The countdown is on to fight time. This is Big Fight Weekend. Now
here is your host, DJ Leaves. I heard you missed me, so
I am back here as part of the Big Fight Weekend preview. Let's just
say that there have been times in which Dan Rayfield has basically said what do
I need TJ for? And so now we put that to the test this
past week, but not out of some planned, coherent plan or design.
It was because of technical nightmares for you. But in any event, I
am back. It's good to be back on the preview with the insider,
the man that we love to hear from from his fight Freaks Unite, Substack,
Big Fight Weekend dot Com. Hello Dan Rayfield. You did a very
nice job under trying circumstances, which we'll explain more in a moment. How
are things as we head into a weekend that has a Devin Hainey Regis Prograde
wty pound title fight, It has a world title fight for Robes Ramirez defending
his title on a top rank show. It even has a British title fight
on a Sunday for the WBO Cruiserweight title as Chris billim Smith. Is an
action we got championship fights all over the place to talk about. And we
got Jake Paul on the show. Jake Paul, who's fighting December fifteenth,
not this weekend, but next weekend. He's back. He's fighting a boxer.
We have a lot on the show, including news in nostalgia. What
are you feeling all right? Are you raring to go for another week?
Listen? It's been it's been a it's been very, very busy, and
as always we make mention to everybody. However, you found his social media
link on Dan Substack his newsletter, the Big Fight Weekend website. Make sure
you're following. Subscribing, rating and reviewing US does help keep it up.
Five star review takes like thirty seconds for you to do that. Review US
Apple Podcasts. I did all that by myself last week. I know you
did, so let's explain this quickly. I was not kidnapped. I was
not being held hostage. My Buccaneers did win a game late Sunday, and
I had a first world computer problem. I thought you were on a bender
after they won the game. Yeah, what right? I had a first
world computer problem of epic proportions, as in, I get home last Sunday
night and my computer won't turn on. And now that has happened, and
it's about a six year old computer that's been replaced refurbished once that's happened maybe
on like one other occasion in the last six years. So I'm in touch
with my man Rayfield going listen, I'm trying to get it to come on.
I'm in contact with my Mac that's the brand of computer I have guru
on how do I get it to turn on? But I think we have
an issue. The biggest part of the issue is that everything that I use
technically to produce this show is not available to me because the computer is down.
Not only I mean you and I could have recorded, but I'm I'm
not able to do what I normally do, even your software. No,
And you were very patient with me, as like ten eastern became ten thirty
eastern, and I'm like, big Dan, I'm good, but I got
no computer. She ain't coming on, Captain she should. The patient is
not doing well here And so as it turns out, the computer dead,
died, gone, And so now I'm in scramble mode Monday morning with other
work duties and other work stuff on the computer a great lesson peeps to have
everything backed up, and if you can have a second computer, have a
second computer. I just don't have a second computer that does all of this.
So in the meantime, Ray Fiel's chomping at the bit. He wants
to talk about Ryan Garcia. He has e Xander Zaia's interview. He has
all He's like the masses, the peeps, the savages need to be fed,
they need to be serviced, and you're correct. You're correct on that.
So I suggested to you, why don't you do your best, like
a like a stand up at you? And I went and saw Jerry Seinfeld
together from our friends at PEPA this summer. You were like Jerry on the
mic. I don't know about the jokes, but you did very well,
which I had some good TJ jokes in there, Yes, and you should
have been taking shots at me. It's not that I didn't want to be
there. I wanted to be there, but as I said to you,
I physically could not make it work. As Sunday became Monday, and I'm
trying to deal with the nightmare of getting another computer, which I was able
to twenty four hours. It was like that one time ever in their fifty
year career that kiss played as a trio and Paul Stanley was sick. That
only happened once. And I know you did spend part of the podcast talking
about Kisses finale. The one question that I keep hearing in the media,
and you'd be a good one to ask, do you really believe that was
it? Do you believe that was the last concert? Goodbye on the pay
per view or do you think they will come back in some special occasion,
some other tour even a year from now or a couple of years from now.
Do you believe that was it? Mister kiss was that it? I
believe it is the last tour, whether they may play another show together,
even if it was like a one off on like an award show or like
an American idol or a special charity thing, or maybe like an unplugged thing,
like just a one off. I definitely could see that where there's not
a lot of strain, a lot a lot of travel, But in terms
of they just finished the three and a half year, two hundred and fifty
city tour, they didn't happen. Paul Stanley is in his seventies. Genus
in the seventies. You know, they've made hundreds of millions of dollars,
So I believe that this is that is it, and they're not like a
lot of rock bands. They had one tour they called the Farewell Tour,
and that was really just when they ended their their original group with Asan with
Peter, and then they continued on for the next twenty years after that.
So they haven't not pulled that card. It's a farewell. They did at
one time, and it was because it was the end of the original lineup.
But I think this time, you know, all things coming to an
end. Kiss came to an end. Showtime's coming to an end. Yeah,
you know next week. I mean it just things go, Life moves
on. And you did a good job. You did a solid job.
Although I will say absence sometimes does make the heart grow fonder. So maybe
maybe you are a little more appreciative here of TJ and the skills and the
back and forth. I don't know if the audience back and forth, the
back and forth is good. It is good, all right, So real
quick, I'm gonna give you micro takes. Ryan Garcia impressive needs to be
better. Somewhere down the road. We agree on that, himI Mungia,
can I say it? You want me to say, what are we doing
here? I said, I said, I know you said it, but
I need to say it. He is the most mismanaged fighter at the world
class level of the last three or four years. I don't think of another
one that's even comparable. He has wasted the last two or three years of
his career. And I don't think that's an overstatement. It's all just to
hear one quick second. There's still hope. He's only twenty seven. He's
now going to be trained by Freddie Roach. Right, they are still rider
for the guys he's been fighting recently. Is actually a step up, it
seems to me, or at least on you know, a quality guy on
the on the devren Schenko level. It's not a complete nobody like you thought
prior to devren Chenko. So it's not a bad fight. When the bell
rings, I think that will be a good match to watch in terms of
entertainment value. And they're still trying to perhaps in the spring do a Berlanga
fight. There is conversation that he may get the call to fight Canelou So
we'll see, you know, the story is not yet written. I agree,
it's been a really brutal last couple of years for what they've done in
terms of his matchmaking. But he just had arguably the fight of the year
in his last fight against Deviren Chenko. The Rider fight shapes up to be
another great battle, So I'll cut him a little bit of slack, you
know, the last upcoming fight. Oh it's okay. You you gave your
takes on that, all right, So now let's get into this again.
We got a little bit of news before we get into the previews, and
Haini and Pro Gray are obviously the most prominent fight the Zone pay per view
coming up from San Francisco. So the the rumored move of Premiere Boxing Champions
too and Amazon Prime ends up being correct. It ends up being the case.
They made the announcement on Thursday, So let's get into that from the
news standpoint. And you've done some digging as well, as we taped this
podcast Thursday night and release it overnight Thursday into Friday. Your reaction now to
this, because it does not come out of the blue. This had been
talked about and now here it is announced. Yeah, not a surprise at
all, expected, you know it was just a matter of that wasn't to
me anyway. It wasn't if they're going to get a deal, it's simply
going to be at what point do they announce it. I was told yesterday
that they're i mean not an official channel, but I was told that expect
an announcement around eleven o'clock Eastern time on Thursday morning. And at eleven o'clock
Eastern time there was the announcement. So it didn't shock me in any way,
shape or form. The one thing that kind of disappointed me in the
way that was announced was Number one, it did say multi fight or i'm
sorry, multi year agreement between PBC and Prime Video. It always gives me
pause me they won't say the number of years. You know, when when
the Yankee signed Garrett Cole, they tell you how many years they signed them
for it. That's just seemed weird to me. You know, in previous
boxing deals they will announce typically the number of years. When Showtime did its
deal with PBC, they announced the years. Uh to my recollection, When
when Top Rank and ESPN did their deal with the years renown that's not that's
not a that shouldn't be a trade secret. That's not a heavy lift.
You don't want to tell me the money and the other minutiah. I get
it, but the years that seemed a little bit weird to me. So
that was the first thing. The other thing that gave me pause when I
when I read the press release or I was like disappointed that it was so
pay per view centric. That's really what this is about for Prime Video.
I don't blame them. They're a business and they believe that pay per view
is a means to goosing the revenue on the on the on the streaming,
uh you know, broadcast sports side. But while that may be what they
want to do, I don't think that's the best way to go out expressing
yourself to the media and to the fans, the people that you want to
buy, where that's front and center, Like, hey, we're all about
asking you for another eighty bus every couple of months to do these events.
So they're all gonna they're also going to have a non pay per view uh
series, the way that they did on show Time and HBO, and they
have on other platforms. Uh, you know, there are non pay per
view fights on ESPN, the Zone, et cetera. So I want to
play that up and say we're going to be doing you know, great boxing
for you on a monthly basis, and we're also going to have our biggest
stars on big pay per view fights like you've seen in the past. So
I thought that was like a weird way to write the press release. Now
the question is is this good or is it bad? We just don't know
because they don't have all the details. I mean, they're not gonna start
until March, so there's gonna be a couple of months lag without PBC fights
UH And if anybody pays attention to my schedule that I update obsessively on a
daily basis, you will notice on some of the smaller cards that are taking
place before the end of this year that some PBC fighters are being put onto
non uh TV cards or not big shows, like just as an example,
they have Mark Megscio, the former featherweight title holder. He's fighting this weekend
in California. They have Jared Hurd on a card in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania coming
up. They have Vieto Milnike is on a card in Newark coming up at
the end of the month. These are all shows that are not PBC cards.
And there's others also, and you'll see more of that if you pay
attention to the club type cards that you'll see. I'm sure several, not
the star guys, not the champions, not the big names, but the
guys that haven't fought in a while, or are you know, maybe are
younger fighters or you know, contenders that are just trying to keep busy a
little bit. You'll see those fighters pop up on these non PBC cards or
even non televised cards. So they'll be back in March. Hopefully they'll still
continue to make solid fights that are not on the pay per view platform.
