Speaker 1: The countdown is on to fight time.
Speaker 2: This is Big Fight Weekend. No, here is your host,
DJ leaves. Well, here we go with a weekend and
interesting weekend because not a lot of significant fights. We
will have a little bit of a preview. We do
have to recap the Monster and what he did earlier
this week in Japan, since we were last with you
not surprising another Ko. We'll talk about that and a
lot more. And oh oh Canelo Alvarez on the program
one on one with the Dan Rayfield. I'm merely TJ Reeves.
He is our insider. Fight Freaks Unite the substack, Bigfight
Weekend dot Com. Ready for another weekend, my friend?
Speaker 3: Yeah, quiet, but I'm ready for it. Not much to watch.
There'll be one of those call your mother kind of.
Speaker 2: Nights probably, so we got to get creative with this preview. Again,
we come your way going into the weekend. Usually preview
mode Thursday night into Friday, Saturday night, Sunday night, something
like that. Sunday night into Monday. We recap off the
weekend on what happens and again Canelo week next week
in a Canelo Alvarez pay per view is a much
bigger deal, but Anyway, if you like what we do,
be here twice every weekend is the point. Follow, subscribe, Apple, Spreaker, Spotify,
leave us a five star review here in a new month.
They do help us. So you'll hear from Canelo in
a little bit. We got a little bit of a preview,
we got some news, we got some nostalgia. Let's start
first with the monster, though since last you and I spoke,
he does get the knockout, as I said, not unexpectedly
of TJ. Dohaney, my namesake from Ireland. Dohany a little
tougher than I thought. Obviously, go ahead brag about having
the over on the bet Us show. It was over
the four and a half rounds, and then, for all
intents and purposes, it was really a back injury. I
even thought live he hurt his back while I was
watching this, because he grabbed his back immediately after that round.
He tried to come out and fight at the beginning
of the seventh round, and again he's walking around with
what I call the grandpasiatic limp, walking around going oh
my ache and back, Oh my aching leg. I can't
feel my leg. All right, there's me saying that the
Monster is the monster. What are your thoughts, Dan Rayfield, Yeah.
Speaker 3: I mean, I'm pretty sure what caused that issue to
make him into the Grandpa back was probably some of
those body shots in the flank that he was nailing
them with at the end of the sixth round where
he was kind of teeing off on him.
Speaker 4: Uh.
Speaker 3: And as it was described to me by Sean Gibbons,
who was TJ. Dohaney's advisor and has been with him
for a very long time, who I spoke to while
he was in the dressing room after the fight, is
that he even coming back to the round. You didn't
see it on the broadcast on the ESPN Plus, but
that he had trouble sitting down on the stool post
the sixth round, you know, gave it up, gave it
an effort. You know, I can't knock him for his heart,
I mean, and when he came out, he just he
couldn't really move very well and in a way got
off some very good punches, like a series of shots
and basically hit him with some other body shots and
caused him the the ropes and didn't go down to
a knee, but basically limped across the ring, grabbed the
ropes and went down to a knee, and the referee
obviously understood that he couldn't go on and wave the
fight off. So it's a TKO. It was a bit
anti climatic. He kind of at the moment weren't really
sure what happened. When you saw the replays of those
body shots, it was pretty clear that.
Speaker 2: In a way it wasn't sure. They cut him over
in the corner and he's like, is that it? He's done? Okay,
I'm the winner.
Speaker 3: You know, TJ. It was like it was a disappointing
ending to a kind of unfortunate, kind of kind of
a messy, kind of bad. I mean, I can't say
a bad fight, but not the kind of entertainment value
or drama or excitement that we've seen in most annoy
in a way fights. But it doesn't detract from you know,
even on a night where maybe he wasn't at his
absolute lights out best, he still dismantled and took apart
and stopped you know, a credible challenger, a guy that
had been a former champion, a guy that's coming off
you know, I guess three knockouts in a row against
guys that were sparring partners, two of them anyway that
were sparring partners within a way, and you know, in
a way's the kind of guy. And if he talked
to his team or he talked to people at top rank,
and you know, you hear more about the way he
kind of carries himself. He's really the kind of guy
that gets up for the bigger fights. So not to
say that he doesn't get himself in top condition and
train and be ready for the fight, because clearly he
was ready physically and he went in there and he
executed and when he let his hands go, still a
very pinpoint puncher, but he just doesn't have that same
kind of like overwhelming just desire, let's say, when you're
in with an opponent that is not at the same level,
when you're going for things like a unified title or
the undisputed title like he's done in recent fights.
