The countdown is on to Fight Time. This is Big Fight Weekend. No
here is your host? D J leaves Well, well, well, we
get ready to have a preview edition of the pod that doesn't really have fights
to preview. Per see, we're gonna get ray Oh. That doesn't mean
that you don't want to be here though, on the Big Fight Weekend preview,
because it doesn't matter whether we have fight cards or not. We have
news. We have Raoul Marquees, the former junior middleweight world champ who's an
analyst with Showtime. He's gonna be here because he was at the Canello Charlo
kickoff press conference in New York. Two press conferences for the price of one,
because they did a second one in California on Wednesday. Everybody to talking
about all those things. But you could hear about birthday parties on this here
podcast. You could hear about twins driving lessons. You could hear about half
naked women in fighters hotel rooms while Rayfield is talking to a fighter about his
cat. You never know, including the nostalgia, and that's why we're here
each and every week, even if we don't have to fight cards. I
am merely the somewhat competent host T J. Reeves, insider Dan Raypheel from
Big Fight Weekend dot Com and his fight for each Unite a substack. We
do have plenty to discuss. How are you feeling as we head of the
weekend. It's the it's not really the last week of summer, but in
our household anyway, it's the last weekend of the summer because we start fifth
grade on Monday. Good for the little man. I have no sympathy in
that regard because we've been back in for like ten days now in Florida,
in a lot of parts of the country, and you're going earlier, like
we talked about, than a lot of places, including north of you.
They don't go to laughter Labor Day, so I can identify, I know.
But now that was in eighty days in the classroom. You only got
so many days on the calendar to get that jammed in if you're gonna not
do year round school. So that's how it works. So good luck,
good luck with a little guy having to have a bed time and a wake
up time and all that. Good luck with all of that, because with
teenage daughters in my household, well, listen, we have a we have
a wake up time and a dead time in the summer too because of his
activities. So we're just got to switch here, no concept whatsoever. Uh
And it was rough last week when we went back. So anyway, thank
you for finding us, however you've done so, make sure that you rate
us in review us. We could be coming back around at some point here
to bribing you again, but right now we do appreciate the ratings and reviews.
Apple Podcasts, Google podcast, Spotify, wherever you can rate us and
review us. Keep doing that. We go into the weekend with the big
Fight weekend preview. We come off the weekend, Hey, we got to
get creative with the fight Freaks Unite recap. Ray Fields already said to me,
what exactly are we recapping off the weekend? There is a there is
a matchroom card. What is the card in England? There's a matchroom card,
and there's and there's another card as well. There's a couple of smaller
well not in our continent. They're not they're not in our in our in
our wheelhouse. Well, there's a there's a there's they're just not the level
of shows that we're going to spend a lot of time like dissecting at all.
So there actually are two The Zone events on Friday Night. One of
them is the ot X card, which is prospect oriented. Headliner is Kurt
Scobie versus Narcisco Carmona, junior welterweights and I And the second card is the
second of the few cards that it's like a small series that they're doing monthly
that Jake Paul and his MDP Promotions did a deal with the ZWN also for
again sort of prospect ish Friday night fights ish if you will. So their
main event on Friday is a also a hunger welterweight fight between Nestor Bravo,
who's an up and coming fighter against the well traveled Will Madera, who they
claim as a prospect in their press announcements, but he's not really a prospect.
He's been around for a long time. The one thing that doesn't make
any sense to me, to be honest with the TJ, is the following.
So I like the fact that they're doing these types of shows in addition
to the bigger shows. You need, you know, you need to have
sort of that proving, that growing ground, that middle class sort of ground
to build guys up and let people know who they are. And that's all
good, kind of like Friday Night fights used to do. Work like a
showbox so so excellently. But for the life I mean, I can't figure
out why the Zone would put two events that are in largely geared towards the
exact same kind of fan at the exact same time. I get the fact
that in college football conferences have different network deals and Major League Baseball is more
regionally, uh, you know, goes around as far as you know,
the games on different markets. So if you have the the you know,
the the MLB package, you can watch everything or you know, NFL games
around the same time but for the same network, the same broadcast or the
same platform. But two cards that are virtually identical in the type of show
they are on at the same time or roughly the same time. I don't
quite understand that. So but anyway, so they didn't ask us. But
that's a good that's a good point that you make. It. By the
way, the Bravo Madera fight is in Orlando, not far from me.
But my problem is when you and I are done here, I'm headed to
New York for Buck Football for the NFL with the New York Jets without Aaron
Rodgers playing in the game. So I'll be at the metal Lands Saturday night
while this is unfolding. But itch, you know the London there's a London
card with Dennis McCann and I note Baluda if that's how you say at the
junior featherweights and galia Fi is fighting in Birmingham, England and a flyweight vout.
That's what I was going to mention to you. But so we got,
we got a little bit. We got a little bit this weekend,
but it's not anything noteworthy to really preview. Yeah, so I mean galalia
Fi and Tommy Frank is a flyweight fight that headlines this Matchroom card. But
match Room has that series that they call the Next Gen, which again is
their version of like a prospect oriented Joe and Yai is a top prospect.
He was a gold medalist in the twenty and twenty Olympics, but you know,
he's only got a couple of fights under his belt so far. He
comes from a fighting family. His brothers were both or are both professional fighters.
You know, his one brother, kaliphis the former world champion. Anyway,
those are not the kind of shows that we're going to spend a lot
of time dissecting here on the on the the Preview podcast, so we'll let
the fans know those are happening. All three of them are on the Zone.
And the one you mentioned when they can in Blueta, that is a
BT sporter. I guess I think they're calling it TNT sport now in England,
but not in America. Anyway, Let's get onto the news. That's
right, Queensberry Promotions has that when they have renamed that cable channel Warner Discoveries
involved, and they've rebranded it like TNT in the in the American lexicon as
a cable outlet or now a streaming service. It's TNT sport instead of bt
sport over in the UK. All right, with that, your thoughts on
Canello and Charlo not once, but twice doubleheader and that was both New York
and in California for both of those, listen. I mean they went to
the news conference typical as they do with these major fights. They faced off.
That was good to see them. Anybody that watch will notice that,
without question, Charlo is the bigger human being. He's taller, he's sticker,
you know, and this is the guy who's coming up two weight classes,
which I never really thought was going to be that big of a stretch.
And I say that because even though Cannello has been a top fighter both
at one hundred and seventy five and one hundred and sixty eight, you know,
he spent a long, long period of his career at one hundred fifty
four pounds doing his thing, winning titles, and then became a middleweight.
The size difference, if you didn't know that Charlotte was the young, dispeeded
dream at adweight champion, you would never realize that there was some sort of
supposed massive size disparity between the two, and Charlotte is actually when you staying
him next to his twin brother, a Jamaal Charlotte, who's the WBC's middleweight
champion, he's a little bit smaller than his brother, so his brother is
a big guy also relative to Canelo. You know, look, I'm excited
for the fight number one, and we will talk about it a lot as
the fight grows closer. In the September September thirtieth on Showtime pay per view,
also with our friends at ppeb dot com, at the Team Mobile arena.
So it's an interesting matchup. And and I actually in terms of the
news conferences, you know, it was not a lot There was not a
lot of heat. Like I wrote a column in my Substack newsletter that was
sort of the theme was, you know, they brought the love, not
the heat, you know, and I get that they were acting respectful.
Canello has always been the kind of guy who will act respectful and courteous towards
his opponent unless you get in his face and start with him and then I'll
cut you down, like you know, Darth Vader and Obi Wan kenobi Uh
and Charlo. But I listen, I kind of expected it to be some
fireworks because Charlo, if you're familiar with him at all, just like his
brother Frankly, it's got a hair trigger temper, doesn't take a lot of
shit, goes off at the drop of a dime. You know, has
a little bit of a swagger and a little bit an attitude, whether for
show where it's just part of the you know, it's part of his actual
personality whatever. He's always got something to say. So I was a little
surprised where he came with the love and the respect, and you know,
Canello and Eddie renosso his trainer and manager, their legends of the game.
