worth
from that, and what a great crowd. Again. Phoenix continues to show
itself as a big time fight town and fight area, whether David Benavitez is
fighting there and some of the other recent times. You remember Jake Paul fought
there and sold out what was it Anderson Silva for that fight. So they
had a loud, roaring crowd there. And again, we're not gonna make
this guy out to be invincible. Obviously, I'm not saying you're not.
He also thought when he thought on the Edwards in December, it was in
Glendale, which is right next door to Phoenix Base right there, so you
know, it is an excellent uh fight region. So the fight itself was
terrific, The performance was outstanding. Uh. You know one thing that that
that was pretty clear in the post fight commentary is that Wan Francisco Astrada had
the right to an immediate rematch. He said he's going to exercise them multiple
times. Eddie Hearn said that he had that right. Bam said he had
that right. They're all willing and ready to do that fight again in the
fall. Uh Strata, in his comments that were translated, said that he
he made a mistake. He knows what the mistake was. He should have
boxed a little bit more earlier instead of going right into the battle. So
we're gonna probably see the rematch in the fall. I mean, I guess
it can't be too mad about it. It does irritate me though that it
has to happen. I feel like rematches should be uh sort of more where
it's the type of thing where the fans want it. That said, it's
a popular fight, people really want to see it again, not because it's
mandate. It should be more organic, I guess if it comes about.
But if there's gonna be the rematch, so be it. Obviously, if
you listen to what Rodriguez said, he would he would prefer to unify in
the next fight against the winner of the July seventh fight in Tokyo. That's
going to be for two of the belts in the way class between Kazuto Aoka
and Martinez. So there's that possibility if if the rematch doesn't take place.
Because BAM's gonna bring money also, and there's that's why he's gonna be able
to get fights because at this stage of the game with his popularity, his
performances, the zones backing, Mattroom is backing He's gonna be able to draw
the guys to fight him who don't otherwise make big money in this one hundred
and fifteen pou Way class. Now let's get chowy. Now that's the fight,
That's what the future lies. They also talked about a fantasy fight in
the long distant future of Noya in a way, which is maybe something a
couple of years down the road, but at the moment that ain't happening.
So we have to discuss TJ my least favorite topic to discuss on the on
the Recap podcast, And what do you think that let's see, is it
having to go to dental surgery? No, having to do your taxes?
We don't normally discuss that on the podcast. No having to sit through another
Trump Biden debate. No, how about bad judging dot com, dot next
dot org Rayphaiel, what is this card from the Mexican judge? I,
honest to god, well, but the one the one that gave estrata like
the first four rounds. I legitimately thought when I saw that card, he's
marking them in the wrong column. But the wrong fighter. All Right,
I'm gonna say it before you say it. At what point are we gonna
publicly fire one of these guys. We don't have to flog them. We
don't have the time to an ant heel and pour kool aid on them.
At what point are you gonna say you're never working another title fight? I
mean, I don't know. If you say you're never working a fight again,
you never working a fight again. No, never say another title fight
again. That's not to me the same thing. The point is, if
the person has shown a reasonable career thus far, you at least put him
into some training, You go over it, you try to rehabilitate them.
I do believe people deserve a second chance, But it's getting to the point
where it's just fucking comedy at this point, because you know, no matter
whether it's a decision or not. Got almost every big time fight there's some
fucked up score that you just can't wrap your mind around. Now, let's
go through this in order. Yep. So Steve Morrow is the United States
judge that was on the panel. He had to fight normal. I'm looking
at the scorecard. He gave the first four rounds to uh Bam Rodriguez,
including a round four where he scored the first knockdown of the fight, and
then he gave him the fifth round of the fight, and he gave us
ten to eight round appropriately because as Trada dropped Bam in round six, that
seemed to be the proper way of scoring the fight. That's how I scored
the fight. That's how lots of people I saw online score the fight.
That's to be the right score. Fifty eight fifty four. Let me let
me interject, there's no planet where Bam Rodriguez is not winning the fight entering
the seventh round. Period continue on. Okay, now, let's go to
our good pal, mister Robert Tapper, from the greats, their great country
of Canada, our our dear friends north of the border. I got nothing
but love for Canada, right, been there many times. We love,
we love the hockey. Been been up there for vacations, Toronto and Montreal,
Niagara Falls. I grew up a few hours from the Canadian border.
I love Canada. You know, I'm almost ready to break into Oh Canada.
Oh you just did it, you just went there. But they should
fucking deport Robert Tapper. Okay, wait, wait, wait, I want
people, I want people fired as judges. You want him deport it?
Okay, continue, all right, So Robert Tapper, we haven't even gone
to the third judge yet, but he's got cover because he as fucked up
and stupid and shitty. As his scorecard is, it's actually not even nearly
as bad as the one we're about to talk about. But on Taper's card,
he's got the fight going into to the knockout round. He's got it
fifty six to fifty six. That makes absolutely no fucking sense. Did I
mention to you there's no planet where Bam Rodriguez is not winning the fight in
entering the seventh round. I believe I mentioned. I'm still looking at the
card. Here he gives Estrada rounds one and two. Now, you might
be able to make the argument that he won the first round. If there
was any other round other than the knockdown round that you could probably give him,
maybe it's the first round. He gave him the first rounds, then
he gave Bam three, four, and five, which were totally dominating rounds,
and then obviously the ten eight round in the knockdown round. After that,
Now to fifty six to fifty six is fucked up. That's bad,
Yes, but it's me. It's like his shit's like just that's like an
annoyance based on what we're about to talk about. So we're leave my friend
from Canada alone for a minute. Right now, Let's go to our our
man, Javier Camacho from the wonderful nation of Mexico. I love Mexico.
Loved the food, right, been there many times on vacation, covered fights
in the bull ring in Cancun. Yes, love love my my uh my
father in law with the time share in Cabo San Lucas. Been there many
times, nothing but love for my my Mexican brothers. One of the port
cities on the Love Boat, I believe it was. It's outstanding Mexico.
I love Mexico. Now nation fucking the port Camacho? Is this? This
is the most unconsionable card I can read. This is like fucking This is
CJ. Ross level horribleness. Okay, this is just pathetic. He gave
the first three rounds to a strata. He almost got knocked down and got
badly hurt in round three, and he gave him that round. That's fucked
up. He at least got the fourth round, right, because Bam had
to get a knockdown actually win the round, so he got that. He
did give him the fifth round ten to nine. And then this is another
crazy thing. In the sixth round, which was the round in which Astrada
dropped Dam Rodriguez, he did something that's not against the rules but highly unusual
is he only scored a ten to nine in favor of Estrata. I guess
in his opinion it was so dominant, but I didn't think it was dominant.
It was only the knockdown, because even after the knockdown, you know
it was competitive, but it wasn't like Bam came back and soup. So
the math again through sixth round, so headed to the seventh round is what
he has a Strata I had fifty seven to fifty six, which is one
of the most fucked up things I've ever seen. I felt like I'm doing
like an acid trip when I look at this squorecard. Now again, you
gotta fire somebody accountability. You got to say you're no longer working championship fights.
And when you start just doing this, then you're going to put people
on notice that if you're there for whatever incompetiti corrupt or whatever reason. Just
you know, Christmas treeing is what we called it on scantron tests and multiple
choice tests. If you're just Christmas treeing your scorecard, you're not gonna rep
championship fights. And it's incumbent on the Arizona Commission, the organizations, everybody.
They won't do anything about it. They won't, they won't give I
want to hear I'd be willing to give heavier Camacho the floor to explain,
like in round three, four and five, we're so overwhelmingly dominant for Bam
that you're like, the fight's fucking over. I mean, he did come
back and get the knockdown on six, but he was beating the living shit
out of Estrada in those three rounds and he actually gave one of them.
It just is it's such an unconsortable I mean, I don't really get where
that worked up about that shit much anymore, but this one just really pissed
me off because the fucking draw score card was terrible and the one that had
him winning is even worse. But what do we say Estrada brought who his
two judges, his right and his left, particularly the body shot with the
left and it didn't matter. It didn't matter, and so congrats to him
and we'll see what he does next. So it's gonna be the rematch.
And how soon will that rematch happen? Is it like a September October thing?
Is it a November December thing? It'll be this fault. That's the
bottom line. We shall see, all right. The cold feature fight is
the fighter who BAM had beaten in his most immediate title win, and that
was Sonny Edwards of England. As you and I discussed on the bet US
show back on Friday, we foresaw that this would be a distance fight,
with Edwards winning two guys that don't have huge punching power Adrian Curiel's one punch
knockout a side of Nat Shinga to win the title. Not Shinga regained the
title knocking him out, and so Edwards was cruising along, was winning some
rounds and then we had a gnarly nasty flash of heads that basically renders the
fight over. Unlike the tim Zus situation, Edwards is like, look,
I'm good, I can't see, I'm believe everywhere and we go to the
cars, right, yeah, I mean, look, we talked about ahead
of time. This was the fight where you have Sonny Edwards coming off getting
battered by Bam and losing the Flyway title in December. He needed a win.
Yet Adrian Curie all who had come out of nowhere to upset on Shinga
by knockout, but then lost by knockout in the immediate rematch, and so
he moves up in wait, he needs to win. You don't want to
lose two in a row. But it seemed evident to me that Sonny Edwards
as the bigger fighter, as the way way slicker, more experienced fighter,
the better boxer by you know, by multiples, that this was the type
of fight that Sonny Edwards is going to probably dominate, and when by decision,
that's exactly what happened. The only thing that was sort of the the
monkey wrench in the whole situation was that terrible head clash that caused the fight
to be stopped. It was it was a really really really terrible cut.
