So by the way, we'll do the Garcia fert That's what I wrote today.
Yes, yes, that's personal countdown is on to fight time. Let's
do it here. We give fight No. He is your host, DJ
leaves Well. We get ready for an intriguing rematch between the former undisputed junior
Wiltawake champ fighting a fighter that many believe may have beaten him the first time
around. Josh Taylor Jack catterall ready to fight in the Matchroom Slash Top Rank
main event that is coming from Leeds, England on Saturday. We're ready to
preview that intriguing super middleweight. Christian Mobilia is back. We're gonna preview his
fight news, nostalgia and more. It is the Big Fight Weekend preview.
I am the somewhat competent host, TJ Reeves. He's our insider. All
more inside scoop coming from Dan Rayphield. Fight Freaks United is his substack as
well as his newsletter and we love him on Big Fight Weekend dot Com.
Again, make sure you're following subscribing to this podcasts feed. As we wrap
up another successful month here coming a few days through the Memorial Day holiday weekend,
etc. We love having you with us. Make sure you find us
previewing and recapping on this feed. Follow, Subscribe, Apple, Spreaker,
Spotify, et cetera. Dan, good to be with you, by the
way, bunch of engagement and audience. Off the Tyson Fury Alexander Usik fight,
as we figured, we've kind of moved off that we're headed for this
five versus five card which is next weekend right back in Saudi Arabia. But
it's an intriguing action this weekend. But first, I know we want to
begin with something you broke earlier on Thursday. Not surprising but now official about
Ryan Garcia and the B samples of his drug testing from his fight with Devin
Haney in April have come back. Give us the update, my friend.
Go ahead. Yeah, like you said, TJ, not surprising. As
I've stated prior when we've discussed this. I've stated before when I have discussed
other positive drug tests. The athlete, at their expense, requests the B
sample to be tested. It is a virtual certainty that it's going to come
back the same as the A sample. The reason they have the B sample
is because there are times when it you know, very very rare, but
just in case you need to have that extra sample there to test, and
just so people are clear at once again, because I find the ignorance on
social media to be mind boggling. It's not a separate sample. What it
is is when they pe and the cup, they take half and stick it
in one vial that gets tested immediately, and they stick the other half and
it gets frozen or stored properly, and if something comes up with the first
one, they've got the second one to fall back on, which was taken
at the exact same time. So in the case of Ryan Garcia, he
gave a sample on April nineteenth, and then he gave another sample after the
fight. And so those two samples, the final pre fight and the post
fight both tested positive for the band substance ostring, which is not permitted to
be in your system and is a adverse finding. And so he requested the
b samples to be tested. They were opened on Wednesday. I was a
little surprised they got the result back in about twenty four hours because the combination
of other people ahead of them, in line the fact that it's the weekend
coming up, that Memorial Day was on this week with next week Monday that
there was was explained to me by Thenny involved that there was a good likelihood
that we wouldn't have seen the results until the early part of next week.
But they got him back and again, like you said, no shock.
It would have been a bigger story, a much bigger story, a much
bigger shock had something come back in the B samples and that they were negative
for the Austrians. So it's just another brick in the wall in terms of
his overall case. So okay, okay, pig Floyd. I like that
slide slide that in there from the from the late seventies. What's interesting with
what you brought up? And I know a lot about this and you obviously
do as well, and you've been done doing a tremendous job reporting on this.
But where the B sample stuff began was probably twenty years ago or more,
when these massive organizationations would do these tests and then people would claim,
you screwed up my test, you did something wrong. So now as like
a backup, a fail safe, they began to split off the sample to
say, in the event that you're going to argue we screwed something up with
your test, we still have these other samples another another sample that we can
also test and prove yes, you did or know you didn't have something in
your system. And that's the process that has now undergone in New York,
and it's an insurance policy for both sides. Basically, it's allows the commission
or the regulating people to have a separate example if there is a problem with
the first one, and it gives the athlete the example also of a second
thing to be tested in case that they really truly believe that there's a problem
with the first one. So again not surprising. Now the question I've gotten
is what's next. Well, I'm gonna tell you what's next. Hey,
what's next? Go ahead? The New York Commission is aware of the results
from both the A sample and the B sample because when the results are when
the lab report comes out. Now I have a people who are like,
well, why does Raykel have it? Because I know a lot of people,
and I do a good job, and I've been doing this for a
long freaking time. I have the documents that are the lab reports that state
specifically be sample positive adverse finding for ostering to both them. And just to
backtrack for a quick second, the reason why they were able to turn this
around in twenty four hours compared to the while that it took for the first
tests. Was because when they're doing the first test, they're not just testing
for austering. They're literally testing for like over one hundred banned substances that are
on the water list. So it takes time to do this science to analyze
it for every single substance on that list. In the case of the b
sample, they're not concerned with other banned substance. They are literally only testing
for austering, So for that right, Yeah, So it's much much quicker
to get the result back. So the Commission will in the next few weeks
they will schedule a hearing. Ryan Garcia will be required to attend the hearing
with his team. They'll be given the opportunity to make their position, their
case, their excuse, however you want to describe it. And in the
end, under the notion of strict liability, the Commission's not going to care
about why it's in a system, and they're going to care only that it
is in a system. Now, if he offers up some sort of significant
mitigating factor that shows a reason that could help him potentially when it comes time
to get the punishment. But it's almost a certainty then unless they do have
some kind of crazy or very very impressive proof of what happened, he's going
to be suspended. It's only a matter of how long is he going to
suspend it again. It could be six months, it could be a year.
It potentially could be a licensed red vacation. I don't know if I
see that taking place. And at that point they also will go through the
process to determine whether they're going to make the result of this fight a no
contest that's usual, or if they're going to make it into a disqualification loss,
which is what the Devin Hainey camp has been pressing for in terms of
the letter that they sent not that long ago to the commission. Do you
believe as we sit here subject to change. I mean, it's a holiday
weekend, who knows, June whenever they have this, even if it's July,
do you believe that the Haines want to be present and want to be
heard as it stands right now, on overturn this to a DQ which is
not that common. You've you've relayed, it has happened before. But from
what you understand right now? Do you believe they want to be heard on
that point? DQ? I think that the letter is their position. This
is not going to be hearing for Devin Haney. This is a hearing for
Ryan Garcia. So I mean not to say that they're not entitled to attend,
because these things are public, I believe. But if there would be
no call for anybody on the team Hainy to attend right because they're not going
to be given the opportunity to speak, I don't believe it this type of
hearing. But wouldn't common sense, wouldn't it be if they have someone representing
them, wouldn't that be the time if you were wanting, while this hearing
is going on, the outcome to be reversed to a dequalification, that would
be the time to raise it, just in general terms, No, it
would be the time to bring it up. You would think the Commission is
in receipt of a very detailed nine page letter from the lawyer representing Devin Haney
explaining their position on why they believe that the result of this fight should be
changed not to a no contest, but to a disqualification loss, and that
should serve its purpose. They don't need to make a further argument. That's
like the exhibit that they've submitted. Now, they make some valid points in
there, and I'd like to hear what Ryan Garcia has to say. I'm
not one to rush to the judgment, but the perspective of the Hani camp
is that the reason they claim it should be made a disqualification is because it
rises above the level of just your run of the mill feil drug test.
They cite two foul drug tests now that they can cite A and B both
positive. So in Assen four samples have been tested. All four are positive
for Austrian. So that's the first thing. The second thing is although they
agreed to a financial arrangement to go forward with the fight when he was overweight,
they took issue with his public comments that he missed a weight on purpose,
which would be a violation of the commission. And then another aspect that
they take seriously is the fact that on the The Zone documentary it is seen
that Ryan Garcia is using an IV bag for rehydration apparently, which is illegal.