And you know he was on his best behavior. So I don't know if
that was because maybe he's a little nervous. I don't know if that was
because he doesn't want to poke the there and why why Ryle Canello up for
no reason? I mean, he saw what happened. Perhaps what happened when
the last time Canelo was in a PBC event was back when he fought Kayla
Plant and at the opening press conference got in his face and you know,
he ended up walking away with a giant cut, bloody cut under his eye.
Thankfully didn't and didn't pact the fight. So the bottom line was Charlotte
and Canello were very respectful. They didn't trash talk each other at all.
And my perspective on it was this, I don't want to see the guys
put hands on each other before the fight. You say that for the ring,
that's when you get paid. And I don't need them to curse each
other out and call their mom's bad names and say terrible, vulgar things the
way David Denebatis and Kayla Plant handled themselves building up to their fight, but
I could do with it. I could do with me a little bit of
humorous trash talk, a little bit of pump my chest and that sort of
thing. Find the way that Errol Spence and Terren Scrawford did. They were
very respectful through the entire promotion from day one through the post fight press cards.
But they had their say about the fish fry and the big fish and
this and that. I mean, you know, they certainly beat their chest
a little bit. And so to me, there's like that happy medium.
I don't need the nonsense of the punches and the cursing and the vulgarities,
but I'd like a little more heat than than than there than there was at
the New York Cress. It was a little subdue, subdued for your life.
It looked more like a board meeting bo b o a r D or
b O r e D. You seem to be b O r e D
with what looked like a bal A r D. And then the second press
comments on Wednesday that they had in Beverly Hills was maybe a little spicier,
a little more to it, but it was it was a business. So
hopefully the heat will pick up and I hope people recognize that that's a good
matchup. You got, you know, a huge star and Canelo. You
got an outstanding fighter in Charlot who is also undisputed in his weight division.
Again, it's not the greatest fighting they could have made. I mean,
I'm not knocking the fight. I like to fight. I'm going to fight.
I actually made my flight reservation a couple of days ago. We will
would have liked to see the Bena VID's fight instead, I think, but
I'm good with the Charlotte fight. The one thing I will say that was
interesting TJ. And I was glad that Brian Custer, who was the moderator
of the press event, you know, who was obviously the host of the
Showtime Championship Boxing events and will host a pay per view. You know,
Brian does an excellent job when he when he does some of the Q and
A of his own questions, not not other questions from other media members.
But he had read some stories and I had seen that there has been,
and this is widespread, some criticism of Canello and that he's not quote unquote
he's not the guy he used to be, and that maybe he's on the
down slide a little bit. Maybe he's a little bit in decline. He's
only thirty three, but he's at a very long career term pro as a
team. And just even though he beat Golovkin in the rematch, even though
he beat John Ryder in their fight that took place earlier this year, prior
to that, he had lost the B ball. You know, he didn't
really look sharp the way he had against Plant in any of those three fights.
And uh, you know, so he asked them straight up, you
know, are you on the decline essentially? And you know, I've you
know, Canello didn't get mad about it, didn't you know, make defensive
comments. He was like, look, number one, he's talked about his
you know, he didn't say it specifically, but he had a risk injury
that that has hampered him. He ended up having surgery that I'm sure impacted
him in the last three fights to some degree. Says he's good now and
that he's glad that people underestimate him because it will just make the victory that
much sweeter. So that's definitely going to be a storyline going to the fight.
What's Canello got left at his age and the and the wear and tear
and the sixty fights or so in his career against you know, a still
prime Charlot who's also coming off an injury of his hand broken in two places,
as well as a what will be I guess about a fifteen month laoff.
So there's there's definitely stuff to talk about, but the press conferences itself,
we're not exactly the type of thing people are still gonna be talking about
next week, okay, but they went and had both. By the way,
you'll hear from Raoul Marquez, who was right there for the New York
press conferences as we made mention, and he has a long relationship with little
Small Charlow's youth. Charlo's in the same gym with him in Houston. You'll
you want to hear that story. And Marques also relates to Jamil Charlow breaking
his hand and having to come back from that himself. So you're gonna find
those comments fascinating. Before we get to the conversation I had with Ralph Marquees
of short time, you have reported two of the undercard fights are set for
this I don't know if they officially got announced yet, you would know that,
but you were reporting it earlier in the week, go ahead and give
the peeps the details here on the preview pot right, So neither of the
fights have actually been formally announced, but it's it's shaping up like what should
be maybe not the biggest names, but two entertaining fights that will probably be
good when the bell rings, and which is really all I can ask.
I would have liked to see some other higher profile stuff on the card,
but I can't really complain about this. The co feature, I think is
a terrific fight. It's Hazers Ramos Junior, the junior Middleway who remember was
supposed to be in the co feature on the Spence card against Crawford and that
because he hurt his hand, they had to rejigger this, you know,
the fights, and he got sidelined because of that. He was on the
plant then Avidia's card in the co feature anyway, so they're bringing him onto
this by the way that you know that PBC has got a lot of eye
hopes for this guy. They keep putting him in co feature of these big
pay per view fights. So that's the number one. He's only twenty two
years old, he's undefeated twenty no with sixteen knockouts, just a tremendous prospect.
I had him on my prospect list at the end of twenty twenty two.
Anyway, he's taken on Ericson Lubin and Ericson Lubin is a guy that
will fight anybody, I mean, and he's a very good fighter himself.
Also a former my former prospect that you're actually going back several years ago.
So Luban, you know, he's he's stopped this to a couple of times.
He has a loss in a tremendous battle with Sebastian Fundora where he was
stopped, but he's, you know, he's come back from that, and
this is just this is just a good what we say, we'll call it
a good scrap, you know what I mean, just a solid, a
solid fight, and that that should be some some very good entertainment value.
And and speaking of which Lubin and Fundora we should not forget, which was
two fights ago for Lubin was a tremendous battle, had Fundora down and then
Fundora eventually stopped him. So you talk about scraps. If we get anything
like that from Lubin in response, that could be that this could be a
really good fight. Yea, Luban Fender was a bona fide, you know,
fight of the Year candidate in twenty twenty two. He has won his
only fight since then, which was a very nice knockout against Luis Arias,
who was not a top level contender. He's now got four losses, but
he's only been stopped one time, and that was by by Ericson Lubin.
So this is just you know, this is a good fight. When I
when I posted about that on Twitter and wrote about it in my notebook on
my substack the other day, pretty much all the commentary from people was,
oh, this is a good scrap, that's a good fight, Like I
like that fight. In other words, boxing fans never agree on anything that
was seemingly one thing that they did all sort of, uh, you know,
unanimously think like this is a quality fight. The other fight, again,
these haven't been announced yet, but that'll be coming probably in the in
the in the you know, the next couple of weeks at least, another
middleweight fight between two up and comers, the undefeated twenty year old Elijah Garcia,
who has you been making a name for himself. He's fifteen, oh,
with twelve knock outs. And uh Armando Rozendez, who is not as
well known. He's fourteen one with ten knock guts, but he's fort a
very big win when he stopped Jared Hurd, who was coming back the former
junior middweight unified champion, was you know, perceived as a pretty big upset
at the time. Uh and uh And Garcia, you know, he stopped
the undefeated Emil clar Vidal. Uh and uh. You know it's it's just
again another I take the back. Garcia was the one that stopped Emil car
Vidal, but just a just a good just a good matchup. You know,
they're both coming off those wins. Him then Vidal Razendez obviously with the
victory over Jared Hurd. Uh. And they're both young because the other guy's
only twenty four years old. So these are the middleweight division is kind of
to use your word, bereft at the moment of top top names. But
these are two guys that are on the upswing and one of them may be
able to step into the to the spotlight in one hundred and sixty pound division.
They're going to have a chance to be in front of a lot of
people because obviously a lot of people are gonna be watching this event. So
two good undercard fights so far, and they'll be a third one that they'll
add to the pew and then of course the rest of the fights. That
thought I had you know, some for the probably the preliminary streaming fights all
that, but so far, so good. We like all of that.