I mean it was deep and it was long, and it was wide,
and it was in a bad spot right by like between his eye, ye
hear his nose, Like it was a vertical cut like they were showing it
on the on the on the replay, it was like they were making it
talk that so wide almost go up, so discussed horrific. So, you
know, so Sonny gets the decision. It was maybe a little more gruesome
than to expect that. I figured he would just cruise to the twelve round
decision. He won going away, and uh it was in ninety to eighty
two, eighty eight, eighty four, and then of course there was one
outlier card which actually had it eighty seven eighty five, which seemed dizarre to
me because Sonny Edwards, who was way faster, way more technical, way
longer with his jab and uh, just much more. There's an unconfirmed before
that Camacho scored the fight one oh six eighty nine for career out go ahead.
So Sonny Edward's look, he gets to win. It wasn't maybe,
uh, you know, the the most exciting fight in the world. But
unfortunately for Sonny, uh you know, he's gonna be off for a bit.
That was a rugged, rutal, brutal, terrible cut. I mean,
honestly, it's going to be months before that stuff's ready to go.
He may be sitting down plastic surgeon, plastic stenergy. That's probably a four
or five month cut at least based on the how Definitely gotta let it,
heal it. He's a good talker, they've used him on commentary before,
so he gets the victory. We'll see what his future is at Flood.
Anything else from the de Zone show or shall we move on? We shall
move on. Let's move on to the ESPN Top rank boxing card in Miami,
a late night Saturday night where Teja Fimo Lopez, as expected, dominated
Steve Claggett, who did not offer a lot retaining his WBO Junior welterweight title.
Lopez busier Lopez landing consistently with the lead right hand. The only question
mark, and we addressed this leading in on our preview and on the vet
Us show, is is the punching power going to translate at some point for
him at one and now the man after the fight fact is talking about after
the fight's over with about wanting to move up to one forty seven. I
was a little again disappointed is the wrong word, but I'm just questioning what
the punching power is that he couldn't get Claggett out of there. Couldn't knock
him down, couldn't stop him. He was clearly dominating the fight. What
are your thoughts in the recap? Well, I've said this before about other
fights. I've never been one to hold it against a guy if he can't
score a knockout. Now, to me, the knockouts the bonus. I
mean, you'd like to see it, especially when you do all the talking
and the bragging that certain fighters do about it. But to me, it's
not like a disqualifying thing. Just because he didn't score a knocket against Clagg,
it doesn't mean he couldn't compete in heavier weight classes. I mean,
I'll give you I'm not making a comparison between the two of them in terms
of their abilities. But like I look at like a Parnel Whitaker. You
know, a brilliant fighter won world titles in a bunch of weight classes undisputed
at lightweight. You know, walterweight champion, moved up and you know briefly
held the Jermim Midlewhight Talle because he couldn't get any competition in the lower weight
division one forty champion. The point is he never knocked anybody out, and
nobody held it against him, So I'm not gonna hold it against him because
Teve Fimo Lopez didn't stop Steve Kagge at a guy who had going into the
fight seven losses, but only didn't stopped one time. So he'd already shown
over the course of his career, a long fifteen year career, sixteen year
career, that he can take a punch even if he wasn't fighting the elite
fighter. So you know he did. Lopez did win basically every single round
there wasn't That was one, thank god, where there wasn't any kind of
nonsense with the cards. Two of the judges had a clean sweep one eight
one judge one round to give the school Steve Claggy, which I can see.
He was very active and busy and this pressure, pressure, pressure.
But here's the thing. The reason why it is understandable if you're gonna be
disappointed in the performance is because when the fight was me Remember, he's coming
off of an absolutely terrible performance against Jermaine Ortiz in February, where a lot
of people question whether he should have gotten the win. I thought Ortiz won
the fight. I was not alone, but it was a horrible fight,
and Ortiz moved and and you know, he ran around and try to just
try to frustrate him throughout the fight, and you know, touch and move
and that kind of thing. So the antidote to that, if you're the
folks that are running Ti Femo's career and matchmaking and all that, is,
let's get him as far away from that negativity as possible. Let's give him
an opponent who's going to be right in front of him, who's gonna do
nothing about moving, dancing side to side. He doesn't even know as what
the word lateral means. I mean, he's just gonna stand right in front
of you and come at you like a bull, and you can punch him
like an open target. And that's what they gave him, Steve Claggan.
That's the reason, Steve. They didn't pick Steve clagg because he's some great
contender, And there was the reason they picked him and didn't pick the other
opponents that were brought to the table. They didn't pick Kenneth Simms for a
reason, right, They didn't pick Raymond Morettaia for a reason. They picked
Steve Klaggett because he is going to offer the best possible chance for two things.
To make it an exciting fight because of the amount of punches that are
gonna be thrown and landed, and that TFMO is gonna have so many clear
openings he's gonna stop the guy. Well, that didn't happen, So that's
why you have to question it. It was made to order for him to
do a knockout victory, and he was not able to not only not get
it, but as you mentioned, never came close to hurting him or knocking
him down or anything like that. Now, part of that you got to
give Steve Klaggett, the old man thirty five years old, you know,
nine years older than TV Molopez. You got to give him some credit.
He had a motor, he had stamina. There was not a lot left
on his punches by the later rounds because he was obviously expending a tremendous out
of energy with that. You know, go get your kind of style.
So I do tip my hat to clack it. I'm gonna tell you right
now, if you're a promoter out there or a manager and you've got a
young, up and coming one hundred and forty pound fighter and you want to
give him a test, Steve Klaggett's the guy to give him the rounds and
give him the test because he's gonna he's gonna give anybody a tough fight even
if he doesn't win. So he didn't. He didn't disgrace himself at all,
not to say Ta Femo disgrace himself, but so from the standpoint of
not getting the knockout, which was the whole concept of making the match first,
that was a little bit disappointing. But I did think that t Fmo
fought a good fight. He fought under control, He threw and landed the
most punches in his entire career according to copybox, and he won every single
round. He didn't get injured. So I'm a little bit I read some
of the post fight things that people said on social media. I read some
of the other journalists that wrote stories about the fight, and I don't think
I'm getting soft in my old age as as a heavier comat show and might
might let you know, but uh, you know, I thought, I
didn't think it was a terrible performance or anything like out that fought a good
fight and did did what he could do. And even if you don't get
the knock it if you went every single round. You've done your job,
and it wasn't like it was a boring fight. Now it did sort of
in the last handful of rounds, kind of degenerate in my mind where I'm
watching the same round after un I felt like and he didn't and he didn't
stop on the accelerator, He didn't get him trapped in a corner and brutalize
him. He didn't do any of that. He just did enough to score
points, score not get hit some. Now he did get hit some.
I mean he had both both eyebrows were a little puffy at the end of
the fight. But Againe for the sizzle, for how good he looked against
Josh Taylor. Uh, this is easy for me to say. We talk
about all the time, go flatten somebody, Go flatten somebody like this guy
and get everybody's rated. Isn't easier said than done. I mean, he's
now five he's got five fights as a junior Welterwait, he's won all five
of them. He did, let me say it. Let me he did
stop Pedro Camp in his debut. But he's gone the route against good fighter
Sander Martin, Josh Taylor, Jamaine Ortizan. Now, uh, you're gonna
be in a sentence with good fighters. Let me just let me finish.
He's a little bit less than those guys. Okay, but let me say
one more thing. You're gonna blab after the fight about one forty seven,
Well to wait this, wanting to fight that, wanting to fight this.
Where have you demonstrated that you can punch at one forty seven? If you
can't punch at one forty well again, I'm gonna say it again. You
just because you can't punch doesn't mean you can't compete and win in the division.
I just used the example of Paronel Whitaker. You did you? Okay,
So now I'm gonna swatch you that you are using one of the all
time great fights. I'm using the exhausts to exaggerate my point. I understand.
He was an elusive, tremendous boxer. That's the style in which he
thought. This guy style is not that. This guy style is he lands
he's in front of you. He got knocked down by George Cambosis because of
it and got brutalized, and a lot of that fight cut up and beat
up. Because that's the way you're you're not being fair. You're not being
fair in that way. We all know, and I'm not defending theme all
of us. He had an obvious and clear provable major physical ailment that he
went into the fight with. So, yes, all the things you said
are true, but there has to be so type of context to the situation.
So all I'm making the point your TJ is the following. Just because
you cannot be a big puncher at one does not mean you cannot compete a
hang at one forty seven. Now that said, he's talking about Terrence Crawford.
While I appreciate the uh, the the you know, the desire and
the and the mariage, Crawford destroys him in four or five rounds. I
totally agree with that. Okay, but we don't agree on a lot sometimes.
But that's that's true. That's true enough. But that fight's not happening
because he Themo Lopez. If he goes to welterweight, he's gonna get to
a welterweight division where Terrence Crawford has moved on to the junior middleweight division.
He's never gonna see one forty seven again. He's gonna fight Israel Magemov for
the WBA belt in the August, and presumably he's gonna have a you know
a little bit of a run in that weight class win or lose against Maduev.
So the Crawford fight is highly unlikely. The more likely possibility if he
decides to move up, and this is from what Top Rank has told me
since the fight, they're probably going to try to make. Okay, well,
let's back up. When Terrence Crawford gets to junior middleweight, the belts
that he still holds in the welterweight division are going to become vacant. You
know, he's been stripped away of the IBF and he was made champion in
recess by the WBC, but the WBA and the WBO eventually, you know,
they'll do something similar day whatever. So when the WBO belt becomes vacant,
which it will, Brian Norman, who's the young undefeated fighter that's with
Top Rank that won that interim title back a few weeks ago, is going
to become the full champion. He's with Top Rank. That's the fight the
Top Rank is talking about making for this fall. Ste Fimo Lopez against Brian
Norman for the WBO welterweight title, So that's a more likely scenario. Now.