Speaker 2: One one thing that I did see, and it was
on a couple of occasions, dough Haany had success out
of the south paw stance with the straight left hand.
He caught him more than once with that punch, but
he didn't I mean, he didn't do any damage, nothing significant,
So is that one of those where we file that
away later that maybe that is a way to get
to the monster somehow, someways. If you are a south
paw who knows Narry was a south paul right and
called him with the left hook early but couldn't do
much after that, well, I.
Speaker 3: Mean it wasn't a left hook. It was because if
he's a Southpa, he's not throwing a hook. But I
understand your point. He's throwing a strong left handed punch.
I feel like the reason that that in a way
started slowly, and I think Tim Bradley alluded to this
on the broadcast with ESPN Plus. Look, he gets in
the ring for the first round, he knows he's with
a southpaw. Now, the power difference between a T. J.
Dohaney and luis Neary, in my opinion, is vast near
He is a bona fide puncher and Dohaney, in my opinion,
his knockout record is more manufactured. They kept talking about
what a great puncher Doughhaney is and I don't agree
with that at all, but I'm not the one getting hit.
The point here, though, is that in a way knows
that against the south pat in round one in this
fight that was in May against an opponent he was
really pumped up for because that was a guy who
was a former two time champion. More significantly, they're fighting
in the Tokyo Dome. It's a huge event near He
comes into the fight as like enemy number one in
Japan because of the past times he'd been there, So
he was really amped up for the fight. Both guys
were not so much the same, Doheny, But in in
a way's mind, he's a smart fighter. He knows Look,
I got dropped in round one. Let me be a
little cautious against this left hander and make sure I
don't do anything stupid. And I think that was the
reason for a little bit of the slow start. And
then he started slowly but surely pick it up. I mean,
you look at the punchdats. He completely overwhelmed them in
terms of punches their own punches landed. But again, in
a way is entitled to if you want to call,
I can't even call it like an off night. The
guy won basically, you know, out of the out of
the seventh rounds. He stopped him in the seventh round.
In the previous sixth rounds. In a way, one you know,
four or five of those rounds and it wasn't really
that complicated. So he wins the fight. If that's an
off night, I guess he'd take that all day long,
because you know, the guy's been so masterful for such
a long time. You know, just total domination in fight
in and fight out, and not just against you know,
nobody opponents. He's been doing it against the best fighters
in his weight classes. That's why he's able to become
an undisputed champion at bandamweight. That's why he's be able
to move up to one hundred and twenty two, you know,
destroy Stephen Fulton, take two titles, beap to paulas handily,
take two titles, have the big fight with Neary, defend
the title, and now he's in the ring against Dohaney, who,
like I said, if that's your so called off night
against your lesser quote unquote lesser opponent, you're still doing
pretty well because Doheney, you know, against any other top
one hundred and twenty two pounder, would be considered like
a bona fide contender. I mean, he is thirty seven.
It remains to be seen what he does going forward.
For anyway, though, look, he got through the fight. He
kind of alluded to the fact that it was he
understood this was not a big name opponent going in
and maybe he wasn't quite as up for it. But
now he got through it, no injuries. He's good and
as Bob Aram, who was there making the trip, God
bless him that ninety three years old or ninety two
years old flying to Japan with his wife to be
ringside for the fight, says that in a way, we'll
be back in December to fight yet again and defend
his titles in Japan, and then after that come the
first part of next year, back for a fourth time,
coming to the United States to fight, as he said,
a big celebration in Las Vegas. Now the interesting thing is,
and this is my more common thing in Japan than
in the United States. The fight ended, but he did
another press cor in a way, I guess on Wednesday,
Japanese time, in which at that press commence, Ohashi Promotions,
that's his Japanese promoter, announced that his fight will be
on Christmas Eve in Japan, which will be I guess,
Christmas Eve, what is that Christmas Eve morning morning US.