Let's rock along here with more insight on the first of the Canelo Charlot press
conferences and do that as we continue. As mentioned, I think the last
time I was around this man was at the Parking GM lobby shortly after Terrence
Crawford had just beaten up Errol Spence in the World Welterweight Showdown and Raoul Marquez
stopped me in the in the lobby, and we have the same look on
our faces. I think we're still stunned a month later at how Terrence Crawford
dominated that fight. It's good to have you back on the Big Fight Weekend
podcast. Great to see you. I can see you right now while we
do the conversation, and let's let's just begin right there. Have we have
we accepted the fact that Bud Crawford did that to Errol Spence. I think
we do what a dominant amazing performance. Yeah, I agree. I think
there's finally was a closure for me this past a couple of days because I
you know, I've been trying to ask different people, you know, whatever
information I could get because I am stunned, you know, the way Crawford
dominated Aero Spence. Look, and I don't want to take anything from Brett
Crawford. He's a hell of a fighter. He's a great fighter, but
I just didn't think he would wipe out Ero Spence that easy. I was
with Derek James this past weekend, you know, since he's got Jamil Charlie
who's gonna fight Canelo Alvarez. I was there for the big press conference,
and it really comes down to man TJ. Comes down to what I've said
all along, Like it was a fifty fifty. I thought a Errow would
pull it. But that day when he woke up, it just wasn't his
day. It wasn't his day. That's what That's what Derek told me.
Just he had a bad day, you know, and Crawford had a great
day. Again, not taking anything from him. He did great. He
dominated him from the beginning. He's a hell of a fighter. He deserves
it. But you know, like just like everybody else was, you know,
we're stunted the way it happened. It was so easy. He made
it look so easy, made it look like sparn, like just another day
at the part at the office, no big deal for Terrence Crawford, and
it was a fight he had been waiting on for years and boy didn't make
the most of it. And it opens up everything, including potential rematch.
And again, I love Raoul's inside as a former world champion at junior middleweight,
so much to talk to him about. Okay, so you led me
in perfectly. I'm checking out all the coverage from showtime and online of the
first of the two press conferences Canello and Jamel Charlo on Tuesday. There's my
man, Raoul Marquez right there with Brian Campbell talking to the fighters. So
they've kicked off the media tour for the September thirtieth showdown. You were right
there, you spoke to both of them on the set with Brian. What
was your impression of the kickoff? Let's start first with Canello? How'd he
look to you? What did you think Vanello looked great? Man? He
looked like he's in a zone. He looks like he's hungry. You know,
he he realizes that maybe his last couple of fights, he hasn't looked
the best. You know. But sometimes a fighter, me being a fighter,
you need some motivation like like this kind of motivation a guy like Jermail
that is trying to you know, great history by moving up two weight divisions
and taking away Canelo's titles. So I think I was very motivated, very
respectful. There was a lot of respect towards each other. And you know,
it seems like he's he's ready to go. He's in shape already.
Jermail Charlo, as you mentioned, will have to jump up not one,
but two weight classes. There were a lot of people observing this. They
thought he looked bigger already even before training. What was your impression being around
him and what about the challenge of moving up from one fifty four to one
sixty eight. I mean sometimes you move up a couple of weight classes,
as you know, in the lower weight classes, yes, and it's like
eight pounds, this is like fourteen pounds to the bigger weight class, a
bigger weight limit. What was your impression being around Jamal charlobout carrying away.
Hey listened for Jamal it's you know, it's there to be great, you
know, and he's, uh, you gotta take risks. You gotta take
risks in the sport, you know. And honestly, it's two weight classes.
I mean, it's a big challenge that many people have done it,
you know, Tommy Hearn's, Sugar Ray Leonard Roy Jones are the only ones
that have done that being able to do that in the past. But if
you notice on the in the in the stair down the size difference, you
know, it's not you really can't see it. I mean, Charlo Jamel
is a tall guy. He's got the advantage with the height, the reach
and he and I know this guy's you know, the twins. I know
them since they were little, when they were at the gym walking around working
out. So I grew up with this guy's when I used to get trained
by Ronnie Shields. And you know, the work ethic is unbelievable. You
know, they never won the big tournaments, but they always came back and
they were always there working, trying to learn, trying to learn. And
I think that's easy. It's easy to say now did you see something out
of them as teenage years coming up that said to you, one or both
of these guys can be big time fighters. Did you see it? Yes?
Absolutely. I always say that because of their work ethic. You know,
sometimes they didn't win the big tournaments, but they were there coming back.
They were always there coming back for training to learn. They will sit
there and watch me one das even Ivander Holyfield when running trading because they wanted
to learn and get better. And look at him now. But you know,
getting back to Jamal, this is a hell of a challenge. It's
not like when I was one fifty four and I moved to one sixty.
You could see the size difference when I fought somebody like Arthur Abraham, even
Jovanni Lorenzo, And would you see him and Canelos up to each other.
You really don't see any size difference. I look at it as Jamal being
more like a one sixty pounder moving up to one sixty eight. He's been
one fifty four. Like the past three years, he's fought once a year.
When he fought Rosario in twenty twenty, he only had to make one
fifty four one time, and then he fought, Uh, what's the other
guy? Daniel? Both times Castagnol drawn, then Costigna a following year,
So find once a year. You only made one fifty four once and that's
it. Trust me. He's not walking around at one fifty four. I
know he walks around at least at one eight one eighty five. So he
is naturally a big guy. So I look at him more like maybe a
middleweight going up to super middleway. That's the way I look at this fight.
Love this man's insight with us for a few more minutes on the Big
Fight Weekend preview. Again, we don't have big time, blockbuster fights,
but I love Raoul Marquez's insight on all things with It's just one more.
Did you ever he had a hand injury that he's trying to recover from,
broken in two places the left hand, Jabel Charlo, Yeah, I don't
know if you can relate a story in your own career where you had to
come off a hand injury and what you have to go through psychologically, et
cetera to be ready to as much less get in there with a future Hall
of Fame fighter off a hand injury. Can you relate anything like that or
what is your what is your absolutely him coming off the hand injury? Well,
look, I mean nowadays with all the doctors and all the good things
that all the therapies they could do. You know, I had I had
hand surgery both of my hands. After I want to see the your boyd
campus fight. I had handswurged because I had problems with both of my knuckles.
I was off for eight months, you know. Then I came back
on ESPN and I found a tough, really tough guy about the four is.
But all of that is mental, you know, going through the rehab,
you know, going through UH, you know in the gym, you
know when you're punching UH. And I'm sure like he feels real confident now,
like how his hand is now to be four only he would be able
to tell you what goes on in camp. But I'm sure mentally, I
think he's gonna be ready because he's been out for a while too, being
able to rest that hand and be ready to go. He talked about it.
He has no problems, and that's that's that's very important when you're going
into especially a big fight against Canelo Varas. No doubt, this is why
we love the insight of this man and a couple more before we get you
out of here. Oh, by the way, Geo marquees moving up the
ranks. Geo got a t KO win this past weekend. Dad in the
corner, I've joked with you about this before. Are you as still at
this moment as anxious and as nervous with him getting in there because you can't
fight for him, you can't throw the punches. How is that going now
that you're six fights in and it was very successful this past weekend. Well,
you gotta realize it's my son, you know, it's how it's gonna
be nerve breaking. But I know how hard he works in the gym.
I know how hard we worked together. I know how hard we work on
different things, different situations. And he rose to the top. Man.
He did what he had to do. When you find on a platform like
that overtime boxing, which is a great platform. It was telebouts on the
zone box, and we were very excited. I think, you know,
Giovanni fought a hell of a fight. Man. He looked explosive. You
know, he was good with his jab, his fast combinations from different angles.
He dropped the nick give a tone in the first round. Towards the
end of the first round, he probably could have finished them, but he
didn't. You know, the bell saved him. But he came back in
the second round and he right off the bat he didn't let the tone get
his momentum. You know, we started off with the jab fast combinations and
then you know, the referee stopped the fight, and I wonder, I
love these kind of questions too. What does he do well right now that
you're very impressed with and what does he need to get better at? Give
me both six fights, but listen what I think he does very well.