Brian Norman does not have a big name, but he's certainly put on
a tremendous performance when he won that belt. Yeah, and you know,
knowing his team, it seems like they would be willing to make that kind
of match, you know, as long as obviously they're paid. He's twenty
six and oh he's only twenty three years old. He looked at so fantastic
knocking out Giovanni Santition to win that belt back in May, a shocking win
because Santiago had looked so good in the previous fight with what with roacha with
Alexis Rocha, and then Norman put it on him. So yes, listen,
santwin was undefeated, and that's and I know what you're saying, that's
a winnable fight for Tayo Fima Lopez. If that's the fight, and a
winnable fight for Brian Norman, it seems to me. I mean, so
you know, you know, even before he stops Santio, he was ahead
on all the cards by pretty wide margins. Well, there was one close
card, two of them were pretty wide. Because there's always a fucked up
score. But the point is, uh, I'm not saying that's a mega
fight, but that seems like a very makeable, reasonable logical fight. If
tia Fima Lopez is insistent upon wanting to leave the one forty pound way class,
here's the thing, TJ. Let's say he decides he wants to stay
at one hundred and forty. You tell me what's the big fight for him?
I just don't see now he mentioned Pitbull Cruise. He said, I
you know, this was him talking to Mark Kriegel in an interview on the
broadcast, talking about how if he could get a fight with Pitbull Cruise,
that he would even be willing to take less money just to get the opportunity.
Pitbull obviously has a big fan base. But again, Pitbull's fighting on
the August third card that Crawford is on. If he wins, I guess
you never say never, that would be I'd listen. That's of the guys
who have the belts at one forty, that's probably the most interesting fight.
He's not going to get a Liam Paro. It's not a fight that anybody
here would care about. Alberto Pueo, you know, he just was elevated
he's got other things he's got to deal with. We're going to talk about
that a little bit later. So Ti Fimo in a unification against Pitbull Cruise,
I'd be down for that. If other than that, I'm not sure
what else here is at one forty. Devin Haney is going to be out
for a little while. I wouldn't mind seeing that, but he doesn't have
any interest. It seems like he's going to take a break understandably. You
know, Ryan Garcia has left the Way class and he's suspended anyway for the
next number of months. So I'm not sure what else is out there at
one forty that would be of a serious note. So I think we're going
to see him in Brian Norman in the Fall. Interesting all right. On
the undercard, as expected, Roba c Ramirez did get his knockout when he
delivered a vicious uppercut and finished off Brandon Leon Benitez, and so that now
sets up firmly the rematch with Rafael Espinosa to come late this year. Tell
me what you saw out of Robas Ramirez. He had a huge partisan crowd
in Miami, as we expected, big Cuban population. Heck, Miami's about
thirty minutes to the south of where I'm sitting right now, and they were
roaring for him throughout that cold feature and that win. He did what he
was supposed to do. Absolutely, I thought Robas Heirom has looked absolutely sensational.
I mean, granted, you have to take into account the level of
the opponent that he was fighting. Maybe he's refocused and remotivated after the upset
loss to Espinosa that took place in December, but Robusirimirez when he's on his
game, is as dangerous and as sharp and as talented as anybody in the
entire sport. But you know, you look at the record and you're like,
Okay, he lost to pro debut. We've litigated that, we know
what happened against Espinosa, and now I mean, he's got a chance to,
you know, to show us that that it's that he is the real
deal if he goes in there and he and he takes care of Espinosa in
the rematch, which is gonna be tough based on what we saw the first
time around and what we've seen from Espinola since in his victory last week.
With that size he has but against Brandon Benitez Robes Heerman has looked absolutely sensational.
I mean the knockout, that's a knockout of the ear candidate. By
the way, it was a massive uppercut, and he rocked his head back
and forth so much he made him like the human pez Dispenser. I mean,
that was a vicious, vicious, vicious knockout. He landed the uppercut
and then a little right hand behind it, and you know, he never
know what was coming, and it was the way he went down, and
that was a sensational knockout. So he gets the rematch, and so he
did his part. Espinosa did his part in the previous week, and we'll
see them fight this fall. I don't know the date, they'll probably do
it in like November ish, and uh, hopefully we'll see another good fight
because the first one was spectacular. And again credit Espinoza for a lot of
reasons. But that knockdown that he suffered early in the fight with Ramirez from
that uppercut, I believe that's that are similar type punch, and he was
staggering all over the ring, recovered and then out fought Ramirez the rest of
the way, dropping weight and won. So there's a lot of intrigue.
Hey, let's hear it for two guys being active in between both getting impressive
knockout wins, and now they'll fight each other. We like that. It's
compelling. I know it's two it's a Mexican against a Cuban, it's two
non Americans, But I'm intrigued by this. If you're a fighter fan,
how are you not intrigued by this? But I've never cared what the nationalities.
You're talking to a guy, by the way, that used to back
in the in the pre YouTube days, and even before there were DVDs,
I was getting VHS tapes of freaking World Island and you're self described as the
Far East sicco. That would have all the fights sent to you on VHS
back in the day. But I'm just saying to you, they could have
that fight in Miami, they could have that fight in Phoenix, they could
have that fight wherever they want to have it, have it in Las Vegas,
and it's going to be interesting and intriguing. So good on both of
those guys. All right again, Shakur Stevenson conversation with Dan coming up shortly.
Let's wrap up with a couple of more recaps that includes have you heard
that Nico Ali Walsh is the grandson of Muhammad Ali? Can I just say
this? We have a lot to cover with his win, his revenge win,
his sixth round decision win over sona Akali. But my god, I
counted from the beginning of the build up with the fight, when the fighters
were walking into the ring, all the way up until the fourth round.
Joe Tessitour mentioned nine different times the grandson of Muhammad Ali, Muhammad Ali's grandson,
Muhammed Ali's grandson, the grandson of Mhammad Ali. Joe, we get
it, ESPN, we get it, top rank, we get it.
You don't have to say it nine times in four rounds. We get it.
I love Joe. Joe's a friend of the pod. Joe listens to
the pods. Thank you, so I think you he just got a little
excited about that. But look, he is the grandson Mohamma Ali. That's
the reason why anybody would give a guest. I was not aware of that.
I'm thanking you for. So let's discussed the fight for a minute.
I mean the pressure up first of all. I I first, if you
ever meet Nico aliwash wife met and talked to several times. I saw him
a couple of weeks ago when I was out in Vegas at the at the
Tank Davis fight. He was at that celebration for the MGM's one hundredth championship
event. He's a very very nice kid. He's very approachable. He understands
the hoopla. He gets it about his grandfather. He's not trying to be
his grandfather. I respect him a lot for what he's trying to do in
this business because it's not easy. Because you have that gigantic target on your
back. You're not just any old offspringer grandkid of a You're the grandson of
Muhammad Ali. That's the biggest name. Five times that we've said it.
So but but again, he has such a good nature about it. He
he embraces it. And why shouldn't he. That's uh, that's grandpa.
Okay. So he's trying to do his own thing. He just so happens
that because of his bloodlines, he gets more attend then your average fighter.
That was nine and one or ten and one going into the fight. Now
he lost a very close decision majority a sixth round or two SONA CALLI back
in August of last year. He's won a couple of fights since, and
so they finally made this rematch, and it was close. But I thought
that Nico did a hell of a job in that fight. He punched,
he boxed again, it's at a certain level, but he got a knock
down. The knockdown was vital for the Actually knockdown was the difference in terms
of winning or a draw if he had not. If he didn't get that
extra point for the knockdown, it would have been a draw. More impressively,
the balls that he showed by dislocating his shoulder in the final round and
then jumping up and down and hitting himself on the shoulder to try to put
it back. Let me ask you, now, he didn't know that it
was hurt because he didn't ever win after him. Meanwhile, his left arm
is dangling by his side. You have done this for so long. Have
you ever seen a fighter trying to hit his own older to knock it back
in place, because that's what he was clearly doing. He said it after
the fight. I was trying to knock it. He's never had that before.
By the way, he knew it was dislocated and he was literally trying
to punch it back into place while keeping the distance from his opponent. I
don't know in the forty five years that I can coherently remember watching boxing that
I've ever seen that it was a sixth round that sona Calli has got terrible
ring IQ because he did not notice that his opponent had a not thrown a
single left hand in round six and b not only hadn't thrown, hadn't fainted
with it, and basically had it dangling by his side for virtually the entire
round. If that's the case and your man has your left hand and down,
why are you not attacking with your right hand which was his punch anyway?
And so I credit to Nico. He fought that fight smart. He
just kept working on the other hand, his right hand, and he got
the and I think he won the last round even with the injury, to
win the fight. So you know, I don't I don't seen the actual
scorecard, but the bottom line was he pulled it out. I mean he
was. It was close and it was competitive, but he got to win,
and you know, we move on again. I don't know how far
he's going to go, but I respect his work ethic. I like his
commentary afterwards talking about how you know that Jake Paul into that. You know,
let's get into that, because that was interesting. He said that he
was offered and I assume he means this July twentieth date that's coming in about
three weeks for Tampa, for Jake Paul to be the opponent, and he
said he was offered a billion dollars and he said, I'm not doing that.
I'm not being part of it. I think he called it a circus.
I'm not being part of the boxing circus. So I found that works
though, because I found that interesting. Nico is one hundred and sixty pounder.
