The countdown his own to fight Time. This is Big Fight Weekend. No.
Here is your host, t J. Leeves. Ah, yes,
we are fact. We are ready for the weekend, a weekend and has
a Unifine heavyweight title to fin Lookye here Alexander Usik, Welcome to twenty twenty
three. He is ready to defend against English heavyweight w BA top contender Daniel
Dubois. We are ready to preview that fight. We got Jared Real Big
Baby Andrew what is this? Real Big Baby's back in action already. We
love that. That's on the ESPN Top Rank Show. We got a world
title fight in Poland, We've got a heavyweight contender card in Tulsa, Oklahoma,
and we've got Jim Lampley on the podcast. My lord, we are
busy, we are ready. It's the big fight we can preview. I
am the somewhat competent host T. J. Reeves. He is our insider.
Hello, Dan Raypheel from Big Fight Weekend dot Com. Your fight Freaks
unite, Substack. I gotta stay up front. My man is cranky.
I'm trying to cheer you up before I hit the record button, because it
is about to be your birthday. But you didn't want any part of that
to be cheering you up. Maybe Jim Lampley will cheer you up because we
got that coming up. How are you feeling, Listen, Jim and I
had a great, great interview earlier, you know, a couple hours before
we're taping this on Thursday, and it was good. You know, I
keep in touch with Jim, and we've kept in touch ever since his days
he is at HBO when they ended their boxing coverage stopped in twenty eighteen.
But Jim and I have been friends for a long long time and we text
regularly. But this was the first time we had like an interview, you
know, in a long time. In other words, not not just you
know, two buddies texting back and forth about what's going on, but an
actual interview about what his upcoming plans are, which we'll get into. So
yeah, so that was good. So I'm happy to have him on the
show. We had had some some good you know Todd the Buff last week,
which a lot of people seem to enjoy that interview with him breaking down
all the things that are going on with top Rink, including their activity in
the heavyweight vision with a card on Saturday with Big Baby Anderson. Not to
mention they're not the promoters of the show, but they're involved the extent that
they are doing the event for ESPN plus. Between the second Dubois and now
this week Lampley and you know, hopefully more to come. We got some
good stuff. We love it. We have Ralul Marquez before that from Showtime,
the former World Champions. So we've been bringing you all kinds of good
stuff. Here a reminder rate us and review us. Please find us wherever
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the thousands and thousands and thousands that are finding us and listening to us every
week, every weekend. As we go into the weekend with a preview,
usually out Friday morning, come off the weekend late night Sunday into Monday morning
with a recap. I know it's a lot of effort for danning me.
We do like to talk as a lot of effort to stay diligent with this,
but a lot of you have appreciated that. Again, help us out
with a rating and a review. And I just have to say I've already
previewed some of the Jim Lampley interview. It's fantastic to hear him because that's
an iconic boxing voice for thirty plus years. So I got fired up just
listening to him say hello to you and to start talking about what's going on.
So I think the fans are going to perk up in a few minutes.
So standby, we've got news. Do I see an anniversary of Money
Mayweather and Connor McGregor. I do see that on the rundown, So that's
nostalgia later on the show. But before we get to all of that unified
heavyweight title fight, here we go. It has been a little while in
the making. It is now slated to happen in Poland Saturday afternoon US times
Saturday night in Poland, where Alexander Usik will defend three of the titles against
Daniel Dubois. Again, Poland a neighboring country to Ukraine, which has been
invaded and attacked by Russia, so that's the backdrop the fighters as we're doing
this. Thursday met with the media, Usik talked some about that situation and
about fighting in the backdrop of Poland where there's a ton of Ukrainians and fight
fans, and now Dan Rayfiel it's about to be here, so give me
some thoughts on this for Saturday. Well. Also, in addition to what
you mentioned about the fact that it's it's neighboring to Ukraine, that there's going
to be lots of Ukrainians that attend to fight, given the population of Ukrainians
who live in Poland or have fled to Poland because of what happened with Russia.
It's also this is the reason that they chose this particular the weekend,
is because it's also the weekend of the independence day of Ukraine in the first
place, so that's sort of like a big deal for them. So he's
very motivated from that standpoint. Usk has said all along, ever since this
whole thing started with the Russian invasion, that his perspective is, you know,
and remember he stayed behind and was involved in the territorial defense for a
while, and how to be sort of convinced to go back and fight,
and when he talked to some people higher up in the you know, in
the ranks in his country, he's sort of like, okay, because he's
more useful to the country to carry it in a high regard around the world
as a heavyweight champion and to bring a positive light and attention to his country.
And as he speaks publicly about what's been happening, that's more valuable to
what happens at home than him just being another guy involved in, you know,
in a military situation. So when he when he was told that,
he decided, you know what, I want to go back and I'm going
to continue my career. Obviously he's making lots of money, let's be honest
about that also, but his perspective, and I believe him knowing the type
of guy who'sa is having covered a lot of his fights and knowing his team
for a long time, that for him it's like a big deal that if
he can bring that you know, hour of joy and diversion to his countrymen
when he boxes, or just to give them pleasure by thinking about his upcoming
fight or talking about his upcoming fight, like that's a good thing for him
because it takes a lot of people's minds off of all the terrible things that
are happening in their country, and it's some at least small sliver of enjoyment
and normalcy. So he has this fight in in Poland, bordering his country
against Duwa. It is a mandatory defense. Dwa is the WBA's number one
contender and they're regular title holder. So this is going to, from my
perspective, besides just hopefully be a good fight, it's gonna do one of
my favorite things in boxing, which is get rid of one of the secondary
titles of the WBA and just reduce it by one more. You know,
whoever wins this fight. That said, we all would have preferred obviously to
see him fight Tyson Fury. They tried diligently to make it for this past
spring. It did not happen. Usk ultimately walked away, and I don't
blame him because of the demands that Fury was making on him in terms of
the rematch clause. So he had to do this fight and it's going to
happen. Clearly, Usk is going to be a big favorite because as powerful
as as do what is, he's a tremendous puncher. He has looked downright
terrible. In the last fight, just just awful. Got knocked down three
times in the first round by basically a cruiserweight. It was like a small
cruiserweight frankly and Kevin Lorena hurt his knee. Lucky that the ref didn't jump
in and stopped the fight in the first round. I think a lot of
refs might have stopped it. I mean it was in Britain on a on
a Tyson Fury undercard, so I think he did get the benefit of the
doubt. Uh you know. And when he fought the only other top guy
he fought in his career, Not to say Larreno was a top guy,
but the one time he fought a legitimate top ten type opponent was when he
squared off with at the time. Uh you know, they were both two
two guys on the rise. When he met up with Joe Joyce in twenty
twenty, and that was a good fight, and U Joe Joyce was the
underdog in that fight in Duba. He got stopped in the tenth round.
Uh you know, I don't blame him for stopping the fight, is he
would had a very bad break of his orbit bone and that was that was
a rough injury, and so the combination of the injury and then you know
there's all the the recovery, and it's also the mental aspect of losing a
fight like that where you get beat up for the first time in your career.
I don't think he's ever really recovered from that. He's at, you
know, four fights instant. You know, he looked okay when he when
he beat Trevor Brian to win the w BA Regular belt. He came to
the to America and had that fight and stopped him in four rounds. But
the Lorena fight is just has to give you pause. Loraina is like such
a lower level guy compared to Usk. Usa is an A plus fighter.
You can argue, I mean, I don't know if you can argue he's
number one pound for pound given what the recent results have been for Terrence Crawford
and for Noia in a way, but I think you can make a very
valid argument that usk is the number three best fighter in the world pound for
pounder certainly in the top five, and he's a tremendous, tremendous talent,
and I just don't think that Loraina. I mean I'd rather Dui has has
much more than a puncher's chance. If so, obviously we'll make some predictions.