And you know people might not think it's you know, a lot of people
not looked like it's that that important. Taking the pressure the you know,
so every time Jobanni fights, you know, because he's my son, he
gets a lot of exposure, he get a lot of tension, and you
know, being on this platform, you know, he beat it on Showbox,
on Showtime. You know, so every fight he fights, there's still
people wanting to see. They want to check out. Let's see with Romer
because his son is about this fight got a lot of attention and I like
the way he's so focused and relaxed. That's everything, because when you get
a fighter that's real tense and tight and nervous, he's not gonna perform the
same I'm telling you. And that's what makes Giovanni perform the way he does
because he's so relaxed, so just like another day at the gym. And
that has a lot to do also with me, because I talked to him.
I try to put this in his head and stood this in his head.
You know, feel yourself, you know, just have fun out there,
you know, do your best. Be relaxed, don't load it up
with every shot, change the speeds of your combination, put everything off.
You know, we're good off the jab. Just make him feel like at
home and you know that he's loved, and of course he is, and
that all that plays out. It's so important. Now, what does Jiovanni
have to work out? There's little things, you know, sometimes when he's
throwing his shots, you know, he might have the chin a little bit
too up. Maybe work a little bit more on his defense. There's always
room to grow, no matter what. He's going to be a world champion
one day, and I'm still gonna be trying to improve with defense, with
power, there's a lot of stuff. You could always be improving. You
never you could never be too good at boxing. That's the way I look
at it. This guy's a former world champion. He would know as he
brings his son along. And one more on that. How do you weigh
right now that you want to keep him active and you also want to be
on a plan of a little better competition, increasing better competition. How do
you weigh that in the matchmaking and in the early part of the process eight
fight, ten fight, twelveth fight with where you want to be? Oh
yeah, sooner or later. I mean, he's gonna you know, I
think we've been matching Giovanni the right way. You know that some people expected
this guy that he fought the last time to go to distance with Giovanni.
He was pretty durable and Jovanni got him out of there. So that shows
you the level of fighter that he is. He's done much better. I
think the way I look at it, the way i'd matched Silvanni. Whatever's
next, you know, I look like to like to look at the opponents.
Some guys might be really strong and powerful. Some guys might be slick
and just awkward, and those guys that want to make you look bad and
hold you. So we try to fight different styles. So whenever he fights
the big challenge, he's you know, he's able to adapt to any kind
of style. And I also based it. Look Giovanni sprawls with of course,
Stevenson Shakour like the work that Giovanni gave him. So Chakur hired Giovanni
for his of course last fight, so he was in camp with him for
about a month in Vegas. He's part of Shocky Foster. He's part of
a lot of guys, you know, even Alston Trout, you know,
like who's older and a veteran and heavier. You know, he also coming
up to me and telling me, man, you your sin is. He's
pretty good. He's gonna be all right. He's part Devin Haney. We
also got the respect for Bill Haney and his you know, his son.
Hey, Giovanni's doing good, keep it up. So when Giovanni sprawls those
kind of guys and you know, he does well. He hangs in there
with only five amateur fights for six. That gives us hope. You know
that that that's motivating, that's motivating. So we're we're excited I'm very excited,
and you know, like I said, Giovanni, I think is very
marketable. People like him. You know, the kid knows how to fight,
he's smart, and he's Raal Marquez his son. I love it.
I love it. Raoul Marquez the broadcaster. I'm still I'm loving it.
You're part not only of the Spanish call a lot of the times on Showtime
Boxing, but also the Showbox series. Yes, so Showbox is coming back
in September, September fifteenth. This is San Antonio. These are junior featherweights
Rafael PetroSA, Ramone Kardenias. The one thing we know about this series and
you love being involved is a lot of the times Gordon Hall, the matchmaking.
It's a fifty fifty fight in the main of so many times. I
know you love it, hey man, This fight sometimes are better than the
big fights because this guy's want to be where the big fights. They want
to get to the big fights, and this guy's, like you said,
it's fifty fifty fights. They're always exciting. They come to fight. There's
gonna be knockdowns, there's gonna be blood, there's gonna be guys being hurt,
because that's what people like to see. That's what we will pay to
see, and that's what you're gonna see on Showbox. And don't forget we've
had over I lost the but over maybe I think it's like over eighty now
over two world champions, future world champions that went through Showbox. And that
shows you what kind of series it is because they when they step in their
ring, that's their opportunity to shine and show the boxing world. You know,
other talents because they want, you know, a big time promoter or
big time manager or a big time TV netwere to pick them up and take
them, take them the right route. So this guy's man there, mano
a mano macho. They go at it, they go at it. I
love it. Listen. I could talk to you all afternoon, but I
love doing this because you've been great with me before. You were at the
Louis Baton store buying shoes when we do one of these, and I showed
that to you in Vegas. And remember Raoul today is trying to do this
interview while the plumber is coming to the Marquez house because they've got a plumbing
problem. I hope it's not a flood. But Raoul's like listen, we
gotta wrap this up really quick because I got the plumber coming. I am
not going to stand away. I go out of town. I go out
of town for a couple I've been I've been pretty busy, by the way.
I've been on the road ever since I saw you. That I had
Shoapbox, I had Giovanni's fight, Then I had a show in Washington,
DC. That I had the press conference in New York. So I'm finally
home. But I'm home, and you know when I when I leave,
this stuff starts falling apart. Now I'm back in town. I gotta fix
it. Now, you got to fix the plumbers. We're doing it.
I gotta get back on later on too. When it gets closer to the
Canelo Charlos, I could break it down. I'm ready to break it.
We want the breakdown from you. I got a good breakdown. I gotta
go breaways. Great to have you. You gave us great stuff today on
the Big Fight Weekend UH Preview podcast. We look forward to having you.
We look forward to Giovanni's next fight. Just real quick, how soon do
you think he'll fight? Next month? Might it be October? I think
we're looking at something in October. Possibly we'll know something very soon. All
right, good on that Raoul Marks. Followment Raoul Marks ninety two because he
was on that ninety two Olympic team. Find him on Showbox the series Showtime
Boxing's coverage and including an esponol love it. Thank you always, good luck
with everything, including the plumber. We'll do this again, Thank you,
Raoul. All right man, thank you, love his insight, and again
he will be part of that Canelo Charlo broadcast in Spanish also Showbox. Before
that, as we were mentioning with Raoul Marquez and I thought it was some
fascinating insight that he's been around the Charlo twins since they were little guys and
through the youth. And he said the thing in that interview that impressed him
was they would lose in tournaments and they would be back at the gym trying
to get better. It didn't defeat them to go try to play another sport
or go do something else. He saw some resiliency in both of them.
And he agreed with you about Charlo being thick. He's in his words,
he thinks he's walking around it like one eighty is what he looked like.
To him one eighty or one eighty five. So that was what my whole
thought. Who knows he would have to lose a lot. You're right to
get down what is sixty eight if that's the case, to get down to
that in a couple of months. If that is the case, So a
lot. We've given you a lot on Kenello and Charlo. Let's get to
the news, and you broke this story. Essentially, you found it out
from multiple sources that the women's undisputed junior lightweight champion, Alicia Baumgarner, had
tested positive for not just a banned substance, but essentially a serious performance enhancing
steroid, among other things. Apparently, So obviously this is a controversy,
and how much longer, depending on her appeal, will she hang on to
her titles as she tested positive just days before her last fight. So give
me, give me the latest, including what you have learned even since what
you reported back on Wednesday. So my experience with this is that unless there's
some massively mitigating circumstance, she will probably be stripped of her titles without question,
probably be suspended in some former fashion. You know, it's unfortunate,
it's just funny. Like that, when you break a story like that and
then suddenly, like within a half an hour, they're putting out statements submitting
it. Basically, Alicia put out her own statement and Naturum put out a
statement, which is her promoter. So this was a This was not a
VADA test. This was done by an outfit called Drug Free Sport, which
is a company that Natchroom has contracted for some of its events. They have
a little bit of a different protocol in terms of how they report results compared
to VADA. Vada is more much more transparent from the standpoint, not that
they call me up or other media members up or anything like that, but
when you test positive a VOTA test, the promoter of the event gets a
notification. Both fighter camps get a notification, the Association of Boxing Commissions gets
a notification. Whatever the commission that's overseeing the event would get a notification.