Jake, you know, on the low end as a one ninety pounder,
so there's a big spread in weight. Horse Jake's coming down, maybe
he gets down to one to eighty five or something like that, but the
spread in the weight was a lot. But it wasn't He wasn't knocking Jake
Paul in that sense. What he was knocking was the comments that that t
Fima Lopez apparently had made regarding him, and he did he took exception about
that and said, I'm a real fighter, you know. And I'm trying
to do things the right way, you know whatever. My grandfather's name is
UH and and so you got to respect that. So again, I don't
know how far Nico Ali Walsh is gonna go, but I'm gonna root for
him guts, big time guts with the busted shoulder. Now, if he
had to fight on multiple more rounds with that shoulder, who knows what happens.
But and Joe Tessitur was on it. And by the way, bravo
to Chris al Jerry, who I know. You know, I don't know
him. I know he's working with our buddy Dan Canobio, and I love
his commentary on and all this stuff they're doing. But he was right on
it throughout the night. And he was right on something is wrong with Walsh
because look at his left arm dangling, and he's not he's not raising the
left arm, he's not using the left arm anymore. He picked it up
right away, So go to him in there. Yeah. The good news
about that and this was I got the note from UH from a top rank
after the fight that UH that the doctor at the Inn had reset the arm
and that they had sent Nico off to the hospital just to get checked out.
For you ever, have you ever seen that done, Because I've been
around in the NFL a bun with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and it is
a painful thing in the moment. But I have seen it where you leverage
and stand in front of somebody and wah pow, pop it back into place
by drinking it back into place. No fun for the person. When I
was when I was a kid in summer camp one year, I was probably
thirteen fourteen something like that, I dislocated my shoulder and no, I know
exactly what it's like. So they had to come over, and it's a
doctor or somebody and they said, Dan, look the other way, take
a deep breath and whah hoow, and they put it back in. I
was in and then I was in like a sling for about That was like
towards the end of the summer camp and the last week of our camp it
was a day camp, but the last week we would go on a camping
trip for like the five days and you know, up in the mountains and
you know, on a lake and the whole thing it was. It was
always a great you know, great fun and a thing we already looked forward
to for the end of the end of the summer camp year. And I
remember being there with the fucking sling on my shoulder. I could do anything.
But what it did help was I because I had to sling on,
I could get out of having to like go pick up the firewood and help,
you know, do all the manual labor everybody else was doing. Because
I was all fucked up with my arm. I would have rather done the
manual labor and had my arm work that week. But what you can identify
with the grandson of Muhammad Ailey, you can you can identify with the grants
of Muhammed Aley. We've made that point. One more fight to go over
and then here Shakur Stevenson in a moment on the Recap podcast that is the
Friday night win in Washington, d C of Lamont Roach. He did what
everybody really thought here he won, and he won impressively multiple knock nowns tko
stoppage of Farodol McCrory of Ireland to retain his WBA Junior lightweight title. What
else here do we need to know coming out of that, including what might
be next? Well, I think that when you say that he did what
everybody expect him to do, I think you're only half right about that.
And the reason I say this is because, of course, when you bring
an opponent like McCrory to your hometown of Washington, d C. An opponent
that, while he had a very good record at sixteen and oh coming into
the fight, had never really been tested, hadn't really fought a top opponent.
And now you're you know, he's getting this opportunity to fight for the
world title, so you know you're the hand pick guy and you're going to
the enemy turf. But the thing about it is, I've watched Lamont Roach
for his entire career from day one. I've got to know Lama and his
father. We you know, we joke around because for many years, for
most of his careers on all the Golden Boys shows because they had signed him,
and since we're both from the region, inevitably we're always on the same
airplanes going to Vegas and coming back, so we would hang out in the
airports together before and after his fights. They're very nice people. But the
one thing about Lamont Roach has been missing in his game. As talented as
a as a boxer as he is in terms of his amateur background, his
skills, his tenacity, you know that, that desire, you know,
you know, you have to have that. He just never was a big
puncher, and that's that's been the case. He doesn't have a ton of
knockouts, but in this particular fight, he looked as good offensively. And
I think I've probably seen literally every single LaMotte Roach fight of his entire career,
and Ben ringside for a number them. I was supposed to go to
this fight and something ended up happening on Friday, I got to cancel my
trip out to to into DC to go to the fight, so I did
watch it on the It was it was the main event of the Probox TV
card. They did a nice job with their presentation. He scored three knockdowns
and knocked him out and looked absolutely devastating with his with his h with his
offensive arsenal he's he dropped him two times with the body punches. The left
hooks were spectacular. He just totally dominated basically with the left hook, and
he took him out of there, uh you know, in in largely with
the left hook. I mean, he just totally systematically beat him down and
stopped him in round number eight when the corner threw in the towel. I
think it's the best performance Lamont Roach has had his entire career, because even
when he won the title, could go back in his previous fight. That
was last fall, that was on one of the Showtime pay per view undercards,
back when it was David Benavite's against Dimitri's Andre. He won the belt
from Hector Luis Garcia, but it was not a particularly good fight, and
it was kind of close, and some people thought that Garcia wan. I
believe it was a split decision. If I'm not mistaken correct, that was
his big win. But this was a sensational performance. I mean, he
had the confidence and he fulfilled the dream we talked about in the preview.
Back in twenty seventeen, which was the last time he had fought in his
home region. He'd fought out at the MGM National Harbor, which is in
Maryland, right over the river into you know, from where he lives in
Washington, close to where I live. I've been to many fights there and
he headlined as a prospect on an old ESPN two card when Golden Boy was
doing some show was on ESPN two and said, you know what, someday
I'm bringing a world championship I back to my town. And it's taken until
twenty twenty four. But he fulfilled the promise and the goal, and he
looked really, really good. And I'm going to tell you what I love
about him. Also, he's not looking at Duck and Dodge. He wants
the best names. He was asked afterwards about who he wants. He talked
about, you know, bring on, I'd love to fight Emmanuel Navarette.
And here's your thing. kJ. This is a guy who is a promotional
free agent. His father has this promotion company. No excuse promotions. There
the ones to put the event on. But he is open for business.
If Top Rank wants to sign with him, or sign him, if if
Golden Boy wants to bring him back, of Mattrum, who wants to work
with him? You know, whoever you name it, I mean, PBC
whatever. He is open for any of those types of fights. I think
anybody that's got like good fighters at one hundred and thirty pounds or say twenty
six pounders that might move up, why wouldn't you want to have LaMonte roach
on your roster not to mention. In fact, you know he's not going
to break the bank. I mean you got to pay him obviously. He
his Royal Championship. He's not the kind of guy that's going to be commanding
crazy, stupid money. The dollars are going up. He gets a title
defense win and now whatever that next move is, you would think, by
the way, that was his first knockout, going back five fights to a
knockout of someone named Daniel Ross in July of twenty twenty one, so it
had been three years and five fights since he had gotten a knockout. But
good on, good on Lamont Roach to get the win on Really, listen,
he's a really he's a really easy guy to root for. You know,
no no one gave him anything. He worked for what he's got.
The first World Championship opportunity that he had a few years ago. He was
the mandatory in the WBO. He lost a decision competitive, but he lost
against Jamel Herring. You know what, he didn't sulk, He didn't,
you know, retire, He just went back to work it, worked hard
and got himself in position, won a bunch of fights in a row.
And even if he talked to Golden Boy. They're they're they're split. Was
not in any way at least from my understanding talking to both sides, it
was very amicable. They just you know, Golden Boy was interested to resign
him. They just couldn't work it out. They decided to stay free agents
and do their thing. And you know, they were able to put this
event on on their own, and it drew a nice crowd there at the
at the arena where they held it, about a forty five hundred seed arena
called the Entertainment and Sports Arena in Washington, d C. And you know,
good for them. They put on a good event. And uh,
you know he you know, he loves to fight for his Washington people,
and uh, you know we Uh maybe I'm a little biased because I've lived
in the Washington area for twenty five years. We have a very underrated boxing
tradition and rich history here in this region, and I've always said for a
long time it's underrated. It's underutilized as a region of bring fights, even
if the guy's not from the city, because they've got knowledgeable fight fans,
particularly if you have a top African American fan. Washington, DC. Obviously
is one of the most heavily black cities in the country. Every time I've
ever been to a fight in the district, which is numerous, they always
bring out a good crowd, black and white. I wish there was more
fights here in this in this region. All right, very good. Now
watch and listen to my segue work. You're talking about a promotional free agent,
LaMonte roach is Shaquur Stevens said, about to be a promotional free agent
or not? Well, we do know this. He's about to defend his
newly one WBC lightweight title against Artam Hartytuonian. You don't have to wait though,
for later this week, for all the press coverage and all the comments,
et cetera. Here is Shakur Stevenson with my man Dan Raphael right now
as part of the podcast in advance of that title defense. It's my great
pleasure to be joined on our podcast this week by none other than the WBC
lightweight champ of the world, sha course Steve Chicourt. Thank you very much
for doing this. How you doing, bro, I'm good, I'm good.
I'm good on sitting back chilling in. It's my birthday, so I'm
just sitting back waiting for the fight. Now, I know you got you
got ahead of me. I was gonna say, first off, happy twenty
seventh birthday as we tape this on June twenty eighth. I'm sure obviously you've
always wanted to spend a part of your birthday being interviewed by me. I
know that's a dream come true for you. Probably not, but we're here
to talk about your first lightweight title defense. You'll be taking on Ardam Hartytuny
in July sixth in the top rank ESPN main event at Prudential Center in your
hometown of Newark, New Jersey. How does a young man spend his twenty
seventh birthday while also in training camp a week before their fight. Uh,
just chill out, just relaxing. Honestly, birthdays is cool, but it's
like I probably wouldn't even be doing nothing for my birthday anyway. So I
just sit back, watch spots saying and patiently wait for my moment. I
got you. So this this is, like I mentioned, this is going
to take place at the Prudential Center. It's your hometown. I know it
means a lot to you. You know, you wear it on your sleeve.