The good news and this was not part of the release, but this is
what I was told. What they say in the business on background from people
involved is that and I asked I asked them this specifically because I get a
lot of questions and comments from on social media from the boxing fans that are
in the UK, and it was expressed to me that this deal will allow
if you are a Prime member, you know you have Prime in the UK
and Ireland, you'll be able to watch the show's overseas too. And the
reason I say this specifically is because it's been so hit or miss for there
to be an outlet in the UK for the PBC shows. Sometimes they're not
on at all. Sometimes they might get picked up here and there. Other
times they might wind up as a small pay per view on the Fight app
and they wouldn't know about it till like sort of the last minute. So
that's a good thing. The other, you know, the good thing in
looking from above is that there's a new deal. Showtime goes out and one
week before they're about to broadcast their final show there will be more PBC and
it won't all be pay per view, So that's a positive. That's a
great thing. You know. Prime Prime is in because it's based on if
you have an Amazon Prime membership. You know, when you you know,
like just because you order a box of cheerios and you get it to come
the next day in your house, doesn't mean you're logging on to watch boxing.
That's right. They are making hey with a lot of sports. They've
got the Yankees, they've got some soccer. Obviously, they've got the NFL
starts at the game that they pay like one hundred million dollars for. So
they have building sports portfolio. Boxing will be part of it and so they're
the accessibility is going to be monstrous compared to what's in Showtime now. The
difference though, is that the people who subscribe to Showtime, which has a
much smaller base than what Prime does, they are a lot of those people
are conditioned and have done so because they want boxing. The boxing on Prime
is going to go by the way, you know, going to whistle past
the graveyard for millions and millions of people have no idea that they have and
don't care. That's right. It still gives you the opportunity to bring in
some new people. All right, let's go at this from a couple of
other ways. They previously had broadcast deals. Now originally and we don't want
to go too deep into the weeds, but these these facts and details are
important. So originally Al Hayman and PBC were given a bunch of investment capital
money and they went all over the place, and you live this where they
were buying time in a lot of places to educate people on here are fighters,
here on championship fights. So fights were on network TV, for example,
not having to pay for it. They were on ESPN networks. Yes,
they were on ESPN. As you know when you were working there.
They went that route. They then ended up doing a deal with Fox.
A second, I want to interrupt for a second. It wasn't it wasn't
just to like say to the people, here's our guys. This was let's
try to like blanket the broadcast industry with our with our product and hopefully,
uh, at least one or two of them will see that it's a great
investment and they'll then turn the And that was coming there, and so it
ended up being that way with Fox, as it turns out. And there
were fights over the air as well as pay perview, all right, So
the Fox deal and again the pandemic year had something to do with this as
well. I understand all of that. The Fox deal eventually faded extinguished and
then they basically became solely with showtime for the shows and then for the pay
perviews. So they really haven't had a network TV comp for a couple of
years. And even in that final year, correct me, because you've talked
about this before. In twenty twenty two, the only time they had fights
on the network was right before the broadcast of the pay per view that night.
They would show a couple of fights on Fox and then here's the pay
per view. So I just wonder, was there not a dance partner somewhere,
even with cable air quotes or something besides Prime Video? I just wonder,
and will it affect things that it's now prime video or else you're not
seeing it? Well, you you're in exactly where I wanted to go,
right in the wheelhouse. There, we're back. We're back synergy like Paul
and Jane. I was gone on Monday, but we're back together, and
it's like synergy people. He was going there, I was going there,
get there, go all right. So in the press release that they announced,
they did not specify any particular Not only did they not specify the number
of years, they did not talk about how many events. And when I
say that, it's in contrast to when again, I'll use the example when
Top announced and ESPN announced their agreement together, they announced, we're gonna have
X number of dates. Approximately when PBC did their deal with Fox or whatever,
they did the same thing. So there was some numbers. Now did
they did they somewhat deviate occasionally here or there. Yeah, I mean that's
just the way things go. But there is no number. But again on
background, from people who are involved spoke to me and said, in the
first year it will be twelve to fourteen events annually, or you know,
for the over each year, however long it last, that'll be twelve to
fourteen events annually. So a couple things about that that's good, but that
that's a good thing. But on the on the negative side, if there
is is that those twelve to fourteen events are a combination of non pay per
views and pay per views. So if you do the math, that means
that on this Prime deal there are fewer dates, i e. Fewer fights
than there were under the Showtime deal, which offered up generally about you know,
a dozen shows per year plus the pay per views. So in two
twenty three Showtime did I want to say seven pay perviews? Two six pay
per views, two David Benavidez fights, two Tank Davis fights, one Canelo
Alvarez fight, and the Aero Spence Terrence Crawford fight. That's six pay perviews
plus the monthly shows on Showtime, which maybe they skipped a month here or
there because of other things. But then there were certainly months in the spring
and early summer where they had two shows in a month but so it averaged
out. They probably did the show Box series, and the Showbox series was
also on top of that, Am I right right? Which was like another
probably five shows this show which was the least that they had ever done,
or four or five shows. But so the quantity is less on this Amazon
Prime deal than there was on Showtime. However, let me say this now,
this is not in my story because I don't have it one hundred percent
noil down, but I'm very, very confident and quite sure that this is
the case based on the conversations I've had with people in this business. This
is not the end. This is not like a one time deal one thing.
If you read again, and as a reporter you learn to do this,
these press will be are written by communications experts and specialists. They are
careful with their words, like I'm careful with my words when I write things.
The word exclusivity never appeared. This is not that PBC is somehow now
exclusive to Prime Video. So I'm telling you that they are out there hunting
for another deal. Now, again, this is a rumor, I think
a good rumor. Maybe not. It won't necessarily come to pass. But
I am told without question that Hayman is shopping for another deal to bring in
another partner, to have other dates because he's got a ton of fighters,
got like two hundred fighters are thereabouts, you know, maybe a little less,
but you know, got to keep guys active to some degree. And
that there's conversations about perhaps a smaller scope deal with the outlet called Stars that
might get involved in do some fights. Whether that comes to pass or not,
I don't know. Now he does have money coming in besides just from
this prime deal. I am told on good authority that the final year of
Showtimes agreement, which was supposed to go through the year twenty twenty four,
obviously that's not happening because Showtime Sports will see this to exist in a couple
of weeks, and that as part of that situation, he's receiving a very
large, you know, north of ten million dollars payout interesting to buy out
the rest of the deal. I think it's you know, I've heard as
much as over twenty million dollars, but I'm pretty pretty confidence over ten million
dollars. But the point is they're starting with another big brand Amazon. If
you're good enough to show the NFL, and you're good enough to show the
New York Yankees. You know you're good enough to do Premier Boxing Champions fights
and pay per views. So I think I'm gonna do what I do every
time these things happen. I've been through lots of changes and where broadcasts come
from, platforms, promoters, et cetera. You go in with high hopes,
You go in wanting everything to be a wonderful situation. You give everybody
bit the benefit of the doubt, You pay attention, You give everybody a
chance to get settled in, and after a couple of their shows or a
couple of months, you make an assessment. So you know, I want
to see how this plays out in March, in April, and you know,
come sometime like late next spring, we'll have a much better handle on
it. One thing I am also told is that it will be the responsibility
of Premiere Boxing Champions to handle the production. So they will have to.
You know, it is gonna be interesting. Do they bring along some of
the folks that have done the shows from Showtime? Who are but it would
make sense right now, it would make sense. Yeah, Do you bring
Mara Ronalo with you? Do you bring the great Al Bernstein? With you.
Do you bring the crew, you know, I'm sure they'll bring along
Jimmy Lennon. You know, do they bring along Brian Custer to host the
shows? You know, whatever you want to talk about, so you know,
we'll it have a similar kind of look to it, a sound to
it. Well. So so perfect example is on the Thursday Night NFL that
you're mentioning, and then we're gonna move on it. Jake Paul's coming up
and we're gonna get to the fight previews in a second. But this is
this is important what we're going over to your point, the NFL production and
right down to Al Michael's calling, it is just almost identical to NBC's production.
So much so it's many of the same people that left NBC because Amazon
is paying them a chunk to come produce the NFL. To wit mister Rayphield,
I was at the Buffalo Bills Tampa Bay Buccaneers Thursday night game in Buffalo
earlier this football season that Amazon was televising, obviously, and it looked like
a super Bowl of production, of production trucks everywhere. You talk about going
all out to produce this and make it look like Sunday night football or Monday
night football. And again, fight fans, don't get overly crazy here.
This is not the NFL. I get that it's boxing, but to think
that the forethought isn't there, have it look like what we've seen on Showtime.
Have it look like what Top rank boxing or de Zones championship production and
fight cards look like, and maybe utilize most or all of the same people.
You'd be crazy not to think that they're looking at that. Not sure,
I don't think they're looking to reinvent the wheel here, and right,
I mean on the positive side. Also, I mean as much I love
and respect everybody that involved with Showtime, you know, they're in about thirty
million homes in the United States. They'reabouts Amazon Prime is you know again,
granted it's because people have the Prime membership so they get their cheerios and their
rice crispies and their you know whatever else they were over I think keep saying
Cereal versus like makeup, clothes, sneakers, shoes, whatever, this records
whatever it is. Uh, but the point is it's available, not thirty
million homes or thereabouts like Showtime. I was. I was just looking up
the numbers people with access to Amazon Prime just because they already have this.
The Prime membership is about one hundred and sixty million people in the United States.
Now, obviously they're not all going to be watching boxing matches, but
the chances of somebody stumbling on it are much greater now than if they don't
even have showtime. So and listen, if they did, like a little
advertisement during the course of one of the NFL games, which do very course,
that's going to help drive some viewership. So I have hope. I
mean, I always go into these things with the positive attitude. I understand
one more quick thing, because you were kind of going down this road.
Do you believe I've just wondered and I've I'm plugged in some I've not heard
this. Could they go back to Fox, who they were with before.
Anything's possible, but let's let's phrase it as how probable is it to go
back to Fox? For this reason, Fox is losing the WWE Pro Wrestling.
Fox is no longer involved with the UFC Ultimate Fighting. ESPN got that
an exclusive deal seven years ago, and Fox may be interested, at least
in the summertime in putting it back on network TV. Non pay per views.