And the reason that is illegal is because you put the fluids in your
system, it dilutes your year and so when you provide the sample, whatever
levels of a banned substance would perhaps be lower than any threshold or any issue
in terms of being a fail test. So the combination of fail tests,
overweight on purpose, and oh, by the way, another violation of using
an illegal IV bag. They claim that is that rises to a level above
your run of the mill drug test, and so therefore they should make it
more punishable, which will be a DQ loss rather than there's just a no
contest. So that's their perspective. I don't have a law degree, and
I do watch a lot of Judge Judy. Okay, maybe not a lot,
but that's a pretty compelling case right there. For those factors, stay
tuned on what they rule, and then we'll see. And I rely on
you to give us the very latest reporting on when that hearing is going to
be et cetera, et cetera. Most people stopped telling me that I'm lying
about this. I've got the documents, daddy, Why why are you paying
that much attention to them? As you just say it. Any find the
documents and you report the truth. That's all you've been doing. So true.
I mean, if it's like Lieutenant Colonel Nathan Jessup on the on the
stand and a few good men. You can't handle the truth, that's your
problem. This is the truth, all right. I'm done with the nineties
movies references at the moment. Shall we move on? Is Matt Trooms Saturday
Afternoon US Saturday Night Primetime main event is Josh Taylor Jack Catterall Part two from
Leeds, England. When last they fought two years ago, it was for
the undisputed one hundred and forty pound title that Taylor had won. I believe
I remember writing the recap about this because it was right before the time you
and I hooked up on the on the Big Fight Weekend website. In the
podcast, I believe Catterall deserved the decision. It was a very close fight.
I will say this. I owned staying in the UK. They are
very interested in this. These are names, They're interested in these names.
I'm not as big on this. This is kind of past the shelf life
of when I wanted to see a rematch, particularly when Taylor has lost to
Taya Femo Lopez in the meantime and there aren't belts on the line. I
get it. This is what we do. We preview the most important fight.
But I'm kind of on this because I believe we can't change it.
I believe it should have happened long ago. So go ahead and let's get
into it. I mean, we disagree on a lot of things and we
do this show together, but I agree with you about that. I mean,
I thought I was getting swatted for saying that with you. This is
the biggest fight this week. Okay, good, I like this going well.
It is the biggest fight this week, but this is not exactly the
biggest week. So look, you know, you can't deny that the fans,
certainly over there in the UK, want to see the fight. And
that's great because anytime you have a popular event that boxing fans want to turn
out for in terms of buying tickets that supposedly sold out, that you know
it's gonna to be widely viewed in the UK. Here in the United States
it's on ESPN Plus and the rest of the world that's on his own,
so lots of people are going to get a chance to see the fight.
There's a clear rivalry. The fact that there's no belts at State. That
doesn't really bother me because it's more of a grudge match than anything else.
It's and then the fact of the matter is the winner of the fight is
going to be positioned to fight for another title anyway, just based on the
victory, whether it's an official eliminator not which this isn't, or for any
kind of world title. But like you said, I mean, the first
fight I didn't really think was a very good fight. I kind of thought
it sucked. To be honest with you, I was not impressed with the
first fight. I was in the vast, vast minority that thought the tailor
eked it out. But again, I you know, respect the people that
thought that it was a Caterall victory, and that's fine. It was a
split decision officially, and so there's a reason for the rematch. But it
just shows you after fighting for the undisputed title, Caterall came into that fight
as the mandatory challenger that was up next after Taylor had unified against Jose Ramirez,
and now here we are, you know what, two years later,
in a couple of months, and now it's not for any of the belts.
That just shows you how things change in boxing. Now they both have
had long act inactivity spells. I mean, if you take a look at
Josh Taylor's record. Here's a guy that fought after two fights in two thousand
and nineteen, had one fight in twenty twenty. Now, granted that was
pandemic related, but it only went one round. He then didn't fight again
for until the fight in twenty twenty one, which is when he defeated Jose
Ramirez for the undisputed title when they unified all their belts. Then he fought
the Caterall fight in twenty twenty two, which is the controversial decision. He's
only had one fight since then. That was the only fight of twenty twenty
three, which was obviously a very poor performance in losing the one remaining world
title belt that he had and the lineal title to Taya Fimo Lopez. So
you know, he's only had four fights since twenty twenty you know, one
of them being the contract do you recall and keep me in the lane.
Here, they were trying to make this fight like late twenty two. Oh
yeah, early twenty three. One of them had COVID positive test that stopped
it, I believe. Then there was an ankle injury on another engine and
they are foot injury, and then the WBO, I believe is the one
that stepped in and said you got to you gotta fight Taya Femo Lopez.
Well, what happened was and it's a more lucrative fight for Taylor to go
fight that fight. So the fighter gotten postponed a number of times, like
you said, and then at some point when when Taylor had the foot injury,
they basically at the WBO were like, look, enough is enough,
the mandatory is doing. They ordered the Ta Femo fight. So that's what
happened. So when that occurred, and he went and fought the Taya Femo
fight, which was last June, and so he's coming off still even since
that loss, it's an eleven month layoff. Now you take a look at
Caterall. Once that fight was postponed because of the foot injury, Caterall switched
promoters again. Remember he had only ended up with boxer and then because of
the whole British broadcast situation. It's kind of a very you know, we
don't got to get down in the weeds on that. But the bottom line
is after after the fight with Taylor in twenty twenty two, he signed with
mattrom He came back off like a fourteen to fifteen month layoff. He ended
up winning two fights in a row in twenty twenty three, in May fight
against Darrek Foley, which was just a very, you know, uninspiring,
forgettable ten round decision win against just a regular kind of opponent. He didn't
look particularly that good, although he clearly won. And then in October of
twenty twenty three, they put him in with the corpse of Jorge Lenaris,
a one top notch fighter who he retired in a decision that actually Lenaris was
a little bit more competitive than I thought. It was like an eight to
four kind of fight. You know, Caterall still was the winner. But
the reality is they come into this matchup for this huge grudge match where Taylor's
coming off a loss and a long layoff of almost a year, and Caterrell
is coming off of a not a long layoff, but a fight against a
corpse that he looked pretty bad in even though he got the win. And
it's like neither guy is on any kind of role. There's only not a
lot momentum for me. Either got. But when you got this kind of
beef, this kind of grudge match, these kind of terrible things, and
they've been salty, and I think sometimes and you've done this, and I've
I've watched and done this some, but you've done it much more. Some
of it's contrived. I get the sense that a lot of this is contrived.
I think Caterrol is genuinely ticked that he's had to wait this long because
a couple of the problems were with Taylor, and then he fought somebody else
and lost, and it took some of the luster and some of the dollars
maybe off this fight. That's my perception. But they're definitely salty at each
other building up to this fight, so howday night, Okay, don't think
it's taking the dollars off. They're still getting highly, highly compensated. But
the thing is that if I'm caterall I'm pissed off about is number one.
I had to slog through those two shit fights to get the rematch finally,
and now I finally got the rematch, and I don't get a chance to
fight for the title right because he lost the title. So even if he
was fighting for no belts but he had never lost in the ring, he's
still at least to be able to say I'm the lineal champion, but he
lost to Lopez, so you know, we'll see once again. I'm I'm
thinking of the first fight, which I thought was that, you know,
if there hadn't been the they just given you know, the Caterall the decision,
he would have been the champion. Fine, but who knows that there
would have been a rematch. It was a mandatory fight, so there was
no automatic like rematch clause, and you know, I thought you got he
was fighting him in Glasgow, where Taylor is from, and it was dramatic
because he knocked him down during the fight to Catterall, he scored a knockgown
and then there were points being taken away from each fighter, which was bizarre.
