The countdown is on to fight time. This is Big Fight Weekend. No.
Here is your host, TJ. Leise. Yes, here we are.
It is June already, can you believe it? And we're ready to
preview the weekend as we come back in here is part of the Big Fight
Weekend preview. I'm just the somewhat competent host. He is our insider from
his fight preaks, Unite, Substack and Big Fight Weekend dot Com. Hello,
Dan Raypiel, Good to be back with you. We do have a
world title fight involving Claressa Shields to talk about. Lots of news and some
good nostalgia to get to on the program. Are you in a decent mood?
I know you've gotten a little cultured since the last time that you and
I talk. We may or may not get into that. How you feeling?
How are things I'm doing good? You know you always introduce me and
you always tell me you're the competent host that you never tell our listeners your
name. This is t J. Reeves. That's more than competent host.
Okay, I'm glad that you now perceived me after over a year of doing
this. Being about being a little more than competent, a little bit more
than lucid and rested in those kind of things. It does say my name
though at the beginning of the podcast, and would it's just the mid the
big intro voice, and I should get the voice of Thunder to say with
Dan Rayfield to come back around if I pay him enough. But that's another
that's another situation. But thank you. How are you feeling You're ready to
go for another week and another weekending in another month. How was that cultured?
You were cultured because you were taking in the arts with your son and
a performance. Are we going to get into that for a second? Cultured
this week? I was, I was impressed. You sent me a photo.
It was a big thing. I mean, when you got a bunch
of kids in elementary school and you take the elementary school band, you take
the elementary school orchestra, and you put them all together like two hundred kids
in a big middle school gymnasium where they played basketball, and everybody's parents and
friends show up and they put on the spring concert, you know, a
couple of weeks before the end of school. It's like a big deal.
And since my son participates in the orchestra, with lots of his other friends
from the school. We went to the concert last night and we watched all
these kids. And let me tell you, I'm not just saying this as
a proud debt. Those kids really they did very well. They played nice.
The band music was good, the works from music was good. We
had a very nice time. I love that. What does he play again
for the audience, I'm just curious. My son plays the stand up bass,
which is taller than he is at the moment. I love that.
That's outstanding. So this begs the question. I am not musically inclined in
the least. I never relayed an instrument. You never played an instrument.
Nothing. So when I was a kid, like in like junior high and
that I did play the I played the trumpet in the school band. Okay,
so you can play a little trumpet. But he, obviously I was
not very good by that. He got his musical inclination from missus Raphael.
We're saying that. So I think he just was interested, like you know
him and those kids, if the kids in school were interested to do it.
He came home one day and said, I'd like to do this.
I've got some of my friends are doing it. Can I do this?
Said? Okay? It sounded good. And he has the bass in the
home where he practice, or he's only had it at school, and he
only practices at school, because that's a big item to transport. But I
mean not to say that anybody really who's listening cares. But I'm gonna tell
you anyway, most of the kids that they're playing in the in the orchestra,
they're playing like the violin, they're playing the cello, they're playing the
viola, whatever the stuff is they play. They transport back back and forth
to practice and everything. But as you say, because the base is so
freaking big, there's actually two. One is at school in the band room,
and the other one is at our home in the basement that we rent
that he practices. And then we brought into the kids. So we had
to bring the big one to school for the actual performance at you and but
it was in a different school than where he goes to school. Was in
the was in the middle school. Now they so did you put the seat
belt across the base just like a childhood because it's a bit's a precious item
there. We can't have a you know a problem with it falling over something
in traffic, seatbelt around the base or no, I don't think the seat
belt was are we kind of like you can push the back seat forward to
make the trunk larger. We were able to fit it in there, and
then he sat in the backseat with it to make sure everything was okay.
This is what you get on the podcast, and by the way, don't
sell it short. There are a lot of people that are listening to us
that have kids that data recitals, dance and our audience that you know,
while we love and we do boxing a lot, and we're really into it,
and I spend an ordinate amount of my life in my day thinking about
it, writing about it, talking about it, that we actually do have
lives beyontween the boxing business and the fights, because as we've told the fans
and the listeners, you've got your twin daughters and a wife, fun of
my wife, and we got other stuff going on a side boxing, no
doubt about that. And by the way, it was the big recital and
everything went great. I did share with you just one more aside. I
went for the boss move. I went for the power move because my three
my wife and my twins that are now about to be fifteen years old.
I can't believe that they are going to a dance recital on Sunday. And
I was able to get out of it because I paid for the upgraded tickets
for them to move them closer to the stage at some thirty dollars a pop
for this day recital. And I got a twin telling me that their friend
is not on until the final couple of acts. I guess, and they're
gonna have to sit there for like ninety minutes before their friend dances. But
I paid Raypheel for the upgraded tickets. And I think there are a lot
of males that are listening to us that are dads that can relate to this
and appreciate a good boss move, which is buy them the upgraded tickets.
You guys have fun. I'll be watching or playing golf. I'll be doing
something else, rewatching some boxing something coming on Sunday. So there you go
a little bit of peek inside the reeves. And ray Fael I did mentioned
to my son that while I thought he did a great job in his performance
and that all the kids did a wonderful job, I did say, you
know, it would have been nicer if it could have been a little bit
more like kiss and we could have seen some fireworks and some fire breathing and
some blood spitting, but it was all right. Well, and by the
way, I have been to these so I can identify with you where they
are just at times off key and what do I know about music, but
they're blaring the rock and roll version of something and it's off key and you're
sitting back trying to smile and go, yes, you're really good or except
if you're not with the middle school or the late elementary, Okay, so
good stuff on that. By the way, thank you for finding us.
We do preview on the weekends overnight Thursday into Friday. We come off the
weekend and recap on Sunday night into Monday with whatever goes on on the weekend
with fights, results, news. So make sure that you're with us on
the Big Fight Weekend podcast feed. Follow, Subscribe Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts,
Spotify. Dan Rayphael is insistent and may come through the microphone and smack
me if I don't say rate us and review us. That does help us
in the searches in the algorithms through Apple podcast rate and review us give us
a five star review. Several of you did that in the month of May.
Let's get June off to a good start. Give us some good ratings
and reviews. Tell us that you like us and appreciate us, because again,
that helps us move up on the ranking somewhat. And more and more
of you, again we say thank you. More and more of you are
finding us, and we love that. You'll get great conversation from us,
but also newsmakers, interviews, fighters. You know you talk to Joe Goosen
recently, we've talked to fighters like Ryan Garcia, Canelo Alvarez and others on
this feed. You get those all the time if you follow or subscribe,
even beyond just the preview podcast or the recap podcast. All right, with
all that being said, again, Claressa Shields will defend her undisputed women's middleweight
championship in Detroit Saturday night. We will get to the preview of that fight
in a little bit full understanding, no disrespect to Claressa. This is not
a big time, massive fight. It's a late replacement opponent. We will
give it its due a little later on the preview. She's expected to win
the bigger story is how big an atmosphere is it in Detroit? She's fighting
downtown. We'll get to that in a little bit, but we've got some
other fight news that will cover first, and then we'll get to that preview.
Okay, So it's officially official, as officially as it can be.
Errol Spence and Terence kraw for July twenty nine in Las Vegas will fight.
They made that announcement, contract sign and so now we roughly have eight weeks
until that will take place. Dan further follow up thoughts there, Well,
it was just you know last week when they went on their social media,
both Terrence Crawford and Arrow Spence and told the world we're fighting and it's done
and all that, and that was great and it was like a sigh of
relief slash a big cry of joy from boxing fans all around the world excited
for that fight. But then it was this week on Thursday, or I
guess on Wednesday actually where the people that actually do the paperwork and make things
officially official and all that put out the formal announcement with stuff about tickets and
all the particulars. So you have Showtime, PBC, TGB Promotions everybody involve
put out the formal press announcements, gave link you know, gave places to
buy tickets to presale began on Thursday. We're taping this just a few hours
after the presale began. The public sales starts on Friday, and so now
it's just another reason for us to be It's I can't talk about this fight
enough. So this was not unexpected obviously, but now it's, as you
said, officially official. And while it's not one scheduled yet, probably not
next week, but the week after. I guess they'll actually do a two
city media tour where they will go and greet the media, perhaps some fans
in both Los Angeles as well as in New York, where you know,
we'll get to hear from the fighters and obviously they'll have a lot to say
about this fight and they'll lead up to it. And I mean, I
know both guys have been already training, so it's not like they haven't been
prepping for this fight already, since I think both guys had an idea that
they would make the fight, and even if they didn't make the fight,
they would fight somebody else. So they've been they've been in the gym and
listen. Like we talked about when when they both announced it on their social
media. This is such a huge fight and I can't tell you what it
will do in terms of money and pay per view. But every boxing fan
I have come across, encountered interacted with in any way, shape or form
on social media, or those who go on my substack and maybe write a
comment on the bottom of a story or something along those lines. Other people
I know in the business who I talk to, our text with or email
with. Every single person and to a you know, to a man,
a woman, whatever, is very excited and can't wait for this fight.