Could that. What's the probability to go to a network partner like that
to help grow and help promote and Fox, who they dealt business, dealt
with with business before, when Fox now has a little because again Fox has
done pretty well, you fur, let me just get the answer. The
answer is no, I don't think they're going back to fix. You don't
think they'll do it because like in Fox's terms, the WWE on Friday Night
has been doing two and a half or three million people. It's ingrained as
much as we met laugh at pro Wrestling. That's a good number for Friday
night TV. Why could that not be old school Friday night fights somewhere down
the road against gone. I'll never say never, but I doubt it very
much, all right, but maybe another outlet is where they go, and
we'll stay tuned and you'll keep I do believe there'll be another outlet when where
exactly? But you know, I think that will happen. Right, He's
got too many fighters and too many top guys to real estate for to have
them fight, period, understood, all right? Saturday night, San Francisco.
They held the press conferences Thursday afternoon Pacific time for Regi's Prograe, the
WBC Junior welterweight champion, and Devin Haney, the former undisputed lightweight champ.
They meet in the match room de Zonne main event. All right, let's
get into it again on this podcast feed. You heard from both of those
guys. In fact, we put both of their interviews together with Dan earlier
this week on the podcas. That's why you got to be following and subscribing.
You heard from them in their own words, a little bit of fireworks
at the press conference. We expected that they're playing it up. And here
we go as we head to the weekend. This is the marquee fight here
with unbeaten former undisputed lightweight champion Devin Haney moving up Progray, a very talented
fighter who has the belt. All right, Dan, let's go, let's
preview it. Listen. It's a terrific matchup. It's a very intriguing fight.
They have different styles. As you mentioned, I know that they've tried
to you know that Regis can say I'm going to I can outbox him,
and Haney's saying, you know I can fight with him. You know,
fine, But I'm telling you the styles are different. Regis is a power
puncher who's you know, a taller, longer, bigger guy, good punching
power, and Devin Haney is a tremendous defensive fighter. He does have okay
offense, but he's not a big knockout puncher. His ratio of knockouts is
exactly fifty percent. He's stopped fifteen of his opponents in thirty wins, you
know, but he's a tremendous technical boxer, very gifted. The one thing
that is interesting to me is that if you take a look at the way
that Devin Haney when he's had some trouble in fights, it's been against south
plus. He had trouble against the BESTSELLI Lomachenko, who was a south pot
and different kind of southpaw than Progray is, but a southbound. Nonetheless,
a lot of people thought Lomachenko should have gotten his hand raised that night to
win. He had some trouble a little bit with Jojo Diaz, who is
a south paw also, so again, if you're looking for some reason to
give Progray a better chance, although he's a pretty big underdog, I'm not
really quite sure why it's that big of an underdog. What I had saw
uh that that could be one factor, that that he has some issues occasionally
with left handers. But I suspect that Devin will come in and having gone
to school on lefties in his training camp and knowing the issues he had in
fighting Loman, which is not that long ago, so he's coming off of
a fight against a south paw, that maybe it won't be as troublesome with
program and pro Gray has any read everybody who's followed knows in his most recent
fight that took place over the summer, he looked like ass He looked terrible.
I mean, he struggled badly. He was lucky to get out of
there with a win over Zaria. So if that Regis program shows up,
I mean, I asked him in the interview at one point, when we
tell what I talked to them, they can hear it. They said that
the the the reality is that people look at that fight and say, you
cann cut the ring off against den Alito Zuria at all. Why in the
world would I think you could possibly do that against a fighter who is far,
far, far superior to Zuria and Devon Ainty and Regis has a good
attitude about he wasn't offended by the question or the comment. He was like,
look, I hope people think that. I want people to think that.
So when I go out there and I beat his ass and I knock
him out, I'm going to get my props. And so with that same
kind of attitude, you know, don't show you know, don't tell me,
show me. That's what I think Regis wants to do. And it's
it's a really good matchup. I mean, I'll say once again, I'm
glad for the rest of the world where they get it as part of their
regular Zone package. Here in the United States, it's a you know,
if you buy it if you're already a Zone subscriber and you purchase the pay
per view with sixty dollars, if you're if you don't want to, if
you don't sub to the Zone and you just want to buy it as a
one off, which you can do on a variety of platforms, including our
friends at PBV dot com, or you're linear your television or satellite service or
whatever, and then it's seventy five dollars. So you know, you save
some money on the one off, but by the same token, you can
spend the money and get it for cheaper, you know, and have also
the rest of the offerings from the Zone, which has put on some good
fights, whether it was you know, just last weekend, the big fights
were all of that, you know, whether it was the Ryan Garcia fight
or the Michael Comlin card or whatever. You had two good shows on the
same day. So everybody's got to make that decision. But I'm disappointed it's
a pay per view, but I do expect it to be a good fight.
I do look forward to watching it. The undercard is terrible. We
don't even have to talk about it. Well. Liam Paro is on it,
Andy Cruz is on it, Ebony Bridges, who would gain an entertaining
female I understand. I'm just making mentioned. They're all on the undercard,
and if something spectacular happens, we'll probably bring it up on the recap when
it's over with. But there you go, all right, So there's the
preview of that. And again hear more from them and their own words with
Dan on the podcast immediately previous to this one, where he talked at length
to both Regis Progray and David Haney in separate conversations. You can hear that
okay again, Jake Paul coming up in a few minutes. And by the
way, you're also going to hear more about the International Boxing Hall of Fame
electees in our news segment in a little bit, and Dan's ballot and who
he voted for. Standby for that all part of this podcast, All right.
ESPN Top Rank Show also coming on Satday night Pimbrooke Pines, Florida,
northern suburb of Fort Lauderdale. Robes C. Ramirez will defend his WBO featherweight
title in the main event. Xander Zaiez, who you also spoke to recently
for our podcasts, is in the co feature of this Richard Torres also on
the card. Bruce Shoeshoe Carrington also on the card. So this is Saturday
night in Florida. This is the traditional slot right after the awarding of the
college football Heisman Trophy on ESPN, but the fight not in New York like
it has been in years gone by. It is in Florida, all right,
So Dan some thoughts here, including Ramirez a very talented, decorated amateur
now world champion at featherweight. We're interested to see what he can do in
the rest of that card. Real quick in the preview mode. Please Yeah.
So he's a two time gold medal winner from but he's fighting now in
South Florida, so they anticipate there to be a large Cuban contingent in the
crowd. I am told that the show is sold out. I mean they're
they're having it at a not a big arena. It's only maybe like three
thirty five hundred seed type place in pember appliants. But the combination of Robas
Ramirez being a Cuban and the fact that Xander's ayas from he is a you
know, pie is a Puerto Rican fighter, but he lives and has grown
up in Sunrise, Farta, he said on the podcast. The arena where
they're fighting AT's like fifteen minutes from where he lives, so he's gonna have
a lot of family, friends and supporters on Obviously Puerto Ricans who live in
that area also, so it should be a good crowd. Number one as
far as the car goes. Look, Robasi Rimirez is you know, he's
a tremendous fighter. I think he's probably the best featherweight in the world right
now, no knocking to anybody else. I mean, I know we've got
other good champions like you know, Luis Suberto Lopez and whatnot. He fights
for top rank also undefeated, but skill for skill, you know, you
have to look at at at Robasi is the number one guy in my mind,
even though he hasn't maybe fought like all the top fighters. But you
can just tell a guy that won the Goldens the way he did and the
way he can, you know, switch up and you know, come forward,
go backward. I mean, I know he lost his pro debut,
uh, but you know it wasn't like he didn't avenge that loss, and
there was a lot of extenuating circumstances. So he's a really outstanding fighter.
He's coming off of a very solid victory, uh in his first title defense
where he you know, he went to Japan and absolutely just obliterated his opponent
on one of the under cards there in a in Tokyo. And you know,
he looked really good when he won the title against Isaac Dogday. So
he's he's on a good role right now. Now. Raphaels Spinoza, who's
his opponent. Uh, he is an undefeated fighter. He's twenty one,
to know, with eighteen knockouts. You know this, though, is taken
a humongous humongous, humongous, shall I say humongous step up in common three
times? Yes, I mean his twenty one wins have come against you know,
honestly, I'd be hard pressed to know like one or two of his
opponents. So he's he's he has fought in Mexico. Doesn't mean he's bad,
but it means that this is a non mandatory And you know, it
seems to me this is like, let's stay busy, let's make sure we're
still there when in a way comes to featherweight for the big money. So
they've got a guy with a great record. I don't know if he has
a great shot to actually win. Robas has got good power, robosy,
he's got good feet, he's got good hands, he's got good skills,
he's got good IQ. You know, it's it's a I think. I
mean, I know he's undefeated, but it's what's behind that undefeated record.
I mean, if he does land the bomb, who knows. But it
seems to me that this is the may to order kind of fight for Robas
to show his abilities and keep the chains moving and notch another title defense and
hopefully put on a good show. And as relates to Xander's eyes on the
undercard, you know, it's like we talked about on the on on our
podcast interview, He's he's going to end another you know, end this calendar
year where he had a very good year. He's seventeen and zero now going
into this fight, and he's only twenty one years old. I mean,
people think he's been around forever, but he turned pro at seventeen, So
he's gonna finish this year. He missed one fight this year because of I
think an illness or something that kept him from a fourth fight this year.
But it'll be his third fight. You know, He's fought in June,
fought in September, fighting now again here in December, and similar kind of
solid opponent in Forte or Hey, forteos been around, got a good record,
but he's coming to what I can consider for the end of his time
as a prospect, Like he's making that step up to young contender, and
I think we'll see bigger things from him in twenty twenty four. Obviously,
he's got to get through this fight. If he does win and there are
no injuries or anything like that, I am told that I wrote this on
one of my Fight Freaks Unite newsletter notebooks last week. I guess if he
is successful, there's the likely he probably will be back. And I forget
the exact date I wrote it, but in February, Top Rank is planning
a card at the Madison Square Guard Theater on which the main event will be
the first title defense of Oshaki Foster xanders Ayas likely will be in the co
feature. Obviously, they want to keep showcasing him in New York City where
they can bring in Puerto Rican fans from that large, very loyal boxing community
and put him on that show. So I think that will kick off what
hopefully will be for him if he wins a pretty big twenty twenty four got
to get through the Saturday night fight. But again, like Robessi Ramirez,
I mean, his opponent is solid enough, but you know, he should
definitely have enough to take care of business, all right, So that's the
Top ranked show, and again Torres the heavyweight. He scored some spectacular knockouts
against the inferior competition, so far shoes shoot carry. He's actually by the
way, with regard to Torres, I know he's fought a bunch of smears
in the last you know, since he turned pro, and that's expected because
he and all that we've been doing this. I don't think I've ever heard
you use schmears. But he's fighting Curtis Harper. Now, Curtis Harper's ajourneyman
opponent. He's unfortunately he's best remembered for having against Faa Jaga and stepping out
of the ring and getting disqualified, and you know that was a whole big
mess. However, he's a gargantuin step up for Richard Torres because he has
been in the ring with some better guys. He has gone around with some
of these guys. I'll actually be pretty impressed of Richard Torres. I mean
we talked about certain Richard Torres fights. People ask like on the bet Us
show, you know the over under is one and a half rounds. You
know, I'm like, oh my god, that's right, and he knocks
the guy out on like, you know, a minute and a half.