So if the fight was in like England for example, like we've seen happen,
the British board would get it, the ABC would get in America.
But let's say the fight was in New York, the Nework Commission would get
a notification, and whatever commission's overseeing the fight in drugs free sport. My
understanding is that just goes to the promoter and also to the to the camp
of the fighter that tested positive, not even necessarily the camp of the fighter
that didn't test positive. So that's one of the things I don't like about
it. I also think they largely rely on your in testing as opposed to
blood testing, which is Avada does both, but be that as amet she
was. She had had her fight against the rematch with Christina Leonardo two,
who she defeated to avenge the one loss that she had had early in her
career. This was back in mid July in Detroit, a homecoming fight for
Alicia, and people were asking because I had written the particulars of what the
timeframe was, and I'm just looking her to make sure I have it right.
So she won the bout on July fifteenth. She had submitted to the
to the earin tests on July twelfth, so three days prior to the fight.
So people are saying, well, why did they let her fight if
she gave the drug tests on the twelfth. When I try to explain to
people, if you're in a drug testing protocol, they're testing you regularly.
Throughout with every few days ever, you know whatever. And so there's constantly
tests being sent to a lab to be tested that you wouldn't necessarily get back
in three days. They do take time to do the results on and so
the situation there was it wasn't enough time to get that particular result back before
the boxing matches. Okay, let me stop you on that point. I
mean, I understand what you're saying, but this is twenty twenty three,
and I'm gonna give you some personal experience money on this money. That's all.
It's true, yes, true. And here's the other thing. What
is the purpose of having a prefight drug test if you are not going to
punish someone for whatever you found before they fight. I mean what she had
because she had multiple other prefight drug tests don't so would she have had one
that week or would it have maybe been a week had she had both?
Both of the women had multiple. It's like a rolling situation. Then again,
it's random, so you don't know exactly when. But and I'm making
up the days, but she could have had a test on Sunday, another
test on a Wednesday, and then another test on the din of the fight,
and the Wednesday, result didn't come back and till till a couple of
days ago. So now I did find it unusual that she gave the sample
on July twelfth. It was sent to the Smartle Lab in South Jordan,
Utah, which is a lab the test for It's one of the WATA accredited
labs in the United States. They do all kinds of testing for all kinds
of sports. Very busy obviously, but they didn't get it till July twenty
one, so it took like, you know, eight or nine days to
get from the collector to the Actually terrible, that's terrible. And now the
other part of it was this. So so they got the sample on the
twenty first, the results came back on the tenth. Now that's not unusual
for it. They'd be ten days. It takes time unless you're gonna pay
a premium, and they're not gonna pay for okay, so let me let
me help, not just you, I'm saying to the audience, let me
help in my own situation. I'm revealing this on the podcast, not just
birthday parties and other things. So I see an interracronologist. I have an
issue where I need to see an intercronologist, and the intercronologist wants to do
blood work, and it's always on me that I got to get the blood
work done the week before the appointment. Or guess what, Rayfield, they
can cancel the appointment and charge me for the appointment. So I have to
be responsible. As a mid fifties year old, I got to be responsible
to get my blood work done. So in my case, they are testing
testosterone levels exactly what we're talking about like this. So I went and got
my blood test on a Wednesday morning at a local lab, at a reputable
national lab, at seven o'clock in the morning. I will have you know
that the next afternoon, roughly probably about thirty hours hold hold on. Thirty
two hours later, am still going to finish? Thirty two hours later,
they had my test toss. You know why because they were testing for one
thing. No, no, no, no, they weren't incorrect. They
were testing for multiple different types of testosterone and different things in my body.
It's called three, it's called SAH, it's called different things. But it's
all based on testosterone, is what they're testing for. Correct, But I
was being tested for numerous other things and numerous other drugs and take drugs in
my system. They're looking at the level of those drugs, all of it
all on them saying to you in the present day, it should not take
ten days to get to the lab. I'm not it's not on trial.
It should not take a month to get the result. Which was ah,
well, you said August the tenth. They were notified August the tenth after
a July twelve test. That's virtually a month that they were notified of what
the AST sample on the twenty first. From the twenty first to the tenth
is not an exorbitant amount of time. Remember, they're testing for dozens and
dozens of banned substances, narcotics, all kinds of different things in the blood.
I mean, I'd rather, you know, in the in the urine
sample, not just maybe maybe the union maybe the urine sample take takes longer
than the blood sample in terms of that on being able to do all of
those types of tenting about that, by the way, And I want to
address this too, because a lot of people were, you know, and
this was part of Alicia's own statement where she's trying to make her case why
this is nonsense with it isn't nonsense because just because she says it doesn't make
it true. Just because you tested negative in a test a few days prior
to your positive, you tested positive, and then after that on the night
of the fight, I guess she tested negative. So I mean a negative,
a positive, a negative. The negative does not negate the fact that
you had a positive in there because the CIST, the substance that she used,
could have been fleshed from the system between the two tests. That's the
whole point of it is you're trying to I'm not again, I'm not saying
she tried to do this. I'm not making that inference. I'm just making
the point that it is conceivable for Alicia bomb Gunner, any athlete to go
through a testing program have negative tests come on either side of a positive test,
but it doesn't mean that you didn't take something or have something that caused
and triggered. The one other important point, and you know this, is
they began to not only have a prefight test, but have an immediate post
fight test, because a lot of times we take the prefight test and then
think I'm free and clear and take something else in the hours or the days
before the fight. Uh, and so that's why you have post fight tests
as well. Has got some splaining to do. She's got some big time
out about it. I mean, uh, whatever, the this is a
this is a muscle building steroid. Period, It's what it is. It's
a muscle building steroid. I am very familiar with a lot of these things,
and that's exactly what this is. And if she's got significant level enough
to flunk a drug test, and that means and it's what's unfortunate about it
is that, unlike our society where theoretically you're you're innocent up proven guilty,
in the world of drug testing and then combat sports in particular, because of
what's happened over all these years of their being positive tests, as you are
guilty till you're proven innocent because the test typically doesn't lie. Again, is
it possible that it's an accident. Is it possible that it was a mistake.
Is it possible that it was contamination. Yeah, it's possible, But
generally speaking, it's not an accident. It's not contamination. It's people either
take it on purpose or they are given something and they're not aware of it,
but it's somebody on their team that gives it them, but that does
not change the responsibility. And we've talked about this before, but the concept
of strict liability. You are responsible for what goes in your body. Period.
It something comes up that's not supposed to be there, that is your
problem, not anybody else's. So you know, I hope that she can
come through this and explain it and and and it's not what it looks like.
But if it walks like a duck and it quacks like a duck,
you know it's usually a duck. So you know, I don't wish bad
on her. She's been a very good fighter, obviously, but she got
caught. We're gonna be blushed. She got caught, and she's gonna be
tainted for this, for getting caught with it unless it certainly puts her undisputed
championship accomplishment in doubt as the bottom line, And so you know, they'll
go through the process. I'm always willing to keep an open mind about these
things, and we'll see what the what the commission has to say and what
comes of this. But you know, it's not a good look. Then
it's unfortunately, you know, the thing I was thinking about, By the
way, and I'm sure that it's not the only one, and I don't
can't say I know every single positive drug testing situation that's ever happened, but
it struck me that it was like the first time I could think of where
a top level female boxer had tested positive for a banned substance that was this
type of substance you know in a screen going into a into a significant fight
for you know, a world championship. It's it's mostly the men. I
mean, it's not that it's never women ever, but this was like maybe
one of the highest profile ones I can think of that involved a female boxer.
And it's not necessarily like a weight loss situation where you're trying to cut
weight make a weight weight loss enhancing drug. Again, this is a muscle
building steroid from everything I read about it. And I know a lot about
this stuff from a lot of days of doing sports media and the stuff that
I take and don't take from my own personal health. I know a lot
of about that. I have to get you tested to do this show.