Even people that are not involved with the fight, who worked for rival outlets,
rival TV, rival promotions, even there, like you know what,
I'm watching this one, or you know, I'm gonna maybe try to get
a ticket at that one. Everybody is excited for this fight. It's truly
like I haven't felt this kind of like buzz for a fight, you know,
this far out in a long time. I tell you when I remember
when let's go back a number of years ago when Canelo Alvarez and employed Meweather
did their fight and they embarked on their media tour. They did a few
different cities, and then one of them was watching this, so I attended
the media the media stop for that particular fight. You could just feel right
away that the people that came out that was open to the fans free of
charge to common watch them through their press conference and talk to the fans and
all that business. Everybody left was such a good feeling, and it just
sort of like it was like a snowball, and everybody wherever they went,
they were excited about the fight. You know, they talked to their friend,
they went to the barbershop, went to the bar, talked to their
colleague, talk to their brother or their buddy, whatever, and it just
created such a buzz in terms of word of mouth. I feel like this
fight has a chance to maybe not at that same level of sales, but
to just really stoke the interests of the mainstream sports fan. And they're off
to a good start, just what I can tell in the first few days
of this being done. And you know, we got now good two months
to really dig our teeth into this thing and and really get even more pumped
up about it. I cannot wait for this fight. I'll be there in
Vegas, and it's going to be a great show. I can't imagine this
being a bad fight either. That's the beautiful thing. There are certain fights
where you might get excited about just because it's a great match up in terms
of like this this the stakes there, or what it means. But this
obviously has that because it's all the historical elements we have already spoken about the
undisputed. They're both undefeated pound for pound supremacy perhaps, but when the bell
rings, just in terms of the actual combat, and it's gonna be a
hell of a fight. So I can't wait. And anyway, it is
now officially official, and uh, you know, I'm sure that those tickets
will sell. Well, they did, you know the tickets that went on
sale? I may, I may mention, and this is the pre sale,
so they didn't open up the entire ring, and they put on certain
sections. You surfing around on the pre sale, what did you find?
I took a look that tickets were priced from fifteen hundred and five dollars up
to eighty five hundred dollars, but those were certain sections and ringside. And
so when the pre sale, by the time this comes out, it'll be
most people in the here. It will be already on Friday, so I
believe it's one pm Eastern time on Friday is when the public sale begins and
they'll open up other sections. So, but they don't have the prices of
what those are, so I can't tell you what already, you know,
say, like what the nose leads are or what the second tier level of
the ticket prices are. But uh, you know, hopefully there's at least
some some tickets for you know, normal people to be able to purchase and
take it for a decent price, you know, a couple hundred bucks and
be able to get in. But you know, I can tell you one
thing, whatever the ticket prices are on this one, you know, obviously
it's probably going to be a sellout. I have no doubt in my mind.
It's going to be a big crowd, and it's going to be a
great like a truly great week in Vegas that week. I cannot wait,
no doubt, all right, So we're anxious for that to get underway.
And again, this is a technical thing and an obvious thing. Obviously the
fighters were announcing it on social media, but you didn't get the official announcement
from those parties until everybody signed everything, and everything's firm like you have always
talked about in common sense always dictates make sure everybody's signed on the dotted line.
And I do think it was interesting. One more on this, then
we're gonna move on. Terence Crawford has revealed this a couple of times now
in interviews is what really put this firmly to bed here, put it into
motion. And they got the agreement done. Was Errol Spence stayed on the
phone, kept after him on the phone. They got on the phone and
Crawford finally, I guess, felt good enough about the two or three concerns
he had, with Spence saying to him, offered on paraphrasing, said I
had a couple of concerns, and Errol Spence said, this is not going
to be a problem. You'll get it in writing. You'll get it in
writing that that is not going to be a problem. That's not going to
be a problem. And they agreed. And so I'm gonna tell you right,
we're good. I mean, Errol Spence, you know, I'm in
a fortunate position. And I understand I'm in a fortunate position that while I'm
a fan of watching these great athletes do their thing. And I'm a historian
of boxing. I watched box in my entire life. I'm in a position
where I've gotten a chance to meet these guys, interview them numerous times,
cover their fights many many times. And you know, again, not like
I'm desk friends with them or anything like that, but have a reporter to
fighter relationship where you get to know the guy like they know, like if
you asked Errol Spence and am I going to be fair when I quote him?
He knows I'm going to be fair when am I don't see guys out
of context, so he's comfortable. So I have a very cordial relationship in
that regard with both him and with Crawford. I was actually looking at their
records when I was writing something about this. I think this will be something
I gotta make sure my numbers are accurate, but I want to say it
will be in terms of in person like my tenth or eleventh Terrence Crawford fight,
and I think my tenth or ninth Errol Spence fight. But the reason
I'm saying this is when when Errol stayed on top of this to make sure
this fight happened in a similar manner that Ryan Garcia did with Tank Davis.
As we've discussed that. Also, like he's not trying to get over on
Crawford. He wants to fight, so he's willing to go the extra mile
to make sure it happens. And I'm gonna tell you from my own experiences
on a numerous different occasions about a variety of different topics, Errol Spence is
just a good person in my opinion. He's like a decent human being that
you know. Of course he's a great athlete, but it doesn't mean he's
a regular guy put his pants on one leg. I mean, I'm not
even saying it's like Crawford's a bad guy. I just feel like I know
Errol a little bit better than I know Crawford. You know Crawford, here's
the kind of guy Crawford is. When Ryan Garcia made the decision to go
and train with Derek James, so my question was, boy, I wonder
how that happened. And when I talked to Derek James, he was like,
well, he called Ryan, who was friendly with Errol. Uh.
Contacted Errol to get my number, meaning Derek's number, UH, and to
also make sure. It was okay because obviously if they bring Ryan into the
camp, that's kind of going on to Errol's turf, it's his gym,
it's you know that sort of thing. They've got to make sure they work
together. And and Errol was like fine with that. And so when that
happened, I texted Errol to ask him if he would give me a comment
about the fact that he was helpful to help make this uh marriage if you
will, between Ryan and Derek work, and he was perfectly fine. He's
like, you know, here you go to this is this is my thoughts
on it, and uh. And then we just had like a normal conversation.
We weren't even talking about boxing, Like he asked about my son,
I asked about his kids. We like had a normal back and forth,
like again, like we're best friends. But that's just the type of guy
he is that he would like, you know, we conducted our business briefly
and then he was like, hey, what's up, how's your you know,
how's your kid doing or whatever. So I he's just a decent human
being and I like him. Uh, and and I so when he says
when Crawford says that those were the things that Errol promised that he would get
taken care of. Like I believe he's a man of his word. He
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And I'll just add this in because we give our comments in our commentary.
This fight would have happened even a year ago because Errol Spins wanted it
to happen. Terrence Quawford, for all reasons of his own, didn't want
it to happen. Wouldn't agree. I'm just saying to you the only reason
why it did not happen last winter is because Terence Crawford not only would agree,
but was working another deal. Obviously, Errol Spence has wanted this fight
and has said so, and I believe so since last fall. I don't
know that Terence Crawford really wanted this fight as badly until probably now, and
now he feels like it's the right time and that's why it's getting done.
But you know, people should not have it. I don't think they do,
because you do a good job from the inside of saying this. This.