So there was a lot of intrigue to that. But the action couple
of years ago. It's a couple of years ago, so we'll see if
if we get good action on Saturday night, we'll find out. But the
action of the first fight was pedestrian. Like here's the point, though,
TJ. This is the thing. The only reason this rematch is happening is
because of the controversy of the decision. This is not happening because there was
a great fight, like when you talk about the possibility of us seeing a
rematch between Alexander usse Entyson Feary, Yes, they've got a rematch obviously in
their contract, but without that, people would still want to see it because
it was such an enthralling, exciting back and forth ebb and flow, you
know, terrific fight. That's not why we're seeing the rematch between Josh Taylor
and Caterall. It was a very pedestrian first fight with a bad decision in
the opinion of most people, and therefore we're finally seeing And because it's bubbled
up for so long, as you mentioned, they've been very salty, a
lot of bad words with each other, and so you know what, at
the end of the day, they're going to take care of it in the
ring. I hope it's a good fight. I hope they do what they
say they're going to do and come at each other and make it a battle
instead of, you know, a pretty poor fight like the first one.
And the winner of the fight is going to position themselves for bigger things.
Obviously, the loser of the fight's going to have to do some soul searching
and figure out what they want to do. I do suspect that if Taylor
is the winner, I can't speak for Catall, but I'm very certain that
if Josh is the winner, he's going to probably go up to welterweight,
where he's wanted to go even before this fight, but the rematch was such
a big deal that he decided to stick around in one forty for one more
fight at least and go on from there. And so, you know,
it tells you how big of a deal it is if Mattroom Boxing and Top
Rank we're able to get together and make this fight. It shows you how
they've split up the broadcast rights and worked on that, that it's a big
deal, and so there's money there, there's fan interest, and hopefully we
get a good fight. I'll be watching it Saturday afternoon right again ESPN Plus
in the United States, dizone in the UK for this matchup Saturday afternoon US
time, and again will handicap at first mentioned on the bet Us Boxing Show
one Eastern Time Friday. Also Patty Donovan, unbeaten Irish welterweight fighting Lewis Ritson
in the co feature, Will handicap that fight as well. Donovan thirteen and
oh you know rising prospect contend that's a nice map, that's a nice matchup
for the start, so will handicap will handicap that is well on the Friday
show a couple of those. So that is Saturday afternoon US time, so
Saturday night in Canada. Christian Mobili is an intriguing fighter at super middleweight on
The Rise ten Round About with Mark Heffron. Let's preview that a little bit
here is part of the preview podcast, and what are we looking forward to
with Mobilly? A guy that you and I and many others are intrigued by
right now at one sixty eight. I mean, Christian Mbilly is one of
the most fun fighters to watch in boxing right now. He's a fun fighter
to watch. He comes forward, he's exciting, he throws big punches.
He's in great shape. He's got a very high level engine. As they
say, he can go and go and go. He just never stops throwing
punches. He is twenty six and oh he has twenty two knockouts and he's
one of the better super middleweight contenders out there. He's not a guy that
a lot of people mentioned about fighting. He doesn't have the name value,
let's say, of a Benavides or even David Morrell or you know, like
Honi Mungia, you know, the kind of guy that that Canelo is going
to look to necessarily. But he is able in my opinion. You know,
he's on that level of being able to contend with anybody. That's why
they call him the contender. He was an Olympian for France, although he
fights now out of mostly out of the Mantra area in Canada, and so
you know, he's staying busy. He just recently signed a co promotion,
so he's been promoted by I the Tiger for quite a while, but now
he's got top ranked as his co promoter and they've been showing his fights anyway
as part of their ESPN Plus deal. So this is not a fighter that
has not been seen if you pay attention to the cards that they run on
ESPN Plus from Canada. So he's going in with Mark Cavron. It's you
know, it's it's not a big fight. Hef Ron has got some losses.
He's not considered to be a very strong opponent from the standpoint where you
think that Mobility is going to lose. But the idea is to see how
Christian mobility gets it done if he gets it done. And what it adds
to the intrigue of this is that, you know, although I'm always excited
when Micbilly fights because he, like I said, he's super exciting to watch,
they already have a deal done where if he wins this fight and he
comes out without any particular injuries or problems, that he's going to take what
would be considered the biggest step up of his career on August seventeenth, back
in Canada, also on ESPN Plus, he will throw down with the contender,
Sergey devron Cheko, who we know from a series of outstanding he you
know, came up on the short end of the twenty twenty three Fight of
the Year as voted on by the Boxing Writers Associated of America and that incredible
battle with Heimi Mongia that was decided on a knockdown in the last round of
the fight. And so Devin Chenko is, you know, he's probably the
best five lost fighter in the world right now, I would guess something like
that or a guy that doesn't guys that don't have titles, very competitive middleweight
title challenges with Triple G Right and Ranny Jacobs. So he fought all name.
That's what's looming. And by the way, one more thing about mobility.
In addition to the talent and the skill, let's hear it for activity
like you and I like to talk about. I'm looking right at this.
He fought in December of twenty twenty two and won by decision. He fought
again in March of twenty three and one by decision. He fought again against
American demand Nicholson in September of last year, knocked him out, and fought
in January of this year in Quebec City with Rohan Murdoch. We talked about
that fight. He scored a knockout there, Raphael. That's one, two,
three four. This is his fifth fight in basically a year and a
half. Let's hear it from ability and activity. We like that. And
by the way, as it relates to different chemer, you said two time
world title challenger, he actually fought three times. Look, I was there
at the Madison Square Garden. I thought he defeated Triple G that night.
A lot of us at ringside thought he defeated Triple G. That was a
tremendous battle. You know, he did not get to win. He lost
to Daniel Jacobs a couple of fights before that. It was very close in
that fight. That was actually that was the last ever HBO fight that I
attended. He got knocked down by Jacobs in the first run of that fight,
but he came back strong and you know, it was a close fight.
He ended up losing by split decision. The triple G fight, like
I said, was super close on the cards. I thought he won,
lots of us thought he one. And then he followed up the Triple G
loss in his next fight. This is in twenty twenty, and he lost
a more one sided decision to Jamal Charlotte when Jamal was still active in doing
his thing. And he's had some you know, he lost to a Majar
again, another close call to Carlos the Damas, who's now the WBC's midleweight
champion. This was a non title fight, so he's had some tough luck.
He lost among the in a great fight that that was super close.
Also again, like I said, decided only by a knockdown on a body
plush roast just stopping Mongia had him hurt bad earlier in that fight. Right,
Yeah, he's coming off to win over the journeyman Vaughan Alexander. But
you want to talk about strength of schedule and competing in those fights. He's
the kind of guy devron Schenko that you know, if he gets this Mobility
fight, he will go in where there will be a lot of people that
think he's gonna give him ability a very tough fight. It's certainly going to
be a step up for him. But first, like you said, Mobility's
got to take care of the business on Saturday against Mark Efron, the British
fighter who's got you know, like I said, he's got three losses.
But like anytime you see Christian Mabilly in the ring, you know, it's
a cool thing. It's exciting to watch. I mean, so I'm looking
forward to that. You know, hopefully we get some good action. Hopefully
we do. And you got heavyweights Macmudov and rov Khanan, the big guys
are on the co feature fight here. Just give me something real quick about
that as well. On this ESPN Plus, I had the Tiger Cards started
nine in Canada, so that's that's the cod feature. So Macmandou was a
guy with a lot of hype and a lot of people that thought he could
do something. He was a big puncher, a big strong guy, a
Russian fighter, but had been living and still lives in Montreal. And then
he took his first loss. This is on the day of reckoning card back
in December. He lost but to your boy A. G. Cabell,
who scored what a lot of people thought was an upset at that time,
and he got dropped three times, got knocked out of the fourth round.