So he'll fight a defense, uh, at the end of December,
and then after that again, if everything goes well, he'll
come back to fight once again in the United States.
Now the question will become who's he going to fight
in the December fight. It seems to me based on
his mandatory situation, it will either be Sam Goodman, who
was the IVF mandatory from Australia who actually got in
the ring within a way post the Neary fight talking
that fight up and Yarie also, by the way, has
Goodman has a victory over TJ. Dohaney also in a
ten round to sir no, I take that back. It
was now I gotta look this up. I thought it
was Dohaney that actually scored the upset against Goodman. I
have to double check that. But the point is that's
one of the likely candidates. The other likely candidate would
be is WBA mandatory, which is already order but was
kind of waylaid by this fight. Is M j Ackman Dive,
who was a former title holder. In terms of the
situation with Dohaney, he actually did lose to Sam Goodman
back in twenty twenty three in a ten round decision,
so they have that common opponent where Goodman was the winner.
I'm not really quite sure why Goodman didn't happen in
this fight. It seemed like that was what was on
pace to be the case, but it didn't. So anyway,
you're looking at the you gotta figure it's going to
be one of the two mandatory opponents that both organizations
sort of claiming that they're due. I'd have to get
some clarification on what the rotation system says. I think
it's the WBA that's next, but who that knows what
the organizations.
Speaker 2: But still, I mean, give the monster credit. He's been
very active by paying for pound top fighter statuses, and
if we get him again in December, that's tremendous h
one year. Let's hear it.
Speaker 3: Let's hear it for that Listen. Like I was saying
before the fight that he had may not have been
the greatest of the performance we've seen from anyway, but
anytime he gets in the ring, I'm excited about it.
I mean, he like he said, I've said this a
thousand times, he's a true I mean, you're watching greatness
and I think everybody should appreciate it while it's happening.
This is a guy who's still a top notch fighter
doing his thing against all the top contenders. He's not
fighting the you know, lesser opponents. Every guy he fights
as a credible quality guy or a former champion or
a current champion or you know, an undefeated guy or
what have you. And he's beating that. He's not just
winning the fights, he's doing it easily. And I'll see
how long you can keep it going. I mean, he's
you know, he's not getting any younger. He's thirty one
years old now, and he has been a professional for
a long time and he's moved up, you know, several
weight classes. I mean he turned professional at a you know,
in the junior flyweight division one hundred and eight pounds.
Now he's boxing a one hundred and twenty two pounds
with a lot of conversation that sometime next year he'll
go to one hundred and twenty six pounds. That's a
pretty big spread in terms of you know, guys who
are that small to begin with. So you know, you
never know when that when that prime or that window
is going to close or there's gonna be a person
that can break through and maybe find a flaw. But
so far, against a whole series of quality guys, and
by the way, different kind of style guys. Like some
guys are boxers, some guys are punchers, some guys are
fast guys, some guys are more slower guys. I mean,
he's fought all kinds of different style fighters. So I
mean in a way, you know, we're seeing the greatness
I work. And you know, again on a night that
wasn't the best, he did the job big time.
Speaker 2: And again just looking at it, it's five fights now
for him since December of twenty twenty two when he
beat Paul Butler and won the undisputed bantamweight titles. If
he fights in December, that's six fights in twenty four months.
Show me another, Terrence Crawford ain't fighting six times in
twenty four months.
Speaker 3: I mean, that's times in six years, bro.
Speaker 2: So that's good activity on that.
Speaker 3: Here's another great stat for him back anyway, by the way,
you know, you mentioned about the activity, and a lot
of people think he's number one pound for pound, He's
now twenty three and oher with twenty one knockouts in
world title fights in four different weight classes, and he's
been undisputed in two of those weight classes. So those
are numbers that are just mushrooming into historic level.
Speaker 2: Agreed, all right, on the undercard, tell me about the
immediate undercard and the co feature fight won by Yoshi
Yoshkai Takai Yoshiki Takai for the WBO bantamweight title. I
have to honestly confess I did not watch that fight
breakfast and Japanese boxing. But give me the update on
him winning the WBO bantamweight title that in a way.