This has not been that both sides couldn't agree. This has been that
Terrence Crawford wouldn't agree. That it's taken this long, and so now we
finally have it and let's be happy about that. Yeah, I mean with
with me, whether pack Yell, for example, like there was problems with
both of them agree that Errol has had. My understanding is that Arrow's whatever
his arrangements are with his people with PBC and TGB and all that that's been
you know, showtime whoever, that's been basically done for a while. Like
there hasn't been any issues. Again, it's like you said, how to
get Crawford comfortable with various elements of it, and you know what, to
Terrence Crawford's credit, it may have taken a while, but as he said,
you know what, that's done, and now the fight's happening and that's
all that matters, and it's gonna be a great fight. All right,
good enough, good enough. There we have some Ryan Garcia speaking of him
out of the ring news, some back and forth with him right now,
and Oscar de la Joya, his promoter. Oscar is claiming that he's got
a list of fighters he wants to meet with Ryan. He even put the
name Manny pachi Ou back out there, which there was talk that that Ryan
Garcia would fight Manny Pachiou over a year ago, a year and a half
ago or more. Okay, so what do you make of all of this?
Because the soap opera, you've even put it in your rundown. The
soap opera continues on here. It seems like within a calendar year, within
about a year, Ryan Garcia is at odds with Oscar de Lajoya about money,
opponents, next fight, something. And here we are off the tank
gave his fight that it appears, where at odds again about what's next.
It's just like, unfortunately, it's like partially oil and water, partially like
let's say, you know, big brother, a little brother, you know,
where there may be like in a beef and an argument of bullying,
whatever it is. They just they just can't figure out a way to get
on the same page. And Oscar unfortunately goes into the public domain and says
certain things that probably are better left said privately between you and the fighter and
the fighter's team. And when he makes a pronouncement that I'm meeting with Ryan
Garcia on Tuesday, meeting two days ago. As we tape this on Thursday,
and then I speak to Ryan Garcia, is representative, is advisor and
lawyer Guadaloupe Valencia, and he basically laughs and says, we're not at we
have no meeting setup. That's not true. We're not talking about opponents,
and we have no meeting schedule. I mean, they're just they It's one
thing for them to have a contract with each other, and that's fine,
but you gotta it takes two to tango if you're going to try to get
along with each other. And they're just not in that moment right now.
And I and a big part of this, and you know, you can
laugh about it, but Ryan Garcia is still and I don't even blame him,
to be honest with you. He's upset that Oscar de Loy, his
promoter, did not come to the news conference after his loss to Tank Davis,
which many of us questioned at the time, perfect legitimate question, you
know, darn well if he had won the fight, that he'd been there.
Bernard Hopkins also for that matter, who's also part of Golden Boy Promotions
who did not come. But Oscars, that's you know, he's the logo,
he's the he's the guy that is the owner and the and the you
know and all that. And I think the problem that people have is that
Oscar, when he made his social media video that was after that to address
that problem, he said that his security told him that they needed to get
out of the arena because he had death threats against him. Now, obviously,
I don't think that that's a good thing. And if you truly have
a death threat against you, not a good situation. And why anybody would
put a death threat against Oscar, I'm not really sure, you know,
for all of the issues Oscar has. My personal perception of Oscar, having
known him, you know, better than just an average you know, a
reporter to the promoter and or a former fighter. You know, Oscar at
heart is like a decent human being also. But the thing is he was
at all the other fight week events. He was standing on a stage at
the press at the way In Outdoors right in front of the of the arena
on the Friday, no issues there. And then in terms of the part
the press conference, if you had death threats, probably one of the safest
places you could literally be after the fight is still in the team mobile because
they had cleared the arena of the public and the only folks that were left
there were probably a couple of hundred people that were people that were your staff
and people working the fight from the network and from PBC, but building staff
security, you know, janitorial staff, operations people you know who are just
there doing their normal job and what like, you know, a couple hundred
medi people who are just trying to get their work done. So you were,
my opinion, you're perfectly safe standing on a stage in front of a
bunch of big, bad media people. So that reason did not sit well
with Ryan Garcia, and he's ticked off that and so they're in a tit
for tat right now, and you know he wants to fight certain guys that
are not with Golden Boy, that are not on the zone. And you
know this is going to become a problem because he wants to come back in
the fall. His team says, we're not fighting pat Yo. So you
know Oscar hasn't you know, he doesn't have anything signed with Manny. Manny's
probably one of the hardest guys out there to deliver because their side is uh,
you know, they don't drive an easy bargain either. So it's just
headed for more trouble. I mean, it's the saga continues. I'm actually,
frankly, TJ kind of surprised that it's reared it's ugly head this quickly
because the fight with him and Tank was like barely a month ago. Usually
after that magnitude of a fight, you know, okay, guys kind of
disappears for a little while, maybe takes a you know, goes on a
two week vacation, chills out. But Ryan was literally down in Texas with
Derek James making their deal like within the I guess it must have been what
less than a week after the far about a week after the fight, and
uh, and now they're already talking about other fights. Ryan's tweeted the guys
he liked the fight. He mentioned Roli Romero, he mentioned Isaac Pittbull Cruz,
he mentioned h Teofimo Lopez should he be the victor against Josh Taylor coming
up in later in June. Unfortunately, it seems like at the moment those
three fights are probably all pipe dreams. Are certainly not in the They wouldn't
be easy to make any of those three. But we'll see what happens with
them. But before he gets in the ring to fight anybody, it's gonna
have to get on the same page with his promoter, whether it's uh,
you know who he's gonna fight and on what platform is going to fight,
and all the other stuff that goes into putting together these deals. So they
got some, uh, they got some issues to deal with between themselves before
they can actually go forward and make a deal for a fight. Well,
we will see when that gets resolved. And again there's a lot of history
because there were squabbles before that. He wasn't getting enough money. De la
Joya gave him more money and then he'd be backed out at least on one
occasion. What summer of twenty twenty one he backed out of a main event.
Uh, well, there was two fights. I mean, one was
the mental health issues that he took a little red from. When he was
ready to come back, he had a hand injury, correct a hand injury,
and then and then that delayed things. But that's that's that's the wait
co is That's not Oscar's fault and that's not Ryan's fault. Well, there
was a lot of talk and we wrote about this on the side, and
this is before you and I hooked up with whatever else about him backing out
of that fight that summer and what was really behind it. And I know,
look, I don't want to go down the rabbit hole for another fifteen
minutes on this. Ryan has talked on the record about having mental health issues,
about having suicidal thoughts. Nobody's gonna make fun of that, nobody.
Nobody is going to minimize that and say that it's not important. But I
can understand from a business standpoint, Oscar dal Joyer realizes this is my meal
ticket right now. I need this guy to be back in the ring this
fall and onto zone as part of my deal. So I can appreciate he
wants to try to get something going there, and you know the public stuff
about I want to fight Roy Romero, I want to fight Tafimo Lopez,
as you just said and alluded to, none of those are realistic right now
because ones with PBC, ones with top rank, you gotta go with what's
realistic here because he signed with Golden Boy. So it's it's that it's not
that fighting a PBC fighter is not realistic. In the case of the Tank
Davis fight which they made, which was with a PBC fighter on showtime,
Tank was and I hate the phrase, but it's the reality. He was
the so called A side because he was the established fighter on pay per view
and it was really, from their point of view, was a total deal
breaker, and for Ryan it wasn't and Golden Boy and the Zone finally came
around to him. But now if you're talking about Ryan taking on a Rollie
Romero or a pit Bull Cruise, for example, two PBC guys, well,
obviously Ryan's the A side on that fight by a long shot, by
a million percent, by ten million percent. So it's one thing for Golden
Boy in the Zone to suck it up and go and do the fight on
the rival platform and make the match. It's an entirely different story to expect
them to give in on a secondary type of opponent compared to Tank Davis when
he's under contract the Golden Boy for the next couple of years, and there
would be no reason for them to even think about allowing that. I mean,
their business partner, what pays their bills largely is that output they know
they have with the Zone, and they're gonna have to figure that out.
So, you know, we'll have plenty of time to talk about this as
it was on right now. It's it's kind of a real mess and hopefully
they can get it worked out like it though, and and in wrapping it
up, as you were just alluding to, it's not like he was going
to be in the ring in June, July or August. Anyway, you
do have a lot of time to wrap it up. This is for the
fall, right This is like October November, but you know they're trying to
get it squared away. Okay, speaking of the fall, speaking of September,
one more item and then we're going to talk about the claressa shields Undisputed
title fight that is coming or Saturday night in Detroit. David Benavidez very interested
in finding Canelo Alvarez who isn't and supposedly they've made a massive lucrative offer to
Canelo that they want this to be the fight in September Mexican Independence Day weekend.