And you know, Caveall has gone on to do well because after that,
as we saw in the card with Usick and Fury, he had a big
win in a title eliminator against Frank Sanchez on that undercard. But we'll see
if mac McDuff can come back and potentially reassert himself and get another opportunity.
So he's fighting. You know Ruf Caanaan, who you mentioned. He's got
some losses twenty seven to three. Probably best known, I guess to the
United States public that in August of twenty twenty two he got stopped in the
second round by Jared Anderson. But he has won three fights in a row
since. Although you know, I was actually I looked up at his record,
so since he lost to Jared Anderson, I was going in with Mackmanduf.
You said, oh, he's got three wins in a row, so
he's on the comeback trail. But I looked at the records of the opponents
he fought as he goes into this fight against Macmandu. He has fought fighters
with records of ten forty three and one. The next opponent that he defeated
was twenty one eighty with seven draws, and then the next opponent that he
fought was ten wins and nineteen losses. Wait, wait a minute, he
fought somebody that has fought one hundred times with eighty losses, that still goes
on, still does on. That's you know what I'm remembering about rov Connan
and that Jared Anderson fight. You just jogged me. That is the night
where I had work duties going with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers as part of their
radio broadcast, and we were playing a preseason game in Indianapolis, and you
and I were in communication. We did the preview podcast, and I want
to say the over under was set at something like a round and a half.
And this is the truth that in Indianapolis and downtown Indianapolis, you can
get out of Lucas Oil Stadium on foot and get over to two of the
huge hotels right by the convention center. In about five minutes, five to
seven minutes, you can be out of the building and in the hotel.
And I remember texting you that, Hey, I'm leaving, I'm headed to
get over to the hotel and I'm going to try to catch some of this
fight, and you were like, you better hurry up. They're starting,
and you texted me while I'm at a traffic light crossing the street. It's
over. Row Conon is knocked out by Jared Anderson in like the first minute
of the second round, so maybe it goes a little longer. In this
Coe feature you just jogged me on August of twenty so they're trying to resuscitate
Macmandeuv after a very devastating to your boy at CAYD. Yellow could be in
the fight again. That is Saturday night ESPN Plus from Canada after the Caterall
Taylor fight is earlier in the day on ESPN Plus. If you have that
in the States and adjust wherever in Canada. I don't know if it's ESPN
Plus, if it's TSN or where else. It would be to see this,
but my Billy is definitely worth it. All right, So good preview
stuff. Now some more news. You already gave us news on the Ryan
Garcia situation. By the way, We've got something on another positive drug test
in a moment. But first, what is this I see from Queensbury Promotions
that they're gonna put Joe Joyce back on the horse here and put him in
front of dear God Rayphiel. What are we doing here? Derek Chesara is
back. July twenty seventh. When last we saw Chessa, he was like
an everlast heavy bag against Tyson Fury in what was a debacle of no,
no, no. Does he fought since? Then? Has he fought since
the Fury fight? Okay, but I must have missed it, But well,
today he fought on the He fought on the undercard in August when the
main event that night was Joshua versus Helenius. Okay, and Chesaora got a
ten round decision win over the former world title challenger from America, Gerald Washington.
So not a big name but a serviceable but solid journeyman title. Okay.
When last we saw Joe Joyce, he was on the wrong end of
a bunch of straight left hands, not once but twice from July Jiang.
He's also won since. All right, so now these guys are gonna fight
in July, and this is uh again, I understand heavyweight, yes,
and in the UK yes, but give me more, give me more.
This will probably be a popular fight. They're putting it at the two Arena.
That's not like some small hall. That's a big time arena where they
have major fights. Uh So, Joe has fought once since that second loss
to Zang. He did win against Cash ally uh pretty much a shutout,
even though it wasn't like a spectacular fight. And look the sours at the
end of his career. He's talking about he wants to have three more fights
and retire. I'm not sure what the magic of three more fights is,
but one of them is supposed to be against Joe Joyce. Look in the
UK, the fight between Joyce and chessaura at varying times. They've been calling
each other out, and I watched their press conference d yesterday that it was
just really never the right time. They both had other things going on,
other bigger fights. Now they kind of need each other. Joyce needs a
name, but a guy that's willing and the guy that they feel he can
beat. Chosaura doesn't have a lot of options. He's one of the few
guys that Jesaura in terms of the name British heavyweights who he hasn't faced because
Chasaura's pretty much fought everybody else over the years, and so they're gonna make
a fun fight. I mean, you can love it or hate it.
I in a weird way. I kind of like it. I expected just
a sloppy kind of slugfest. Now, Derek Chesaura has been in a lot
of tough fights. You know, kind of probably should be retired at this
point, but again not kind of probably he's been cashed. I mean,
but listen, I got I have no say over that. I'm not the
regulator. I'm I'm just the viewer and I'm gonna watch this fight. It's
gonna it's on sky I mean, I'm sorry, it's on TNT Sports in
in the United Kingdom, but it'll probably they haven't done the deal officially that's
done yet, but it's gonna wind up in the United States being on ESPN
Plus. Like a lot of those Frank Warren krts have been. I thought
that one of the great quotes from Derek Tsorro understands his position in boxing.
First of all, he's a funny guy to sore, a great sense of
humor. And one of his quotes, I'm gonna read it to you because
I wrote this in the piece on the notebook that I were writing about this
particular press conference. So what I'm thinking is, by the time we finished
the fight, someone's gonna have less brain cells left in their brain. I
don't mind that is the case. Let's be honest about it. It's a
perfect fight for me, it's a perfect fight for him. And you know
what, that pretty much sums it up. They're gonna be less brain cells
promotion for late July. They're gonna bash each other up, and it's it's
it's it's a fight that both guys, you know, Joyce with a win.
I'm not saying it's gonna launch him into like another championship fight, but
he certainly while I've nicely rebounded against a name guy was a popular fighter in
the UK, and obviously if Jasora somehow managed to pull the upset, which
we've seen Joyce upset by janyg twice, you know it'll I'm not saying it's
gonna get him a world champ, it's a opportunity or anything like that.
But you know, it'll it'll make his last two fights, he claims.
The you know, it'll grease the wheels towards getting that stuff. But just
it is what it is. It's two name heavyweights who are kind of uh,
you know, maybe not at their best at well. The one thing,
I'm just gonna be serious for a half second. The one thing that
we always talk about too is sometimes fighters have to be saved from themselves too,
from the people around them and or the British Boxing Board of Control,
et cetera. So particularly whoever loses this fight, because Joyce took two rough
knockouts and he's older, so let's just see, let's see what that looks
like. I put like this considered Joyce Joyce to me, anyway, we're
putting his age aside. It's not he's not that he's not even in his
forties at this point. He's not the kind of guy where I'm thinking,
oh my god, he has to retire. He's like looking at major,
major damage. Because before the Jang fights, you know, he uh,
you know, he was he was undefeated and he was doing his thing.
You know, Chesaura has been in some rough goes. I mean for a
long time. You know you wanted to be a beating against Tyson Fury and
that fighting. Yeah. So again the thing about the story, because of
his popularity, you want to see him be able in his later life to
be able to go to a fight, go to a bar, not have
to buy a drink, not have to buy a ticket. Everyone's gonna want
to take a picture with him and is going to get in terms of popularity.
I think he's mostly already there. The Fury fight certainly had mega mega.