The good news is neither one of us have to get tested. I should
be tested as to why I keep sitting with you every Thursday night into Friday
and every Sunday night in a Monday. Maybe that's at scan. I'm not
just her, but anyway, I need an MRI. We certainly gave a
lot of attention to that, and rightfully so, and we will wait for
more of your reporting. And I want to think about that. By the
way, Yeah, I reported on the on the band substance, which was
mestro, a loan that she tested positive for. In her own statement that
she put out, she actually said she tested positive for mestel and another steroid
called neth and alone. So I didn't see. I got a copy and
people can look at my Twitter if they want where I posted the paperwork.
You know, people accuse me of like making shit up and whatever. I
don't care about that, Like you shouldn't put it out because it's like a
hippolo. I'm not down by hippolo because I'm not a doctor. I'm a
third party journalist that was able to get a hold of something and you know,
it's none of your business and I'm demonstrating that she tested positive. Here's
how I know. Boom correct, I'm with you. But the thing is
the letter that was sent to to their team was just about the mestrolne I
don't have a copy of a letter that says she tested positive for men alone,
but she said it in her own statement. So take that for what
it's worth. Two of them. Yes, I get that. Okay,
let's get to some fight news and then we've got some nostalgia, and then
we are done. You've got some reporting and some things that you have found
out. Interesting names. Let's begin with Zerdo Ramirez, former one hundred and
sixty eight pound world champ. When last we saw him, Dmitri Beevil was
beating him decisively in a light heavyweight title challenge. He will fight Joe Smith
Junior, who again, when last we saw him, unless I have it
wrong, Arthur better Be beat him badly and took his title off of him
in a unification fight at light heavyweight. All right, what have you learned
about these guys? They're getting together and when and what do we know?
Yeah? So, I mean, like you said, they're both coming off
one side of losses, one by decision, one by knockout. Of course,
Zerdo was supposed to fight in March, but he was so dramatically over
the one hundred seventy five pound weight limit by like almost eight pounds, and
he never even came to the official weigh in and the fight was canceled and
they ended up having to go forward with a much reduced event because they just
put the undercard on. So I my sources have told me that they are
in the process of finalizing this fight. That and it's a good matchup.
I mean, even though they're coming off losses, that's fine. There's still
two of the better fighters that have been light heavyweights over the last number of
years. That day will do a fight. It'll be early October, you
know, official date to be announced. They're gonna have a fight in a
in Las Vegas. That's the site. And because Zero obviously is never gonna
make light heavyweight again, whereas Joe Smith could still fight a light heavy if
he wanted, part of the deal was it's going to be a catchweight,
so it's not going to be at the full cruiserweight limit. But they're gonna
do the fight, and this is one of the things they're still dickering around
about. I don't think there's like a big argument about it. They're just
having actually determined. But it'll be at a weight somewhere in the one nineties
and that's really an accommodation to Zero, who was going to be moving up
to cruiserweight at some point fully anyway. And for Joe Smith, who's the
smaller, uh, you know, he's not really so much smaller based on
the fact they both were light heavyweights for a long time, you know,
because Zerno, remember one, is world title as a super middleweight, not
as a light heavyweight the way that Joe Smith did. So the weight situations
and accommodation for Zero, I had a lot of people like tweeting, why
isn't it at one seventy five? Well, who cares? Not a title
fight? One guy's moving up and wait, anyway, he's not going to
even be at the full cruiserweight limit. So they're gonna have a nice matchup.
It'll headline at his own Golden Boy card somewhere, you know, in
the in the one hundred and nineties in terms of the weight, and the
winner will obviously take a big step forward and the loser is gonna have some
big problems because they'll have two losses in a row and you don't have to
figure out what they're gonna do. But that that, you know, it's
kind of like the uh, the Dmitri Bevo loser sweepstakes because they both got
beat by Bevil. You know, uh, Zero getting basically shut out essentially
in the in the fight that we just talked about. And then Joe Smith,
you know a few years earlier, also lost the decision to people.
I was actually at that fight in Turning Stone. Uh. He almost stopped
a Bible late in the fight, but he couldn't get enough done in the
twelfth round. But that was a solid matchup. So anyway, good fight
if you ask me, I like the matchup should be a good, exciting
fight. Continuing, you've also learned unification at middleweight involving Janna Beck and and
basically the next week now that we're talking about this in October, October fourteenth,
correct, tell me more. Yeah, So this is going to headline
an ESPN event. It's going to take place in Texas. They haven't I
haven't learned the exact venue yet. I don't think it's like that site signed
yet, but it will be in Texas, which is kind of weird because
jannabec Almacanooley is from Kazakhstan. He will be unifying. He's the WBO champion.
He will fight the newly crowned IBF title holder from Germany named Vincenzo Gulatari,
who was probably, for my money, maybe the most anonymous world titleder
in the entire sport. Remember when Triple G vacated the WBA and the IBF
titles they were to be fought for. Well, Aristonia Lar really was just
elevated to the full WB from the regular champion, but the IBF belt was
vacated. So uh this uh Gulatari fought against the top ranks undefeated Esteva Falco,
that took place in July in Germany, and uh, you know,
and he won the belt and so this will be his first defense. I
mean, it's kind of like when there's nothing else going on in the weight
class, what are you gonna do? You're always looking for what's the biggest
money fighting, While this is not a mega money fight by any stretch of
the imagination, in a in a weight class that's sold, to use your
word, your favorite word, bereft of top guys, Uh, at least
if they partial to devoid you like bereft, But devoid also works too.
It's devoid, keep going devoid. So if these guys unify at least the
winner will do something to help raise their profile, you know, because Gulatari
has never fought outside of Germany. Uh Jannebec. You know, he's a
good fighter, but he's not uh not does not have any particular fan base
here in the United States, even though this is where he fights. So
but you know what, as a as a top rank ESPN main event,
I'm down for a unification fight. What the heck? Nothing wrong with that.
So, you know, we'll see if they can unify their titles,
and hopefully it'll be a good fight. And I watched the Gulitary Thalkal fight
that's on. You know, it was made of help by the uh the
German promoter on YouTube, and uh it wasn't like a barnburner, but it
was certainly watchable. It was a pretty solid fight. So it is what
it is, you know. And this is a year where we've seen,
you know, the last couple of years, lots of unification fights on disputed
fights, so uh, you know, this will be to unify two of
those titles and we'll see what goes from there. Now I feel like I'm
selling again the the Ginsu stake knives or whatever else that we wait, wait,
now it's flexile that Jerry Seinfeld was joking about, right that he sees
the flexile. How much would you pay now twenty ninety five? But wait,
there's still more Rayfield news about October. You got you gotta tell the
people why you're bringing up Seinfeld because we got to see him. We got
to see him in Las Vegas, his show at Caesar's Palace, and he
went on and on for about five minutes about flex Saul the great glue like
tape and substance that helps seal everything up. And the infomercials and the commercials
brilliant is always from Jerry. So that was one of the best parts of
the whole week, was seeing I mean, look, I enjoyed being at
Spence Crawford. I we're digressing here. I like being at the fight,
of course, but you know, that's like a bucket list thing. Go
see Jerry Seinfeld that Vegas and concert. I've never seen Jerry perform live.
I've watched him. I watched on the show where you see the little segments
or you've maybe seen a special right on TV that he was fantastic. He
was tremendous and by the way, he's coming to Meyer. He's coming to
Tampa for the one night only at the end of September. While we're doing
schedule stuff, he's going all over the country. So Seinfeld maybe come into
a city near you, peeps, check it out. But he was in
Vegas when we were out there. But anyway, how much would you pay
for the fight news for rayphel Uncovering fight Matchups nineteen ninety five. But wait,
there's more the next week in October October twenty feet, you've got Alexis
Rocha back in action. Tell me more about what you found out, because
we've seen Rocha's last couple of fights was good as a welter weight A mean
more, this is another good matchup. I mean again, not superstar names,
not big world championships, but at least what should be a fun fight.