I'm very confident that that that Curtis Harper. He may get stopped, but
he's definitely gonna last more than a round in the fight. I mean,
he may last several rounds. I think they purposely matched him with Curtis Harper,
knowing that Richard can outbox him easily and maybe bang him around a little
bit, but that he should give the give Torres some experience and also some
some rounds. And again that will be after the Heisman Trophy presentation on ESPN
the Top Rank show from Florida. The Dodge Arena, about a thirty five
hundred seat arena, as you were saying, appears to already be sold out
when you look when you look for the tickets, there's not a lot of
tickets on the secondary market that are available. It's interesting. They have a
lot of arenas down in South Florida, Miami, Fort Lauderdale, etcetera.
This is just interesting where this one is. And let's see how that plays
out again, Jake Paul conversation coming in just a moment. There is one
more title fight we mentioned. Chris Billum Smith in England in Bournemouth, England,
the coastal town where he's from, will defend the w BO Cruiserweight Championship.
Help me, I'm gonna do my best. Uh this don't even let
me. It's much Masternock, right, Mettias Masternach Masternach. He's he's been
around a long time. Pretty solid guy, you know. I think this
can be a good fight. Actually, I mean it is this. It
is Chris billim Smith's first offense. He had uh the decision victory over Lawrence
o'coley back in May, who was actually a good friend of his, not
a bat. That was actually a pretty fun fight. And by the way,
I actually called that on the bet Us show and cashed like plus three
hundred on the money line for bill Smith that night. So he now goes
to the home crowd and people have asked, well, why is this on
a Sunday instead of the normal Saturday time frame? Hey, wait a minute,
for Dan, why is this on a Sunday as opposed to the normal
time frame. So the reason that they gave when they announced the show is
because Chris is from uh Bornemouth, the coastal town in England. And I
guess they're like local soccer you know, football team if you will, has
a big match and tons of people in the city are going away to travel
for the game, and they draw from a lot of the same fans,
and they wanted his people to have the opportunity to come and see his fight
too. So they decided Boxer the promoter and Bill and Smith said, you
know, can we move it so I can have my people, you know,
robustly at my event. And so they said okay, And I guess
they worked it out with their their primary broadcaster, Sky Sports in the UK,
and the fight well, instead of being on Saturday night, will be
on Sunday night. Now that's good for us here in America because, like
any of these boxer cards, you may be watching football, but if you're
a diehard boxing fan like me, I'll be watching the fights. We have
the two shows that we just talked about on Saturday, with the pay per
view and with the Robasi Ramiers card, I don't have to worry about having
to spend you know, the hours in the late afternoon watching, but I
will be happy to do so on Sunday because like all boxer cards going forward
and the last two, we can see them here in the United States.
Read the the same broadcast we see on Sky. It's just the same feed,
the same commentators. You know, they just showed the same thing on
the Peacock streaming service. So we get Peacock so you can watch the watch
the fights on there, so you know boxing is now a streaming sport in
this country. The only linear channel left is ESPN, and even some of
their fights with top rank are on Plus only ESPN Plus only. So BILLM.
Smith on Sunday and look, he's got some big time fights coming up
because they're looking to match him with the other boxer, Richard Rico Pore,
who has an important fight comeic in February on Peacock and Sky against Joshua Batzi
in a WBA eliminator. But they may end up making a fight with Dyllan
Smith instead, could be more lucrative. We's shall see. But Chris billams
an appealing guy. I mean, he fights fun fights, He's got an
interesting story, good personality. I was just going there enjoy him, which
again and the okolely win. In the aftermath of that win, he was
in tears in the ring doing this in front of his home fans newborn son,
where he was saying, I now get to share with my son,
or at least like a one year old son, that I have won a
world title when a lot of people didn't think I could do this, and
his mother this is not an exaggeration, has been near death on and off
for the last year or so with breast cancer, and he said, my
mom, my mom has gotten to see me win a world title. So
you feel for this guy, you kind of root for the story. Let's
let's see how he does with the veteran in Master Nek, and we'll see
what happens Sunday and again the Sunday afternoon. If he does do a rematch
with Rikapore, it's gonna there's be a great story there too, because the
first time they fought back in twenty nineteen, he lost his split decision in
that fight and then went on to become a world champion. So he's gonna
have a lot of options because the cruiserweight division is, you know, somewhat
rich. In the uk ji Opataiah also there who's fought over there as well,
will be fighting. That's different promoter, that's different promoter. But yeah,
the cruiser the cruiserweight business is picking up a bit a little bit,
and we'll see what billim Smith looks like. And you can't see it in
the United States Sunday afternoon. Now, I realize the NFL is a godzilla
that you're going up against, but you could see it on Peacock and I
would assume they have it housed there after it's over and watch it later if
you can, and watch the last couple of shows. The all good on
those for the championship fights without further delay. It's not this weekend, it's
next weekend on December fifteenth, that Jake Paul returns. But you don't have
to wait for next week. You got Jake Paul right now on the pod.
Let's hear the conversation with Dan Well. It's my honor to bring in
for our second appearance on this podcast together none other than Jake Paul. Jake,
I know you're getting ready for a fight coming up December the fifteenth,
live on de own at the carib Royale Resort in Orlando, Florida, against
Andre August. Thank you so much for doing this, welcome to the show,
how things go and getting ready for your fight. Thank you for having
me man. It's always great to speak and feeling good. You know.
Locked In have had an amazing camp, which every fighter says in every interview,
but it is true. I'm ready to fight and just falling more and
more in love with this sport and the training and the details and bettering myself
as an athlete and increasing the sparring and just man, it's just been an
amazing time and I'm excited to show my new new skill set from this camp
on December fifteenth. What is it that you like the best about boxing?
Because you've come to the sport without a big amateur career, not something you
did as a small child, like a lot of the great pros do.
What is it about it that you like the best? Wow? That's tough.
Wow. You know that there's so much, But I would say the
fight night first and foremost, Like just the anticipation, all the hard work
that goes into that one moment, you know, showcasing the sacrifice and you
know, hopefully most of the time coming out with the with the win,
and that feeling of the satisfaction afterwards, knowing what you accomplished, I think
is something that I've never experienced before. I don't think there's a greater form
of satisfaction or a greater feeling in the world than ultimate sacrifice for a long
period of time and then it picking off on a global state. So you
had your fight with Tommy Fiery earlier this year in February. You know you
took your first loss. It was a very close fight, did good business
for everybody, I guess and from what I understand, but it was the
first time you fought against a guy that was mainly a boxer, not an
NNA fighter or some non combat specialist. I wonder coming out of that situation,
what did you learn the most about in that because you seem to brush
it off fine when you had your fight after that. Yeah, I learned
so much. You know, hindsight is twenty twenty, and I think mostly
learning that you're not in vincent will like a certain you were all human and
I was going through so much during that time. I don't even want to
get into it because people, oh, it's excuses whatever. But and I
just powered through because I would never want to like reschedule a fight or pull
out of something whatever. And so that was a big learning lesson in realizing
how important it is to have the right people around me to prepare for these
big moments. And you certainly, yeah, I mean, you certainly bounce
back. Well, I mean you fought your next fight against Nate Diaz in
August. Obviously he's an MMA fighter, but a big star in that sport
kind of a grudge match. I guess it was a big pay per view.
You guys did a huge gate at the American Airline Center in Dallas,
big crowd. You guys talked about doing a rematch. I think I heard
you say you maybe you'll do a rematch in a cage with him. Uh,
And nothing really seemed to come of that. Uh. Is that still
something in your mind about a possible rematch either in we're Nick Martial Arts.
Yeah, I wanted to run it. In MMA, we had, you
know, the ten million dollar offer to him, and there's still silence on
his end other than some you know tweets that right, Ray's clearly high and
say like random things. But you know, I think he got the paycheck
from from our fight. It was like, Wow, that's big, that's
massive, and then wants to do it again. But it's just not willing
to risk it in MMA. I think he knows what would happen there and
I believe I would clearly dominate him and ruin his legacy. So I don't
think he's willing to risk it for the money. So now you go into
this fight a different, different kind of animal altogether as far as the kind
of event. That is the kind of opponent you're facing. You're taking on
a fighter named Andre August, staying true to your word that you would fight
an actual boxer again, not not an MMA fighter or non combat person.
He's ten and one with a draw as a boxer, he has I'm looking
at his record, five in a row, he has a win. He
had a long layoff, but he came back. He had a fight victory
over the summer in August. Can you just talk me through your decision to
go this route as in terms of an actual boxer, not a big name
with you know, but a guy with similar professional experience to you. It's
not a pay per view like most of your fights have been. It's not
in a huge arena. We know where you've done big business. It's it's
what most prospects in boxing do, is take on an opponent of a similar
sort of level number of fights and try to continue to build up their experience
and their skills. But talk me through a little bit your decision to go
this route instead of you could have easily done some other Diaz ish kind of
event. Yeah, this is just my road to world champion, and I've
said it since day one. That I'm gonna be a world champion and fighting
the biggest fights in the world, and everyone's gonna see that I'm gonna beat
Canelo and all of these things. And now it's just me putting that into
action, gaining the experience, and it not being about the business side or
the entertainment side of things anymore. This is about me, my team,
my skill set, and getting better and staying sharp in camp as a young
boxing prospect like you alluded to, and just taking the more traditional boxing route,
which is what I'm here to do because I believe, you know,
it's gonna be one of the greatest sports stories ever world a world champion.
So you would acknowledge then that for doing this fight. And I'm not saying
that Jake Paul's not making money on a fight like this. Obviously you wouldn't
be doing it if you weren't. I don't believe. But by not doing
a pay per view against a more known name, be it boxer or MMA
person, that you are leaving money on the table by doing a non pay
per view, by not doing the fight in a big arena, Yeah,
for sure. You know, I don't even know how much money I'm making
for this fight, to tell you the truth, and could care less.