You're always talking about Newark, and you've done a lot of community work
in the city and brought a lot of big time boxing matches back there.
It's going to be your third fight there in your last four fights, your
fourth overall in that building, Prudential Center. You fought in Las Vegas,
New York, Atlanta, Atlantic City. Well, what does it mean to
you to have fights in front of your people, in front of your hometown
in that kind of arena? Amaze everything to me. Own. I hope
that everybody comes out to support. I know that my promotional company is not
trying to promote the fight properly, because I'm not. I had to resign
with them, So I just pray that the same people that have been coming
out for me keep coming out for me and just show up and enjoyed the
show. Well, you touched on it when you say they're not promoting the
all right. I mean from my way of looking at as a media person,
which is sort of one of the things they promote towards to get media
attention. It seems like they have because they've helped set up this interview between
you and me to help promote your fights. So can you tell me what
you mean by that, I mean usually it's just more. You know,
I've been working with them for years, so you know, it's not just
about the interviews that I'm doing, which I feel as though we've been working
for a long time, and it's just more. I ain't gonna get into
detail. I ain't. It is what it is. I ain't chipping on
it. I just got to show up and do my job. So I
was gonna get to this a little bit later in the interview, but since
you brought up the whole free agency, we'll get to the fight in a
minute for sure. But like you said, it is your last fight with
your promotion contract with Top Rank. You've been with him your entire career.
Seems to me from the outside looking in, you've done good business together.
You've won world championships in three different weight classes. You've unified titles in one
of those weight classes. You've made millions of dollars. They've put on some
big fights for you. But now that the free agency is upon you following
this matchup, is it all a distraction to you? Nah? I don't
really care for uh, honestly, the free agency and everything where that matters
after the fight, right, now we got to stay focused on what's what's
the ahead of us, and the main thing is come in and they are
prepared and ready to put on the performance. So nah, I don't care
for it. It is what it is, not a dishttion at all.
Okay, glad to hear that. As I mentioned, you have won the
titles in the three whel with three weight classes. You have beaten some notable
opponents Oscar Valdez, Concasyle, Jamel Herring. There are many people shakor you
know this, you see it. They talk about you as being one of
the most talented boxers in the whole sport, a guy that's gonna be on
that talent for poundless for many years to come. But we got to go
back for just a quick minute and look at your last fight. That's when
you won this WBC vacant lightweight title against Edwin de los Santos in November.
You won a decision, but you'd be the first to admit this. I
think that was not a good fight from for anybody to watch. He barely
threw any punch as he turned one of the most dismal performances I've ever seen
in almost twenty five years of covering boxing. I know you did not seem
happy after that fight, even though you got the win. Were you disappointed?
How disappointed were you in the way that fight went, the fan reaction
to the fight. I know, I'm sure you're happy you won the title,
but uh, what about that other part of it? The other part
of it. It is what it is. At the end of the day.
I can't do nothing about it. But at the end of the day,
we got to also take recognition and understand that Delasanto's is not an easy
fight, and hopefully I'm hoping that somebody gives home an opportunity, because now
the world can see that that's not a guy that that you just go in
there and annihilate, and especially like somebody with me that I got one hand
in the fight. So now I'm fighting this good fighter that has good defensive
abilities and got power, and it's a tricky fighter with good skills. I'm
fighting home with one hand. Yeah, I was mad at myself, but
now that I went back and like rewatched it and understand like everything that was
going on, I'm not mad at I'm happy that I can go pull that
off on a bad night, and I don't think that there's a lot of
fighters that y'all put at the top level that will fight him. We already
seen Pitbull CRUs turned him down in a fight. You wonder why he would
turn him down. But take a fight with writ somebody that Edwin Della Santos
knocked out. I think that is just a game that's not really being played.
Fear because I think like the outsiders, they don't understand everything that goes
on into like the sport of boxing. But when y'all sit there and y'all
say, oh, y'all didn't like to fight, Okay, cool, y'all
probably didn't. But it's some people that understand boxing that did like the fighter,
and the people that understand boxing that did like to fight. They like
chests. It was more and so a chess match with two boxers that's more
defensively and one got one hand in there. So now I'm handicapped and making
it work. So honestly, I feel the stuff. I'm going back on
it. I'm not even mad at the performance, no more, I'm mad
at the public. I'm more so mad at the public whole. Oho.
I go out there and I'll go perform night after night, years and years
of me putting hands on people and beating people up, and then you have
one off night and then everybody just say fucking And if that's how they feel
about me, if it's fuck you to me, it's fuck you to them
too. And people may say, oh, well, these are people who
pay money to see you fight and they do this, and okay, understood.
But at the end of the day, I'm a man, and if
anybody anybody, I don't give a fuck who it is, whether it's money
involved or money and not involved. If anybody say fuck me, I'm gonna
say fuck the too. So well is what it is. Then that's I
understand where you're coming from. I just uh for the point though, I
don't think people are holding it against you for the rest of your career.
I think it's understandable they may have been upset that one particular night, but
it's not that they don't have any interest in seeing a talent like your self
perform in the future. But you mentioned about being honeycop. The logic,
the logic that they've runned me. Oh now, now I'm a runner.
But how many fights have I stood in the pocket? No? I get
it. I get it. You mentioned this, I'm a hockey fighter.
If we're being real, I want to just clarify. You said you were
a handicap because you had one hand. What was the you had? Was
it a shoulder injury? If I'm not mistaken, No, the shoulder was
my right shoulder went fucking. The one hand that I got, I still
was using, but it was the hand was my left hand got you?
Okay, all right, So that that's in the past. I just wanted
to get your reaction to that. But now you obviously have this fight coming
up against Hartitunian. Look, you were a twenty sixteen silver medalist in the
Olympics. He was a twenty sixteen UH bronze and bronze medalist in the Olympics
for Germany. You fought in different weight classes. He fought at light welterweight
about one hundred and forty pounds. You were fighting obviously down in about one
hundred and twenty three pounds, so you're in you're in a different division.
But were you familiar with him from the amateurs at that time or do you
remember seeing him perhaps in the Olympics. Yeah, I seen him, I
seen I've seen a fight this tall Cuban kid from Ajubbajan. No, he's
really from Cuba, but he was training. He went to Ajibbajan scene and
I wouldn't say he lost, but yeah, I seen him. I seen
him, I'll do. So, what is your sort of assessment of his
abilities and what he brings? Uh, obviously you were separated by a lot
of weight back then. How you're obviously you know, at the same weight
class. But what did you What is your sort of scattering report on Hartitunian.
I think he's a real good, solid fighter. I think that he
tried to press you, pressure you with his legs, got real good feet,
where know how to like bag out, got a nice little hot guard.
Honestly, I just don't think he sings anything like me. So the
one time he did step up and fight a more recognizable kind of name was
a pretty good fight. He had the fight with Frank Martin, who just
recently challenged Tank Davis for the WBA LIGHTWEIGHTE belt and did get knocked out in
that fight. But Frank Martin was able to win a decision against Hartitunian.
He did score a knockdown against him in the in the final round in the
twelfth round of their fight. Did you see that fight and what did you
What was your impressions of Hertitunian's performance in that one time he did step up
against a name opponent. Honestly, I thought he was winning the fight.
I thought it was a pickup fight. I still think it was a case
where it should have either been a drawer or I ain't gonna I ain't gonna
say or it could have went either. I think that the problem was he
took a knee, because I ain't even gonna say, you got knocked down.
Let's like we're gonna really I analyzed, like the actual fights. It
wasn't like a punch that Frank Martin hit him with that heard him. Or
he took a knee I want to say from fatigue. Okay, that's that's
kind of what I saw from watching the fight. And when he took that
knee from fatigue, I think that kind of gave the the decision away.
On being that he's fighting in Dallas, I want or was it Veggies.
I believe it was in certainly was not in his home area. Let's put
it like that. I forget what it was the B side he was let's
just say he was the B side right from being the B side taking the
knee in what the twelfth round. Uh, it's the worst thing that you
can do, especially in a fight where it seems like you're ahead, but
it's like you give some moments where Frank is doing anything too. So honestly
a good fighter. I don't take nothing away from Home but his lovels.
Yeah, I understand that. I mean, I think if you looked at
it and you analyzed your boxing ability compared to his, I would think that
you think that. I'm not gonna say you think this is an easy fight
because he does have that amateur background. He did have a good performance against
Frank despite the loss, But you figure that you are just a far superior
boxer to him overall in terms of the way you'll be able to handle and
get the win. Yeah, I think that I'm just levels above Home.
Man. Still got to go out there improve it. So on July sixth
is the date. That's the day we go out there and show who I
am. I wanted to go back real quickly to your discussion about your your
potent, you know, your impending free agency. I've seen some videos or
saw some of the commentary from Mattroom boxing promoter Eddie Hearn. He's talked you
up, talked about how great of a young fighter you are, thinks he
said, he thought you're not being promoted the best, and so I'm sure
he'll be a shuitor among others. When when you do hit the free agency,
when you when you do decide where you're going to sign whatever offers are
presented to you, what are you looking for in your next deal in terms
of a promoter. Is it just strictly the money. Is it about the
opportunities and who they have that you can make a match for you against.