Speaker 3: Used to hold well. He was defending the title for
the first time, that's the first thing. And he was
taken on Daego Higa, who is a former WBC Flyway
titlelder who was a pretty damn good fighter. This was
a really, really good fight. I mean, whatever the main
event may have lacked in entertainment or dramatics or big
punches or big knockouts or knockdowns or whatever you want
to discuss this, this fight between Takai and Heiga was
a tremendous battle. These guys really let it all hang out.
Super excellent fight. You know, Takai is a fighter that
was a former kickboxer who came into boxing and won
the title in his previous fight, and now he's making
the first defense, and they didn't do him many favors
by match them up with a really solid opponent in Hegau,
and this was just a great matchup. This was these
guys both like I said, they both went to work,
they both let it all hang out. They both were
there to win. It was very close. Uh, you know,
hego had a lot of good moments, and then come
the eleventh round where the fight's really really close and
you're like, you know, you know, could maybe be going
either way. He just scores a knockdown. It was you know,
when you watch the replay, it could have you know,
there was some some up uh complaining from from heat
from Takai when it was when it was called because
he felt like it was a slip. When you watch
the replay, he clearly did slip, but there was also
a punch. So it really is a judgment call. Had
the ref rule to the slip, you couldn't really argue
too strenuously against it. He called it a knocked down.
You can't really argue too streng strenuously against it. There
was a shot that landed. Uh, but at that point,
that extra point, you're like, okay, that could really have
a big difference in what happens because the fight is
so close. And then you know what Yoshiki ta Kai
did what champions are supposed to do. He went out
there in a twelfth round. He did not leave anything
the chance. He went out there and he beat the
shit out of Daego. He got in the twelfth round.
I mean, it was the overwhelming, most overwhelming round of
the entire fight. You know, he was keep in mind
by the way Tikay's had a rough fight also, It's
not like he had an easy night. He was getting
hammered also, as was he got. You know, the guy
was cut over the eye, blood was coming down his face,
and he went out there and like I said, he
just laid it on him and he could just you know,
couldn't breathe in that round he was getting just the
pressure was just NonStop. And in the end it was
an overwhelming twelfth round where I think I didn't do this,
But if you had said to me, you scored the
twelfth round ten eight with no knockdown, you know I
didn't do that. But I couldn't really blame you, frankly,
because that was that overwhelming of a knock of a round.
Again until if you look at the compy box stats
in particular in that round. Again, I know that's not
the end they'll be all the judges don't have access,
but on on postfight looking at those stats, it is
interesting in the twelfth round to Kyle out landed, he
get twenty eight to five. That's domination and a lot
of them were clean, hard punches that were rocking his head,
knocking him into the ropes, and so in the end
he got the decision. It was very close, one to
fifteen to one to twelve on the two score cards
and one fourteen to one thirteen on the third score card.
First time tick I had ever been knocked down as
a professional boxer. They did make mention that he had
then dropped two times as a KICKBOXERU. But that was
a very very good fight to retain the WBO bantamway
title in a fight that was the fight of the night,
you know, because the main event was a little bit uneven.
Speaker 2: Okay, so good because again that was midweek since last
we did the recap podcast that they had that Now
again Canelo Alvarez coming up here in just a couple
of moments. We don't have a lot we will have
a bet us boxing show coming on Friday, will handicap
both the Sam Noakes European lightweight title defense which is
Friday night in London, and then there's a WBA strawweight
title I've been practicing. My name is it Toma Moon
or Thoma Moon. Toma Moon Niamtrong is the fighter that
has the WBA strawweight title. He's fighting in Australia against
a relative new professional in Alex Winwood, a former decorated
Australian amateur. That is the championship fight of the weekend.
It's in Australia's Saturday morning US time, so we got
a little bit there, but not a lot in the
preview mode.