Rocha, who's won a bunch of fights in a row since his one
lost to Rashidi Ellis back a couple of years ago, back in twenty nineteen,
I believe it was. Anyway, he's gonna take on the undefeated Giovanni
Santion, who's like, what's the thirty one and zero? He's with top
ranks, So this is things. Two good things. One a solid fight
between two welterweight contenders, and two another example of the fact that that rival
companies like Top Rank and Golden Boy, who get along pretty well these days,
are able to make a fight together. Sometimes they put a Golden Boy
fight. Top rank fighter goes on a Golden Way card, and there's been
times when the Golden fighter goes on the Top Rank card. This is one
of those times where the Top Rank fighter is going to go over and fight
on a Golden Boy card. So it's ticketed for The data is supposed to
be October twenty feet. Now, this was not anything that was like from
anonymous sources. I spoke to Eric Gomez, who was the president of Golden
Boy Promotions, who told me about this fight, and I confirmed it with
the Top Rank people. So the data is supposed to be October twenty one,
but that is pending them finalizing a site, which they do not have
just yet. So the site is TBA. It's probably going to be the
twenty first. And the interesting thing about this is Alexis Rocha, who is
now twenty three and one, who's sitting there as the mandatory challenger for the
WBO welterweight title held by Terrence Crawford as well as Crawford has all the other
belts, but when they were making the fight between Crawford and Spence, he
stood aside to allow the Spence Crawford fight to go forward to be for all
of the belts, because he could have really pressed the issue and carried on
about the mandatory and out of everything, but he was cool about it,
and Golden Boy gets it. They're not looking to get Crawford stripped because A
they would like a shot at Crawford if he stays around the way Glass because
it's a lot of money, or B, you know, a more winnable
fight. They'd be content if he had to go fight for title against somebody
that's not as good as Crawford. So they're in a pretty good position.
So he's going to risk that status against a guy that's thirty one and zero,
but it's a good matchup. I mean, it seems to me that
if you can't make these major world title fights for different reasons. Obviously in
Wealight, one guy's got all the belts and you know, we're not sure
what he's gonna do. Just get might as well make two contenders against each
other, and that's what this is, hey, and again that would be
Golden Boy in top rank trying to get together, as you made mention of.
While we're on the subject, you know that Golden Boy is talking with
Virgil Ortiz, who's been sidelined now a couple of times because of the blood
disorder that he has. I'm still concerned. What do I know that this
is career threatening. You're at least encouraged that they're talking to him right about
returning. Nothing firm as of yet, though, While we're on the Golden
Boy walterweight subject for Ortiz, right, So Virgil, as everybody knows,
he had a withdraw from the fight against Danionist, the regular WBA welterweight champion.
That was a fight that I think a lot of us we're looking forward
to, supposed to take us on July eighth. It was actually the third
time that the fight was postponed then canceled. One of the first one,
remember, was when Standyonis had have the appendecked to me in the emergency situation.
The next one was when Virgil was beset by his rob though blood disorder
that caused him problems. And then the third one that happened a couple of
days before they were supposed to fight, perhaps related to rob though but not
specifically, but he fainted in the gym. The most people believe it was
due to his trying to make the weight one hundred and forty seven pounds,
but anyway, he ended up in the hospital and the fight got canceled.
So Golden Boy is going to meet with Virgil and his team sometime this again
what Eric told me when I spoke to him, sometime the next couple of
weeks, to have a specific discussion about the particulars about his return, which
they're planning to do in December. And at that conversation, you know,
I'm sure they'll talk about potential opponents. They'll also solidify the fact that,
even though it's not officially yet, I'm sure it will become officially. He's
not going to fight at welterweight. This fight will be I'm sure junior middleweight.
And that wouldn't shock me, to be honest with you, even if
it was a little hired than that, just because it's not a championship fight
or anything. If they did it at like one fifty five, one fifty
six something, like that. But the good news is, as long as
Virgil is healthy and by all accounts he's doing well and everything is good,
we'll see him back in the ring, you know, one time before the
end of this year, and hopefully a new weight class and he can get
himself back on track because he's an outstanding young fighter and you'd hate to see
it gets snuffed out before he gets the opportunity to fight for a world Tyler
or have a bigger fight. One more news item than some Mike Tyson nostalgia
before we are done, and that is and this is unfortunate. We're not
going to revel in this. But it doesn't happen all the time. But
Top Rank has cut loose some of their their fighters out of their stable because
they haven't been performing or producing enough. I mean, that's just what happens,
and every promoter this happens. So but it's uh, you know,
everybody. Every now and then you got to kind of purge the roles because
as you sign more fighters, you gotta gotta get rid of the ones that
aren't performing, either in terms of wins losses, or or drawing or being
a pain in the neck or whatever the case may be it ain't like baseball.
We gotta guarantee contract or. You know, in the NFL they can
catch you anytime, and in boxing most of the time promoters, if they
so desire, they can cut you whenever. So Top Rank, based on
recent results of fights that took place in July, they have released from my
reporting the lightweight Carlos Beldaris, who's been a big disappointment. He was a
Olympian, you know, he got he came in with a lot of hype.
It was with Richard Schaeffer, suffered a loss in twenty nineteen, signed
with Top Rank. They had high hopes for I'm a good looking kid,
nice kid, you know, fun style, just never got to that level.
You know. He won several fights in a row with Top Rank,
five in a row actually, and then in a recent fight on July twenty
eighth, the night before Spence Crawford on the Sinisa Strada undercard, you know,
he lost and a guide that he had no business losing to. And
here Albright, so he got the pink slip. And the other fighter that
was on that same show, Xavier Martinez, he took on Andre's Cortez and
that was a matchup that was sort of like a fifty fifties kind of fight
where Top Rank had both guys and they just made the fight and Morten sure
who was going to win, and Cortez stopped him in the round and they
released him. Now, look, that was his second loss in a row
in three fights he's had with Top Ranks, So I get that one.
And then the other one was the heavyweight Stephan Shaw, who they co promoted
with Loud Debella. He's still with de Bella, but he looked He's never
really looked good in his recent fights. He got a six round knockout loss
to Joseph Goodall back on July twenty second, and they were like, we're
done with that. And Top Rank is, you know, very involved in
the heavyweight division, as you know, with having recently signed Jolla Lave,
the gold medal winner from the Olympics, and obviously they have Jared Anderson and
Faa Jagba and you know several other heavyweights. Obviously they're the co promoter of
the heavyweight champion Tyson Fury. But Shaw has been a disappointment big time,
and that was just a terrible, terrible performance he had against Goodall. I
think more more than just the loss. He didn't really look like he tried
in that fight, and so he gets the pink slip also. So yeah,
it's just it's part of the game. Unfortunately, Hopefully these guys will
all, you know, be able to come back and hook up with other
promoters in the case of Shaws with the Bell and you know, continue with
their careers and reached the promised land. Just because you get released doesn't mean
you can't go on to do big things. It happened plenty of times where
guys get caught in, they find success elsewhere, go find another promotion,
work hard to get back in there, a bit of nostalgia, and then
we're done. Mike Tyson nostalgia. It was twenty eight years ago Saturday as
we released the podcast that Tyson came out of the clink, The who'scal how
many different metaphors we want to use? The lock up? The pokey you
got anymore? Jason the cooler? Okay, I think I'm good. He
came out of prison in Indiana and he fought Peter McNeeley in a much hyped
pay per view that probably didn't deserve to be nearly as hyped as it was.
But it was more about Tyson's return to the ring, and really all
the build up and all the blustering before the fight, and the fight was
like seven seconds, okay, or seventeen seconds or twenty seven seconds as longer
than that, but it was actually eight quickly eighty nine seconds. It was
over quickly. McNeeley tried to engage him for about three or four second It's
what a mistake that was. And it was over a short time later.