We're back with the bet US Boxing Show Friday one Eastern Time, live
on the bet Us platforms, including their YouTube. But in that Lorraina fight,
you mentioned the knee injury for Dubois. On the first knockdown, Lorraina
caught him, caught him off guard, and Dubois clearly buckled leg buckled,
and that's where he hurt the knee. And then it was weird from there
because he actually went down one of the three times on the knockdowns with Lorraina
swinging and missing at him. He couldn't stand up and he swung and missed,
and Dubos still went down discombobulated injured. So there is a real injury
question still at this point, I believe, knowing what I know about ACL
injuries. I'm not a doctor, I'm not an orthopedis. I'm just playing
one on the podcast. But I know enough about people coming back from ACL
injuries that it's not a given that you're the same. So here we go
off of that, and then again Usic off a one year layoff, he
fought Anthony Joshua and the rematch in Saudi Arabia a year ago. So this
one just one more time, might take a little while to get started,
maybe for two or three rounds, because these guys one off of injury and
the one off a year layoff. Well, Usick is more of a boxer
anyway. He's not a guy that just runs out there like a house of
fire and knocks guys out. I mean his game has been from day one,
you know, to pick guys apart and outbox on the way he did
against Thanny Joshua, for example, on their fights when he claimed these titles
and obviously defended it against him in the rematch, and also he did the
same thing as a longtime cruiserweight champion. But he's a key is He's twenty
no right now, and whatever happens on Saturday, I believe that Alexander Russe
will be inducted into the Hall of Fames someday. He's an Olympic gold medal
winner. He's one of the great amateurs of all time. As a professional,
he is a former undisputed champion in the cruiserweight division. He has three
the belts in the heavyweight division. You know he wanted to have the undisputed
fight with Tyson Fury. I blame that on Fury squarely at this moment in
time. Hopefully they can get it together after this if he is successful in
devis Duwa. But I'm gonna stay once again. Da is a good fighter,
but to me, he's not what he was before. Joyce and Lorena
was such a was It gave me so much pause what happened in that fight
that I just cannot I mean, maybe I'll be wrong and I'll land a
big punch, because that's the only way he's gonna win. He's sure as
X's not gonna outbox Alexander Ussek, certainly not in Poland, you know,
unless there's some kind of freakish thing like an injury and he's got a hobble
around for ten rounds and and Usta just can't move. So I think,
again, maybe I'll be wrong. I view this as just a rank mismatch
in terms of talent, skills and all the things. Clearly, it clearly
is a mismatch in terms of skill. I think we all agree on that.
But the big thing is what you said just a second ago. Can
he land the big equalizer, the big right hand. I don't call him
Dynamite Dubois because he's a ballet dancers, because he's trying to land a big
punch. Okay, But Anthony Joshua is a much more experienced fighter than Dua
in the pros. He fought much better opposition in the pros than Dua has,
and Anthony Joshua fought him twice. I mean, and Joshua was a
guy would maybe not for one punch the kind of power that Duba has.
But Anthony Joshua, make no mistake, he's a hell of a puncher.
The guy stopped Vladimir Klitchko, the guys stopped in his most recent fight,
Robert Allenius, even though it had been a while since he had a knock
knout title defense. Knockouts for Anthony Joshua as well. Yeah, I mean
he you know, he blew away Charles Martin when he when he won the
title back in the day. He stopped Gubro Pulev, who was a good
contender for a long time. I mean, you know, he didn't know
he didn't get the knockout win, but he dropped Andy Ruiz when they when
they had their first fight which he lost, but it's still had dropped him.
I mean the guy, you know, he pulverized and knocked out Alexander
Povetkin. I mean, the guy's knocked out quality guys. He stopped Carlos
Tokam, who was usually pretty durable. You know, on and on we
could go. So I don't see if if if Joshua who landed who did
land some very good punches, particularly in the second fight against Alexander Usek,
I just don't see it happening for for Daniel Dubai. I mean, that's
why they fight the fights. But you know, and I'm looking forward to
watching it, I mean, and the interesting about it in terms of the
way it's going to be delivered here in the United States, and this is
highly unusual. But part of it's because the fact that ESPN Plus and Top
Rank are doing a similar doing a heavyweight show that night with the preliminaries that
started a little bit earlier. Uh, they're only showing most of the time,
they show full undercards and all kinds of preliminary fights for Usk and Duba,
just so people know, according to their announcement and their schedule, they're
showing just the one fight on ESPN Plus, which is the main event,
and then obviously they get to their their their card that takes place in Tulsa
with the with their full card here in the United States, So, uh,
you know, that'll be a little interesting. But I'm I'm anytime you
can get a heavyweight title fight, and for us here in America, we
don't have to buy it on pay per view. In the UK, it's
a pay per view on TNT Sports. But I'm excited to have Alexander Rustick
back in action. He's a tremendous fighter and I watched him do some of
his workout very very and this is not anything unusual. This is just his
personality. He's the most jovial, chill like, happy go lucky kind of
guy. I mean, obviously there's a serious aspect to him also when he
trains, and certainly when he thinks about I'm sure what happens has happened in
his home country, but he's one of these type of guys. It's like,
I'm just happy to be here and do my thing. He's he's he's
just a tremendous fighter, and uh, you know, he's in his he's
in his element getting ready for these fights. He's in great condition. Uh,
no weight issues or anything like that, being a heavyweight now after making
cruise weight. For all those excited to defend the title, to do it
in front of what's gonna be a partisan crowd, obviously make a ton of
money. I mean, life is good if you're Alexander us from from your
professional lifestyle. And by the way, one more quick note than we're moving
on, I promise there was a heavyweight title fight in Poland with which Klitchko
and Thomas Adamec. That was about a decade ago. So they well,
they're fighting this same location, the same stadium, it was in the same
state, and this is back when the tally Clichko was the WBC heavyweight champion.
His mandatory challenger. I believe it was a mandatory fight, but it
was a fight that a lot of people wanted to see. Was Thomas Adamec,
who was the number one Polish fighter. I mean, you could argue
that Thomas Adamec is the most accomplished Polish fighter of all time. Certainly had
a lot of popularity both in Poland when he fought and as well as when
he fought in the United States. He drew huge crowds in Newark, New
Jersey, being that he spent a lot of time and lived there in Jersey
City and drew tons of people to the Crudential Center after it was built in
Newark anyway. So yeah, so that fight took place also at the same
stadium in war Claw, Poland televised on HBO in the United States. And
this is the next probably biggest or certainly the only other heavyweight title fight that
they've had. They had other heavyweight fights because they had you know, adamc
had other fights after that, I think, you know, Andrew Galatta had
a couple of other fights that were kicking around. Uh you know. But
but this is a big deal for the country. Poll not not exactly a
hotbed for heavyweight title fights. Okay, there's that one. You have alluded
to it, and we will hear from Jim Lampley here in just a few
minutes. Big baby, real big baby Anderson, Jared Anderson right back in
the ring and he's going to fight another Ukrainian in Andre Rudinko, who basically
has had a long layoff himself with the outbreak of the Russian invasion and the
conflict he's been out of the rings as well, right, so for a
while. But he no, no, he Rudenko. He was off the
entire calendar year of twenty twenty two. He had fought in December of twenty
one. He has had one fight in twenty twenty three, which took place
in January. He got a second on knockout, and so this will be
the next fight after that. To my point, thank you, Sane's February
of twenty twenty three, well, actually January of twenty three, Yeah,
January of twenty three. Okay, so he's had one fight earlier this year,
hasn't been that active. And then he's also thirty nine years old.
So the fundamental thing is what kind of opposition do you believe this is?
For real? Big Baby headlining on the ESPN Top Ranks show Saturday night.
I mean, look for Big Baby Anderson. It's just you know, if
you ask Top Rank, it's another another piece of the evolution of him becoming
a more well rounded fighter, getting experience against guys who have experience, because
if you take a look at Ridenko's record, no one's gonna say he's a
great fighter. He's thirty five and six he's been stopped just one time,
so that's something to keep an eye. And of Jared Anderson, who's knocked
out every opponent's face other than his most recent opponent in Charles Martin. You
know then that that's a pretty good something that he put in his feather in
his cap, so to speak, if he can knocked the guy out.
But if you take a look at at Roydenko's record, he's experienced, he's
fought. You know, he went to distance against Jangs July twenty nineteen.
He lost, you know, a decision, a ten rounder. You know,
he fought your your boy a jid Kapi Yell and lost a decision to
him. In twenty nineteen, he got he went and he went twelve rounds
in twenty seventeen with Alexander Povetkin. Uh you know. So the point I'm
making here is he's experienced against that level of opponent. Those are all quality
guys, even like back you know, twenty fifteen he went to distance with
Huey Fury, you know, the cousin of Tyson Fury. He went to
distance with Lucas Brown, who was a heavyweight contender for a while. So
he's in a very experienced fighter, even if he's thirty nine years old.
Soo, Jared Anderson can look good against him, maybe get the stoppage.
You know. Again, it's just a continuing continuation of his development. He
is now fifteen to oh with fourteen knockouts. He's been considered for a while.
He's only twenty three years old. Most people have viewed him over the
last couple of years as easily the number one American up and coming heavyweight,
certainly one of the top heavyweights in terms of the rising contenders and prospects in
the sport worldwide for the last few years. And then what happened in July.
On July gave some people pause that maybe there's some folks that were jumping
off the bandwagon because he went in there with Charles Martin, who was a
late replacement, and he went to distance with him in a hometown fight in
Toledo, Ohio. It's one thing to go to distance. I never really
get too concerned about that. It's good for guys to go to the distance
and sometimes guys to start not getting knocked out on it given because they got
great chance. But the problem that some people and he also scored a knockdown.
I might add against Charles Martin, who he dropped them the third round.
But Charles Martin had a couple of rounds in the middle of the fight
where he hurt Big Baby, he rocked him, he did some damage.