Is there in the in the real reason why we should take this as
hey, it's a sign that maybe this could happen or is it just the
case where they're trying everything saying to beat the Canelo Golden ticket on their end?
Benavides in his camp, what about it? Well, I think it's
possible, it could happen. It's going to be up to whether Cannello wants
to do the fight or not. Because, as we've discussed numerous times,
Canelo Alvarez he has plotted and planned his career for this exact reason. While
he enjoys doing business with The Zone and Golden Boy and not Golden Boy,
the Zone and Natch Room and has made a lot of money with them and
has done pretty much every swall. He's done every single one of his fights
since he parted with Golden Boy with matchrom with the one exception was in the
order to get the fight for the undisputed supermanowy title, that man facing Kyle
Plane who had the fourth belt, and he did so by leaving Matchrocorps one
fight and fighting on you know, against a PBC fighter on showtime pay per
view. And so if you were to do a fight with David Benavides,
because they've made such a lucrative offer to him, that would probably be the
same situation. So my understanding is that the offer that has been made by
Sampson Lucawitz, who was his promoter, who works with with Al Hayman and
PBC and has done so for a number of years, but he is David's
promoter on paper, and he's been the guy that's had him, you know,
for his entire career. That they've made an offer north of fifty million
dollars for Canelo Alvaris. And and I clarified this by the way, unless
they're lying, which I don't think they are, it's not four fights that
require options and this and that this is a straightforward one fight offer, uh,
you know, and they have to stell if there if you send a
proposal, it's not like a done deal. You've got to agree on other
elements whatever about other things besides just the guaranteed money. You know, there's
there's the small stuff like rooms and plane tickets, and then there's the larger
things like how we cutting up the gate, how we splitting the revenue on
foreign television, how we cutting up the percentages on the actual pay per view
revenue, et cetera. But the first, the first thing someone's got to
do is, you know, make the original offer. So they have done
that. Eddie Reinoso, who is the person receiving this offer, because he
doesn't Canello doesn't have a promoter. Eddie is the one that runs that business
as the manager as well as he's also the trainer. Of course, claims
I guess that he didn't at the offer. I talked to Samson Lukewitz like
a little before we got on our our our video here to do our our
tast and and I've known Sampson for twenty five years almost. I mean,
when he says I sent him a text message, I sent it to him
via WhatsApp, and I send it to him v email and laid out,
you know, the the proposal to get the ball rolling. And he claims
he didn't get it. But he I know he got it. I sent
it to all these places, so I don't know what he's talking about.
So if you if the two sides can't even agree on whether the offer was
received, how are you going to move forward to try to negotiate it.
So maybe it's just a little like you know, gamesmanship and the nonsense that
goes on a lot of times in this business. Sure, but hopefully you
know no one Sampson the way I do. I'm sure it's a it's it's
a it's you know, they may not take the offer, but I believe
it's probably legitimate offer. That's the fight that David Benavides and and their side
PBC would love to. Canello has been, for his own reasons, has
been stuck on doing a rematch with Dmitri Dvol. I can tell you one
thing, and I don't You don't have to be an accountant or a economics
major or anything along those lines, but I can tell you, and I
would die on this hill, that a fight between Canelo Alvarez and David Benavides
would gross tens of millions of dollars more than a fight between him and b
Vol. And it's not a knock on Beievle, who I think is one
of the best fighters in the entire sport. But just from the fan point
of view, the ones who pay the bills besides, because they buy the
tickets, and they buy the pay per view, and they buy the t
shirts, and people want Eyeballso sponsors gravitate towards zac caliber of a fight that
that fight would do way way more business than a fight between Cannelo and Dmitri
Biva. Now Cannello's made one hundreds of millions of dollars, so maybe he's
say he's screwed it. I'm going to take the fight that I want,
not the fight that's necessary the bigger money. Look, he left money on
the table to go home and fight John Ryder and took a lot less money
than it would have been had he fought a different opponent and done so in
a place like Las Vegas. So you know, at this moment in time,
maybe it's not only about the money for Canelo Alvres, but he also
was the guy Canello albrets that tells you a thousand times all the time he
wants to make the fights that the fans want to see. And again,
nothing against the meet your bible. But I dared say, way, way,
way, way, more fans are interested to see Cannello tangle up with
David Benavides than they are to see a rematch with to meet your bible.
So the ball apparently and the Canelo Alvarez court, and let's see how they
respond. But so far the response has not been the best. All right,
let's move on. As we mentioned, it is the women's undisputed middleweight
championship on the line in Detroit Little Caesar's Arena Sturday night. Claressa Shields makes
her latest defense. It is a replacement opponent from about a week and a
half ago. Maricela Cornejo is the opponent. Okay, so give me a
little bit of insight into this one. Obviously, Claressa is the story,
the draw. This is in her region. She's from Flint, Michigan.
She's fighting in Detroit as a headline fighter. It's on de Zoe own.
So gave me a little more about this because this is the championship marquee fight
of the weekend. Dan there in the preview bound Yeah, I mean I
know that had to switch opponents. She was supposed to fight handing Gabriels,
who has won world titles and three weight classes. That would have been a
rematch of a fight that Claressa one the middleweight titles that were vacant back at
the time that they first fought, and the hook if you will to the
fight, because in the end Claressa actually won pretty handily in terms of the
decision. But the one sort of selling point of the fight, the thing
that they kept talking about was that the only person ever in Claressa's professional career
and she's now thirteen and oh as well as her amateur career where she had
you know what, she was like seventy nine and one or something like that,
or seventy five and one, with the one loss against Savannah Marshall,
which she avenged in her last fight when she became the undisputed champion for the
second time by winning back a belt that she already had but had given up
that Savannah subsequently won. In anyway, that's the selling point for Gabriels was
she knocked me down in round one, and I'm gonna go out there and
I'm going to knock her out now. This time. She was dropped from
that fight because she had a positive drug test for a banned substance, and
so they got Marisela Cornejo on short notice. And while yes, it is
short notice because it was like a week ago, the reality is, according
to Corneo, as she's spoken about this weekends and her comments during the press
conference and they're in the workouts, she was thrilled because she was training for
a fight that was supposed to take place on June the sixth, and she
was able to get out of that fight and get a much more lucrative opportunity
to fight in terms of the money as well as for the undisputed championship.
So she says, I'm already in great shape. I was ready to go,
and I've just I've already been training, So this is just I'm switching
opponent's the same age way she is. But I've been ready and she's anxious
for the opportunity. Now, in the terms of Cornejo's experience, you know,
she's been a pretty good fighters. She's got five losses. She's sixteen
and five with six knockouts. She's lost. Her three fights that she has
lost have come in world championship fights. She's fought for middleweight titles and super
middwaight titles. Two of her losses are to Franchise Franchi On Cruise Dessern,
who was currently the undisputed champion at super middleweight, who, by the way,
is the woman that when Claressa turned professional and franch On Cruise turned professional,
they fought each other amazingly. I mean, two women that went on
to become, you know, pound for pound level fighters faced off in a
tremendous battle in the four under I was actually at that fight, was on
the undercard. I forget it was the first fight of the second fight.
But one of the two Andre Word Serage Covle fights point is franch On Cruise
is no joke and Cornejo lost a super close decision to her in one fight
and then a little bit more of a lopsided decision in the second fight.
But she's experienced against good quality opponents. She lost also in a world championship
fight to Cali Reese, also a quality opponent. So Corney and my point
is Corney was not a bump. She's a quality fighter contender in her own
right. And as it turns out, and this is helpful from the standpoint
of mandatories and all is that she happens to be the mandatory or a number
one challenger in three of the four organizations for Claresse's title belt. So this
is still despite the change. And I mean, when I saved, I
actually think this is a better fight than actually fought Gabriels in the rematch,
because she wiped out Gabriels just because of the knockdown. So I'm more interested
personally in senior fight corn Yeo as opposed to or rematch with Gabriels, even
though I mean, I I mean, it's hard to say Shields is going
to lose the fight. But this is really all about Claressa's going home.
It's the first ever boxing match in the Little Caesar's Arena, which is the
big arena in downtown where the Red Wings play and where or the Pistons play.