Speaker 3: I like to refer to him the champion because I
have hard time saying the Thai name. I go by
the nickname or the sponsor name. He is knockout CP Freshmart,
So like many and I don't know if the listeners
realize this, and this has been a common thing for
decades that in Highland. You know the fighters obviously they
have what their names are, but when they're in the
professional ranks, typically they have a sponsor and oftentimes it's
a gym, and so they take the name of their
gym as their as their sort of studable, so that
that's a regular thing. So he's been known depending on
which reference you look at. If you look on box Wreck,
for example, that call him by his real name, Neilmtrong.
If you look in other places, you know he's referred
to as knockout CP Freshmark.
Speaker 2: You want me to start calling you Freshmart, don't you.
Speaker 3: I'm just no, because they're not my sponsor. They want
to pay me. You can come with it. But the
point here is that whether you want to call him
the am Trong or CP Freshmart, this is a fighter
who has been a long time champion. I mean, he's
not the most known guy. This is going to be
his first fight in a little over two years. He
had a whole thing where a mandatory was constantly postponed
and canceled and there were issues. So he has not
had a fight for quite some time, and so you're wondering,
you know, is you know there's Russ and then there's Russ.
I mean, like I said, the guy he has not
fought since July of twenty twenty two, when he won
one of his title defenses and you know, after that
long of a break, you know who heck knows what's
what's ticking with him, So this is one of those
things that's kind of up in the air. Now. He's
thirty three years old, but he's also twenty four and
oh with nine knockouts and he's making his twelfth defense.
This is the guy who's one of the longer reigning
champions in boxing currently. But win Wood, I'm not really
sure why he's getting this title shot. He's only four
and oh with four and oh in his professional career
with two knockouts. He's twenty seven. He was a two
thous twenty Australian Olympians, so he's got a decorated amateur career. Obviously,
he's got some muscle, if you will, economically in Perth,
in the western part of Australia, because this is a
fighter in a CP fresh Marty's traveling from Thailand to
Perth to the hometown of the challenger, which is not
the most common thing, especially when you consider that most
of the defenses that he has made have taken place
in Thailand, you know, where there is a pretty good
boxing scene, So that's kind of interesting. Now, the one
historical thing that the promoters are making a big deal
about with regard to Winwood, who I guess does have
some element of popularity in his home area, is that
because he is four and oh, should he win this title,
he will achieve a record for Australia for the fewest
number of fights to win a world title buy an Australian.
And it's not just any old guy's record. He would
be he would be breaking the record of one of
the all time great fighters Hall of famer, maybe one
of the greatest, if not the greatest Australian fighter that
there is, and that's Jeff Fennick, who was involved in
some tremendous battles over the are and is just, you know,
a legend in Australian boxing, frankly a legend of boxing
Berried and uh, you know, a really cool guy I've got.
I've met Jeff many times. He's trained some fighters. I
I met him and spent some time with him at
a time when he was training Mike Tyson, when Mike
was getting ready for his final fight against Kevin McBride.
But anyway, if you can be mentioned in Australian boxing
and the Annals of Boxing, history in Australia. In the
same breath as Jeff Enick. You're probably doing something right.
So a lot of pressure on wind would because that's
been a big part of the build up in that
country for this fight. Can he break the Fennick record?
And to me, uh, you know, who knows what what
the champs got after such a long laught for little
guys like that when they're they got to struggle to
make that weigh one hundred and five pounds. He's thirty
three years old, you know, so that's a rough one.
So there'll be a good there'll be a good crowd there,
I would imagine, and we'll say it's unfortunate there's no
uh you know stream that I'm aware of, at least
legally anyway in the United States where in North America.
Speaker 2: I was just gonna, I was just gonna say, how
do we go about seeing this? And it may be
like a YouTube replay or something like that.
Speaker 3: Uh, for that fight probably probably be.
Speaker 2: Saturday morning, US time, sorry night in Australia. By the way,
Finnick won the world title. If I have this right,
won the IBF bantamweight world title in his seventh pro fight.
Win would trying to break that record in a fifth
professional fight. Very curious.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so he's going for that record in his fifth fight.
You got the champ CP Freshmart looking to make his
twelfth defense. So there's a battle of numbers if.
Speaker 2: You will like all of that. All right, speaking of numbers,
a guy that has amassed a bunch of numbers in
terms of wins, accomplishments, title victories, money made is Canelo Alvarez.