You know, he had him a little discombobulated. And there's two ways to
look at it. You can either jump off the bandwagon and say he was
quote unquote exposed and you know, when he gets into with a guy that's
a lot better than an older Charles Martin, what's gonna happen. And then
there's the other side, if you want to be the more positive viewpoint of
things, say, look, Charles Martin's a good pro. He had a
heavyweight title for a minute. He's a good puncher, he was a good
athlete. He came in pretty good shape for that fight. He had opper
spirit for that fight, and Jared Anderson took his best shot and never got
knocked down. Overcame some adversity in the heavyweight division, especially if you want
to go to the Promised Land, you know, you gotta show you can
overcome some adversity. And so from that standpoint, if you're a Jared Anderson
supporter, you're like, you know what, my guy got in there with
a tough, solid vet. He showed what he's got, He took some
solid shots, he overcame some brief adversity, and oh, by the way,
when it was all said and done, he won ninety nine to ninety
on two scorecards, in ninety nine to ninety one on the third. There
was no issue in terms of him winning the fight. So he just didn't
look the best. But everybody is not going to have the perfect night.
That was the kind of fight was probably in the long run good for Jared
Anderson. The question is Kenny put whatever issues he had behind him. Like
you mentioned, he's back in the ring less than two months later, which
is good for a developing fighter, and we'll see what he can do.
And he's got a guy like Ridenko who's known to be a tremendous in terms
of a taving a tremendous chin never you know, one time stoppage and all
those all those fights he's had over a long career. We'll see what he
can do. Yep, all right, the co feature just real brief mention
of that Faa Jogba and Coastal Buttski another unbeaten but largely unknown and untested fighter.
And it seems to me, what do I know, and you're more
plugged in with top rank, that they may be looking at a jog Ba
as a real big baby opponent, especially if a Jogba looks good. I
don't know that you would know that better, but this is like the second
time that a jog was fought right there with real big baby on a card
that I can recall. Maybe they're trying to set that up. Just a
quick thought on that before we move on. Well, that's certainly a possibility.
One thing top rank they do like, which is good for boxing.
It's good for fans to put on some fights. You know, gotta put
on heavyweight fights. People like heavyweight boxing, and so they have some of
these heavyweight fighters and so putting them on the same card together is not a
huge surprise. You know, Joga has been a little bit disappointing in terms
of his development so far. When he started off in the pros. You
know, he's coming off of the twenty sixteen Olympic. He's from Nigeria.
He had relocated the Texas training with Ronnie Shields and looked like a phenomenal prospect,
huge power and big size and you know, just a great physique and
all that. And while he is you know, continued to win, he
did have the let's call it stubbing his toe. He fought and this was
a step up fight for both guys. In twenty twenty one, on the
undercard of the third fight between Tyson Fury and Deontay Wilder, he fought Frank
Sanchez. Now, Frank Sanchez is a very slick Cuban boxer, you know,
not a big puncher, but a real skillful guy. And it was
a matter of, you know, is it going to be the Sanchez skills
or the Jogma power, And it was the Sanchez skills, you know,
won that fight. So he that was his one loss, a forgivable loss
because Frank Sanchez is an excellent technician and a good quality up and coming contender
in his own right. So since then he's got the two wins in a
row against most recently in January against Stefan Shaw, who was lost his next
fight. After that, Tuna Row got released by Top Rank and has kind
of been a disappointment. But now he's going with Kasabutski, who's not a
lot as no one about him in terms of he hasn't been seen by American
fan base. He is nineteen and oh you know with eighteen knockouts now,
just real quick. He was supposed to be the Jared Anderson opponent back in
July. He had a visa issue and he was who Charles Martin replaced when
they got the visa worked out. The thought originally was they'll match up with
Jared in the next fight. For their own reasons, they decided to match
him with a jog Butt instead and put Jared Anderson in with Ridenko. But
be that as a may so he's visas tayting caravan. He's fighting his fight
now. He's not fought big name guys. Probably the most recognizable name on
his record was back in twenty twenty two. In May of last year,
he has a fifth roun knockout against Johann Duopis, who was a fighter that
has fought lots of name guys. Once fought Deonte Wilder for the WBC Tattle
and lost that fight. So look, these are guys the top rank is.
They're putting their guys in in fights where where jog and Jared Anderson are
favored, but the opponents that they're facing are solid pros who it's not like
on paper, you're looking at fights that are humongous mismatches. And one other
note I might add, this fight was originally announced. This card was originally
announced as a heavyweight televised triple header, and the other fight was supposed to
be the first bout since Top Rank signed the twenty twenty Olympic super heavyweight gold
medalists from Uzbekistan, the big giant south Ba Bakodar Jalabav, and he was
on this card supposed to be opening up the broadcast on an eight rounder.
That he's still on the card, Top Rank is going to instead show his
bout on its YouTube channel. And the reason for that even though they didn't
publicize this, and frankly they didn't bother to tell anybody. I just was
looking at things and asked a few questions. There's an issue, a legal
dispute because they signed him. But Disrupt Promotion is living up to its name
of being disrupt Promotions by claiming that when they bought out contracts from the now
defunct Probellum that they still have some sort of claim on the Jala Lav contract
and if your ESPN, you don't need any part of a potential lawsuit.
So they're like, we don't need any part of this, and so they
took him off the ESPN broadcast. They took him off the ESPN Plus broadcast
because ESPN did not have appetite for the potentially a lawsuit. Top Rank is
willing to take that gamble because they don't see it as really a big deal,
so they're going to put him on their YouTube channel. They just have
more of an appetite for the confrontation, illegally speaking, than the network does.
So that's the reason why that is occurring. So he's still on the
card. He's just not going to be mentioned a lot. He's not going
to be seeing a lot unless you watch the YouTube channel. But the three
heavyweights that they are building their future on to some degree, Jola, lav
A, Jagba, and Jared Anderson are all on this show and that will
be coming Saturday in Tulsa, Oklahoma. So we have Poland and we have
Oklahoma. We love all of that. Now you're gonna ye, yes,
he says sarcastically. Now we are ready to hear from the Hall of Fame
Voice of HBO Sports and it is great to hear this voice. And again
I already to preview some of this. He will be part of the PPV
dot com interactive coverage of Canelo Alvarez Jamel Charlo at the end of next month,
September thirtieth. That's part of why you reached out to him. But
as you said, you love commiserating, talking, catching up with Jim Lampley
about all things, including boxing. So in this case, we bring it
to boxing and get ready to hear the voice, the iconic voice of HBO,
Jim Lampley, and that is with Dan right now. I'm very excited
to bring into the podcast this week my longtime pal who I haven't seen in
a while because we haven't been ringside together in a long time, and that's
the one and only international Boxing Hall of Famer, the great blow by blow
announcer for thirty years on HBO, and it is none other than Jim Lampley.
And we're gonna get into it why you're on the podcast and what you're
doing. But thank you very much for doing this, Jim. My privilege,
Dan, and great to be back in touch with you. I look
forward to seeing you. Yeah, well, We were in touch regularly.
We text a lot, even if we'd haven't hung out in a while.
But we'll tell the people why you're here. You haven't done any boxing matches
since HBO exited the business at the end of twenty eighteen. Still a shock
to me, to be honest with you. But now we're getting you back
in. We're getting you back in for a little bit because you've signed on
with our good friends at ppev dot com to work fight week for the upcoming
September thirtieth Showtime pay per view event between Canelo Alvarez and Jermale Charlot for the
undisputed super middleweight title. Of course, ppv dot com is the digital platform
that will stream the event like they do for all the big pay per view
fights, and so you're gonna be working with them, hosting a chat on
the night of the fight, doing some other activities and content creation I guess
during the week for their website, for their social media. So first of
all, just how excited are you be back involved in a big fight of
any capacity, even though you're not necessarily calling the fight. Well, I'm
very excited that I'm coming back to a fight that takes place in the natural
homeland of present day boxing, the MGM Grand Hotel in Las Vegas, around
the corner of the team Obile Arena. So back to a venue and surroundings
with which I'm very familiar from all of my past experiences. Back to strolling
the hallways of the cavernous MGM Grand and bumping into people like you and Lance
bug Meyer and many of my old friends from the years of boxing coverage.
I think that you and I might have agreed logically a few years ago that
I was likely to show up doing blow by blow somewhere, but that turned
out to be, for whatever reason, a false expectation, didn't I did
sign you'll recall, I signed a deal to do one fight on Triller,
to feen the Lopez against George Camboso's in a proposed rematch. Lopez came down
with covid U, and I wound up with no further connection to that outlet
trailer after that, because the next thing they asked me to do was something
that I just didn't want to do. And you know, whether it was
to be expected or whether it was unexpected, take your pick, nobody else,
no streaming excuse me, no streaming service no cable network, no other
television vendor for boxing reached out to say, are you interested in doing our
blow by below commentary? So to get a reach out from PPV dot com
to do something that's a little bit more free form, that's more editorial analysis,
more in keeping with what Larry Merchant and Max Kellerman did in my company
me is very exciting and I'm interested to see what kind of an impression I
can create, what kind of impact I can deliver working in something more like
a Merchant slash Kellerman rolled than calling blow by blow. Very very interesting.