So it's a first class, you know, major league facility. Obviously
they're not going to have eighteen thousand, but they expect a pretty strong,
healthy, you know, crowd that maybe could approach ten thousand, let's say,
from what I've heard from the Claressa people. So this is the chance,
basically, and I'm not trying to sell the fight. I'm just saying,
what the what the deal is here? You have CLARESSA Shields, who's
undisputed at middleweight. I think anybody with a reasonable frame of mind would say
she is the number one fighter in boxing, pound for pound, in women's
in the women's sport, and she's back in action taking on a very reasonable
lenger for her titles. And Detroit's a tremendous fight town, going all the
way back to Joe Lewis and the arena being named after him, moving forward
to the Kronk Jim and Thomas Hearns and all the Kronk fighters, great history
in Detroit. Let's see what kind of atmosphere there is there. Will make
predictions on this fight and also on the co feature fight with our Drill Holmes,
who is in the co feature bout just before this one as a junior
middleweight in a contender fight, So we'll talk about those on the bet Us
show coming Friday. Claress is massively favored. I mean I've seen as much
as forty five to one on the bet Us line that she's supposed to win
this fight. But ask yourself to ask yourself this question. TJ. You
tell me with I can think of maybe one or two exceptions. Who who
wouldn't she be almost double digit favorite again? Right, that's true because she's
been that good in that dominant Yes, if she fought a rematch against Franchione
Cruz, for example, she would still be favored heavily. It just not
it wouldn't be like ten to one. It might be like, you know,
six or seven to one, but she'd still be a heavy duty favorite
against Frand I want to say, even fighting Savannah Marshall in England, she
was still like seven to one, we'll have to seven or eight to one,
something like that figger point. So the problem it's not it's it's really
there's a lot of good quality female boxers, you know, even in and
around her weight class. It's that she's so superior technically and skill wise and
experience wise, and she's just a winner, pure and simple. She is
a winner. I mean, she won two Olympic gold medals. The one
loss she had against Savannah as an amateur was a highly questionable decision when she
was like, I think seventeen years old, So that's obviously been avenged in
a you know, a good fight, a competitive fight. But I don't
think anybody walked away from her match up against Savannah in the pro fight that
was in her most recent doubt in the fall, thinking like, Okay,
she didn't win that fight. Of course she won the fight. So this
is not in any way in indictment on Hannah Gabriel's on Cornejo, on France
on or any of these gals that get in the ring and do their thing.
It's just that you're talking about, you know, if we refer to
the fighters like Dmitri Bevil and Naiolia in a way, and and Terence Crawford
or Errol Spence or you know, any of the men that we view as
potential number one pound for pound in women's boxing, there's really no argument in
my opinion, she is number one pound for pound Claressa Shields. And again
it's not a knock on the other fine uh fighters out there. You know,
you could talk about whether it's a Chantel Cameron with the big winner,
it's Katie Taylor, or it's Bomb Gardener or any of any of the other
tremendous fighters that you know. Amanda Serrano, whoever, Clarressa Shields is the
number one fighter in boxing. Maybe Katie Taylor had the stronger argument till she
lost a couple of weeks ago in Ireland, so we'll say Claressa hasn't been
beaten yet. So the other thing about Claressa, by the way, is
oh so Katie she lost when she went up and wait, but she's still
obviously a dominator at one thirty five. But part of the definition of pound
for pound is what if you were fighting you know other way, you know
people that were all the same weight class, But in the reality, you
can go up and down. So she proved that she had trouble going up
to one forty to do business. Claressa is the only women woman to be
undisputed in two weight classes, and she's actually been a unified champion in three
web classes because she's currently undisputed at one sixty. She formerly was the undisputed
at one fifty fourth till she moved up. And when she first started her
career, she had unified I believe it was three the titles, maybe it
was just two, but it was at least two of the titles at Superman
Away. So she's done it up and down the scale, and I mean
you know until further notice, she's the best female boxer out there and as
much experience and as good as she's fought in previous fights. Cornados in a
lot of trouble on Saturday. That's the bottom line, all right. So
there we go with a little preview mode there, a little more news than
some nostalgia, and then we're done here on the podcast. All right,
don't snicker at me, Tim Zoo. We get news from Australia. You're
stickering Tim Zoo injured and not a run of the mill injury. This is
so you were talking about Hannah Gabriels is not in this fight with Claressa Shields.
And you laid it out beautifully that she was using a cream on a
wound on her dog after surgery, and that the cream may have gotten on
her fingers, on her hand and inner system. And I joke with you
and said, not only the dog gate my homework, but the dog failed
my VADA test. If that's the excuse, and that's what's to be bleeded.
Now we got Tim Zoo's fight with Carlos Ocampo scheduled to be in Australia
in the middle of this month. In jeopardy because Zoo got bit by a
dog on his right forearm. And not just a little nip or a little
nick. This was a significant dog bite that is called into question about whether
this fight can go on. Tell me more about your reporting on this,
because you were texting me and you're like, Okay, everything looks like it
should be good, and I just sent back one word raybias with an exclamation
point. He got bited by a dog, Dan Rayfield, give me more.
According to his team who I was in contact with, he was attending
like a barbecue or some kind of social gathering. I mean, he's in
training camp, but guys still, you know, they do unwind a little
bit after a hard day at the gym, I guess, and he was
just Coincy was just charged by a dog that was there at this gathering and
the dog bit him, as you mentioned on the right form, and it
was bad enough where he actually had to have like some kind of minor surgery
on the wound and get stitched up. And so before they can give him
the all clear, and maybe it's already happened. I'm not sure because dar
timing is so much different than but they're waiting and they were thinking it would
be this week that they would know more particular, uh, you know,
make sure the wound is healing properly, that the stitches are okay, that
there's no infection, and then the doctors would have to sign off on it.
But you know, as of when it first happened, you know,
a few days ago, there is there's concern legitimately, so that maybe he
would have to sit out to fight now, Tims said, Apparently he wants
to, you know, according to his people, he says, I want
to fight, and that's fine that you know, he's a fighter. But
in the end it's going to be up to his handlers and obviously more importantly
to the to the medical professionals and to the commission folks that handle such events
in Australia. So hopefully he's okay and well enough to go through with the
fight. If he can't, I mean, he did just fight recently.
He's still waiting on Charlot to get better and to have his hand healed.
So if he has to miss a fight for an injury also, it's I
don't think the end of the world. But ideally he'll get a chance to
fight. You've got a good show there with some guys on the undercard.
You know, you never like to see shows get canceled because while it certainly
impacts fighters in the main event, people don't don't think about all the you
know, the other It maybe ten fighters or more on the undercard who was
out on their opportunity to do their job to get paid and they've gone through
training camps. So hopefully Tim can fight. But yet it is a very
freakaus injury, as somebody suggested to me, So Tim Zoo, he's really
got dog in him, doesn't he? Or he had the dog on him?
Yeah, sure, And there was probably a raby shot you would have
to think, just to be precautionary, as well as antibiotics and other things.
And we'll see. And as as we release this podcast and Thursday becomes
Friday and Friday becomes Saturday, hopefully we get good news that he's healing up,
and maybe it's after the weekend that he's healing up. And that is
a June seventeenth in the US, June eighteenth, correct on Sunday in Australia.
The only other thing, and we don't have to spend ten minutes on
this, The one other thing I was thinking is if he is somehow going
to be healthier a week later. I know that would be somewhat chaotic to
have it, maybe on Showtime, which they intend to show it, but
the Australian TV arm would probably wait. The other fighters some may wait,
some may not on the undercard. But if they had to wait a week
because of this to make sure that he's fully healthy, wouldn't that hypothetically,
I'm not saying it is. Wouldn't it hypothetically be an option for the next
week or maybe two weeks later in June. I don't know that it goes
much beyond two weeks. I don't need if he needed a week, hypothetically
maybe that could happen. We don't know. We're not reporting that. I'm
not I'm not sure what the status of what Showtime we do or what the
Australia pay per view, But one thing for sure is that the money that
will come from the show, from the pay per view in Australia is I'm
sure more than the money that Showtime is paying. So that's who they would
have to answer to first. The idea ideal thing is like, hopefully he's
either okay and they can go through with the fight as scheduled, or if
they have to postpone it for a little bit or canceled outright, you know,
that would be unfortunate, but it maybe one of the possibilities. So
hopefully, like I said, hopefully he's okay. And I'll say this also,
I've written a countless stories and things about fights that had been postponed or
canceled for different injuries, and I must say that this is my first,
a dog bite being one of them i've written, you know, the one
that springs might remember. Remember zab Judah once had a call off a fight
because he he fell through a glass door and a shower. Alexander put his
hand right, yeah, so he had some cuts in the fight was called
off. There was one fight years ago and I dont remember the opponent was
where it was. I believe it was Alexander Povetkin, the heavyweight was involved
in what was a pretty big fight at the time. They had a call
off the fight because he tripped over a tree route while he's out doing roadwork
and messed up as like ankle or a schnee or something. But I've heard
like lots of weird reasons for fights being postponed. Getting bit by a dog
is the first one, the first time i've and just one more time.