And I've grossed you know, two hundred and fifty million dollars in interview in
three years. And it's just not about the business I have, you know,
money coming in so many other ways, like and and so many businesses
that it's just like, yo, we don't need to do that. It's
sure, it's great, but I'm truly focused on the sport of boxing and
my skill set. And yeah, I think it's just like the entertainment and
the pay per views and all of that's fun, but I'm I'm serious about
becoming a world champion and this is the route to that. I kind of
look at your career as backwards from what most would do, Whereas most fighters
would start out doing what you're doing now, which is taking on an unknown
opponent but with a certain level of experience, trying to build up your your
career, your skills, your popularity, et cetera. But you're kind of
doing it in the in the reverse, where you started off in huge fights,
you know, second or third fight on pay per view, fighting big
names, making huge money, selling huge arenas pay per views, and now
it's going the other direction. What are your thoughts about doing in that order
as opposed to the more traditional order, because you could have done this at
the beginning. Yeah, it's very interesting. It's weird, dude. I
mean, I gotta be honest with you. Yeah, no, I don't
think this has ever happened in the sport of boxing. But it's just how
things played out, Right. This all started with you know, YouTubers talking
shit to each other, right, and then you know, decided to fight,
and then one thing led to another. I'm fighting more YouTubers, then
all of a sudden, I'm fighting Nate Robinson. Then I'm fighting UFC you
know, undefeated guy Ben Askering. And this is just how the cookie crumbled.
And I didn't know I was going to fall in love with the sport.
I didn't know this is going to become my love, my passion,
my destiny. And there's something beautiful about that. And I hope to set
the precedent, you know, moving forward. So do you think after this,
though, then you'll go back on pay per view against another like bigger
name or are you ready to do like a few of these types of fights
in a row to do what you want to do, which is to put
yourself in the best possible position to get a big time you know, a
little legit world title fight at some point. Yeah, I think it'll be
a balance as things come through the door, But for now it's focusing on
fighting prospects and gaining experience. But yeah, let's say one of these idiots
who calls me out wants to get smoked up in a blunt for ten million
dollars, Like, of course I'm gonna go and do that. But my
main focus, you know, that's I call those the side quest. This
this is the main quest, and the main destination is being a world champion,
And for now it's fighting real boxers with real skill and challenging myself.
This isn't the key. Just to add, he's still making a seven figure
payday on this fight. Oh I'm sure he's still gonna be either the first
or potentially second, but most likely the biggest gate in Orlando history for a
boxing event. Right, Like, the business is still great for someone with
his experience, and a big part of that is the profile he's built through
his first eight fights to then be able to do this. At the same
time, he never wanted to charge his fans for a pay per view to
fight a guy that no one's ever heard of, and no one is saying
this is, you know, a true gatekeeper to a championship. Oh for
sure. Personal decision to do right by his fan base, I understand,
and I'm glad to hear that that's actually a good thing. I actually have.
I have two more questions for Jake. One of the things, and
it's not about your career so much, Jake, but you have a women's
World championship fight on the undercard between Shade's a Green and Franchion Cruise deserned.
They're fighting for the vacant WBC Women's Super mid Await title. Franchion Cruise.
Of course, she's the former un disputed champion that weight class. You've been
a huge supporter at you and Nikisa then big supporters of women's boxing. You
guys have helped make Amanda Serrano into a big star, into a big draw.
I'm wondering, Jake, from your point of view, what was it
about it that made you decide to throw your name and your weight, so
to speak, behind the women's side of the sport. Yeah. Look,
I think it started with Amanda Serrano and just becoming friends with her and how
amazing she is as a person, and her coach and other manager, Jordan,
and our relationship with them growing, and then seeing how needed it was
to help the women in this sport, and I started to speak about it.
I started to get them big paydays, and then all of a sudden,
it's like, Jake Paul is the spokesperson for women's boxing, and so
it's like this responsibility almost that was taken on my shoulders and there wasn't equality.
There was you know, they were being taken advantage of. They weren't
getting the same opportunities. Blah blah blah. And we have the ability,
because of our unique positioning and marketing and skill set to help and change this
forward. And that's exactly what we've done, and that's what we love to
do, both Nakeesa and I. When we have conversations, it's how do
we make history first, and then the business side of it comes second.
Jake, thank you very much for taking time to talk to me today about
your fight. I wish you the best of luck and I'm interested to see
how you perform against and an a guy, a guy that's a boxer like
yourself that's done the things in the gym and is trying to also better himself.
Awesome man, No, appreciate it, Appreciate the time today and yeah,
look forward to it. All right, Thank you very much, Jake,
Paul. Good stuff. And as you discussed with him in this interview,
he's now back fighting a cruiserweight boxer, I said to you, and
I'm gonna be consistent. I am more intrigued if he's fighting boxers moving forward.
So I am intrigued next weekend in my part of the world, in
Central Florida, because this is the next step towards. Is he gonna be
a cruiserweight tender. We don't know, but I don't have to see any
more, Amma. Guys, I know he can beat MMA. Guys,
I get well, he's he said as much. He's Yeah. He made
the point that it's not only the money, it's I want the experience.
I want to get better, I want to try for a title, and
I think to do it and he basically, you know, he's doing his
career in reverse. As I pointed out on the on the interview, most
guys start out with this kind of fight Andre August ten and one with a
draw. You know, in this six or seventh fight, but he had
all of those fights on pay per view and made a shitload of money.
But now he's sort of going backwards and not going on pay per view and
now not fighting a big name. But there's a lot of people like you
or me that find it even a little more intriguing because he's fighting an actual
boxer. Now, not to say that Andre August is some you know,
boogeyman, king of the world pound for pound champion, but he's got eleven
pro fights, he's coming off a win. Uh, you know, he's
not an old, used up guy in his mid thirties, and he's getting
the opportunity the way Jake is and we'll see. I mean, that's the
kind of fight that would be on an undercard on a streaming, on a
on a you know, if it wasn't a big name guy like Jake Paul
because of his popularity outside of boxing. But I don't blame for that.
He's taken an opportunity, and by the way he's giving the opportunity. So
all the the fighters on the undercard, whether even like the they got the
women's super middleweight vacant title fight on that show between franchion, Cruise Desern and
Shadasi Agreen. So, you know, good for good for Jake and his
team at MVP for bringing shine to the other young fighters, and for Jake
for for you know, is skewing the huge money and the pay per view
and the giant arena and just going in there and working on his craft against
a guy that he's similarly matched with. Just did it again. I think
you used the shmear for the first time, and you just used a skewing
for the first time. And all these months and the year and a half
plus we've been doing these podcasts. Yeah, I love a skewing. That's
that's brilliant. I love that. I'm a I'm a writer. I got
a pretty good volheads. I mean I can drop the fucks and the ships
also, you know, but I got a good hote. And there's the
first two of those on the pod tonight. Uh as we record this Thursday
night into Friday. All right, let's cheer it up even more. I
know you have been chomping at the bit to talk about the International Boxing Hall
of Fame. Tell me is now out? You had ballot out? It
is now official? On who is going in let's spend a few moments on
this as we move along on the podcast, Tell me more go All right,
So they announced the class of twenty twenty four on Thursday morning, as
everybody expected. They will be inducted at the you know, into the museum
in Canastota, New York. That will take place on the in the final
event of the Hall of Fame weekend that will conclude on June ninth, and
it's you know, as always, there's a lot of great stories, a
lot of great boxing people going into this hallowed shrine that is very, very
near and dear to my heart. I grew up not that far from there.
I visited and as a fan when I was in high school and in
college, and you know, spend time around the museum, and I've been
back there for official things like the induction ceremonies, and I've covered fights at
Turningstone, So have gone to the Hall of Fame just to go, you
know, on the day of the fight, that sort of thing. So
it's it's a wonderful place. I've said this a thousand times. If you're
a boxing fan, put it on your bucket list to go on Hall of
Fame Weekend and take part in all the festivities, whether it's the memorabilia show
or the parade, or the champions dinner, or the night before or the
fist casting ceremonies, or the the talks they do, you know, the
uh with the different people over different subjects. They'll talk about uh, you
know, on the grounds of the museum and just look around the museum.
It's just it's just a you know, if you're it's like heaven if you're
a boxing fan. I mean, it's just a great thing. So the
new class that's been elected, Uh, I'm happy for all these people.
So in the and they divide it up into a variety of the categories.
In this particular uh cycle of of inductions, you have the modern men's category,
the modern women's category, the non participants observers, which is journalists and
other people that you know watch, you know, historians, things like that.
You have the Then they have different categories, uh, old timers,
trailblazers, you know that that alternate differ years. But the big you know
that the marquee category, of course is the modern men. Those are the
famous boxers that we all know and in this is a tremendous class. You
have the finally, the induction or the election of Ricky the hit Manhattan,
Uh, you know, one of the great at his time. Took him
a few years to get in because of a jam the ballot with people that
were clearly ahead of him in terms of the hierarchy who should go. And
you're not going to like I voted for Ricky Hatton, but I could never
vote for him over like, say, you know Floyd Mayweather, and you
know Vladimir Klitschko and Andre Ward and you know many other greats you know that
went ahead of him into the into the Hall of Famer, Roy Jones being
one of them. Last year Bernard Hopkins won, Manuel Markz, etcetera.
So he's kind of been stuck in, you know, in that too many
guys. But now it's stand out of it. So I was really thrilled
that he's being inducted. He was a pleasure to cover. I got to
know Ricky a while, you know, over the years pretty well, just
just as fun a guy to hang with. The jail you've shared. We
can't overstate immensely massively popular prominent fighter in the UK. We're in the United
States, but this is a worldwide sport it's the International Boxing Hall of Fame,
and so obviously in the UK they are roaring for this one. And
he also he looks at he he may not have the resume of a Muhammad
Ali, but it's not like Ricky is the you know, resume is the
void of signific get a win. But the thing I was thinking about,
because you know, he's been kind of a borderline case in my mind for
a while, what kind of put me over the top to vote for him?