We have a lot to unpack from that. First of all, I think
when you were going to do the Trailer fight, it was actually the first
fight between Cambosis and Lobs. It never fought a second fight, so there
was no rematch. But that was you know, that was because Trailer ended
up mishandling their purse bit and it ended up dropping down to the second bidder
in match room Boxing, and so it was unfortunate you never got the opportunity
to do that fight. And I know that the other fight, I think
they tell me if I'm wrong about this, I believe they asked you to
do the farcical exhibition between Vander Holyfield and an MMA fighter, correct, I
you know the lover hate it, judge it the way you will want.
I said to them, I don't do trite and meaningless exhibitions between boxers and
MMA competitors. That's not to my way of thinking, real and legit like
all the boxing I've covered over the years. So I wasn't interested in going
to Miami, and it feels like the right move since Belfort knocked out holy
Field in the first round and that was that. But now on to what's
going on with this I'm curious about So you mentioned our buddy Lance pugm Are.
You're going to work with him, who's also involved with PPB dot com
doing some writing for their website and also co hosting the chat with you they'll
do on the fight night and some other creation during the week of the fight.
What I'm interested to know is what sorts of things. Okay, the
chat we all know about. I know about chats, anybody that's followed me,
No, I did chats for years on ESPN and USA Today, et
cetera. But besides being involved with that, which is going to be very
cool, I think for the viewers. What other sorts of things do you
have planned or are you thinking about doing with them during the week of the
fight while you're out in Vegas. Well, I think some of it will
be unplanned in the sense that they want me to come to Vegas on Tuesday
night, which is forty eight hours earlier than would have been the case back
in the day calling blow by blow. So I'm I'm there to show up
Tuesday night at d MGM Grant and then in the next seventy two hours ninety
six hours before the fight. I think what they're looking for is that I
stroll the halls, go to the media room, hang out with people like
Dan Raypheel, and wind up being a part of the general conversational environment relative
to the fight of Some of that will be taping interviews with radio and online
people. Some of it will be just talking with people like you about what
we expect and what are the reasons for those expectations and the context within this
within which this competition is going to take place. Some of it will just
be rubbing the shoulders with people like my dear friend Lance pug Meyer, whom
I really admire, who I think is a classy guy with a strong editorial
vision, and you know, some of it will just be enjoying the company
of fighters, promoters, managers, trainers, writers, broadcasters, all the
people who are part of the fight community and who basically haven't seen me face
to face in four years. December eight, twenty eighteen was the date of
the last boxing card on HBO. Were four and a half years removed from
that, and I the one big plan I had in the interim was to
go to the Hall of Fame induction ceremonies in Canistoota, New York three years
ago, to be a part of Roy Jones and Bernard Hopkins inductions because they
were so much a part of my friend structure and I felt so close to
both and that was the moment when I caught COVID. Yeah, so I
was not able to go to Canastota on that planned occasion. So basically I've
been isolated. I've been kept in a lock box. I haven't had any
of the kinds of experiences in direct contact with boxing that I'm looking forward to
having at the end of September when I go to Las Vegas. And all
of that leaves open a lot of room for discovery in terms of what the
heck does Jim have to say about this at this point and is it in
any way interesting? We'll find out. So one thing, I mean,
I know the answer because you and I have stayed in touch, but a
lot of people have asked me via social media sometimes I've seen people at fights
that I have been to to cover what's Lampley doing now? They don't.
I mean, you're not doing boxing, of course, but can you just
take them in and explain to people what your life is now away from boxing,
because we were so used to seeing you on TV every couple of weeks
doing the Fuel events and it's been a while. So at the end of
twenty nineteen, my wife, Debrah, and I made a big move from
Delmar, California, to the home of my college alma mater, Chapel Hill,
North Carolina. I was responding to an invitation to teach in the Department
of Communication at the University of North Carolina. I wound up teaching five semesters
and what a thrill that was because I was on campus, a member of
the faculty, hobnobbing with the chancellor of the university. At the school where
I dropped out of school more than fifty years ago. In nineteen sixty eight,
I ultimately flunked out of school because of my terrible undergraduate school grades.
I had to fight my way back into school via correspondence courses and a long
string of a when I got back onto campus, I wound up going to
graduate school in the department which is now the Department of Communications. And it
was at the end of graduate school when I accidentally was chosen out of a
talent hunt by ABC Sports to become the first person who ever stood on the
sidelines college football with a camera and a microphone, first person who ever stood
on the sideline of any football game with a cameron on microphone. That was
in nineteen seventy four. It was nineteen eighty seven, of course, when
a new division president arrived at ABC Sports, succeeding run Arledge in that job,
and arrived with one basic predilection about ABC Sports, which is, how
do I get rid of Jim Lampley? And he assigns me to boxing,
thinking that that would kill me. His idea was boxing will be allergic to
Lampley. Why did he want to get rid of you? Why would he
want to get rid of you? You were it on college football. I
remember those days. He didn't like me. That's all the pure personal animosity.
He didn't even know me, but he walked in the door at ABC
Sports saying basically, I don't like this guy and I want to get rid
of him. Oh and I had I had specific guarantees in my contract for
the Calgary Olympics that he absolutely wanted to up end. So his aim was
to mistreat me as much as he possibly could, and part of that was
assigning me to boxing. They had been casting about trying to find the right
ringside blow by blow person to succeed co Sell. Obviously, following co Sell
in any role whatsoever was a thankless task. The audience was accustomed to that
bigger than life persona. So he thought, Okay, I'll put Lampley at
ringside in boxing. That will kill him, That will force him and his
agent to walk away from contract. What he didn't realize at the moment,
or didn't pay attention to, I guess, was that the network could just
signed a look see, get acquainted contract with a nineteen year old heavyweight from
New York named Mike Tyson. So my first several on air boxing appearances at
ABC Sports were Tyson's first few appearances on television, and therefore I sort of
became connected to the Tyson story, so that eventually, when HBO signed a
long term contract with Tyson, HBO decided they wanted me to call the fights,
and I wound up. You know, everything in this business is poignant
and has a downside. The downside was that I was brought in to replace
a very dear friend and a wonderful guy named Barry Tompkins. To Barry's great
credit, we have never had a fractious moment about it. He's still been
my friend ever since that moment, and I loved him and revere him for
that. But I replaced Barry Thompkins in the HBO chair and I continued forward
with Tyson February ten, nineteen ninety. As you know, I was in
took you to call what became the biggest upset in boxing history, and I
called dozens and dozens of great prize fights over the years before ATNT bought HBO
and in twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen and decided they weren't interested in boxing anymore.
Well, one thing you forgot to mention in that is that when that
person at ABC decided to quote unquote punish you by putting you on boxing.
They didn't realize that you were a lifelong boxing fan and that you loved the
fact that they put John boxing. My father died when I was five years
old, and I know you know this story. Sure. Father died when
I was five years old. The very first time my mother ever sat me
down in front of a television step to watch a sports event, she took
me to a neighborous cocktail party. She marched me down a hall and put
me in front of a tiny, miniature television set was on a TV dinner
train, and she pointed to it and said, watched this screen. You're
going to be watching Gillette Friday Night fights at Sugar Ray Robinson versus Bobo Olson
for the middleweight Championship of the World. This will be their second fight.
And the reason you're doing this I was six. And the reason you're doing
this is because if your father were still alive, this is what he would
be doing with you. So I watched that fight. I inculcated the voice
of Don Dunfie into my consciousness. I became a constant fan of Gillette Friday
night fights. Over the years, I was still watching Gillette Friday night fights
on the Unforgettable night when Amiel Griffiths fought Benny Kidd Perrette. By that time,
we had moved to Miami, and eventually I wound up saving lawnbowing and
car washing money to buy a ticket to the very first live prize fight I
ever attended, which was February twenty five, nineteen sixty four, Miami Beach
Convention Center, Sunny Liston versus Cassius Clay. Three days later, Cassius Clay
became Muhammad Ali and and so that was the first time. When we're on
the go day to day, things can get a little jumbled. Okay,
are in the dishes, stack the kids, pack the shower of reply to
traffic, present the elevator, take dinner to swimming, cook the homework,
and wash the sandwiches. You need something on the go that's good for you
so you're good to go. Glennel and farm Key for protein pouches. Power
your body with a double dose of pure goodness fifteen grams of protein and got
friendly cultures keeping you feeling good. Whatever's on your to do list? Oh,
I almost forgot, I need to Hoover the Dog Glennel and farm Key
for protein, making sure you're got to go every day. Ever saw a
live prize fight, and you know it's just a kind of poetic arc that
you eventually go forward to ringside at Tokyo in February of nineteen ninety when I'm
sitting there in the eighth and ninth rounds of what has become an obvious Douglas
win, and I'm thinking, oh my gosh, the first time I ever
went to a live prize fight, that was the biggest upset in the history
of boxing, And now here's the fight that will succeed it as the biggest
upset in the history of boxing. And I'm describing it for the entire American
audience. When something like that happens in your life, it's inescapable that you're
going to think, oh my gosh, I was this is destiny. I
was meant to be here. So there has always been a strange and almost
severe, surreal element of destiny surrounding my connection to boxing. And yes,
there was no way in the world that Dennis Wanson could have known any of
that. As far as he was concerned. I was a preppy Eastern kid
who probably didn't have any background or connection to boxing, and this was his
way of beheading me, was to send me up to Glens Falls, New
York for Mike Tyson Versus Jesse Ferguson in early nineteen eighty seven, and I
listen, I grew up not too far from Glens Falls in New York,
and I remember watching it. I covered some of my first sports events at
the Glens Falls Civic Center, not boxing, but high school sports. And
by the way, the fact that your first live fight was the first fight
between then Cassius Clay became Muhamad Ali winning the title against Sonny Listen, it
trump's my first ever live fight of Buddy mcgart against George Heckley. But that's
a different story only. Yes, yes, do you remember do you remember
the post fight interview at Tyson Versus Jesse Ferguson Alex Wallow went into the ring
to talk to Mike after that. Do you remember what was said in that
interview? I believe it was something to the effect of that he he punched,
was it when he he was gonna punch his nose into his brain?