This is not an insignificant dog, but he had over twenty stitches close up
the gash of what happened, so it's significant, and hopefully over the course
of the next couple of days, three days, four days, whatever,
we'll get good news. So keep it locked in on Dan Substack. Maybe
we'll have good news by the time we do the fight Freaks Unite recap coming
off the weekend, that this fight is a go ahead for a couple of
weeks from now and can happen in Australia. All right, what else?
Speaking of Australia, George Cambosis, that fight is official for later this year.
What other what other news items do we need before we do some nostalgia
and we're done well with the George Cambosis. Right, We've reported about this,
but they made it official today. He is returning. As I've mentioned
in previous notebooks and on this podcast, I believe he's fighting Max and Hughes
an IBF eliminator for number two, but it's been officially announced. Remember,
we'd already discussed that he's signed a contract extension with Lou Debella and now he's
also going to be co promoted by Top Rank. He is a very good
name in the lightweight division, forward unified champion. So this is his first
fight under that new agreement. It will be Maxi Hughes. It will take
place in Shawnee, Oklahoma. It will headline the July twenty second Top rank
ESPN of and UH. They'll fight in a in an opportunity to move a
step closure to a mandatory position. Remember, with Devin Haney still undetermined whether
he's going to remain as a lightweight or go to one forty. If he
does go to one forty, all these belts are going to become vacant and
it's gonna put him or Maxie Hughes a winner to fight for that vacant title
against the number one contender who I'm not sure off top my head who it
is, but in any event, so that's the that's the card that that
was the main event that was announced, and then on the under card they
also announced the lightweight prospect, the number one prospect in the sport in my
opinion, because I picked him as a twenty and twenty two prospect of the
Year is Keishan Davis that the Olympic silver medal winner eight and oh with six
knockouts. He will be in a ten rounder. In the co feature,
he'll take on the former European champion from Belgium, Francisco Petera twenty and three
with ten knockouts. You know, pretty solid opponent for this stage of his
career. And uh, that's that's a that's not a bad Midsummer show,
a nice main event with some stakes. Maxie Hughes has been on a great
winning streak and has pulled some upsets. Fearless about taken on cambosis or doing
it on neutral territory. So one guys Australia, one guys from the UK.
They'll fight in Oklahoma, and you got Keishan who's taken on a reputable
guy who I think is one of the if not the very best prospect in
the sport. So nice, nice doubleheader there and I'll be watching all right.
And the WBA is announced that they have a couple of fights that they
have ordered as well, real quick on those. So we saw Leewood regain
the WBA featherweight title last week. He got the pretty lopsided victory over Mauriceo
Laura to avenge his knockout loss. And we know he heard a lot of
talk about after the fight, like he wants to fight Josh Warrington. That
would be a huge fight for the UK. Warrington is a former IBF champion.
They're both with Matcham and that's the fight that Eddie Herne has wanted to
do. And that's not to say that they can't perhaps still work it out.
But there's a fighter, an excellent fighter, who most people have not
heard of. He's from whose deck stand. I have watched this kid,
and let me tell you, as God is my witness, this guy can
fight. He's a real legit guy and I might even make him the favorite
over Leewood. But his name is Odebek Kalmatov and he just won an elimination
fight over the undefeated Thomas Patrick Ward, who was like thirty and oh when
they fought each other, and he absolutely destroyed him. He's a real guy.
He's only got about eleven or twelve pro fights, but he was one
of these top amateurs that didn't need a lot of seasoning in the pros.
But in any event, he is by winning that fight over Thomas Patrick Ward
put him in the number one position, and the w BA quite a while
ago when that happened, ordered that he would be able to be the mandatory
to face the winner of the rematch between Laura and Wood, which they approved
instead of the mandatory. So they already had given essentially an exception to doing
the mandatory. So they put out their letter this week saying they have thirty
days to negotiate the Komatov camp and the Lee Wood camp to negotiate a dealer
they'll call a purse bid. But the fight, you know, because obviously
Lee just fought. It's not like he's going back in the training camp tomorrow.
The point is, though they say the fight can happen no later than
September twenty six, so it's always possible that science can work out agreements,
and you know, if nobody has aggrieved that they can move on and do
something else. So it wouldn't shock me, frankly if somehow the Lee would
call tough fight was put on hold and they did allow that to happen,
if he's willing to take some kind of step aside. But the point is
they are following their rules. This was not a surprise. Everybody knew it
before the maricol R fight. The Komatov was next in line, so they
ordered that fight and the other fight that they ordered was in the one hundred
forty pound weight class. Same situations, you know, thirty days to make
a deal, otherwise a purse bit. Again, possibilities exist. I suppose
depending on how things are organized and arranged and negotiated that perhaps this white weight.
But in any event, they ordered Roly Romero, who has got the
WBA's one hundred forty pound title. As terrible as a situation as that was
with it against Barroso, with that horrendous, horrendous, horrendous, horrendous,
horrendous, horrendous stoppage. I got five horrendouses there. But again this was
not something that was unknown. They said this before the fight, so they're
not springing this or not not following their rules. That they've ordered him to
fight the mandatory which is O'Hara Davies, So that fight was ordered. Also
again, maybe they can do a rematch with Brrosso, maybe he'll get Ryan
see the fight that Ryan has been asking for, et cetera. But the
bottom line is the WBA has followed their rules and ordered these two mandatories.
And I've seen some people, oh, you know the WBA. You know,
they're they're standing in the way of this fight. You know, of
course they're ordering that they didn't order a Barosso rematch. And my perspective is,
look, you know, you're looking at the guy that's been the number
one critic of the w BA, maybe in the history of critics of the
WBA. I mean, I wrote a Calm once where I called through their
abolition and to make the world of safer better place, and have consistently referred
to them as the wretched WBA. Continue. So my point was very simple.
Had they allowed him to do a rematch of Barosso and denied the mandatory
they already ordered against O'Hara Davis, you'd have the same people bitching and moaning
that they're allowing O'Hara Davis to do the mandatory and not ordering the rematch.
If the shoe was on the other foot and they reversed that scenario, they
would complain about the opposite. Like the WBA was in a situation where they
really can't win. It's sort of like pick the you know, what's the
what's the least worst option. I guess in some sense the choice where,
you know, do we order the Barroso rematch, which makes sense based on
how he got fucked so hard in that fight by Tony Weeks, or do
we go through with what we already said was the case and followed throughout our
rules and order the O'Hara Davis mandatory or you know, so I think they're
they're doing the best they can in this situation. In an ideal world,
you know, I'd like to see if they have to go down this road,
let that Rolie fight against Davies happen, and then let Barroso get a
shot at the winner. But then again, you know, if Rolie somehow
I had the opportunity with the title at stake to fight Ryan Garcia, I
mean, again, he is coming off a loss, but it's obviously a
big money fight for everybody involved. I mean, there's really no good solution,
but they're following their rules and anyway, the meaning that he they're ordering
the Davies fight for Rolie instead of the Barroso rematch. If they had ordered
the barross Her rematch and denied Davies, you'd have some segment of people that
would bitch that they hilated their rules by screwing their mandatory. So you can't
have it both ways. I understand, you know, like we like to
if we're in WWE, you can do a triple threat match and I've all
three in the ring at the same time. That is not happening. We
can tell you about things that could happen. We will definitely tell you that
is not happening. That is the that is the point, all right,
So some good stuff there on the news, Okay, nostalgia Obviously Saturday,
we commemorate the passing of Muhammad Ali. That was seven years ago that Ali
uh passed away from complications with Parkinson's UH and and post fight the greatest,
simply the greatest. And I love going back not only and reliving his fights,
but going back and reliving all the interviews and the conversation and all of
the different stuff that was out there from Muhammad Did you realize do you know
this that Muhammad Ali actually played Muhammad Ali and the Muhammad Ali movie in the
late seventies, the made for TV movie. A lot of people don't realize
that he acted as Muhammad Ali playing Muhammad Ali, and it's play him better
than himself. Yes, of course, it's kind of like did a good
job in the movie, but it's still not the same. I mean,
who else was gonna win that in the casting besides Muhammad Once Muhammad Ali decided
he was gonna go and try out for the part, who else is gonna
win that? But the greatest, the greatest passed away June third of twenty
sixteen, seven years ago. And we cannot overstate enough for the younger generation
and the younger fight fans. I mean, I'm gonna I'm talking to you,
gen z, I'm talking to you that all think that boxing started in
two thousand and eight. Muhammad Ali was the biggest of the biggest deals for
the better part of fifteen years, from the mid sixties till till about nineteen
eighty. He was the biggest worldwide of deals in sports more than just boxing.