So if he's still gonna fight, like, enjoy that part later instead
of maybe not being able to because you're not you're all messed up. So
it is what. He's got little kids too, and you want to enjoy
them growing up and have you know, some brain capacity. But we've we
spent a lot of time on that. He's a fighter, by the way,
dis just In Dan Rayfield reports on failed drug tests of all kind,
shapes and sizes, not just Ryan Garcia. Correct here and here we go
again. Go ahead, So lest anybody thinks that I have some kind of
direct line to get every single piece of paperwork from VADA, which I wish
was the case, but is not the case. I will now turn my
attention way fel drug test that was conducted by Drug Free Sport, another agency
that is less effective than VADA, but still if you are dumb enough to
be able to not be able to cheat him out, you're gonna get caught.
And that's exactly what happened with the women's WBA Junior Featherweight champion Erica Cruz,
who fought to a split draw in her title defense against Nazarena Romero from
Argentina that was on the Mexico card that Mattroom and Box Stars put on on
May eleventh at Aguas Calientes, and she ended up fighting to a draw in
that fight, and her Drug Free Sport test came back, which again,
I have I got, as they say, teacher, I've got the receipts,
I've got, you got, you got the d and the receipts again
yep. So she didn't test positive for some unknown, weird looking substance where
you got to look it up and say, what's this do She tested positive
for like one of the old granddaddy's of steroids of anabolic steroids like the the
old the old school, the o G stanazol. She tested positive for the
meadow lightest abolites rather of stanazol. I'm not going to try to pronounce them,
but they are two different ones. This was in a random urine test
conducted by Drug Free Sport on April twenty ninth. Results or return this week,
and she's looking at you know again, like with Ryan Garcia, she'll
have the opportunity if she so desires to pay to have her be sample tested.
I can't say I'm an expert on how things are adjudicated by the Mexican
Commissions in terms of drug testing, but certainly as it relates to the to
the world title that she holds. You know, if the if the results
hold up, which they probably will as typically they do, the WA would
strip her of the title. And you know, Cruz has been in some
very good fights. I mean number one, that fight against the gal she
fought on that May card was an exciting fight that was a draw. A
lot of people thought that she lost that fight and the and her opponent you
know, should have gotten the decision, but she had an absolute freaking war.
If you go back to February of twenty twenty three where she she lost
a round decision when she was in with Amanda Serrano at the Madison Square Guarden
Theater. That was one of the most action packed women's fights you'll ever see,
and that was for the undisputed title. And going into that fight,
you know, if you ever thought maybe there's a featherweight that might be able
to possibly defeat Amanda Serrano, you know, I thought, I thought going
into that fight, Cruise had a pretty decent chance to do so. And
if I remember, it was a very bloody, gory fight. Oh I
believe too to Serrano getting the decision eventually, but there was blood everywhere.
So that's that's that's her. And she also she has a loss, I
mean, Cruise besides that incredibly you know, exciting, bloody battle against the
Serrano that I just mentioned, you know, besides that, she hadn't lost
for like years and years and years. You got all the way back to
like twenty sixteen and like a four rounder, I mean, so she was.
She's an accomplished women's boxer and has won world a world title and been
in the ring with some of the top women out there and again, like
any of these cases, it sucks when you see these athletes test positive for
banned substances. But she didn't, like I said, she tested positive for
the og stanazo, right. I mean, that's that's Ben Johnson shit.
And what we keep talking about with these we would love to be I guess
naive or somehow give people the benefit of the doubt. But when you when
you keep seeing this happen, what happens a lot of times is they're taking
something. I'm just saying this in general, whoever it is, boxers,
track athletes, NFL players, whomever, they're taking something and they and especially
if they know they have a fight in boxing, they're trying to cycle off
of it, and they're trying to cheat the test by getting off of it
in time. And then they get caught by a random test because they don't
know the random test is coming. That's the whole point. And so I
gotta say, I don't know the specifics on this case. I'm just saying
in general, when you keep seeing this happen, a lot of times,
they are aware they are taking this stuff and they're trying to beat the test
somehow, someone on the timing of the test and they still get caught.
I am about at the point where I'm done giving the athletes the benefit of
the doubt, because I believe, in my experience of writing and covering and
knowing about a lot of things that go on in this sport that they're doing
it. And there's plenty of athletes out there that are doing peds who have
smart enough strength coaches and science people and people that know better when to get
them off the shit before they get the positive tests. Some of them are
just too dumb and they get the positive test and they can't beat the system.
But there's a lot of people, and you know, it's one thing
is that we've seen a little bit more recently than we ever had before.
Maybe it's because the sport's at a higher level now, is more women also
failing tests that you used to be like the domain where you only saw the
men that fell the test. But we've had Erica Cruz now with this particular
test that we're talking about. We had not that long ago, we had
the situation with Alicia Baumgardner and her foul test. So I believe you reported
about that and wrote about that and talked about it. Uh huh, So
just just while we're going over it one more time, when Canelo Alvarez tested
positive before you and I hooked up, you wrote about that and talked about
it when Jirell Big Baby Miller couldn't have it broke that also couldn't couldn't have
the Anthony Joshuall fight in the summer of twenty nineteen. You broke that the
Bomb Garway situation women's title when Lucas Brown tested positive and got stripped of the
WBA title. I had that one also, Yeah, And so what I'm
pointing out is once again not just the Ryan Garcia situation. Here's another one,
kids, and you got the info and you've put it out there on
your sub stack, and we're talking about it here with Erica kru By the
Way, and more than likely she's gonna get stripped and gonna be looking at
at least six months if done a year. I don't know. Again,
I don't know the punishment standards in Mexico like I do in America, but
certainly her belt is in major jeopardy unless he's got some kind of excuse.
Now, in the WBC, for example, they don't go on by strict
liabilities. So if they do their opposed investigation, and they deem that whatever
the banned substance was was ingested without purposeful intent, then they can oftentimes not
get tripped to their titles and that sort of stuff, And that's sort of
what has happened over the time. But again, the sanctioning bodies, they
don't control whether the box are going to enter the ring. They only control
the rankings and the belts. So again, if you take that as the
example in the case of what happens to say with connor Ben, like they
couldn't suspend at WBC is because his first test was a WBC Clean Boxing Program
test. They could only remove him from the rankings. The ones that could
sit him down and prevent it from fighting was the local commission or the British
Boxing Board of Control exactly. So we'll see. And by the way,
you were writing and reporting on the connor Ben positive test too while we're adding
to the list. I didn't break that one though, I got into the
problems, but you were still writing and reporting on it and finding out information
and have been all along, including when he was fighting in the United States
why he was allowed to get around whatever with the license. So I'm just
blaboring the point that it's not only about Ryan Garcia, right, even though
I am the devil. But I would just say as all as you bring
up all these past cases and there are others if we wanted to discuss when
it comes to drug testing reporting not my first rodeo. Yeah, correct.
And by the way, Ostereen is it naturally made by the body and he's
got to do some serious explaining about how it got in there. Okay,
a couple more, just real quick, and then the nostalgia and we're done.
Speaking of ta Fimo Lopez. As we mentioned earlier, the June twenty
ninth card in Miami. Top Rank has made it official and that also includes
a couple of the interesting undercard fights. Real quick, go ahead. Yeah,
So, as I had reported back a few weeks ago, TaiMo Lopez's
title defense will be against Steve Claggett, a fighter from Canada who's a come
forward fight usually makes good fights, So from an entertainment point of view,
WHI should be good. But he also was probably the easiest opponent that he
was offered. You know, as I reported a while ago, Top Rank
basically gave Team Lopez four names and let them pick one of them with Steve
Klaggett. But the others were the excellent up and comer at Top Rank Raymond
Morettaya. There was the other contender, Kenneth Simms Junior, who was coming
off of a WBA eliminator victory in a very good runs. Kenneth Sims is
an excellent young fighter, and the other one was Elvis Rodriguez, who,
by the way, had been with Top Rank as a as a young prospect.