But don't you remember listening to all the pre fight where he was gonna rap
Tyson in this cocoon of horror? I didn't remember that phrase. So the
fight actually lasted two seconds less than when Mike knocked out Michael Snakes to be
the undisputed are the lineal heavyweight champion. He was already undisputed when he knocks
spins out and the two undefeated fighters. But I don't think people canna if
they weren't around in nineteen ninety five. Remember, Mike had been in prison
for for or you know, he had gotten out. He had been out
of the ring for four years. He hadn't fought since his rematch victory against
Razor Ruddick. They had had a tremendous first fight, a pretty good second
fight, and then he you know, he went to prison for the rape
conviction, and everybody knew he was gonna fight when he got out of jail.
Obviously, he resigned with Don King, which a lot of people thought
was a terrible mistake. And I think if he asked Mike, he would
tell you the same thing based on the lawsuits and all the things that happened
after that. But he was back with with with Don. They put this
fight on at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. It did. It was
a back then. It was set pay per view, which is the old
name for showtime pay per view, and like you said, it had no
business being this big of an event. But Tyson was, you know,
the face of boxing. He was the biggest name in the sport. He's
one of the most famous people in the world period boxing sports, or just
in terms of any person out there. They drew a big crowd, and
the thing is this fight sold and one point five million plus on pay per
view, an absolutely gigantic number there had Remember at that time, there had
never been even a two million selling pay per view. Now there's been a
few with Canello and Floyd and pack Hill and Floyd and Connor and whatever,
Oscar and and Floyd very uncommon. Like the record at that time was it
still hadn't even been achieved when Tyson the Tyson holy Field fight hadn't happened yet,
Tyson versus Lewis hadn't happened yet. So one point five two I think
at that time, if it wasn't the all time record and it was like
in the top two or three, it was a gigantic event. Two things.
Number one, that the pay per view had really begun to take hold
in the early to mid nineties away from the closed circuit, and the internet
was still really new, and you didn't really have ways. You didn't have
a streaming way. In other words, to watch the fight, you had
to buy it through the pay per view to be able to get it.
So much show Brother Rayfield. I still remember this. I had the pay
per view. I bought the pay per view at my apartment. I was
not yet married. I would get married the next year. My fiance is
there other friends broadcasting friends of mine, and I kept saying, as they
got to the ring and they're doing the introductions, I'm like, get in
here in the living room of my apartment. I'm like, get in here
because this thing is about to start and it may not take very long.
And I had one media friend who's like, oh, what's the big I'm
like, get in here. This may take a minute, because we've been
over here for like forty five minutes or an hour waiting for this thing to
start, having some snacks, food, beverage, whatever. Get in here
for the start of it. And I was not wrong. Rayfield twenty eight
years ago, not exactly a difficult prediction to make, but the fact that
this fight did that kind of business against Peter McNeely, who was nothing more
than a club fighter. I mean, and I'm not trying to insult him,
but he could not fight at all. He had a great chick about
him. He could talk. You know, he went forward and try to
make a brawl, but you don't go and try to brawl with Mike Tyson,
who you know, we're looking to just get you out of there in
the first of the comeback fights. And you know it's funny, actually I
remember it after, you know, he became a celebrity after that loss.
He did a Pizza Hut commercial. Remember he got knocked out by the slice
of pizza, the very first box I didn't remember that until you just I
gott a YouTube that so so he had gotten knocked down by Tyson in the
fight, and his manager, Vinny Vecchioni, had got in the ring to
keep him from getting destroyed, and it ended up becoming officially a disqualification.
But I think we can all agree it was gonna end in the very horrible,
violent fashion for McNeilly. But what I was gonna tell you the very
first professional boxing card I ever covered, which we have discussed before. I've
told the story many times of how I got the blood of George Heckley on
my notebook from the punchrom Buddy McGirt in the main event that made me from
just a regular boxing fan to a lunatic boxing fan. And that was the
first boxing match in terms of professionals that I ever attended and the first one
I ever covered. But on the undercard was the post Tyson Peter McNeeley,
who was like, yes, Buddy McGirt was the name fighter on that show.
But in terms of the local build up to the event, because we
didn't have a lot of boxing cards, you know, in Saratoga Springs,
New York. The guy that was getting all the attention besides Buddy McGirt as
the former two division world champion future Hall of Famer, was Peter McNeeley,
not because he was any good, but because he was the guy that came
back and had gotten fame around the world because he was Mike Tyson's first opponent
of post prison, and so he was also on that undercard. So I
have the memory of one of the very first professional boxing matches I ever have
saw a scene was you know, in terms of in person, was Peter
McNeeley on that undercard And then of course, you know, we went forward
with the rest of the show. But yeah, that was that was a
humungous event. Huge. I wish people should go and check out some of
the build up if they can find that on YouTube, because it was it
was massive. We did, we did talk a lot about it. Let
me just say this, there was more build up for Tyson McNeely than there
was for Errol Spence Terren Scrawford by a ton Well, and again boxing was
much more mainstream. He was a worldwide star that had been in prison and
this was the first fight coming out of prison. And here's another thing,
because I remember defending this. At that time, I was doing five day
a week sports radio, and I kept defending this over and over again,
and I was right then. I'm still right thirty years later, thirty plus
years later, for all the talk from Don King and those around him that
Desiree Washington, the victim in this case, was was only in this for
money, to sell a book, to sell a movie, to sell whatever.
Desiree Washington gave one interview into my knowledge, one and one only ever
to like good Morning America or something. That's the only place she talked immediately
after the rape conviction. She has never had a book, never had a
movie deal, and they, I mean you know, they vilified her for
weeks that that was her only motive in this. It's thirty something years later,
never made a penny off of telling her story, wanted to go about
her privacy because something horrible happened to her, and wanted to get on with
the rest of her life. So that's that's now, thirty years later.
And not not to get on a tangent, but as as Tyson once told
me, and I'm not condoning it making excuses, I don't I'm not saying
I believe him. I'm just telling you what he said. I'm paraphrasing.
I didn't rape the girl, but I did enough bad ship in my life
that I deserved to be in prison. Okay, yeah, well that's that's
the philosophy according to Mike Tyson. But he did return from prison for that
fight with Peter mcnelian. By the way, a Saturday. I believe it's
Saturday, the anniversary of Alexander Usik defeating Anthony Joshua as that was the rematch,
the rematch last year. Let me double check on which exact day it
is for the weekend. That's yes, that's actually Monday. It's actually Monday,
but it was a year. It's the last time we saw us is
a year ago when he beat Anthony Joshua to retain unified titles. And now
we'll see him again here coming up next weekend for the first time since that
fight. So there you go. You've had plenty here on the program.
I'm looking forward to seeing us back in action against Duet. I don't think
it has got a huge chance to win. Save Your Savior Powder because we
got a Sunday night show and we still got a you next week that we
got to come up with material for again the Sunday night show. We're gonna
get creative because we don't really have big fight cards. If something dramatic happens,
we'll probably talk about it. Dan may have an interview, We'll have
other fight news. We will have something for you off the weekend. Even
though we were robbed of the due to the injury of the better BF Smith
fight this weekend for the unified light heavyweight titles. We don't have that this
weekend, but we will have a Fight Freach Unit recap in the meantime.
Enjoy your weekend. You're Saturday with light boxing. I'm headed to New York
again for Buccaneer preseason football game Saturday night. So I'll stay in touch with
you off the weekend and we'll do a Fight Freaks Unit recap on something off
the weekend. My friend, and as I say to our boxing fans and
friends, on Saturdays, when there's no boxing to speak of, call your
mother, Yes, please do get ahold of mom and grandma whoever else did
you want to get a hold of. Follow Subscribe to this podcast by the
way rate US Interview US, Apple Podcast, Google Podcast Spotify. We go
into the weekend with the Big Fight Weekend Preview. We come off the weekend
Sunday night in the Monday with the Fight Freaks Unite recap. More and more
of you are finding us. Thank you for doing so, Dan Raphael,
have a great weekend. We'll talk to you off the weekend, all right,
you Tube. There is our insider. Go read him on his Fight
Preach Unit, Substack and Bigfight Weekend dot Com. I'm merely TJ. Reeves.
Thank you for being with us as part of the Big Fight Weekend Preview. M