That's exactly right, the memory, Yes, Alex asked Tyson a question about
the uppercut that had splattered Jesse's nose and created blood flow all over the ring
in the fourth round before it was stopped in the fifth, and Mike said,
Customato taught me that the purpose of the uppercut was to drive the opponent's
nose bone into his brain. And I was trying to drive his nose bone
into his brain. When I was sitting at ringside, thinking, oh my
god, this guy's not only going to be the greatest quote machine in boxing,
He's going to be the greatest quote machine in sports. Look at what
I've stumbled into here. Because by now it was clear I was going to
be installed as the ringside boxing guy. So within the next few weeks,
they all came tumbling out. Boxing is a hurt business. Everybody's got a
plan until you hit them. All the things that made Tyson Tyson were visible
from the start, and I was suddenly the narrator of all that. I
mean, I wasn't a narrator that but because I grew up in that area,
we all you know, and I was a teenager, like a young
teenager at that time. We all knew Tyson in school. Not because he
was the heavyweight champion at that point. He wasn't, but he had fought
all of those early fights in our capital region of New York where we grew
up. So we saw him on the local TV news, We've read about
him in the newspapers. You know, it was like he was they talked
about him on the radio. It was like kind of a he was like
a local celebrity before he became a world figure, like you know, as
your chronicling of his fights helped him become over those years well all over the
country because his very skilled manager slash promoters Bill Katon and Jimmy Jacobs knew how
to build a personality. And at that moment, this is before the cable
television era, so every local television station in the country has a sports director,
and the sports director has to somehow fill three three and a half minutes
every night between the weather and the end of the newscast, and and sometimes
if there's nothing going on locally, it's not easy to fill those three three
and a half minutes. So Kayton and Jacob's put together a videotape of mike
first seventeen knockouts, and you can remember seeing the tape. It was comical.
Guys are flying through the air, Guys are doing summersaults as they land
on the canvas. You know, it was all. Every one of those
knockouts was a spectacular mismatch type knockout. And that's how Mike's image was built
before he ever chose to try to drive Jesse Perkinson's snows bone into his brain.
Now, I wonder, so that's back obviously back in the day,
but and now you're coming back to do this project with pbev dot com.
You're living in North Carolina, working as a as a professor at your alma
mater at North Carolina. So I wonder how much since the end of the
HBO days, at the end of twenty eighteen, how much are you still
or how closely are you still following professional boxing these days? Do you think?
I mean, I probably, I think pretty close. I know you're
reading my fight for each night news letter. I'm sitting here every week,
stupidly thinking that somebody's going to call me up. I'm offer a blow by
blow gate so intelligently trying to stay abreast of the curve. I'm watching all
the fights so that I will have opinions on them. Not all, but
you know, everything meaningful and important, such as, for instance, Canelo
Alvarez versus Dmitri b Bull too, you know, two fighters I had covered
extensively on HBO. I'm watching all of these things as they go along.
I got some kudos from our mutual friend Tom Howser a couple of weeks ago,
because Howser called me to ask, you know, what do you think
is going to happen in Crawford Spence? And I, you know, went
out on a limb and said, I not only do I think Crawford's gonna
win, but I think Spence might be to rescue in the late rounds.
And so you know, I've picked up as much as I can. I
can't say that I am as knowledgeable and astute me as I was when it
all stopped back in December of twenty eighteen. But I still pay attention and
I feel fairly confident that I'll be able to offer some opinions with regard to
Canelo and Charlo on September thirty. All right, so you've called obviously tons
of Canelo fights because he had many, many fights on HBO and on HBO
pay per view. You know, some of his biggest fights he's ever had.
Charlo never appeared on HBO even though he was fighting when you were still
doing back in HBO, but you never, to my recollection, never had
an opportunity to call one of his fights. So I'm curious. Since you
are following the sport, it means you're probably familiar with the fact that Charlo
became the undisputed champion in his weight class at junior middleweight and clearly still following
what Canelo was. What's going on with him? Can you just give me
your initial thoughts on Canelo versus Charlo. He is moving up to weight classes
to challenge Canelo, but it doesn't seem to be that big of a size
difference when I've seen them together at the news conferences and and uh, you
know, having been in their presence in person. Also, just what are
your thoughts on the general matchup that you're going to be chronically Well, you
know, it's it's natural two favorite Canelo because of his vastly more high profile
resume. It's natural to favorite Canelo even with regard to the weight equation,
because he's basically the larger man and one sixty eight would seem to be at
this point Canelo's natural weight and Charlo's going up fourteen pounds from one hundred and
fifty four. So there are all sorts of reasons to assume that Charlo is
an underdog to canelo aldrest. But on the other hand, Canelo is older,
Canelo has had many more fights, Canelo has made tons of money at
One of the things I've always said about boxing is if you go into the
gym and you are one percent less every day during training than you used to
be because unconsciously your motivation has slipped, your dedication has slipped. You take
a little short cut here and there, scoop of ice cream at night,
stuff like that that you don't think he's going to affect you. And the
margins of competition are so fine that ultimately those kinds of things can and do
affect you. So at what point has Canelo made too much money to continue
to be the hungry competitor that he used to be. At what point is
Charlo biting off more than he can shoot by going up and wait? What
happened when Canelo took another bite of the apple at light heavyweight after having easily
beaten Sergei Kovilev and found out that Dmitri Gogol was an entirely different thing.
This is a sport. A lot of people think these are wide margins of
competition because you see people getting knocked out. That's not the case. Knockouts
proceed from fine margins of competition, just as decisions too, and so at
the end of the day, there are fine margins. There are unpredictable factors.
You want to say, Oh, canell is an obvious favorite, he's
bigger, he has more, big fight experience, et cetera, et cetera.
Not necessarily the case, until until I get a chance to look at
them and maybe talk to them face to face in Las Vegas, the way
I used to do in a private room in intimate circumstances the day before the
fight. It probably won't be exactly that kind of thing. But until I
see them and talk to them, I'm not ready to tell you what I
think happens in the fight. It's always the product of very personal factors and
equations that you really can't fully evaluate until you get to the site and see
the fighters. Listen, I agree with you, and I get asked that
all the time. While you pick who you're picking, then you know you
have an idea. But I tell people all the time when at least when
they're fights, I attend Spence Crawford's a prime example. I kind of knew
who I was gonna pick, but I really didn't know for sure until I
was face to face with Crawford and Spence on Thursday and talk to them after
the press converts, where then I really kind of at that point you assess
body language and that sort of thing and you make your pick. So I'm
sure that it'll be the same when we get the Vegas for Cannello versus Charlotte.
I did pick Crawford. I didn't pick him by by a knockout the
way you did, and I didn't think he would totally dominate, But I
definitely had the opinion that Crawford would be and I kind of always had the
opinion that Crawford would probably win. But I was really much more firmative when
we got to the you know, the couple of days prior to the bout.
And so when you see those guys, I'm sure it's you know,
like I said, you covered a lot of the Canello fights for HBO.
Will be your first experience with with Charlo. Uh. I mean, I
guess for you. I mean, even though you're not calling the fight,
it's kind of like like riding a bike, you kind of don't forget,
like when you get the fight week is you just gonna feel back at home
in one sense, even though it's been a while. I hope so.
And you know, I'm doing something different than I've done before. I'm communicating
via chat on a computer rather than talking into a microphone. I hope I
can remember during the fight that I'm supposed to write it down. I guess
Lamp gonna elbow me or wave his hand in front of me or something if
I make a mistake. But the bottom line is it'll be an introductory experience.