Besides comparing who else to vote for on that ballot, I thought to
myself, if you're going to write the history of the early twentieth first century
of professional boxing, you cannot do it without prominently including Ricky had he was
that big of a deal. I mean, he was in two of the
biggest fights I ever covered. The fight between him and Mayweather is one of
the biggest events I've ever covered, and it was a tremendous build up.
And even though he got knocked out and you know, somewhat of one sided
fight going into that fight, you have to remember what it was like going
in. They were considered like the two Floyd number one maybe pound for pound,
Ricky was certainly high and everybody's pound for pound was undefeated, you know,
the champion at the one hundred and forty pound wait less he went up
and wait to challenge me whether and then he was involved in another humongous fights.
After he got beat by Floyd, you know, he put together some
wins and he ended up having another mega fight against Manny Pakia. So his
only three losses in his career are to Floyd. To Manny, no shame
in that they're the two best fighters of their generation. And then in his
last fight that took place three and a half years after the pack y off
fight, he got stopped, you know by a solid guy Sanchenko. So
those are his three losses. But other than that, he ran the table
and he beat some good guys along the way, and putting that magical victory
over Costazu, who he made quit so happy for Ricky uh. And this
was another guy I voted for. I took a couple of years again because
of the pack nature of the ballots. But Diego Chico Kraus restless soul,
as as exciting a fighter as there was, devastating puncher, probably as great
of a warrior mentality as anybody I can think of in boxing. To me,
he's on the of the guys I covered. I can't speak for the
old timers, but of the fighters that I knew and covered, the guys
with the greatest heart I've ever seen, who just that never say die,
ultimate warrior attitude in the ring like I will. I will literally walk through
a wall to get this win. It's in no particular order. It's Diego
Corrals, Evander Holyfield, and Artiro Gaddy. You know, no no shock
at all. Three of them were home fighters. So uh, it's kind
of hard to have a Hall of f with the guy that was the lightweight
champion who unified the titles, a guy who was a junior lightweight champion who
had as good of a run at one point as you could have had in
that era, where in back to back to back fights he avenged a loss
to Joel Kassamayor, he knocked out and took away the undefeated record and a
lightweight title from my man Popo Freitas, and then he had the War of
the Ages and was the knockout winner in one of the most dramatic comebacks in
the history of sports and probably the greatest boxing match that ever took place in
the sport where I was ringside for on May seven, two thousand and five
at the Mandala a Bay against Jose Luis Castillo in their first fight. So
to me, Chico Carrales, you know, is a worthy candidate. You
know he did fight Floyd Mayweather and get spanked. But again, like with
Hatten, you know nothing to be ashamed of him to get beaten up and
knocked out by Floyd Mayweather. So he's going into the Hall of Fame.
You have the first ever left handed heavyweight champion of the world, the heavyweight
champion, not just the guy that had a belt, and that is Michael
Moore. I did not vote for Michael. I did, you know,
consider him, but I didn't vote for him. But I understand why people
did. The guy. If you take a look at the guys in the
Hall of Fame, if you were the heavyweight champion, generally speaking, you
get in. There's exceptions. Buster Douglas is not in the Hall of Fame
or anything like that. But Michael had enough wins. He also did enough
damage as a monster punching white heavyweight and also in his early days at a
heavyweight. I mean he won his first twenty six fights of his career by
knockout, you know, when he was being trained by Emanuel Stewart out of
the Cronk Gym. It's not like Michael came to you know. It wasn't
an accident that he won the heavyweight title against Vander Holyfield, and then he
regained a portion of the title later on a couple of fights there. So
he's going in. And then you also have one of my favorite guys.
You know, a little guy, five foot nothing, southpaw, couldn't couldn't
crack an egg, but as consumm and a boxer and as cool as guy
as you could ever deal with. And that is my man, Ivan iron
Boy Calderon, two thousand, Puerto Rican Olympian, teammate of the great Miguel
Coto. And this was a guy, and I've said this before, there
were was a long period of time in my early days of covering this sport
when he turned pro where it was death taxes and Iron Boy Calderon by lopsided
shutout decision because he just boxed everybody's ears off. He was he had no
power. Everybody was bigger than bigger than him, even in the strawweight division,
and he just was like a metronome. He won every single fight,
and it's not like he didn't fight any solid guys. You go down the
wrist of his opponents. I know that strawweights are not like the most famous
or deepest weight class, but he beat a whole shitload of guys that were
either guys who were the top contenders, who had won titles, who would
go on to win titles. He eventually moved up in weight and won a
title at junior flyweight, and only at the end of his career when he
was kind of has slowed down a little bit and didn't have that those great
reflexes in that speed that he got beaten. He got knocked out by Giovanni
Segura, who was one of the biggest punching junior flyweight you'll ever see,
a big, big dude for that weight class, lost him twice, and
then you know, lost in his final fight. But other than that,
he was he was like in many ways, not in terms of their power,
but like klitch Goo Klitchko. When Vladimir Klinsko was in his prime,
he won fights and didn't you know, he would knock guys out, but
he barely ever lost rounds. In his day, Ivan Caldron would win like
one nineteen one, eighteen one, twenty. He didn't barely lose rounds in
these fights. And I'm glad he's in. I have voted for him in
the past. I voted for him again he got caught up in the numbers
game a few years. I think I was thrilled when I saw the new
fighters that they put on the ballot this year, who I didn't think would
make it, and On Caldron got enough support. Now, the interesting thing,
by the way, about this year's inductions, I just mentioned four fighters,
Hatton Corrals and Michael Moore and Ivan Caldron. If you take a look
at the ballot, and if you subscribe my newsletter and you are of my
one of my paid subscribers, you will see a photograph of the actual ballot
and how I checked it off. But you if you read the chatter the
instructions, it will tell you that of the forty two men that were on
the ballot, that you may vote for up to five, but three will
be elected. So when I saw the fourth guy elected, I also knew
they didn't say this on the ballot, but I know that it's it's three
elected or anybody over eighty percent. So if a fourth guy gets elected,
that means you'd have to have four fighters get over eighty percent. Well,
in a year like this with no automatics, I knew there was no way
that four guys got eighty percent. So I texted my good pal Ed Grophy,
who is the executive director of the Hall of Fame, and I asked
him, Hey, what's up with the four instead of the three leg it
says in the ballot. He would not tell me who it was, but
he said, the reason for the four is because two of the candidates tied
in their vote total, so they weren't going to just do two. They
put the two guys in the tide. So that's fair. So you have
four guys in the new you know, who were newcomers this year, which
means they'll also be a fourth fighter added to the ballot next year, not
just three. So that's like the sexy thing in terms of like who I
voted for, Just to make it clear the guys that I voted for.
Besides I mentioned to you, I voted for Calderon, I voted for Ricky
Hatton, and I also voted for Chigo corrals. But of the of the
other fighters I voted for because you're, like I said, you're allowed to
vote for five. So the other ones I voted for were Darius Mikolchewsky,
who did not make it in. He was a long time eight long time
light heavyweight champion. Unfortunately, he's probably most remembered for never having an opportunity
or never making a fight with Roy Joe, who was the number one guy
at the time. But this was a dude who retired forty and two and
had a very very long title reigned twenty three defenses of his WBO light heavyweight
title. I also voted and have voted in the past. I voted for
Mikkelchesky in the past two at times. But the other guy I voted for
on some on a somewhat regular basis for quite a while is another great Puerto
Rican fighter who just gets no love. Three division world champion Wilfredo Vasquez Senior,
who was involved in some tremendous fights, who was a could punch with
both hands and like I said, one a bunch of titles. You know,
he may not be Trinidad or Codo or Wilford Benitez or you know,
picked a picked the you know, the the top fighters you can think of
for Puerto Rico. But he, yeah, Camacho, you know, Carlos
Ortiz. You know, there's a lot of great fighters that have come out
of Puerto Rico. But he while not the top say four or five or
six, he's probably in that top ten. He's a tremendous fighter, and
I believe he belongs in the Hall of Fame. He deserves it, you
know, just just a tremendous fighter. You know, his son was a
world champion. Wasn't not as good as he was Scott that that also in
terms of people that might know his name because his son was a world champion
not that many years ago. But you know, will fred O Vaskaz,
I think is unfortunately kind of destined to be forgotten about by a lot of
people, and it's really a shame. But I will continue to vote for
him as long as there's no other big names that head them up, you
know, ahead of them on that ruster. Now, in terms of the
other categories I turned in, I turned in an empty women's ballot because I
just think that it's they just the depth isn't there but they still elect to
and so that's what happens and what they did in terms of this year,
they elected Jane Couch from England. Now she's there because of what she did
in terms of being a trailblazer, even though she's on the trailblazer category.
Basically she's the one that won the court case low way Kurt Flood did for
baseball for agency or you know, he didn't win a court case, but
the way Jackie Robinson broke the color barry in Major League Baseball. She basically
forced, because of a lawsuit, the British Boxing Board of Control to start
licensing women boxers because women boxing was illegal for many years in the UK.
And so she won that landmark court case, ended up winning a couple of
world titles. Uh at a time when the women's kind of world titles were
you know, not it wasn't the main organizations like there are now. There
was a lot less clarity. But so she's getting in and the Mexican former
two time junior bantam junior flyweight women's champion uh Anna Maria tour off the top
of head. Anna Maria Torres, I want to say help me out.
DJ I think it's yeah, yeah, it's ah. Let me take a
look here. I'm just gonna do just layout what at this one? You
find it? Yeah? Yeah? So the other the other, the second
lady that's being gonna be inducted is the Mexican boxer Anna Maria Torres, who
was a two time world champion, popular figure in Mexico. But I just
felt like, you know, the it's already being watered down after just a
few years. So I did, I set my ballot back blank, I
signed it. I'm happy for the women who are getting in. I just
uh, I feel like if they would, if they would lessen the number
of people, maybe make it one inductee, Maybe do the category every other
year. You know, it will catch up when the women of today's year
that are going to the Hall of Famers, for sure, the Claressa Shields,
the Katie Taylors, you know, and others. You know, you
know we'll see some of them, uh, you know, Cecilia Breck who's
but right now it's a little too much. And then you know there's always
the people that are in the other categories that don't do their business inside the
boxing ring. But who I know, most of them, have had you
know, friendly relations with them. My dear friend Fred Sternberg, the great
all time publicist he's getting in his first year on the ballot. Was thrilled
for him. You have the manager Jackie Callen, who is famous for her
management of James Tony and others and working with the Cronk team in the eighties.