It was because all things did outside the ring. Um he was the
greatest and and and should always be revered as the great I will tell people
if they're if you know, there's been so much written in and said about
Ali. There's been so many uh film about him, documentary's done about him,
about certain fights, certain parts of his life. But if you're looking
for the look like the deepest dive of the overall history of this, of
this of this man's life, not just like the Foreman Fighter, the Frasier
Fighter or whatever. I can't recommend highly enough the PBS documentary that aired.
I believe it was last year, um, maybe his year before that.
Ken Burns did who was the great American documentary maker who's done other other boxing
related documentaries. He did a fantastic documentary on Jack Johnson, which I find
myself watching, uh you know, probably a couple times a year. But
the ALI doc, which is uh, you know about I think it's about
eight hours long altogether, but it flies by. It is just it to
me. And and I'm I'm slightly friendly with ken Burns, having met him
a few times when he was doing other projects. So I actually messaged him
after I watched Ali, and I told him, I said, listen,
I mean, you've done a lot of great docs, Baseball, civil War,
you can name a thousand things that he's done. The ALI, and
I've seen millions of Alley Docks. It's the best one period, not even
close. I mean, it's so beautifully done. It hits all the right
notes. It didn't really cut too much out or give too much short shrift,
because when you're doing this magnitude of a life with this many things,
it's hard to really treat everything fairly and get everything in. But they had
the right interviews that had the right pacing. It covered the big events,
some of the smaller things. They had great archival footage. They had the
co operation from members of Ali's family. They had the cooperation from Bob Aram
who obviously was the promoter for you know, something like twenty seven of Ali's
fights and did you know a huge amount of business with him and was there
in front row for all these events, so he knew a lot of what
was going on in the background. Anyway, I encourage you to watch it.
But yeah, his death was when it happened. It wasn't just any
old great sports icon passing away. He was a global HiCon from far more
than just his boxing career. But boxing is what made him his name as
an Olympic gold medal winner, as the first ever three time heavyweight world champion.
Some of the biggest fights in the history of boxing. I mean there's
so many, you know, whether it's the list in fights or it's the
three Joe Frasier fights, or that the Romo in the Jungle, Big Giant
upset against George Foreman, the return to win the title the third time when
he revenged the loss to Leon Spinks, and the trilogy with Kenny Norton.
I mean, he's just got one huge fight after another, Floyd Patterson,
and you know, just pick a guy. I mean, he fought everybody,
Larry Holmes, which was obviously not a memorable one if you're an Alby
fan, but an important fight in the history of boxing, and even up
to the last fight he ever had against Trevor Burbick, who you know,
it's interesting, Trevor Berbick is the link between Ali and Tyson because he defeated
Ali in the last fight of Ali's career, went on to become the WBC's
heavyweight champion, and then who took the title from Burbicks up you're playing the
six degrees of separation. How do you draw the lineback? You know,
Tyson beat Burbick, and Burbick beat Ali, and Alie beat you know,
Foreman and so on and so forth. So it's, uh, you know,
he's that that that that important link to those two ears. But uh
yeah, I mean we're gonna talk. I'll talk a little bit about the
fact that on that anniversary when Mohammad passed in twenty sixteen, when it happened,
I was in California covering the WBC Junior Lightweight Championship fight between the then
champion, Francisco Vargas and Orlando Sledo, would also had a title in that
weight division, and they were fighting in what was then the Stubb Hub Center,
And so obviously I was around a lot of boxing people when the word
came that Mohammad had passed. This was the night before the fight when I
went to the fight that so that was obviously a huge deal. The two
fighters, you know, they they honored Ali. I don't remember which one,
but I think one of them was wearing like an Ali shirt coming into
the ring. They there was the moment of silence and the ringing of the
ten Dells Frali in the stadium that night that I can still feel like the
chills you got because people were so respectful and so not like happy that he
had passed, of course, but they were just they honored him with the
cheers were just like outlandishly loud, and then not to say this wouldn't have
happened anyway, because the way that Francisco Vargas and Orlando Salido fight are all
action type warriors. But they went out there and they laid it all on
the line, and you know, they said it was partly in their attributes
to Ali to put on a great fight, but they tore each other up.
It was a draw, and it turned out to be, at least
from my opinion, it was the two thousan sixteen fight of the year.
They put on an absolutely sensational battle. Francisco Vargas retained the title. Slido
obviously did not win the title, but fantastic draw. I'm you know,
being there, I've covered several fights in the in the tennis stadium there in
Carson, where they've had so many great matchups, But that was a truly
special night because of the the the feeling in the crowd as as they as
everybody honored Muhammad Ali and then these two great warriors went out there and gave
a fight worthy of the greatest Muhammad Ali fight, a Frasier Ali kind of
fight, and uh, it was very much of an unforgetable experience to be
there on the night after Muhammed Ali passed some good nostalgia and tying it in.
And by the way, if we're going with the nostalgia, also as
we released the podcast for Saturday, June the fourth, you can go backwards
to Miguel Koto fighting at Yankee Stadium and you were there ringside that night as
well, some more nostalgia with Koto and Ury Foreman. Right, Yeah,
so that was a fight. That's what is now the Yankee Stadium across the
street from the former stadium that they had torn down, but still a Yankee
Stadium, home of my New York Yankees, my favorite team. They hadn't
had a fight at Yankee Stadium when well, when Miguel and Miguel, when
Miguel and Uri Forman fought that fight in twenty it was the first fight to
day place at Yankee Stadium. Obviously, one I'm gonna mention was at the
stadium that was built that was torn down across the street. That was one
of the fights between Muhammad Ali and Kenny Norton that took place in nineteen seventy
six at Yankee Stadium. So it had been thirty four years since it had
been a boxing event in the stadium. Top Rank put that on the gel
of course, was a huge draw among the Puerto Rican community in New York.
They drew a gargantuan crowd for a boxing match over thirty thousand at Younge
Stadium. They set the ring up basically behind second base, sort of in
like the outfield, So where where we were sitting in in terms of some
of the seats and the press area, we were like basically in centerfield.
But looking at I guess what would be the first base railing in the outfield
with the third base railing behind us. And it was a tremendous atmosphere.
A little drizzly that night, so kind of a weird sort of atmosphere from
that standpoint. Uriforman was the WBA champion at one hundred and fifty four pounds.
Remember Miguel, he had done a gallant and valiant effort against Manny Pacyo,
but lost his welterweight title by knockout in his previous fight. When that
was over with, he decided to move up and wait, and in his
first fight he got a shot at Uriforman, who was also with Top rank
and they made a big event and uh, you know, Aaron promoted that
Ali Norton fight that was at Yana Stadium. He also promoted this Miguel Coda
Uriforman fight and it turned out to be quite an event. I mean it
maybe not wasn't fight of the year, but there were certainly some memorable moments.
If you were there. You remember Uriforman had had suffered a knee injury
during the fight and the corner tried to stop the fight by throwing in the
towel, and Arthur mccanty was the referee. He did not accept it and
the phraseology that he used, come on, suck it up, Champ.
I mean, I don't think that was appropriate. The corner stopping the fight.