He left Top Rank he signed with PBC. He then left PBC after
their situation ended and they obviously were having a lack of TV dates. But
just on Wednesday, Top Rank announced that they had resigned Elvis Rodriguez, which
was sort of had been the rumor that it was going to happen for a
while, So they resigned Elvis Rodriguez, who's trained by Freddie Roach and you
know, one of the better fighters out of the Dominican He's going to be
on this undercard, not on the main card for ESPN purposes, but on
ESPN ploss. He'll have his return with Top Rank on the card. So
that happened this week also, But in terms of the main card, he
got again. Lopez looking to maybe shake off what a lot of people thought
was a very poor performance in a close victory against Jermaine Ortiz that took place
recently. I thought Jermain Ortiz won that fight. Lopez comes back off that,
and then you also have on the undercard, as we've discussed, you
have the former w BO featherweight champion Robas Ramirez, who is looking to get
a rematch with Raphael Espinoza after their very dramatic fight that took place at the
end of last year where Espinoza scored a huge upset won the title. Originally,
as I've talked about before, Top Rank wanted to make the immediate rematch,
but the Espinoza team insisted on having an interim fight, So he's fighting
Chirino this summer. And then you have Robasi Ramirez is going to be on
the card fighting and again if he wins, and if Espinosa wins, Top
Rank will make that rematch later this year, probably in the fall. But
in terms of Ramirez, this fight is a ten rounder. Will fight a
Mexican fighter named Brandon Leon Benitez, not a well known guy, guy with
a good record. Thought twenty one and two with nine knockouts. He has
won seven fights in a He's his one big win quote unquote was in twenty
twenty two, he got a decision by split decision against the former WBO title
holder Zoo Can from China, So at least he does have some you know,
at least one good reputable victory on the record anyway, So that's the
rematch that they're looking to make. But again, Robisi's got to take care
of the business here. I'll off his Cuban fans probably there rooting him on
in Miami. And if Espinoza takes care of business, we'll see that rematch
in the fall. And then the other fight that will open up this tripleheader
is you have the middleweight Nico Ali Walshed, obviously the grandson of Muhammad Ali.
He's going to take on a fighter named Sona a Cal which, if
you have followed the career of a Nico Ali, washed suffered a six round
decision loss to a Cal. And now this is the rematch to try to
interest even there. All right, So again that's at the end of June
in Miami, top ranked show there with ta Fimo Lopez headlining. Yeah,
I got ten months. He lost the fight to a cal August of last
year, so he's had other fights since then. But now they've determined its
time to make the rematch and see he can avenge that defeat. I almost
hesitate to bring this up because we have not really even talked about this card.
It is next week, but the WBC cruiserweight champ Noel mcalean is off
the Don King pay perview with Adrian Broner and Blair Cobbs said to be in
the main event. You've got the quick deats again on what happened here wise,
he off, Well, you can you can love or hate the Blair
Cobbs in Broner fight, but McKellan is an exciting fighter, been a good
cruiserweight for a long time. Had a spectacular performance back in November when he
won the vacant WBC titles. Scored a knockout against Iluna Magabu, very very
good performance, and he was supposed to be defending the title against his mandatory
Ryan Rozikie was also an exciting fighter from Canada and unfortunately this week he suffered
a cut on over his right eyelid in his sparring session and that forced him
off the fight. Now Noel mckallion. He's from Armenia, but he fights
out of Miami and he has I guess when if you watch the Macabu fight,
had a nice little cheering crowd there for him. So this fight's taking
place in Hollywood, Florida, so he was excited to be basically fighting in
front of his adopted hometown. And it's you know, it's unfortunate because there's
some good action in the cruiserweight division, whether it's Chris pillm Smith or obviously
McKellan getting getting his business going. He got Lawrence o'coley trying to win another
title this weekend over in Poland. Or I take that back, he's going
up the bridgeweight. I guess to fight go Coley is Bridgeway. Yes,
yeah, so he's not in the cruiserweight division anymore. But anyway, the
point is it's just anytime you have a guy that's like a week out of
a fight get an injury, especially when it would look like a pretty good
fight on paper, certainly in terms of the adding depth and heft to the
Broner and Cobbs undercard, you know, it's disappointing. So unfortunately mckellyan's injured
and hopefully they'll reschedule it soon when he'll get better. All right, lots
of news. Let's wrap it with some nostalgia. It was I remember this
fight and I don't again. I keep saying this to you. I don't
want to accept it was thirty one years ago Wednesday, May nineteen ninety three,
royd Own became a world champion for the first time, defeating Bernard Hopkins
to win the vacant IBF middleweight championship. Tell me more about what we remember
about May twenty two, nineteen ninety three, and that night also included a
Riddick Bow heavyweight title defense as part of it, but it's more known for
the Hall of famers Jones and Hopkins obviously going on, well, I mean,
the main event was Riddic bo He was the heavyweight champion of the world.
His promoter, manager Rock Newman, was from the DC area. They
brought the fight to the gigantic RFK Stadium, which was very, very big
and obviously way too big and wasn't really even remotely needed to have this type
of fight because it didn't draw that kind of crowd. But remember he had
defeated Evander to become the undisputed champion. He had had a garbage defense in
the first run against the old and completely shot Michael Doakes. This was his
second defense against the Journeyman nine loss Jesse Ferguson. That was the main event
of this card. This was the fight that seated his second fight, the
fan Man fight against Holyfield. So this was the final title defense of Rick
Bow that was successful against Jesse fergus and he wiped them out in the second
round. And in the co feature on HBO that night was the fight between
as you mentioned, Roy Jones, young Roy Jones against Bernard Hopkins, who
were not stars not you know, Roy was known because of his exploits as
a United States Olympian and all the controversy about that, but this was him
having gotten to twenty one to zero and getting an opportunity to fight for the
title. Bernard was not a well known guy, but was highly ranked and
you know had you know, done a good job in his previous fights leading
up to this, and they matched them together for the vacant IVF title.
Now, unfortunately it turned out to be a stinkeroo as they say, not
a good fight. Now it's much more exciting and interesting to talk about because
of the magnitude of the careers that Roy and Bernard went on to have as
rivals and as pound for pound guys and make a lot of history and win
a lot of titles and have a lot of big time fights. But the
action of their twelve rounds is entirely forgettable. Now, Roy had an injury
in that going into that fight that was revealed later. He basically fought him
with one hand, but he still won one sixteen to one to twelve,
and all three scorecards. Nobody disputes the decision. And if you take a
look at the overall career arc of Roy Jones, you have to consider this
one of his best wins. You know, there's this win, there's the
James Tony win, There's the Virgil Hill knockout, there's the John Ruiz fight.
There's maybe the balls he showed in the first Antonio Tarbor fight. I
mean, Roy's got good wins. Reggie Johnson by shutout, you know,
you know, Loua del val to the unified titles, but Bernard and Tony,
who are top notch Hall of Fame type of guys, Roy basically,
you know, made him look like he didn't belong in the ring with him.
And we all know that Bernard went on to become one of the all
time greats and become undisputed the middleway champ, the lineal champion of the white
heavyweight score a bunch of big upsets, and like I said, it's a
lot more fun to talk about what these guys did after their matchup than actually
go back and sit through the agonizing twelve rounds of their fight in Washington on
that particular night. But it was a great win for Roy. It got
in the title. And the other thing that it's interesting, it's not so
much about the action of the fight itself, but this was the fight where
Bernard Hopkins became a guy that was very, very involved in trying to pursue
fair rights for fighters and was a big time supporter when the legislation was brought
by John McCain, the late senator from Arizona, to try to pass the
Muhammad Ali reformat. And the reason was because Bernard found out eventually that HBO
had paid Butch Lewis, who was his promoter at the time, something like
six hundred thousand dollars for their part of the pie like the fee that was
paid, not the perps. The package, a package that went to the
be Hops side was six hundred grand. And out of that six hundred thousand
dollars, Now, remember promoters do not have a fiduciary duty to the fighter.