She is the first female manager to be to be elected into the Boxing
Hall of Fame Trail Meg Ryan the movie Yeah. And then in terms of
the observer category, you have, you know, somebody that was a beloved
figure who I was friendly with, who was just a wonderful human being,
and that is the great sportscaster Nick Charles, the original blow by blow voice
of the show Box, but before that he spent many years as a sports
anchor at CNN. But he always covered the big fights. You'd go and
watch like the pay per view of an Evander Holyfield fight, and then you
flip on you know, either ESPN and and see their postfight coverage. And
if you flipped on CNN, you'd see Nick Charles doing his business. Uh.
When I was writing about his induction or his election rather, and I
was writing some of the background material and shock. I couldn't believe he's been
gone since twenty eleven. Been a long time. He was prominently intertwined with
Showtime as well as a host for a lot of years. And another fun
nugget gown of HBO pay per view fights back in the day. Yes,
and indeed go back as a nugget and watch the Knight of the Douglas Tyson
upset. Nick Charles is there at the Tokyo Dome for CNN doing the interviews
and the coverage, just like ESPN was there doing it with Eric Plemons.
I'll give him a shout out, yeah that they're they're they're there broadcasting at
that night. So good good for the family and that those that know and
the CNN family that know Nick Charles cool. The other observer is the the
columnists and journalist mainly known for his uh his writing in the New York newspapers
that he worked for. Very his publications mainly like news Day. I think
of the New York the New York was it the New York Post? The
Day? I forget it was the He might have word at the Daily News
in the Post end news Day. I think he had the triple but Anyway,
Wally Matthews, who I first met when I first got on this boxing
beat back in two thousand, so he's being uh inducted. I worked with
Wally for a good period of time at ESPN. He wasn't doing boxing.
Once in a while he would help out, but he was mainly covering the
Yankees at that time. But he's written sports on a lot of different topics,
but boxing has always been his favorite thing. So, uh, you
know, Wally was uh, you know, the the quintessential New York tabloid
columnist. I mean, he always had his strong opinions. And you know,
I'll give you a quick Wally Matthews story. Not so much about Wally,
but the first time I ever met Mike Tyson when I interviewed him,
and I've told the story in the basement of the gym in Detroit a couple
of like three days or so before he fought Andrew Willatta and uh and Mike
and I went south real quick, uh, and he went on an absolute
tirade. Uh he did you know, he was talking about how much he
hated the media, and he didn't know me. I was this is my
first time ever meeting Mike. You know we had met and everything seemed fine,
but he did refer to Wally Matthews specifically. He was the only reporter
that he named checked and he basically said, Wally Matthews is a reptilian piece
of shit. So Wally Matthews is going to the Boxing Hall of Fame now
with Mike Tyson, and I'm sure they have a better relationship and they just
moved it over. Yeah, I will. I will say this again.
Go back down the rabbit hole and watch the recap on HBO of the Tyson
upset loss, and Wally Matthews has to own up well, I'm not even
no, it's the wrong one. It is the Michael Spinks fight prior to
that, where Wally Matthews has to has to basically admit he picked Spinks to
win the fight of the fight lasted ninety one seconds. Listen, you know
what I remember my memory, I covered uh Lewis Tyson with Wale Matthews,
and Wally picked Lennox Lewis. I mean I picked Mike Tyson KO one in
that fight because I was working I remember I was. I was working for
USA today and we would do like the box of the media picks that would
run in the newspaper on the Friday before the fight, along with like whatever
article I might write. And so I went, you know, I was
in Memphis for the whole week, and I was polling like the top boxing
writers myself and Associated Press and New York Daily News and New York Times.
Anyway, so Wally's picked. I'm almost positive, he says. One.
Yeah. That was the only chance Mike had to win was the land in
early bomb and get Lennox out of there. It didn't work out, But
he's anyways in the Hall of Fame. He's in the Hall of Fame.
And can I get you on the ballot? How do we do that?
Can we get the savages behind you? Can we give the ray Field push
like the Eagles have their push push, they have the brotherly shove. Can
we push you onto the ballot? How do we get that to happen.
Let's talk about how that happens. But I mean, if it happens,
someday, it'll be a big honor. And let's figure that out somewhere down
the road. All right, So plenty on the Hall of Fame, A
couple of I just love the Hall of Fame. I love it. I
know you do when you're passionate about it. A couple more items, including
nostalgia. Amanda Serrano has given up her WBC version of the featherweight title because
she says, hey, if you don't want to let me fight twelve rounds
three minute rounds, then, you know, just like the guys, then
I'm going to take a stand here and say if you can have your belt.
Interesting. I mean, look, Amanda has spent her entire career,
you know, trying to get to a point of respect and money and fame
and main events and having people know who she is. And she's finally there.
She's a wily respected fighter. She's beaten everybody other than Katie Taylor,
you know, way up in the bigger weight. She's now a star in
women's boxing and she's earning money and she's the undisputed featherweight champion. It was
anyway, and she wants to fight the way the men do, and she
did that in her most recent fight against Daniel Loroamos that took place, you
know, a month or so ago, and they did a twelve round fight
of three minute rounds with the blessing of the Florida Commission and she has stated
after that fight that going forward, if you want to fight me, you're
gonna have to go twelve three and the WBC, which I respect their decision,
that's their call. I've had many conversations with Mauricio Suliman about that,
and they're adamant at the WBC because of whatever they have been told by their
medical advisors. They say is that they believe that it is more dangerous for
the women to go twelve and three than it is for the men for their
reasons, and so they're not going to bend to her wishes, and so
she gave up their title. She didn't make a big stink about it.
She said, she had her say about equality. She's made the point many
times that when she trains her fight, she trains like men three minutes in
the gym in terms of her sparring and hitting the pads and all that.
She made the point that because Amanda also participates in MMA, that when MMA
matches take place, the women fight the same length of rounds as the men,
same number of rounds as the men, generally a five minute round by
the way, in UFC or in MMA. Yeah, they don't make a
distinction when they do theirs, and she feels like it's a big deal.
And so when Daniel Ramos fought her, she enthusiastically accepted the twelve to three
requests from their team and there you go. So she's like, I'm not
going to fight for a sanctioned body that won't approve it. Now, I
don't think there'll be a problem going forward because when she fought Ramos, even
though the WBC did not sanctioned that fight, the IBF, the WBO,
and the WBA all did, so I don't see why they'd have a problem
going forward. So she'll hang on to those three adults, I guess,
and move forward with her career. But you know, it's disappointing though that
you'd have to give up your title for that particular reason. But again,
she's in a position where she can call some shots now, and I don't
think she did it in a disrespectful manner. She just said, this is
what I want to do. If you don't want to do it, then
fine, here's your title. That's your prerogative. The same way, by
the way, it's the prerogative of the sanctioning body. At times two ship
fighters of titles. This was like being stripped with the other way around.
Take your title back, all right? Nostalgia time and a birthday, my
goodness. On Friday, December the eighth, as we released this podcast,
Bob Aram is ninety two years young. Incredible. Are you going to sing?
I am not singing neither are you? Bob Aram. Birthday to you?
Oh my, you are singing. Bob Aram ninety two. He has
been involved with the sport what going back to the mid nineteen sixties, longer
than probably I believe the first fight he ever promoted. I know the first
fight. I just you'd have to look the europe you can look under Muhammad
Ali. I believe it was his nineteen sixty six title defense against George Shavallo
in Toronto, Canada, and solate. Most of our audience wasn't born.
Most not all, but most of our audience is born. It's incredible how
long he's been. Arab is an absolute fucking legend. You know, you
can love him, you can hate him. I don't think anybody's indifferent to
him. And I've known Bob for almost twenty five years. We've had our
ups and we've had our downs, But I said before, most of it
has been ups. I have a lot of respect for Bob. He's a
hard working guy. He pays attention to the details, and uh, there's
a reason why he's still at the top of the food chain after you know,
half century as a boxing promoter, because you know, he's not easy.
One thing about Bob, though, is when he does shake your hand
and make a deal, uh, you know, he honors the deal.
And that's not to be said for some people in this business. I mean,
you have to tide up the contracts, but uh, and there's been
issues getting those deals signed. And you know, he'll exploit a loophole if
it's there, if you weren't careful enough to have it closed up. But
you know what, Bob is one of the most interesting people that I have
ever met in my life. And I say that about people whether I've met
them because of boxing or in my life outside of boxing. I have had,
like I said, some some issues over the years, but most of
the time, my relationship with Bob Aaron has been excellent. I enjoy his
company. I've enjoyed talking to him, learning from him, hearing his stories,
hearing his jokes, you know, having having a couple of of you
know, having many laughs with him, covered many of his fights, and
it's amazing he is still very with it, I mean very much with it,
quick witted and comebacks and all of this. I just want to be
on the planet at like sixty two, seventy two, eighty two seems like
it's on Pluto, Rayphiel for you and me and traveling, and he was
being ninety two years old and still involved and still traveling and flying all over
the world. He was at the Tyson Fury fight in Saudi Arabia, for
God's sake, and he was at the press conference not that long ago for
some other stuff over there. I mean now now he doesn't travel to every
single event anymore. I'm My understanding is, uh, he's having his birthday,
you know, he is on Friday, so they're having I think a
little get together for him at his home in Beverly Hills. So I do
not believe he's going to be attending the top rank fight that's on Saturday in
Florida with Robas Ramires. But that's a rare thing. Normally he's at the
fights, and not only does Bob go to the fights, but Bob would
be the guy that's sitting in the front row watching the four rounder that opens
the show. That's for real. I mean he goes and watches the young
fighters and uh, you know, props to him, and I always compare
it, you know, you have to compare Don King and Bob Aram.
Now. Don King is still out there doing fights. He did a show
last week, but the level of event that he does is just off the
close. What Bob does is Bob's Company is still putting on some of the
biggest fights in the world. And I think one of the reasons is because
Bob has surrounded himself with a great staff, younger people that have innovative ideas.
Bob's never like Unlike Don King, Bob is not a micromanager. You
know. He lets his matchmaker's match make, he lets his pr people pr
he lets his logistics people logistic. He has people to handle certain things and
obviously he has to say so. But he's got a tremendous team around him
and they're all allowed to do their job without him sticking his nose in every
little detail. Well, trust me, when Bob wants something done and he
wants to stick his nose in, You're gonna know it. Bob and scream
and holler and curse you out and give you the finger and all that kind
of business. But you know, I just say one thing, Happy birthday
to my man Bob Air. I'm ninety two years old. God bless him.