Will be the first time that I'm doing chat, would be the first
time I'm working for PPB dot com, and I don't expect to be perfect.
I expect to give it a good try and see if I can provide
some interesting material and follow Lance's lead because he's the veteran. Now he's he's
done this before, and then we'll see where it goes from there. Well,
it sounds good to me. I'll tell you one thing, I'm sure,
a lot of boxing fans who've missed having you around at the very least,
we'll be excited to see your involvement with this event. And I'll tell
you I'm looking forward to seeing Las Vegas in a few weeks. I'm looking
forward to seeing you Dan. We'll have to find a moment to get together,
whether it's for an ill or just to sit down, diet coke or
whatever. Absolutely, but bottom line is yes, there are many many dear
friends I am really looking forward to seeing in Las Vegas, and you are
very much at the top of the list. I appreciate that. Jim.
Thank you very much for doing this today. I'm glad we're about to get
together. Like I said, I'm glad you'll be doing some work with ppev
dot com, who, by the way, I'd be remiss if I did
not say, has been an outstanding sponsor of this podcast at times, as
well as my Fight for Each Night newsletter, which I appreciate. And I
will look forward to seeing you in a couple of weeks or a few weeks.
Thank you so much. Talk to you later. Dan, Thank you,
Jim, take care one more time. I'm not fawning all over you.
But I really enjoyed that. I enjoyed getting to hear here because you
don't hear him really anywhere anymore for the last five years. That's kind of
the point of why PPV dot Com is doing this. But if you were
watching Big Time boxing in the late eighties, the nineties, the two thousands,
you were hearing Jim Wampley over and over and over again, and we
just haven't heard him for the last few years. So great stuff. They're
on that one more time. No, I'm really I'm happy that they looked
him up. Look, the bottom line is, and you can hear it
in the interview, he would like to call fights again. He's somewhat dumbfounded
why no one has sought out his services as am I to call fights once
again, but it hasn't happened. But he's he's you know, he's got
another life, as people heard in terms of him being a professor at his
alma mater of the University of North Carolina doing other things. But he's excited
to get back and dip his toe back into boxing and hopefully he enjoys him
his time working to fight in Las Vegas and the fans enjoy you know,
interacting on PPV dot com and seeing what other types of stuff that he along
with my good pal Lance plug Meyer produced for them during fight week. And
it'll be good to see him and again he and Larry Merchant and Sugar Ray
Leonard there in the late eighties and the and the early nineties and eventually Emmanuel
Stewart, George Foreman, Roy jones On and On Kellerman kell him and it
was big time boxing when you heard those guys on, there is no doubt
news and then some nostalgia and we're gonna be done. So Tim Zoo,
hey, once again, I'm going to applaud here being active. And this
is not a surprise that Zoo will fight as the elevated WBO World champ when
he fights in October. They announced this on Thursday in Australia that he will
fight Brian Mendoza in October October fifteenth in Australia, venue to be announced.
Zoom, who's already fought twice this year, Hey, what a novel concept.
A third title fight now really in about a seven or eight month time
period. We love that. So a couple of quick thoughts because Mendoza's off
the upset of Sebastian Fondura earlier this year, so this is not some intrigue,
so go ahead. Does it count as an extra fight? Also on
top that, because of the fact that he wrestled with that dog that did
him before the last five and he overcame that, and then the dog might
have given him a tougher fight than Carlos ocamp Did I say that? But
I'm bump continue on, my friend. So yes, As you mentioned,
the fight will take place October fifteenth in Australia, which will be a Saturday
night October fourteenth in the United States. And because even though the paperwork is
not signed and the eyes are not dotted and the teas are not cross,
this fight will be on showtime in the United States, the same way Tim
Zoo's previous three fights have been, including the last two that took place in
aus Shelly against Tony Harrison when he won the interim title of the WBO,
the old Campo fight that you mentioned, and this will be the next one
out. What's interesting about this fight is because of the w BO recent ruling,
when Charlo fights Canelo on September thirtieth, he'll be able to go into
the ring as the undisputed champion, you know, for the pageantry purposes and
the historical purposes and all that. When the bell rings, he'll be stripped
of the WBO title and Tim Zoo will automatically be elevated from interim champion to
the full champion. Remember, he was supposed to fight Charlo back in January.
It's not his fault. He's been waiting on this fight. They hope
to reschedule in June. Charlo wasn't ready, and then when Charlo was going
to be ready, he got the opportunity for Hugh j money and legacy kind
of stuff against Canelo. So the tim Zouki people didn't even blame Charlot for
taking that opportunity. But in the end, they want the title. They'd
still like to be on the student, so he'll have the So even though
at this moment he's not the full WBO champion, he's still the interim champion.
Comes September thirtieth, after the bell rings for the Canelo fight, Zoo
will be the full champion and therefore when he fights Brian Mendoza, it'll be
a title defense. And also of significance is that part of that WBO ruling
which was very nuanced. Even if the Canello Charlotte fight does not happen for
some reason on the thirtieth, it's still you know, if it doesn't happen
on the thirty he'll still be elevated to the full champion. And what also
adds another small layer of intrigue. Of course, when Mendoza knocked out Fendora
with that one punch and a big upset in a fight that Fendora was winning
candily in all three scorecards, Mendoza won the WBC's interim title. Should the
WBC follow suit and eventually strip Charlo, also he would be elevated, which
would technically make this a unification fight because Mendoza would become the full champion of
the WBC, Zoo will be the w BO full champion, and so it'll
be an unusual sort of unification fight. But that's would have been nonetheless,
so good matchup. You know, it's a solid fight. I don't I
mean, I don't think it's something that's the end all be all because no
offense Mendoza. But to me, it's a huge difference in class between Tim
Zoo and Mendoza. And we saw Fandorra and just played with him for six
rounds before he got knocked out. Clarify for me with what you just said,
because you travel in these circles and you know this. So part of
the intrigue, and they were playing this up in the press conference. Is
he's the WBC interim champion fighting the WBO soon to be elevated. That's the
phrase world champion they kept using. If Zoo wins the fight, hypothetically,
would he be the WBC's elevated champion at some point if they fight, if
they stripped Charlo, or would he have to still fight somebody else like for
the vacant world title. I'm always confused on the rules. You're not even
talking straight right now. If they fight and it's for Zoo's title a w
BO, that's right, and and Doza has has and has not been elevated
because the WBC is not gonna probably strip Charlo, then that interim title wouldn't
even be at stake for for for Zoo. Why would only get why?
I just had a curiosity. Why would it not Because you can't unify a
regular you can't unify a full title with an interim title. It just doesn't
happen. It's not happening. So this sport, this sport makes up the
rules about all the titles and all the things. Anyway, I just want
to the bottom line. I want to get to Charlo and and Tim Zoo
with as much on the line as possible. And if you're telling me that
I can get Zoo with two titles to fight Charlo with two titles, that
be even better. That's what they would like to have happen. The chance
of that are very very smart. Carlo has said if whatever happens against Canelo,
he plans to return to junior middleway A. I'll believe it when I
see it. B Well, let's see how many delts he has left.
Because the sanction bodies are not I can all just let him linger and linger
and linger. At least the w BO had the balls to make a firm
decision. I felt like they made the right decision. They didn't mess up
the undisputed aspect of the promotion for Canelo. But they're also going to make
sure that Zoo is not, you know, left holding the bag and not
get his opportunity and Mendoza interim or whatever if he does get elevated, will
be a gutification fight. If not, he's just fighting another good contender in
Brian Mendoza. All right, as some might say, don't worry, you're
pretty little head about it. But still let's credit him for being active.
This is a smart time he keeps him on the same timeline because he's fighting
only a couple of weeks after Charlo. That this could happen, God willing,
this could happen in the first half of the year next year to get
Jamel Charlo back in the ring. Depending on what happens, I'm with you,
we got plenty of time to talk about it. Jamel Charlo pulls the
upset with Canelo. He's not coming back to one fifty four. He'll defend
those titles at one sixty eight. What do I know? That's my belief.
I'm just interjecting what you were just saying there too. I'll believe it
when I see it. Ye were to happen. All right, let's move
on a couple more quick ones than we'll get to the nostalgia or Dennis Ugas,
Mario Barrios. They're going to be part of the Canelo Charlo undercard with
something significant on the Here we go interim titles again with something significant on the
line, go ahead. Yeah, I mean, this is one of those
fights that's sort of been in the you know, been discussed, been sort
of rumored for a while. Uh, it's going to happen. It hasn't
been officially announced yet, but it is my understanding that you know, perhaps
on Friday, perhaps at the beginning of next week, they will make the
formal announcement of the Canelo Charlot undercard, which they've gone through their press tour
and obviously for the main event, and now they're getting ready to announce,
you know, in total what the PPV with the pay per view undercard will
be. And I have reported, as others have, the other two fights
on this card, which one is the opening fight between Elijah Garcia and Armando
Razendez, a very good middleweight fight between you know, two exciting guys or
you know, kind of on the rise. Then the co feature which has
been widely reported by myself and others as well, tremendous matchup in the middle
and the junior in aweight division, that's Hayzis Ramos Junior against ericson Lubin,
which has you know, all action ran all over it. The fight that
will go in between those two fights on the pay per view will be this
or Dennis Ugas versus Mario Barrios fight. They will fight for the WBC's interim
welterweight title. Why do you need a welterweight interim title fight? I don't
really know that. Terrence Crawford just became the undisputed champion, obviously, you
know, his schedules up in the air. If he fights Spence in a
rematch, maybe it'll be at one fifty four. So in essence, the
WBC is sort of like producing who's gonna win the vacant title when Crawford,
you know, ends up vacating. They often do that. They kind of
get it backwards a little bit in terms of the timing, But as far
as the matchup goes, you know, it's a it's a somewhat interesting matchup.