The manager does, but not the promoter. So what Butch Lewis did
on that night was out of that six hundred thousand dollars that he got from
HBO, he paid Bernard Hopkins sixty thousand dollars. And when Bernard Hopkins found
out, he went fucking ape shit wild, as he should have. He's
lucky because he was lucky that Bernard couldn't find him the problem. That is
correct, So what when the ali Act passed? Now there's a lot of
problems with the ali AK because the enforcement of it is very poor, but
there's still a requirement now, especially you know for the televised fights at least,
that there has to be a disclosure to the boxer or his team,
you know, the lawyer of the manager, whoever, yes, what the
network paid for the fight. So if the ali Act was in forced on
that night in nineteen ninety three, Bernard would have seen six hundred grand as
as a cavalier as Butcher Lewis was, he wouldn't have had the balls to
only give him sixty grand. The you know, the rightful portion would have
been much much larger. And so when you think about the reforms that have
happened in boxing, it's not perfect, but it's a lot better now than
it was in nineteen ninety three. And one of the reasons is because Bernard
got fucked so bad again Roy Jones, by his own promoter, Butch Lewis
that it helped lead to the Muhammad Ali boxing and format. So while the
fight itself was shit, the result of the legislation that was born, in
large part by the in my opinion, just horrible for treatment that Bernard received
from his promoter, you know, immoral treatment that helped make this which is
one of the other reasons why historically this fight's important because of what it meant
in terms of that legislation. Not that I'll step off my soapbox. The
historical significance, I'll add is all over the place for Hall of Fame fighters
and for what happened after that and the reform attempts that were made. So
move forward from that night seventeen years to May twenty second, twenty ten,
which again was fourteen years ago Wednesday, on May the twenty second, the
final fight, epic fight between Raul Raphael Marquez and Israel Vasquez. That fight
was held, and you've always talked about this, and we've talked about it
several different times. They had obviously tremendous second and third fights, the fourth
fight and for so much but first, but the second and third were both
fights of the year, right, So this is the fourth and final fight
that we're talking about on the anniversary the quartet, if you will, of
Rafael Marquez Israel Baskets. All right, So the first fight that they had
was the fight of the year, and then the second fight was later that
year and it trump did it. So the only reason why fight number one
was not the fight of the year was because both of them took place in
two thousands and seven. Had they taken place in separate calendar years, they
all they both would have been the fight of the year, but one was
in March, and then the rematch in August of seven. The second fight
was the fighter of the year, and then the third fight in two thousand
and eight was the fight of the year. In two thousand and eight,
so the second and third where the bona fide actual voted on and picked by
the organization of the BWA. I think Ring Magazine certainly when I was working
at ESPN, et cetera, as the fight of the year, and the
first fight kind of got left out on the cold because it was a different
calendar year. So then they fought a fourth time, and that's the one
we disavow. It's sort of like the boxing equivalent of like Star Trek five.
It do you just forget about it? Doesn't Court or Rocky five,
by the way, and we could go on and on down the list.
So Caddy Shack two should be disavowed as well while we're talking about those.
Yes, great Grease two. I think Grease too probably as well, Yes,
very nice so but theres so anyway, the anniversary is of the fourth
fight, but I said, let's talk about it, even though the fourth
fight stunk and really probably shouldn't have happened, but just as a celebration of
this great rivalry between them. It was Israel Vasquez's final fight. He retired
at the end because he was a little messed up and probably should have had
the fourth fight he had the eye problem and everything. They ended the four
fight series two wins apiece. But the first three are the ones that really
were the big ones. They were all for WBC one hundred and twenty two
pound titles. The third, the fourth fight, was a non title fight
or for a regional title if you will, at the featherweight limit. It
was at the Staples Center on showtime. Again, it probably should not have
happened, but it did. And if you go back and watch any of
their first three fights, they're absolutely spectacular. I mean, they are every
bit as good as the Gaddy Ward fights and the Burn Morales fights and Patio
Marquez fights. Obviously, Raphael Marquez is the younger brother of Juan Maanuel Marquez.
Raphael Marquez was voted into the Hall of Fame based a lot on his
exploits as a long ragning bantamweight champion, but also because of the exploits that
he had in the fights against Israel Vasquez, where you know, again,
they put on some of the greatest fights you'll ever want to see. But
the fourth one was a disappointing fight, but it was a great celebration of
the fantastic rivalry that these two men had love it so again May twenty second
special for those two reasons. That was Wednesday Thursday, as we released the
podcast into Friday. Thursday is May twenty third, and Marvin Hagler would have
been seventy years old. I know, we talked about Sugar Ray Leonard's birthday
off the weekend and the recap podcast and the Marvelous One would have earned seventy.
We lost him a couple of years ago. Again, we could go
on and on, and we did a little bit the other night too about
what the Four Kings meant and about Hagler's place in history as menacing a middleweight
champion as there has been in the modern ERAa of boxing. I don't think
that's I think he's got to be either one or one A in terms of
what Hagler did from late seventies through the mid eighties, Yes, including the
epic fight obviously for all time with Tommy Hearns where he eventually survived that Hallatia's
first round and not turns out it stole some more on Marvelous Marvin Hagler.
Please. Well, I figured if we were going to have our discussion a
couple of last podcasts on the birthday of the great Sugar and Leonard. How
can we leave out the great Marvin Hagler, which is his birthday was not
that long after well, like you mentioned, very sadly he passed in March
of twenty twenty one. But I will say this, in my time of
talking about boxing, thinking about boxing, writing about boxing, and meeting all
kinds of people in the business, fans around the around the world, I'm
not sure there's another fighter that is universally beloved as Marvin Hagler. And that
because there's even Sugary Leonard and Muhammad Ali and you know some of the biggest
names, the Manny Packs and Floyd Mayweathers and Mike Tyson's and you know,
pick the guys. There's some people that don't love them, that that are
not fans of. There is that that that for different reasons, have have
a negative h point of view about them. You know, this guy was
a pretty boy, this guy duck this guy, this guy didn't fight this
guy, this guy, you know, got arrested, this guy did this,
this guy was on drugs. Whatever it was like they they looked down
about certain aspects with Hagler, It's almost universal I've never met a person in
the business, a fan, another journalist who did not have anything but massive
respect and love for marvelous Marvin Hagler. He fought everybody, He made great
fights. You know, he wore his kind of his heart on his sleeve,
so to speak. Never dodged anybody, came up the hard way,
or earned everything. He got, no and handed him anything, you know,
basically fought his way out of the Philadelphia. You know, he was
not from Philly, but he made his bones fighting in a lot of tough
fights against a great middleweight group of contenders in Philadelphia in the nineteen seventies.
A lot of people don't know this. He was born actually in New Jersey.