Love that all right, two pieces of nostalgia. They're both on Thursday,
as we released the podcast. Twenty one years ago. HBO doubleheader Vladimir
Klitchko, Jamelle mcclin and Floyd Mayweather winning over Jose Luis Castillo this in Las
Vegas. Give me a little bit on this. So interesting the fact that
you had think about the type of fights that they give us now and cards
they put up together. This was a live HBO card, not pay per
view. This was Vladimir Klitschkow defending the WBO heavyweight title in the main event
against Jamie mclein, who at that time was on a really good run and
you know, was a legitimate contender at that time. Vladimir only had at
that time the one loss against Ross Pearty. He was thirty nine and one
going into the fight. This was like a first class kind of significant fight
at the time, you know, a serious heavyweight title fight. Jamil had
come off of in consecutive fights. He had beaten Michael Grant, he had
beaten Mount Whittaker, who was a good contender, and he had beaten Shannon
Briggs. So those three fights in a row alone, and he had some
other OK wins prior to that, But that put him in position to fight
against Clitchkow who dominated the fight, who stopped me in the tenth round with
an onslaught, including a beautiful left hook. I actually, because I knew
we were going to talk about this fight, I hadn't seen the knockout in
quite a number of years. I actually went back and I watched. It
was a heck of a knockout, you know, he dropped him with just
a tremendous the prime Vladimer had such quick hands for a guy that big,
it was scary. And Jamille just never saw the shot coming anyway. So
that was the main event, and this was the last time I double checked
this. Also, this was the last time that Floyd Mayweather ever appeared on
an undercard. It was the co feature my recollection. Maybe a little sketcher,
but I believe that it was a Clitch Goo date and and part of
the deal to do it was to get Mayweather on, but the top rank
ended up promoting the event, but Clitchko was in the main event, and
they put Floyd on in his rematch against Castile for the lightweight title. Remember,
in the previous fight in a main event, Floyd had narrowly defeated Castillo.
A lot of people will look at that fight and say, if there
ever was a time that Floyd shouldn't have won the fight, it was that
first fight against Jose and Luis Castillo. I scored the first fight a draw
watching on television, he ended up getting the victory. So now they met
in an immediate rematch. And this was back when Floyd, you know,
couldn't be accused of cherry picking anybody. He was stepping up to the plate.
He had moved up to lightweight from one hundred and thirty where he was
a dominating champion. He took on Jose Luis Castillo when his first fight in
the division, who was considered at that moment number one in the way class.
He got a close win, and he ran it back and he beat
him again another close fight, but he you know, he definitely won the
second fight, and that was your undercard fight. And after that he never
fought on an undercard again, but the fact that you could have two bona
fide superstars, two first ballot lock Hall of famers, two of the greatest
who ever fought in the in the sport, certainly of that era, in
a dominating heavyweight champion in Vladimir Klitschkow this was still during his first title reign,
and then Floyd maywere on the same card, taken on like these were
not like BS opponents. Castillo was, you know, just giving Floyd the
toughest fight of his life and arguably won and was the number one lightweight other
than Floyd at that time. And you got clitchco taking on one of the
top ten definitely guys in the heavyweight division. And mcclein, by the way,
was one of those rare heavyweights that can look clitchgo in the eye that
weighed about the same amount of them. I mean, they were both big,
big guys. In fact, Clitchgow was outwighed by like over twenty pounds
of that fight. If I recal, you got Jamal mclein weighing like two
sixty something and clitch goes you know where he always was around two forty,
So he was fighting a heavier dude, and I think that's again. I
bring this up not because it was the greatest card of all time, but
you had two highly significant fights with two big time names in two big time
fights, not pay per view, on the same card. And now they
try to give me Liam Paro in the co feature of a pay per view.
Give me a fucking break. One final piece of nostalgia. It was
thirty four years ago on December seventh, nineteen eighty nine, that Sugar Ray
Leonard and Roberto Durand sort of fought for the third and final time. Not
a not a memorable fight. I do remember having this pay per view in
Memphis, Tennessee in November. He'll be proud of me of my sophomore years
of college. December December, December bh bla bad December if I said it
wrong, Pearl Barbor Day, December seventh of nineteen eighty nine. I do
remember this my sophomore year of college watching it. It was not a memorable
fight. I remember them having the blankets on them because it was so cold
in the Nevada Desert. Duran Duran just didn't offer much. Leonard had enough
to out box him, out maneuver in a super middleweight title fight. The
most important piece of the nostalgia is this is the final fight of the Four
King series, Dan, I know that's what you want to follow up on
as well. Yeah, I mean, look Roberto Duran and Sugar Ray Leonard
in their first memorable welterweight championship fight, where Duran upset Leonard and won the
welterweight title in a very famous fight in Montreal in a tremendous battle. That
was the first fight of what became a nine fight series of legendary fights between
Leonard, Duran, Marvin Hagler, and Thomas Hearns. They all fought each
other. Most of the fights were great, and they carried the eighties,
and I always found it interesting and sort of perfect the cosmically that you have
Leonard and Duran open the series in nineteen eighty and then go through the whole
decade with all these series of incredible fights, and then they closed a decade
in December, like a month before the end of the decade against each other
in their third fight. And unfortunately it was if you were if you were
ranking the nine fights between the Four Kings by Miles and Miles and Miles Leonard
Durant three is the worst of the fights. I mean, it just provided
no entertainment value or no action, perhaps some nostalgia for some people that were
there thinking we might get the clock turned back to what happened in the first
fight, even the second fight that had such a chaotic ending with Roberto Durant
quitting on the No Mos fight, but Ray Leonard ran away to a lopsided
decision shot out on one scorecard. What also found interesting was they were boxing
for Sugar Ray Leonard's super middleweight title, but the weights for the fight were
were under like he fought for a super middleweight in a super midow title fight,
but Ray weighed one hundred and sixty pounds in the bout and Duran weighed
one fifty eight. So you know, if you look on first mention like,
well, that must have in the middleway title fight. No, No,
it was actually for the WBC's super middleweight title. And you know what.
The other thing that's significant about it is that in the great legendary career
Sugar Ray Leonard, this was the final victory of his career because after this
fight, in the end of nineteen eighty nine, he did not fight it
all in nineteen ninety he came back, unfortunately, and he's told the story
to me about you know why he came back and he shouldn't have. And
in early nineteen ninety one he fought Terry Norris and lost a lopsided decision.
Yeah, and then was done for another six years before he came back for
five years and had the very misguided opportunity to fight against Hector Camacho and was
stopped after he injured his leg. And this very forgettable victory over the great
Roberto Duran will go down as the final victory of Ray's career and the final
fight in the Great Four Kings era. It's fair to say you and I
both, but I was as big or the big as Sugar Ray Lanard fan
that there could have ever been. But his career clearly went out with a
whimper with these with these last three fights that you mentioned, and went his
fight before the Duran fight that we're talking about, I would say he was
a whiper because it was a hell of a fight. Kind of underrated.
Actually was the rematch that he had against Tom Iarns, which was officially a
draw, but everybody knows Ray Long lost, so if you go by what
should have been the case, he would have finished his career one and three.
You know, the loss if you will against Hearns, the win over
Duran, and the terrible third fight, and then as I mentioned, the
losses to Terry Norris and Hector Camacho. So this was, you know,
this was the end. Like the last great performance he had, I guess
you could say was the previous fight to the Herns rematch was when he stopped
Donnie l Lan. But again, I'm always stuck on the fact that they
opened the eighties, they had the great, incredible series that carried the entire
decade, and that the final fight of those nine took place, you know,
in the waning days of the year of the decade. And again Duran
won the first fight of the four Kings, and he didn't win another one
of those fights. So that's interesting. And Sugar Ray Leard won four of
them, beating Duran, eventually beating her Hens in their first meeting, beating
Marvin Hagler, and then winning the final one of the series and the draw.
I said, whin Yeah, no, I know, but but that's
the thing in the event, Yeah, Ray was the rain maker because he
was the guy that brought the big money, so there's a reason why he
had the most fights in the series. And the other part of it is
that when Ray and this was by design. When Ray won the rematch with
Duran, Duran wasn't getting a third fight anytime soon. It took nine years
for him to get him again, by the way, and when he beat
Hearns, it took eight years for Hearns to get another chance to get him.
And and they offered an opportunity for Hagler, but Hagler declined to do
her remain the call of the day and go to Italy and make movies.
So see the Four Kings documentaries. They're out there. They're available through Showtime
and other outs. And read the book called The Four Kings by the by
the late great George Kimball, who I covered many fights with that ring side.
George covered all nine of their fights. The book is the best,
one of the best boxing books I've ever read. I actually have it.
I literally keep it in my nightstand in the drawer, and just for the
hell of it, I just will randomly pull it out on a given night
and just decide I feel like reading about Hagler hearns and I read the chapter,
or I feel like reading about Duran and Leonard, I read the chapter.
Anyway, there you go, there's your nostalgia. What a show we
have. We've given you a ton, including the preview of Haini Progray coming
Saturday night pay per view San Francisco, the ESPN Top Rank card that we
previewed, even the British WBO Cruiserweight title fight that will take place Sunday.
You heard from Jake Paul who's fighting next weekend, December fifteenth, and then
we gave you some news and some nostalgia as well, boxing Hall of Fame
nostalgia. We've had it all. You know. Whatever happens, we're going
to be back. I'm back. We're going to recap it on the Fight
Freak two night recap off the weekend. But if they're hearing us now on
Friday, join us one Eastern time, bet us TV, their platforms,
their YouTube, their Twitter, their Twitch, Find us on bet us TV
because we'll be making handicapping prognostication on these title fights and who knows what it
devolves into with the live chat. We love that about that show. Live
one Eastern Time, watch it later but we be with us live for the
questions of comments, etc. With that, my friend, that's a full
show. Great stuff here as always enjoy the weekend. We'll talk on the
bet US show. We'll recap all of this when the weekend is done.
Dan Rayfield, Yes, sir, always love being with you. I'm merely
TJ. Reeves again. Follow, subscribe, rate us, review us.
It is the Big Fight Weekend podcast feed. You've been listening to the Big
Fight Weekend preview. Bye.