What are you what are you thinking about in that sense? Or is it
something else I didn't mention. I think big fights is mainly the thing that
I'm looking for. I want to be in big fights, be could I
want a chance to pose it the work, to show who I am as
a fighter. But honestly, it's hard to even think about that kind of
stuff with what's going on right now, and I'm trying to like stay within
the moment and focus on arm So we could talk about it, but it
ain't here yet. I mean, you know, it'll be better interview me
after the Artam fight, and they're not gonna, you know, strategically tell
you, well, we can do that. We can definitely get together after
this. We can get together after the fight, all right. So I
just want to ask you this then. I mean, you know, I
know you're very confident in beating Artem in the fight on July sixth, uh
And so I know, look, this is an important fight because it's a
title defense, and obviously your perfect record is on the line, and anytime
you go into a match, it's important. But I don't think anybody looking
at this considers that a so called big fight. So I wonder, from
your perspective, what is the big fight? Like I think you tell me
if I'm wrong. A lot of fans would love to see chakhor Stevenson lockhorns
with Tank Davis, see you lockhorns with Lomachenko. Also would be a unification
fight. Obviously, there's a lot of conversations right now that Tank and Lomachenko,
their teams are negotiating with each other for a fight later this year.
Well, what what what is your big fight is? Yes, sir,
he is, to my knowledge, they're making the Tank Davis Limachenko fight.
That's what I've reported about. I take it you think that I see you
laughing about that. What's uh? You tell me what you think about that.
Uh. I mean it's business at the end of the day. So
I understand it and I get it. But my issue is when you know,
guys like Tank go and do interviews and say, oh, I'm on
this side, and I'm basically saying that I'm on a certain side and that's
why the fight with me can't get done right now, or he says things
like that and then doing business with somebody with Top Ring after saying like they
wouldn't do business with Bob Aaron, and Bob Aaron is the guy holding the
fight back. But I mean, clearly they ready to get in business with
let me Chenko. So I think it's just a lot of camp that's been
putting out there. Well, it seems to me that you certainly with your
fight that you have coming up right now, that you would be in if
you win, be in great position to fight the winner of a potential fight
between Tank and Lomachenko. I assume it would interest you know, come on
now for sure, But like I said, we never know until it gets
here. So I'm taking things one step at a time. But I think
that people just contradict themselves a lot when they start talking about at the size
of the streets and street signs and all the these kind of things that prevent
fights from happening. But clearly a lot of people is willing to make bread
and get in business with each other when the time is right. Well,
you're right about that because taking Lomar with different companies, so they are going
to work together if they're able to make the fight. So hopefully that that's
good for everybody in boxing. You know yourself and all the other fighters that
want to fight other top guys from different companies. But first you got to
take on your your challenger and artem Hardtunian Chakur. I wish you the best
luck in the fight, and I'd like to say happy birthday, my friend.
Thank you man again. That battle is coming in Newark, Shakur's hometown
as you covered with him. All right, thoughts, here we head into
Shaquur. Stevenson titled Defense fight Week off of the fourth of July. Midweek
had a weird fourth of July being on Thursday. Anytime it's midweek coming off
a fourth of July. Though maybe I'm working the puns. I'm working the
metaphors. Maybe fireworks from Shakour coming on Saturday. Final thoughts there. On
the interview Dan Well, we did talk about how bad the last tia Fimo
Lopez fight was when he fought in his recent fight against Jamaine Ortiz. If
there was anything worse than that fight, it was the last, unfortunately sucort
fight, when he fought Edwin deel Loos Santos. He went in, there
were some injuries, but it was just one of the most miserable fights he
could ever see. So he's kind of got to make up for that a
little bit. He's I got the distinct impression, and I've always enjoyed talking
to Shakur. I've known him since he was an amateur. I've interviewed him
numerous times, been ringside for many of his fights. I feel like in
going into this fight, he's got even a little bit more of a chip
on his shoulder than usual, partly because of that performance and the grief he
took about it. Even though you know it does take two to tango.
It's not all his fault, but more so because of the fact that his
contract with Toppring is coming up, and you heard him talk about it.
You know, I had in my prepared questions that I wanted to talk to
him about when I did the interview with him. Of course, I was
going to ask him about his impending free agency and all the things that Eddie
Hern had been saying very nicely about his interest in signing him and what a
great fighter he was, and now he wasn't being promoted the right way in
his opinion, which I disagree with, but that's a different story. But
I was surprised when Chakor brought that up, like what thirty seconds into our
interview and he started ragging on top rank and they're not fighting the right way.
So I was a little surprised by that. But you know, look
at the end of the day, it's in his hands. You know,
what kind of offers he's going to get gets up to him to go out
there and perform and remind those who have those checkbooks of what he really can
do and put on a great performance. It's Hardtunian. Now, I'm pretty
sure he's gonna beat Hardtunian. But again, if you're looking for that big
mega contract and those opportunities. You know, it's on you to make us,
the viewer and the promoter who's going to be spending the money, to
give them a real reason to want to roll out the red carpet. Because
the way I look at it, TJ is the following. You know,
there's not that many big promotion companies in boxing. It's a very splintered industry,
but in the days of like there's a whole bunch of promoters that are
that are making their way. It's obviously been much more consolidated in recent years,
partly because of the broadcasting situation. So when you examine what's out there,
there's Top Ranked obviously where he's been with his whole career, who have
a very row best television agreement with ESPN. There is Mattroom Boxing and Golden
Boy. You've got deals with the Zone. You have obviously PBC, who's
struggled little bit lately because of their lack of dates, even though they do
have this agreement with a Prime Video which they're going to start doing non pay
per view fights come August. And then there's the overseas promoters that don't do
fights here in America, like a Frank Warren who's obviously got a huge amount
of talent in this table, but does the most of his events in the
UK and now obviously Saudi Arabia. Question is, so, who's really a
candidate to me? The only real candidates I think that would even be in
the conversation are either to stay with Top Rank and come to a new agreement
even though Top Rank has offered him something and been turned down, or Mattroom
boxing because I don't see PBC going forward and that type of thing, because
they're having enough troubles keeping their own guys going uh, and you're not going
to take on a high ticket item like that without even having like some mega
fight for the guy. Although the Tank Davis fight would be there, that's
obviously the biggest fight they can make, right and so and so you're talking
about Mattroom as the other possibility. You know, he doesn't really Not to
say that Golden Boy couldn't do a good job promoting it, but he doesn't
seem to fit with the profile of the fighters that they have in their stable
other than William Zapeta, who's man just going there. Yeah, williams Zapeta,
I'd love that fight, but I don't know on the realism mean or
how realistic it is. I mean, only because he's gonna be He's you
know, Zepaida is in an interesting situation. We'll talk about him more next
week when he comes back into the rink. But he's that rare fighter.
It's highly I mean, I'd have to go back and look, but it's
can has happened very often at all. He's literally number one in all four
organizations across the bord at one hundred and thirty five. So he's gonna have
his options of where he wants to be the mandatory. But I just don't
I don't think that that him. I don't. I just don't feel like
Golden Boy and Shakur are are the right. It just doesn't doesn't seem.
But maybe maybe he does. What kind of Canelo has been doing as a
blueprint Devin Haynes recently, you just do a one off, do a one
off somewhere and then try to figure it out. Who knows. But the
difference is Canelo is a big star and Haney had big time attractive fights that
they did. And now you see what happened. He was a free agent
and no one bid on his next fight. Uh is more. Wait,
but wait, there's detail that we're leaving out there. He got clocked by
Ryan Garcia in the ring with whatever happened after that, and there's question marks
in this case this guy, there are some question marks, but his trajectory's
going up. I don't know. We'll see and here's the bottom of here.
We go back to how good does he look Saturday night? To help,
I was just yeah, he his next situation is going to be a
lot of It's going to depend on what he shows Saturday against Tartitunian and we'll
see. But I suspect he'll win the fight. And like I said,
I feel like he's got a little bit of a chip on his shoulder because
of all the things we've discussed, and that may motivate him and bring out
the beasts in Shaquar, because trust me, he can be a beast.
He is a phenomenal fighter and a great talent. All right, speaking of
beasts, we've been here for a little while, we've heard from Shakur and
I've got women, all of them, including my sixteen year old twins,
who are ready to go eat dinner soon. At the time that we're taping
the podcast. So let's get to some news, and we've got some more
Mike Tyson nostalgia because it's Mike's birthday on the night that we're doing the podcast
here on Sunday, his fifty eighth birthday. All right, News, First,
you've made reference to Devin Hainey vacating the one hundred and forty pound title
in Albert Poyo being elevated. We talked on the preview podcast going in that
that had happened, and now the latest is it looks like we're gonna have
a purse bid here for his next opponent. Explain what's going on at one
hundred show for the WBC. So we know that there had been a purse
bid for Haney when he was still the WBC champion at one hundred and forty
that the purse bid was ordered between him and Sander Martin, who was the
mandatory challenger. They did not make a deal. Top Rank, which was
the co promoter of Sander Martin, was the only promotion company to bid on
the fight. There was a number that was not particularly big in terms of
what Haney would get, so he was clearly upset about that. And then
partly because of that partly because of the fallout from what happened with the Ryan
Garcia fighting him losing even though he now has no contest blah blah blah.
Anyway, he became champion in recess. He asked for that, and so
by that happening, the WBC then elevated Alberta Pueo from the interim champion to
the full champion. He didn't have to wait long because he only won the
interim belt that was on the undercart of Tank Davis against Frank Martin just a
couple of weeks ago. I don't think he had any expectation that he would
be elevated that quickly. He beat Gary Antoine Russell via split decision, and
now he's suddenly he's now the full champion. But the thing is he now
takes over that Sander Martin mandatory challenge, which is a fight on paper that
I don't think is going to be appealing to a lot of people, frankly,
but they ordered the fight and so that's going to probably be next if
he wants to keep the title. So they gave him a month to negotiate
the deal, and if they are not able to make an agreement, then
the purse, but it will take place July twenty third. I wrote about
the details in my notebook from a couple days on my substack on my Fight
Freaks Night newsletter. The interesting thing about this, and this is within the
rights of the WBC to do this, but it is a little bit unusual.