You stop the fight. But nonetheless Eurie got up and showed bravery and
heart. He ultimately got stopped because of the knee and Miguel Codo ended up
winning the title at one hundred and fifty four pounds, on his way to
becoming the first ever Puerto Rican mail boxer to win world championships in four different
way classes. He had been the Champ eight champion at one forty. Obviously,
he had done so at one forty seven, which he then lost him
Manny Paco. He then won this WBA title against Uriforman. He would go
on to become the middleweight champion, the linear middleweight champion to boot against Sergio
Martinez. But that was a very big crowning moment for Miguel to win that
title and that kind of venue on that kind of night, with that kind
of crowd and that on atmosphere and his you know, basically what was his
city, um you know at a bring Yankee Stadium back into boxing, which
had hosted by the way, something like forty six previous fights before Miguel and
UH and Uri Forman. Maybe that was the forty six fight, but they
had hosted numerous fights and UH buildings that were called Yankee Stadium through the years
that hosted some very big fights, some of the Rocky Marciano, Joe Lewis
just some of the names that obviously headlined among among others that held out at
Yankees Staium. That was yeah, I mean and listen, as a New
York Yankee fan, for me to be able to go, I was gonna
ask you, I was gonna go there. When you walked in there to
that setup, did you had to have a moment where you're going wow,
almost like a fan, Wow, this is really cool. There's thirty thousand
people here and this is Yankee Stadium, right, So I have been to
what is now that I had been to Old Yankee Stadium just as a fan
many times. I'd actually even been there as a journalist before in my in
my former pre boxing life. Um, so I you know, as a
lifelong fan, that was a thrill to go cover a game there. And
also obviously I've been there many times for a ball game just as a fan
with friends and family. I've been to the World Series there and that sort
of thing. So, but I had yet I've now been to games at
new at what is now New Yankee Stadium. But my first time being in
New Yankee Stadium wasn't for a baseball game. It was actually for the boxing
event. So when I got there, it was like, I was like
thrill. So I'll tell you a little funny thing about that. During the
undercard there was a break and we're like literally sitting on our chairs at the
press area in the outfield, and you could like walk back where the media
area was or where the backstage stuff was you kind of walked behind yourself into
there was like an open gate. You could go on to the concourse and
you could like go to the press room or you know, go to the
bathroom or get a soda or whatever. Right next to Monument Park in the
Yankees Stadium, which if you're familiar, it's where the Yankees have the statues
and the retired numbers for all the great former Yankees, you know, from
Babe Ruth to Don Mattingley and now Derek Jeter and all the greats in between.
Anyway, I took a twenty minutes where there was nothing going on,
or maybe there was some crappy undercard fight that I didn't if a shit about,
and I literally went into Monument Park, which was open. I wasn't
like, you know, doing anything that was against the rules, and I
was literally like by myself in Monument Park and I spent like twenty minutes just
going through it. I took pictures of like, you know, Reggie Jackson's
plaque and Babe Ruth statue, and Joe DiMaggio making Mantle absolutely Babe Ruth,
lou garret all the great Yankees. And that was a blast because if you
go there as a civilian to a game and you want to get in to
take the tour, you gotta wait online for a long time, and there's
a shipload of people in there. I basically a monument park to myself and
was able to hang out there and just enjoy myself. And I, by
the way, another thing that was one of those you are who you are?
Yeah, No, it's because I'm a Yankee fan. End up happening
to be open when I went back to take a piss. Like, my
wife does not go to a lot of boxing matches. I mean, you
know, she's been a couple of times over the years, but uh,
I forget what the reason was. But she was in New York with me
that part of that week, and she and my mother in law who who
passed away a few years after, but my mother in law who was at
my old box again, my my wife and my mother in law were at
that fight also and had a great time. Wow. Yankee Stadium, June
fourth, twenty ten. Miguel Codo, all right, I'm just gonna piggyback
for quick sixty second story that I had a brush with Kdo never covered any
of his fights, watched them on TV. Obviously two thousand and six.
Four years before this, March of two thousand and six, the first World
Baseball Classic was taking place, which again this is something that they do about
every three or four years where all the countries play. This was the first
one of the United States plays, Mexico plays, all the Caribbean countries,
Japan plays, Korea plays, even Australia, etc. Like Europe is about
the only one that doesn't really participate as much, although I think England had
a team this year in the World Baseball Classic. So anyway, the World
Baseball Classic had different venues in the early rounds, Raphael, one of the
venues was in San Juan, Puerto Rico. So I'm there doing the baseball
play by play for XM satellite radio. Prior to the merger was serious.
I was wondering where you're going with that? Okay, So I'm there to
do play by play. We go to a restaurant for lunch in San Juan
as a crew with my color commentator, the engineer, the translator, the
producer. There's about five of us. We are seated at a restaurant and
I'll even give the name called El Che in San Juan and all of a
sudden, Miguel Codo and Honorage come into the restaurant, about six or seven
of him, including his wife, and sit down right next to us.
And my engineer who's Puerto Rican and the translator capital Flippe d flipped out because
my man Codo in his heyday was sitting right next to us in the restaurant.
So all I am saying to you is you have had numerous brushes with
all these greats, including Codo or whomever. I don't have a boxing brush
with Codo, but I got a San Juan, Puerto Rico lunch brush with
Miguel Codo in two thousand and six. I pig you back on your nostalgia.
I can't say it had a brush with Coda. I covered his entire
career. I covered, I think, I mean off top of head.
I want to say that I was ringside for about twenty five or twenty six
Miguel Codo fights, including in Puerto Rico, and including most of you can't
overstate, and I know you echo this, how big of a legend in
Puerto Rico. He still is? He still is right now in twenty twenty
three. I know Miguel had the public persona as being very stoic and maybe
not with the greatest personality. But again, I'm not his best friend,
but you know, you get to know him over the time, you know,
I can. I remember when I showed up in Puerto Rico and I
was there with Tim Smith, who at the time was the New York Daily
News boxing requorter. Now currently he is the vice president of communications for Hayman
Boxing. It works with PBC, but he was still writing at the Daily
News and the two of us, you know, had traveled to come to
the fight, and Miguel knew us from covering so many of his other fights.
I feel like when we when we went up to him after like the
press comments, and he realized that we were there to cover him, Like
I think he was genuinely touched that we had traveled all this way to have
to cover his fight, which was not a megafight he was fighting. I
don't remember that it was. I remember who it was, to be honest
with the opponent that night, but he defended his title in Puerto Rico,
and he's just again I told you about the stoic sort of personality that maybe
comes off to the public when you get to know him a little bit.
Miguel was a very thoughtful and friendly guy. Later on he kind of loosened
up a little bit, got a little bit more of a sense of humor
about him, and again, just a just a good decent human being.
I said that same explanation when I described the personality of Errol Spence. They
go quote A very good decent guy, all right, A joy by the
way, an absolute thrill, enjoyed a cover. Miguel gave the fans more
I think bang for their buck entertainment wise, and just about any fighter of
modern vintage with a few exceptions, but he was always a guy that gave
everything you had. I think we've given everything that we could have here on
this preview. You've gotten lots of nostalgia, lots of news. Glaressa Shields
again, Women's undisputed middleweight title fight Saturday night, and I think we're good.
We'll be back on the bet US Show coming Friday, one Eastern time.
Depending on when you're hearing us, watch us live on the bet US
platform's YouTube, Twitter, Twitch Live at one Eastern. We'll do some handicapping,
we'll have some other give and take. Hey, we'll answer your questions
live as well on bet us if you catch the show later on on Friday
or on Saturday, or in segment form. The show is always live at
one Eastern time on Friday's through bet Us TV and whatever happens, As we
like to say in closing, we're back to recap. It's Sunday into Monday,
Sunday night into Monday on the Fight Freaks to Night recap with that,
my friend, have a great weekend the first weekend of June, and we'll
be back at this off the weekend on this very podcast feed with the recap
podcast Daan, Ray Feel anything else, No, you bet, We'll see
on the bet to Us show tomorrow and then we'll do the recap on Sunday.
Look forward doing good enough on that. There he is our in Saturday
and Ray feel again find him on the Fight Freaks to Unite, substack again,
rate us, end, review us, on Apple podcast wherever you give
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with Shields, his title defense and more. We're back to recap it off
the weekend here as part of the Big Fight Weekend podcast. Feed by