Look for Dennis Ugas has been one of the better welterweights out there for
the last several years. He has not fought since April of twenty twenty two.
That is, when he lost the WB eight title in a one side
knockout loss against Errol Spence. When Errol unified the three belts. He suffered
a very serious eye an orbit injury in that fight, and so he has
been offered that long. So now he is coming back into the ring after
that injury. So he's going to be coming off fight of a long layoff.
And Mario Barrios is a guy who most people know just for his two
big losses, which was, you know, he gave Gervata Davis a solid
fight at one hundred and forty pounds and twenty one and he got stopped in
the eleventh round. And his next fight, he came back and you know,
he lost a one side of decision to the you know, to the
former title holder, Keith Thurman. He's only fought once in twenty twenty three.
That was a eighth round knockout against the very average Jovanni Santiago. You
know, Mario Barrios, in my opinion, nothing against the guy, nice
guy, pretty good fighter, doesn't belong in a world title fight at this
level in my mind, has never won a big fight. When he got
an interim belt or whatever, a regular belt for the WBA back in twenty
nineteen, he got a gift from God in that fight against Akmadoff, I
was ringside for that it was an atrocity of a decision. So look,
if Ugus is not damaged from what occurred against the Spence fight, you know
it should be a fight that he'll be favored to win. But putting the
title element of it aside, just in terms of a match on the card,
this is a very very good pay per view and I don't say that
a lot. I think this is an excellent pay per view undercard. It
may not have big, sexy world title fights, but each of those three
bouts that they have announced, Raymar they haven't announced, but they will announce
shortly, Ramos versus Lubin, Ugas versus Barrios, and Garcia versus Razendez,
all worth time, all worth interest. I think it's a tremendous undercard and
obviously Ugs built his name. You know, this off the huge win over
Manny Pachiou, which was a while ago, but he'll be on that undercard
quickly. We move on to two more news items and then the nostalgia.
Jai Opataia will defend the IBF Cruiserweight Championship. He's been out a lot of
these guys have been out with injuries. He's been out because of a broken
jaw after his win over Britas, which was over a year ago. He's
now back tell us more about when that's happening where and the opponent. Well,
he is the IBF champion, but he's also the ring magazine champion,
the lineal champion based on that victory over Bradest, a tremendous battle that they
had in Australia last year. That's where where Opataia is from. He's a
very durable, very strong, very exciting fighter. That was his first big
time fight. He won, but he suffered the jaw injury as you mentioned
in that fight, so he's coming off of that. He was now Remember
there had been multiple mandatories that he was ordered to make. One was against
Richard Riakapore. One was against the Polish fighter whose name escapes me at the
moment, and those guys turn him down. So the next guy available was
Bredest and so he accepted. So it was going to be a rematch.
They had asked the IBF about a week or so ago for an extension because
supposedly they were close to a deal. As it turns out, part of
what they did, and this is what I was told today by sources that
were involved is that they dad a deal to give Bradest a step aside,
so he'll get paid whatever he's getting paid and allow opa Ty to do this
optional defense, which will take place on September thirtieth, unfortunately, the same
day as the Canella fight. He will fight. He's an Australian fighter.
He will fight in London at the Wembley Arena and he will take on the
British fighter Jordan Thompson in this defense. Because remember he is promoted by Tasman
Fighters out of you know, Australia, but they recently made a deal for
him to be co promoted by Natchurroom Boxing, so he's going to go to
the UK. This will be a natch Room Boxing card. He'll be televised
on the Zone around the world except for and I believe Australia and New Zealand,
where I guess it'll be a pay per viewer I suppose. But so
this is going to be for a lot of people an introduction to this fighter
that haven't previously seen him. But he's an exciting guy, like I said,
makes good fights. Put on a well of a fight against Brightest.
They both did a really good action fight. Showed a lot of recall,
I remember we talked about this fight, and I remember we recapped it.
Didn't Opataia broke his jaw like early on in the fight, or at least
midway through the fight, and had to fight several rounds, if not like
half the fight with a broken jaw, showing nothing but toughness against a world
class fighter to upset him and win the belts. And this will be the
first fight since then. What does he look like now? And it's a
road warrior fight in England in somebody else's backyard, plenty of right, I
mean, they're listen the guys that are mashed up with Thompson's not exactly the
number one contender, but you know what, honestly, coming off of that
type of fight that he had, plus the layoff, plus the new promotion
contract, plus you know what, everybody's entitled maybe to a little bit of
a lesser fight once in a while, especially after that tough fight. This
is that for him. He is undefeated at twenty two and zero. You
know, had a great background also, it was a you know, a
top amateur, was an Olympian. So it'll be good to see him back
in the ring. I mean to try to grow his profile because he's worth
watching. Is my point good enough? One more news item than the nostalgia.
And we did talk about Zero Ramirez and Joe Smith Junior. You were
reporting that fighting. You've learned more details, including the weight agreement. Zurgo's
weight keeps going up and up and up here is it just me? All
right? Give me details? Well? As I reported they were going to
fight this fight, uh, and it was finally officially announced that they're going
to fight October seventh. It'll headline at the Zone Show. It'll take place
at the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas, a very nice venue, small venue,
but an excellent place for this type of fight. And they announced it as
a cruiserweight fight. But like promoters do, they don't like to tell you
the exact weight. So I have to make the phone calls and figure it
out. So I spoke to Joe di Guardia from Starboxing, who was the
promoter for Joe Smith Jr. Who said, yeah, the weight that we
signed for is one hundred and ninety three So the official wait for this fight
was one hundred ninety three pounds, which is in a commod limit, right
the limit? Yeah, that's the maximum that's in a combination the Ramiers.
Now, not to say that Joe Smith won't be happy to put on a
few pounds, but remember when Gilberto Ramirez was supposed to have his most recent
fight, he came in way over the one hundred and twenty five pound limit.
Like, let's sarcastically fill in the weight limited super middleweight audience and Dan
is one hundred and sixty eight pounds. The weight limit audience and Dan at
light heavyweight is one seventy five and zero that by three exits on the interstate
for his fight earlier this year at like one eighty something, and now he
wants a weight limit at one ninety three. That's not a problem. The
problem was missing to wait for the last fight, I understand. But he
needs a weight limit of one ninety three when he fought at one seventy five
a year ago. I don't have a problem with that, because the whole
point here is he fucked up and missed the weight back last. He needs
to be eighteen pounds heavy. Oh he doesn't. He's moving up the cruiserweight.
That's the point. Let plenty of guys go from light heavyweight to cruiserweight.
He's actually making a stop in between. He's not going to fight at
the fall two hundred that's twenty five pounds difference. He's fighting at one hundred
ninety three. Sort of get used to the weight. There's been plenty of
guys that have moved up and weight like that. So this is at one
ninety three. Let's hope he makes one ninety three, is my perspective,
and he'll he'll do this fight. And by the way, when this fight's
over with, presumably Gilberto Ramirez will then be on his way to fighting a
full fledge cruiserweight fight, perhaps the title fight down the road. You know,
we'll see what happens with Joe Smith winner Los. Does he stay in
that weight range, does he try to go WBC route and look for a
bridgerweight title. Does he go back to light heavyweight. But the point is,
here's the bottom line. Whatever the weight is, he's the one guy's
moving up. And it's still a good matchup between two guys who are experienced
championship blabbo fighters who have not faced each other yet, who are or willing
to fight each other, both coming off losses, both need to win.