Is normally, when you have a champion and a challenger, there's a
division of the purse that's going to give the advantage to the champion. Now
it's on a sliding scale. They have every right to change it here and
there, but very, very rarely do you see it be split fifty to
fifty. They're actually giving sanderd Martin a fifty to fifty split on this particular
fight. I'm not entirely sure what the reasons are for that, but it's
a fifty to fifty split, So that makes it a little bit of an
unusual situation. But we'll see that fight happen. I'll tell you one thing,
if they end up making a top rank in PBC, if they're able
to finalize the fight that they've been discussing between Tank Davis and Vasilio Lomachenko,
which by all accounts is moving along very nicely because this would be Pueo against
Martin, which is also a PBC versus top rank, and the timing seems
to be logical. It seems like maybe that's a fight that could potentially wind
up on that undercard when they end up, if they end up making the
match between Tank and Lomachenko. I'm just, you know, spitballing that.
But that's you're making a lot of sense. You're making a lot of sense
if that is well, that's that's the news there that that that Pueo takes
over that mandatory and they have ordered the fight. All right. Speaking of
the WBC, I can I tell you that when I saw this, even
while I'm at the beach vacation, I literally loled. I laughed out loud.
The WBC has given David Benavitez a two week extension to decide if he's
going to remain the interim titleist at light heavyweight or it's super middleweight. Can
I just say to you, at what point does the fighter and his management
get to give the WBC a two week extension on are you going to order
Canelo Alvarez to fight me? Or are you going to strip him of his
title? Because I've been the interim champion since since Abraham Lincoln was the president.
How much longer do I have to wait for you to order him to
fight me. I'm not upset with your logic, but you do not know
the rules. So I'm gonna explain to them a little bit to you when
and again I don't I'm not saying I support these rules. I've had my
conversations with my friends at the WBC a battle. I don't like this rule.
I don't agree with it. I think they need to make it more
clear and make it logical. But that being said, when you be and
I didn't actually know this for a while, and then I actually read that
section of the rules, and it's accurate. When you become a WBC interim
champion, you are not the mandatory. Now in other organizations you are in
the WBC, just because you have the interim title does not make you the
mandatory. They have to confer that position on you. So just his status
as the WBC's interim champion in either way class does not make him mandatory for
a champion. And I'm going to stop. Let me stop about for I
need to finish this. They did make him the mandatory for Canelo. Okay,
they just haven't ordered the fight. There's there's the rubb on that the
i'll use big words. The convoluted stupidity of what you just said is the
problem with rankings in boxing right now. The guy won an interim title fight
and has even since defended it, and to say that he shouldn't be the
guy to fight for the full championship for over a year is just stupidity at
this point defended it multiple times. So no, no, no, to
fight the guy Canello. And the fact that it hasn't been ordered. The
word the word you use, the word that I used before you. Where
is the ordering? You have to fight him or we're going to strip you?
And they won't. I know why they won't do it. I know
why they won't do it. But still this whole thing of you got to
give us, you got to give us an answer. Why don't I have
to give you answered? I actually don't know what David David is going to
do because if he stays as the super middleweight mandatory, it's not like Canelo
is gonna suddenly fight him. And I know he has, you know,
some troubles with the weight He's going to be out of the ring for a
bit anyway, because his hands are all messed up from what happened in the
training camp going into the fight against Bodzick that took place a couple of weeks
ago, and then he exacerbated those injuries in the ring, plus he got
cut. So David is out of the ring probably until the late fall,
I would think. And if he stays in the light heavyweight position with the
interim title, it's not like he's getting an immediate shot for that belt either
because Alexander, I mean, because Arthur better Biev is the champion, but
he is going to be coming back from his injury to take on Dmitri Bibol
in October for the undisputed title, so he's not going to get that fight
either. So he just has to decide where do I feel more comfortable in
terms of my conditioning and my weight and my training. What kinds of fights
are available to me if I stay at supermittlewight if it's not Canelo, And
what kind of fights can I have at light heavyweight if it's not going to
be next against the winner of the undisputed fight. So you know, he
has a good team behind him, Ampson Lucawitz, who's this promoter as a
very smart boxing person. Obviously, he works closely with the folks at PBC
and TGB promotions, so they know their shit too. Don't have to figure
it out, all right. Don't hold your breath on anything coming his way
though, for right now. No matter what he decides, however, he's
one of the he's one of the intriguing fighters that's out there right now,
whether it's at one sixty eight or one seventy five. And we'll see what
happens with David Benavitez, all right. Before we are gone, we've talked
a ton about Mike Tyson when we left on the preview pod, we did
nostalgia on his one round destruction of Michael Spinks. Also that not only that
anniversary from this past weekend, but the anniversary of Byte night in the rematch
with Evander Holyfield, and Mike now has turned fifty eight years old, which
we knew it was looming that, you know, in advance of fighting Jake
Paul, he was going to turn fifty eight years old. So happy birthday
to Iron Mike here at this stage and what else, what else in the
nostalgia here about Mike Tyson, because we covered a bunch obviously back on Friday.
Well, it wasn't so much about one particular fight. It's just the
fact that here you have one of the if not the most iconic fighter in
the history of the sport other than Muhammad Ali turns another chapter, turns another
age. And the fact that we could even sit here at age fifty eight
saying well, by the way he scheduled for an official boxing match, you
know, in November, still mind boggling to me. It may be an
official fight, but obviously to me, his career ended back in two thousand
and five after he thought Kevin McBride. But the fact that all this is
the thing that is amazing about. First of all, I think he's the
first to tell you the fact that he's still alive at fifty eight is like
a miracle, Like I don't think he ever thought that with all the terrible
things that he's gone through in his life, and all the issues he's had
and going to prison, and just the upbringing he had and just the crazy
lifestyle that he lived, the drugs, the whole thing. Well, part
of what you mean, and this gets lost on the newer generation is that
he grew up in a very rough, poor area of New York and he
was basically rescued because of his boxing ability by Custom Motto and Custom Otto's people
to train him as an amateur fighter and give him a way out of that
rough life or he probably would have been in prison or dead. And he's
admitted that and talked about that. Look, the prophecy, Yeah, the
prophecy from Custom Otto was that Mike Tyson, this is after he started working
with him, that he would become the youngest heavyweight champion of all time.
And Cuss had passed away at that point, but he fulfilled the prophecy of
the old man and he knocked out Trevor Burbick and when he was twenty years
old when he became the heavyweight champion of the world. I mean, it's
still one of the more impressive feats in the history of boxing. You look
at statistics and milestones and important accomplishments. The thing that still amazes me is
like you and I were kids. You know. I was like in high
school at that time, and I was more in tune with Tyson than the
average boxing fan because back in those days. I was not the die hard
boxing fan that I became, But because I grew up in that upstate New
York Albany, Schenectady, Troy, Glenn's Falls area, not that far,
like you know, less than like an hour drive maybe from Catskill. He
was a local celebrity. He was in the local newspapers, he was on
the local TV news programs. They covered his boxing matches that took place in
all the New York ins connected in New York, in Glens Falls, New
York, in Troy, places like that. So he was well known to
our community. And then when he burst on the scene and he started fighting
on ESPN and then those early fights, and he had then went to HBO
and had some you know, pre title fights. He was already made.
They let me tell you a little nostalgia here from TJ. Reeves in the
youth. So while you were in tune with Tyson at that time period when
you're talking about nineteen eighty five primarily and a little bit into nineteen eighty six,
you and I are contemporaries. Were the same age. I'm in high
school in Tampa, Florida, where I live. We actually physically moved to
a new area of Tampa. And this is how crazy it can get kids,
because there was no internet different times where we moved, it was not
wired for cable yet, Dan Rayphiel, so we went, oh my cave
or something. We went. We went to an area of Tampa where it
was not yet wired and ready to go for cable. I understand that.
But the area where we had been had it. The area where we moved
did not have it yet. So when Tyson was fighting several times on ESPN
in the early part of him destroying everybody in late nineteen eighty five early nineteen
eighty six, young tj ain't seeing that because we don't have ESPN and there
is no internet. This is in a day when you didn't see it that
night you missed it where you missed the highlights of it on ESPN after the
fact. It was not until he began to fight and we eventually got cable
later eighty six. But when he fought those fights on ABC's wide Willdess Sports
Quick Tillis was one of them. And who was the other one, Jesse
Marguson, No, the big one, the one, Yeah, those are
two for sure, but the one that's the memorable one is the one where
he blew out Marvius Fraser. He destroyed all three of them. When we
started seeing we started seeing those fights on over the air ABC now called called
by Jim Lampley pre HBO. That's correct, the Marvius Fraser destruction and quick
Till Listen and maybe even Ferguson. We finally were introduced to who this was.
I remember reading in Sports Illustrated about him because they had they had him
on the cover like Kid Dynamite or whatever, with all the knockouts before he
became the champ. Would you be surprised? I told you? Would you
be surprised if I told you TJ. Reeves that In my extensive boxing collection,
I have that Kid Dynamite issue of Sports Illustrating. That doesn't surprise me
at all. I expect that of you. But what I'm saying is once
he got introduced, not just to me, but to millions of fight fans
because boxing was so much more mainstream by it being on Saturday, ABC's wide
wall to Sports free to see network TV, the legend grew at that time.