Yes, they had eventually migrated to Brockton, Massachusetts. And you could
get a lot of people on the trivia question that he wasn't born and bred
in Massachusetts as a matter of fact. But where he made his bones as
a boxer was in the fighting city of Philadelphia, where he fought everybody,
and at the time it was a very stacked division and there was a lot
of top quality talent there and he suffered you know, the draw here,
the loss there, but he earned it. When he And the other thing
is when he finally got to fight for the title the first time. This
was in Las Vegas. This was actually on the undercart when Sugar Ray Leonard
won the welter with Yeas Beneath. He fought against Anti Fermo in their first
fight and he got a split draw, and a lot of people thought that
Marvin got a robed that night. This was at the time when at the
Furmo was the WBA and the WBC champion, which at that time was the
undisputed title. This is in nineteen seventy nine. Did get raeb Howard Cosell
went crazy that night on the under cart of that fight because he was scoring
it along while he was calling it terrible decision. Marvin dominated the fight and
Afermo bled all over the place the second half of the fight, and they
robbed him, and so I think Marvin became a little more sympathetic and then
he eventually became the champ and then he just broke people in half and broke
him down. With the exception of Duran, you could not stand up to
Marvin Hagler in the eighties. But the other thing about it was when he
got the draw and didn't get the title and they didn't get an immediate rematch.
Antefero ended up losing the title to Alan Minter, the fighter from the
UK. And when Hagler finally got another shot, this is about a year
later. It's like ten months later. He got another shot at the Center,
but he fought three times in between there like as you say, let's
hear it for activity back in those days. So Marvin went to England to
fight him at the Wembley Arena right across from the Big Stadium where I was
there when they had the wigh in for Anthony Joshua and clitchco. But they
fought in that building and Marvin completely dominated, beat him up, cut him
up and won by a third round knock. I remember watching that fight live
and it's known more for what you were about to talk about next. Yeah,
So he never one of the things that drove Hagler, that stuck in
his craw as they say, and became like a big thing. That again
I say he wore his emotions on his sleeve. Is he never got to
be announced as the winner of the title and anybody hand them the championship belts
in the ring because the lunatic fans in England in London that day started pelting
the ring with beer bottles and debris, upset about the stoppage, which was
a perfectly fine stoppage, and they had to like basically rush him out.
And as I've heard Hagler talk about in interviews, you know, they made
it seem like we did something wrong, like we were criminals and we had
to like run and hide, even though they had done nothing other than have
Marvin Hagler go in the ring and beat up their guy and win the title.
So when he did that, he got developed. When he came back
and he fought, you know, in front of a home crowd in Boston
and started putting one defense after another together and went through like you said,
where he was breaking guys apart. HBO at that time was becoming a major
player. They gravitated towards Tagler. He signed with HBO. It became his
home. He did most of his biggest fights on HBO, including as you
mentioned, the Roberto Duran fight. Obviously the Hearns fight that was a close
circuit, but they had the rights to it. I recently actually just watched
which I hadn't watched a long time. Just for fun, I saw come
up on my YouTube suggestions. I watched him beating up one the Mingo Rall
Dan yep, and in a fight. There was a couple of fights before
the Hearns fight that was actually where Marvin, in the first round suffered what
is the only official knockdown of his career. But it was a slip.
He got pushed. It was kind of a bullshit knockdown, but you know,
he was all pissed off about that, but he ended up beating roll
Dan up and stopping him in the tenth round. I mean, this is
a guy who fought everybody, and even up to the last time when he
fought mcgabi, when he was near the end, he still gutted out a
very very tough win and stopped him. And it was only when he was
basically all done, I shouldn't say all done, but done enough that Sugar
Ray Leonard finally decided to end his long retirement and come out and fight him.
And even on that night, a lot of people felt that Marvin defeated
Sugar Ray Leonard. But this is a man who had a spectacular career,
automatic first ballot Hall of Famer. I think I've said this on the show
before. One of my greatest times I ever had in my career was when
I was out in Las Vegas with my boy Brian Kenny from ESPN and we
were covering the Winkie Right Bernard Hopkins fight for Sports Center. They actually hired
Marvin to come out to Vegas and spend a couple days with us to be
our guest analyst. Bernard was a huge fan of Hagler. Hagler was a
big fan of Hopkins. They had a lot in common in their background and
you know, coming up the hard way. So I got a chance to
like hang out with Hagler for a couple of days and sit with him in
the arena and have lunch with him and just hear some stories. He was
a great guy, friendly, good sense of humor, kind of dry sense
of humor. But just what my own regret is, I didn't get a
picture with Hagler. I didn't get an autograph from Hagler. But we had
a fucking blast and never heard your memories. And again he retired what at
thirty three years of age thirty two I think, and he he never fought
again after that night with Sugar Ray Leonard, which was surprising to me at
the time as a fight fan, as a teenager, that we never saw
Marvin Hagler again after that lost to Ray Leonard in April of eighty seven.
But we have to say this, I know I repeatedly say this for all
of the gen Zers, for all the sub thirty year olds, and again,
think boxing began in two thousand and nine. Marvin Hagler was as menacing
as any fighter before Mike Tyson. He was as menacing as any fighter in
the eighties, let's say, the seventies, the eighties before Tyson came along.
All right, I love doing this with you, and then we got
to get out of here in just a second. Hagler in his prime or
Canelo Alvarez fighting at middleweight. Who would you take Canelo in the modern day
or Marvin in his prime. I mean, I think everybody knows that I'm
a big Mchinelo Alvarest fan, and I have nothing but love for Canelo,
but no disrespect to my man. That's not really even a fight. In
my opinion. I think Hagler beats him down. Hagler walks him down and
beats him down. Marvin Hagler, go back to Sugar Ray Robinson. Sugar
Ray Robinson, who had overall one hundred wins in his career, all those
world title wins, fought a bunches of middleweight Sugar Ray with the skills,
the artistry. We're talking Sugar Ray Robinson, not Sugar Ray Leonard. I
love these all time hypotheticals. You're still taking Marvin. Marvin breaks him down,
corners, body body work and then knocks him out. I don't I
don't forrob't know about that. I mean, I'm no expert on on on
the on the well, the welterweight version of Sugar Robinson, the videos just
don't exist. The middleweight version of Ray Robinson. There's plenty of videos to
look at, uh, you know, and I guess I would. I
would defer to some of the people that know a lot more than I that
regard Sugar Ray Robinson as the greatest fighter whoever lived period, that as great
as Marvin Hagler is, he lost to Sugar Ray Learner. Even as an
older fighter, I always thought that Ray won that fight, despite my love
for Hagler, even though I have love for Ray also, It'd be hard
to pick, uh, against Sugar and Robinson when he was in a prime
in his middleweight titled I don't know that. I don't know that Hagler didn't
win that fight. I don't know. I mean he again with the Yere's,
but I would have This is the butt I would have loved to see.
And I'm not I'm not saying that I think. I'm not. I
don't know who I think would win. I'd have to think about it.
But just from an action point of view, from a chin point of view,
from a hard punching point of view, from a desire point of view,
how about fucking Hagler and Galovekin. That's the fight. Oh yeah,
that's okay. And I think I take Hagler in that fight too. Maybe
I'm just biased because I'm a child at the age I don't it's okay.
Uh So Marvin again, rip to Marvin Hagler, who would have been seventy.
Man, We've had a busy show. Once again, we mention you
and I will do this on the bet Us Boxing Show Live on their platforms
one Eastern time on Friday. Look forward to that and what happens here with
the Taylor Catterall rematch. The Christian Mobili Fight. We're back to recap it
off the weekend on the Fight Preach Unit Recap podcast. Looking forward to that.
Other than that, my friend, have a great weekend. Let's watch
the action. I'll see you on the bet US show and then let's see
if we get some great fights to recap on this podcast. Peat Dan Raphaeld.
That sounds good. I will see you on the show. All right,
that's coming one Eastern time on Friday. Depending on when you're hearing us,
make sure you're following and subscribing on this podcast feed. As we preview
going into the weekend, we recap off the weekend. It is the big
Fight weekend preview podcast for Dan Rayfield. I'm TJ Reeves. Enjoy the fights.