It may not be the biggest fight in terms of what it means. But
I do think it happens to be a pretty good fight. I'm actually looking
forward to it so again October seventh, on that date, first Saturday in
October in Las Vegas for Zerdo and Joe Smith Junior and Nostalgia Time. It
was August twenty sixth of just six years ago on Sunday that Floyd maybe I
was telling my back when I was telling my forties. By the way,
you were in your forties then, Floyd Money, Mayweather, Connor McGregor,
you were there, you were ringside all the Mayhem. McGregor kept calling you
the boxing guy. That's why it's in your byline on Twitter. You've talked
about this before, but reminisce because the anniversary is here. Give me something
else about this event where Floyd, Floyd knew what he was doing, He
took him into the deep rounds, wore him down, He knew what he
was doing in that fight. Well, I mean, listen, most people
look at it as though, you know, people were shocked when Connor seemed
to win like rounds one and two, and people were like, oh my
god. But the reality is, and I'll go to my grade belief in
this, and I know a lot of guys that were there covering up with
me. He carried him, he let him do it. He knew what
he was doing. Floyd made with her. He wanted to put on a
little bit of a show. He wasn't gonna do anything stupid and get himself
knocked out or anything like that. But he basically didn't do anything, gave
away a couple of rounds and then slowly maturey picked it up and until he
put the you know, put the fight out of reach and stopped the Connor
mcgerger in round ten. But this was about more than just the fight.
The fight actually because of Floyd's willingness to kind of play along a little bit,
we lived up to the expectations because the expectations were really from people that
really knew, were very low, because again, this was the first really
big time fight that took place between an MMA fighter who wanted to come over
and cross into boxing. Now it seems like it's happening all the time,
but at the time that this took place in twenty seventeen, it was still
a novel thing. Particularly fighters on the level of Mayweather, who was,
you know, the biggest name, even though he'd been retired for a couple
of years and McGregor was the number one star in the UFC. Correct So
Floyd you know who had retired after his victory against Andre Berto, he came
out of retirement a couple of years later. He said, just for this
one fight to make his record a nice I glossy fifty and ozer he fought
against McGregor. I have said many times that the Nevada Commission regulating this fight,
agreeing to sanction this fight was ridiculous because you're putting a guy with making
his professional debut in with the greatest fighter of his time. Which now,
anytime there's a questionable fight for the commission, you can always point this,
well, you'll let McGregor fight Mayweather. Why can't you, you know,
sanction this fight. So from that standpoint, you know, not good but
big time promotion. It was a short promotion, only about seventy five days
or so, maybe a couple less than that, from the time the fight
was actually done until they actually were in the ring, and it was a
fight week where everybody was there, I mean from all walks of media,
not just boxing media, but but, but mainstream press, you know,
entertainment shows, you know, you name it, publications that wouldn't typically cover
a boxing event because it was such a big deal. And you know what,
they did the business because other than Mayweather pack yet which set every record
conceivable in terms of dollars generated, pay per view, you know, sponsors,
you name it, you know the ticket, the live gate, in
terms of the tickets, this fight did every single record other than beat what
Mayweather pack. Yeah, did So Floyd is number one and number two in
terms of all time events. So think about this, a guy making his
pro debut, but a huge superstar in the UFC. Six hundred million dollars
plus in revenue for the event. Again, we can't overstate, and that
number states it. We can't overstate. He was tremendously prominent and popular in
UFC. And the buzz was, will this translate into him handing comical as
it might have been for boxing fans, could he hand Floyd Mayweather his first
ever loss? And that was the build up, That was the intrigue.
Now you were right there at ringside for all of it, and and so
just a final thought was largely a waste of time. Did you think because
Mayweather was carrying him in your words early on, as it dominated him,
it turned out to be a fun event. It you know, it lived
up better than the expectation. I want to give you some of these crazy
numbers just because this is how sick it was, so putting the Mayweather pack
Yo numbers aside for a minute, Mayweather versus Connor McGregor six hundred plus million
in total revenue, a little less than what Mayweather at Pachyo did four point
three million pay per views, the record set by mayweth a Packers four point
six So just not that many less than, you know, all things considered,
and that's still, by the way, two million more than the previous
record, which was I believe Da La Hoya versus Mayweather. And right now,
how about big time just as a reference, any big time, prominent
fight. We're jumping up and down if they get seven fifty or a million
pay per views, and that one had four million, six years, four
point three million, wow, four point three million. And here's another thing,
the Mayweather versus pack Yo fight, the gross for the tickets at the
at the MGM Grand was seventy five million, just a hair below seventy five
million. The gross for Mayweather pak yaw, I mean Mayweather McGregor, which
was at the Team Obile Arena. How about fifty five million, four hundred,
fourteen thousand, eight hundred and sixty five dollars and seventy nine cents.
You have a down a tenny. Well, yeah, that's exactly what it
was. So the gate was astronomical, the pay per view was astronomical,
and Mayweather walked away with the easiest win of his career, practically fifty and
oh and as he said, I robbed you know, I was robbing the
bank that night. And but at least they put on a fun show.
I mean, I don't care to see it again. I don't need to
see Tyson Fury against uh, you know, Francis Naganu from the standpoint of
a and then they start against a boxing star. But this was the first
one. It was a huge event. I was still at ESPN at the
time, and our whole, our group of boxing folks and the MMA folks
were all over this. It was nutso, uh, you know, I
was out there. You know, meant you meant my birthday. I covered
the weighing on my birthday for that fight the day before and then uh,
it was just it's an interesting, so t J. Quick nostalgia on top
of your nostalgia for sixty seconds. I still remember that night. I'm working
preseason football in the NFL for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers radio broadcast, just like
I will do this Saturday for the final preseason game. And those days they
had four preseason games. That was the night of the fourth game, right
Phil, If you know anything, and you do because you follow the Giants,
anybody that follows the Cowboys, Patriots, Packers NFL football, the fourth
or the final preseason game is usually worthless. So this is largely a worthless
game. I'm having to participate in the postgame show, live radio duties after
the worthless game while this fight is going on, and there's a group of
us that have it up on the computer. It bought the pay per view
just like everybody else. There's about eight of us. I'm talking about the
worthless game, and there's people going ooh, uh, ooh ooh around me
in the Raymond James Stadium press box because we had to fight on I vividly
remember that from six years ago, you were ringside. I was detached watching
while working and talking about a meaningless preseason game for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
So there you go, littleness. It won't go down as like the big
Time championship fight. It had no real bearing on pound for pound, but
as events go, because of the star power of both of the two guys
involved, that was a big deal. As you mentioned, you know my
thing with McGregor when it all first started when he came into confront of me
at ringside at the Madison Square Garden Theater. If you don't know what I'm
talking about, google it or YouTube it. And then of course they had
the Wild for City press tour. Uh look, I'll tell you, I'll
give you an example how big of a deal this fight was. I've been
doing this a long time and there's been a zillions of press conferences. I've
actually only traveled for a kickoff press conference just a handful of times in my
day. Most of the time they're just, you know, really conducive to
getting real work done. But this was such a big deal that ESPN asked
me to go to Brooklyn to cover the press stop that took place at Barclay
Center, and uh, it was complete and utter Can also did one in
London, right, they went over and ramped up the UK fans. They
did, They did a couple, They did a couple where they did like
four cities. But the PostScript of that was I went to the press conference
in New York City and it was running very behind schedule, so instead of
having the media availability prior to the to the formal nonsense, we had to
wait to get with Connor until after the craziness. So We're sitting in the
interview room at the Barclays and I've done a thousand times for all the fights
I've covered at Barklay Center, So I'm sitting on my seat that happened to
be like in like the first or second row, kind of in the middle,
and uh, they asked, you know, please, when you when
when you ask your question, say your name and tell them where you're from.
Like with Floyd Mayweather, I didn't need to do that because he knows
who I am. I've covered him for twenty years and a lot of guys,
so they didn't really have to introduce him. He knew who that guys
were. But Connor didn't really know a lot of US boxing reporters. So
I got the microphone. It was my turn to ask a question and I
said, I'm Dan Raphael from ESPN. Oh you're the boxing guy. Like
it was like exactly, that's where it came. Well, then he'll call
me the boxing guy the first time. So it was like full circle of
that first incident. It was a crazy night her Connor McGregor. That's where
it comes back from on that. By the way, Happy birthday. We're
done with the podcast. It will be your birthday on Friday. Happy birthday.
You have joined the fifty three club along with me. We're vintage nineteen
seventy baby on the podcast here Missus Reeves is a year behind us and about
to be her number, which she doesn't want uttered in about a month.
Stand by actually actually a box now that I think of it. Oh my
lord, I gotta I gotta get a gift. It's coming up in like
ten days. But that my advice, that's my issue. Don't don't fuck
that up. No, yes we will. We will keep it straight and
narrow on that X for life, baby, Yes, very nice. Great
job with Jim Lampley. We gave you plenty here again the bet Us Boxing
Show. As we release this podcast, bet US platforms, YouTube, Twitter,
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podcast as it comes your way as a preview every Friday Recap podcast Dan ray
Field. No matter what happens this weekend, including if dubh shocks the world,
which would be huge, We're ready to talk about all of its Sunday
Night into Monday on the Fight Freaks Night Recap with that happy Birthday and enjoy
the rest of the weekend. Thanks sir, appreciate that, and we thank
all of you for being with us again. Bet us show Friday at one,
We come your way with a big fight. We can freeve you into
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or subscribe on the Big Fight we Can podcast feed for Dan Rayfield. I'm
TJ Reeves. Enjoy the fights. Thank you for being with us.