Just being nostalgic here on top of your nostalgia on how the ledging grew
into what we eventually saw, which is him winning these title fights that were
all on HBO or closed circuit or pay per view later on. The thing
that still amazes me, though, is that twenty years post his boxing career,
that he's still in many ways within the sports world and ubiquitous figure because
of the Jake Paul thing, and you know, the Roy Jones exhibition that
did you a million, like, well over a million paper views, maybe
close to two million pay per view bys. Granted there was extenuating the circumstances
given and we're all trapped at home during the throes of the pandemic, but
even still, he's so he's gone through so many like layers of his career
because for a long time he was the feared, baddest man on the planet.
Then he was a reviled figure because he was in jail for a rate.
He was then you know, discarded and hated by everybody when he bit
holy Field's ear, that he he could come back from those two things,
specifically to be a love beloved figure because he's in the you know, he's
in the Hangover movie. He gets the tattoo, you know, the chip
still got it after the pick, right, hand. I mean, he
and listen and the tragedy that he's encountered also in his life because of the
things he's been through, the death of one of his daughters at a very
young age a few years ago. Was extremely, extremely sad that he's still
standing and still ticking and still doing his thing. You know, it's pretty
remarkable. And I mean, I know he's done bad things, but I
will say this, I mean, I get it, I know it.
I don't excuse it. And not that say Mike and I are like best
buddies, but I've known Mike for twenty something years, not that we're close,
but we you know what deceived me. It's it's a beautiful thing.
We hug it out, it's it's it's a pleasant you know. I've told
the story of the first interview we had with him, which was a fucking
train wreck, But my interactions with him post that in two thousand, right
and two thousand, I guess it was, Yeah, have all been outstanding.
So I'm glad that he's due a point in his life as he turns
fifty eight years old today as we record this, that at least on the
outside, he's in a good place. He's you know, he doesn't have
the hundreds of millions of dollars he should have had from his boxing career.
We don't have to litigate all the issues he had with Don King, who
you know, he accused of taking money that was not rightfully his. Obviously,
you know, they've had their litigations, they've settled all that. He's
been in bankruptcy, he's been married, in divorce multiple times, as I
said, death of a child, all kinds of issues, prison, jail
for the road rage incident, a drug problem, and he's come out the
other end, and you know what, he's a stronger person because of it.
And now he seems like he's living his best life. He's making money,
he's having fun, he's you know, he's eating his edibles. He's
gonna fight Jake Paul. I mean, it's just the arc of his career
is just so remarkable. We got to know him as like a We started
to know him as about a nineteen year old, and now as a fifty
eight year old. Some you know what all these years later we did still
in our life is amazing to me. We did the whole what if thing?
You did some what if this happened. What if that happened? And
one of the things I brought up right away when we did that on one
of these pods many months ago, was what if don King did not drive
the wedge in between what was left of Cus Domatto's lineage cust To Motto had
died, Jim Jacobs had died, and if Kevin Rooney had still been the
trainer, and if if, if, if, if he had still stayed
on track and stayed focused, the Buster Douglas thing never happens. I firmly
believe it was. It was just February of nineteen ninety. Yeah, honestly,
I think if he had stayed with those folks, if if, for
example, Jimmy hadn't passed, or he had stayed with with uh Rooney and
not with King, whatever, maybe they would have kept the train on the
track a little bit longer. But it was inevitable that it was going to
go off the track at some point, So I don't maybe, I mean,
maybe maybe somebody was going to beat him, and maybe it was going
to go off the track, but certainly not as downward as spiral as what
happened within about a year where he was beaten by a fighter that had a
great night but had no business beating him, and uh, and then the
rest leads to prison in his mid twenties. After that, the fleet during
that lead to I could have foreseen that Mike Tyson defended the title another eight
or ten times, possibly in the early in the early nineteen nineties. None
of that ever happened. Buster Douglas beading him and he went to prison.
I just wonder is it possible. Is it possible today for there to be
another boxer as famous as him? Because as famous as Manny Pacyao became,
or Floyd Mayweather became, Oscar de la Hoya, Cayson Fury's fame is a
pittance compared to Mike Tyson. The only thing that he's got compared to Mike
is the fact that he's named after Mike. So I'm just making the point
that I don't I think he's the last one to achieve that level of justice
because all but like he can go anywhere in the world, that's right,
and they know who you were. And it's like Ali, you could have
plopped anywhere anywhere in the planet and he would have been recognized absolutely, But
today you can PLoP Mike Tyson anywhere. I don't care if it's Africa,
Asia, Europe, the United States. I need street corner. People are
going to recognize Mike Tyson. And the reason and the reason because we keep
emphasizing this that he became so well known is boxing was in the past ten
so much more mainstream. The heavyweight title was such a big deal worldwide,
and he was destroying everybody leading to it, destroying them It was laughable,
destroying them in a round or two in a lot of cases. And these
biggest fights, especially the Sphinx fight, when everybody thought that was going to
be such a big test. After he had wiped out an age Larry Holmes
and had wiped out two or three others in titled defenses, and then he
destroys Sphinx in around You're looking at this going this guy's invincible, and worldwide
they do know who he is. But the end result is nothing ever lasts
forever. That run didn't last forever, but Mike has lasted to age fifty
eight, which is what your point is. The bottom mine is thety birthday
to Iron Mike. Yeah, if you spent if he's fifty years old today,
he spent literally about forty years in the public Spoway, Yes, and
he's still in it and he's fighting coming up. It's crazy happy Brandon,
Mike and uh and one more little footnote here. Really I believe it was
his last amateur fight. We got the Olympic boxing that we always know about.
In the Olympic boxing, it's controversially is it going to be in the
Olympics, Not in the Olympics anymore, et cetera. Mike lost to Henry
Tillman in the Olympic Boxing trials, and Tilman went on to the LA Summer
Games in nineteen eighty four and won the gold medal. How much different or
what more would we have known if Mike Tyson the amateur ends up in the
LA Summer Olympics and wins a gold medal. Who knows if he would have
won the gold medal? I don't know. But that's how about when Tyson
fought Henry Tillman in the pros and destroyed him. He got his hands on
Tilman in nineteen ninety after the bug Buster Douglas loss, and again it was
quicker than the Burger King drive through. It was over card. That was
the card that he fought in the main event on where George Foreman fought in
the co feature, and Bob aarm and Don King co promoted that because George
was with Bob, and they did this big show at Caesar's Palace, a
double header on HBO where George fought Addison Rodriguez, and there was a lot
of conversation that that was the prelude to what I think would have been easily
the biggest fight in heavyweight history in terms of the money, at least at
that time, was George Foreman against Mike Tyson. I would have been big
even if it wasn't for a world title, and for a variety of reasons,
it never happened. But that night when they fought on the same card,
it was Tyson exacting the amateur avenge against Henry Tillman, who we absolutely
destroyed it in the pros. Are you gonna tell me now that you have
a program or a poster from Henry Tillman beating Mike in the Amateurs? I
wish I did. I do. I do have the program of the poster
from that doubleheader with Foreman absolutely about that. I count on you for that.
In the Rayfield collection, I don't even know. I've never seen.
I'm sure there's a I'm sure there's something to the to the trials, but
it wouldn't necessarily mention Tillman or or Tyson on the cover in the there is
there is video out there. I want to say, ABC showed it,
even in clip form, not the whole fight of Henry Tillman beating Mike Tyson
in the Olympic Trials, and then ABC televised the Summer Olympics a couple months
later. That think as much as much boxing is as ABC did in their
day, especially with wide world of sports, one thing that people sometimes forget
is for all the big professional fights that they put on ABC, they also
very very regularly covered amateur boxing. That's right, all the all the trials,
and and not only the trials, but but things that were, you
know, national Golden Gloves, National Golden Gloves. They would also cover just
like a random due meet, the United States versus Cuba, or the United
States versus Poland or whatever it was. And and that was the way that
a lot of those amateur fighters got It's kind of like if you're watching,
you know, back before it was one and done. In college basketball,
when players would stay in in the big schools and play for three or four
years. Those players when it came time for the NBA draft were household names.
You know, sit there and you you know, watch where Shaquille O'Neal
going. He had been playing college ball for a few years. He was
known. Or you know, Christian Latoner, everybody knew a lot was people
would watch that. Now it's not the same, but amateur boxing that was
sort of the same thing. Those guys became big names. That's how Ray
Leonard and all those great fighters on the seventy six Olympic team became known at
the time. Same thing with the eighty four Olympians, Whittaker and Evander Holyfield,
and they were all known because they had been seen on the weekend shows
for years. Tyson didn't get to that level because he didn't fight in the
Olympics. But uh, you know, we digress. But that's the point
though Tyson got that early TV exposure, combined with the massive knockouts, became
a fucking legend. And uh, we're still talking about him forty years later.
Interims Hay Birthday, iron mind and with that, it's been a busy
recap pod. I am getting the stink guy right now about going and grabbing
some dinner with the twins. So thank you for finding us here on the
pod. We're ready for fourth of July week, Shakur Stevenson Title Fight week.
Hopefully you enjoyed hearing Shakur. Make sure you're follow subscribing on this podcast
feed, follow and subscribe to the email newsletter and the Dan Rayfield substack as
well. With that, my friend, we come off the weekend. We're
ready to have a good week, a holiday week. The independence of the
United States of America coming up this week. Have a good week, Dan,
anything else will be good. I think we're good. I hope you
enjoy the rest of your Foco Beach excribe agains, and yes, we're having
fun over here. We'll be back in due time with a preview pot off
the fourth of July holiday. Thank you, Dan Rayphaield, have a good
week you too, sir. There we go fight for e ch Night substack.
Make sure you're following subscribing. I'm merely TJ Reach. Thank you for
being with us.