Speaker 3: Next weekend he will interview interviews logged with Rayfield.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's that's starting to total up as well. Next
weekend he headlines September fourteenth in Las Vegas on pay
per view against Edgar Berlanga. But you do not have
to wait until next week or next weekend for Canelo Alvarez.
He's right here with us on the preview pot.
Speaker 3: Well, it is my pleasure to once again welcome to
our podcast, the one and only can Banillo Alvarez. Canelo,
you've been on this podcast before, you know the drill.
I appreciate your time. Look forward to covering my twenty
third Canelo Alvarez fight come September fourteenth, when you defend
the unified super midiweight world Championship against Edgar Berlanga. It'll
be a PBC on Prime pay per view at the
Team open in Las Vegas, as I call it the
House that Canelo built. So welcome and thank you for
doing this. How's everything getting ready for you? Getting ready
for this big fight for you?
Speaker 4: Every day it's very my friend. I'm very happy for
here in Lake Taco. I always training with my person
there in the game, and I feel great. I enjoy
every day every time I'm being in training, common and
getting ready.
Speaker 3: Now, last week spoke prior to the fight that you
had in May against Haimi Mungia, I introduced you as
Canelo Alvarez, the undisputed super middleweight champion of the world.
You were defending your four belts. You went out there
and you beat Hamimngy and an entertaining fight for the fans.
No controversy won the fight. And now we go into
this fight between you and Edgar, and unfortunately your status
is undisputed is no longer there because the IBF stripped
you of their title because you declined to fight the
mandatory against a fighter named William Skull who is so
unknown that he fought an eight round fight on your
undercard in May in a fight that was not even
part of the pay per view or even on the
preliminary stream. So my question for you is has that
upset you that they've taken away the belt from you?
We know you're the champ, but you don't have that
extra belt.
Speaker 4: I know you know that. I understand them, and I
know I'm not complain about it. They think they that's
the correct thing to do. I don't really blame on them.
You know, I'm josh them and I'm I'm very happy
with that where I am. So I'm doing my team,
don't I'm not gonna fight with the school. I I
can't fight with everybody at the same time, right mm hmm.
And the fight with the school I don't. I don't
see that much. I don't see that fight.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it's not gonna sell. It wouldn't sell any
pay per views, is I mean? Listen, you're always going
to sell pay per views.
Speaker 4: Like Honestly, I never hear of all the school seeing.
When I hear about the schoolers after they they say, hey,
you have them on the toy you need to play
with them. But I look, I'm doing my team and
I'm I'm not complaining about it.
Speaker 3: All right. So let's go back to the May fight.
You had the fight against Mongee, like I said, a
very entertaining fight. You you won handling on the scorecards.
You're you didn't get the knockout. I know you probably
would have liked that. You're fifth fighting a row without
a knockout, but still a clear decision. I've heard from
some people who have suggested Canelo that once you had
him under control later in the fight because you had
knocked him down, that you basically carried him. You let
him survive and not got the knockout because you didn't
want to embarrass a fellow Mexican. What is your response
to those who think that you could have got the
knockout but you let him survive because he kind of
liked Mangia and like I said, he is a fellow countryman. Yeah.
Speaker 4: I like my people from Mexico. And you know why,
having phoned there in the fight, I really enjoy it
a lot. And I say to my turner, you know,
if I put everything in one round, on two rounds,
I maybe finish Mungia, but you know I have him phone,
taking my time and the people enjoy a lot of fight.
Speaker 3: So after that, when it came time to set up
this fight for you on the September of Mexican Independence
Day weekend, because of who you are and your stature
in boxing, everybody knows that if Canelo Alvarez chooses to
fight somebody, chances are he can get the opponent that
he wants because of what you bring in terms of
the exposure and the money and everything to go along
with the Canelo Alvarez event. So my question for you is,
what was it that made you select Berlanga. I know
there was also conversation maybe Chris U Bank Junior was
one of the candidates. What was it that made you
and your team and Eddie everybody say, you know what,
let's give Berlanga the shot.
Speaker 4: You know was yeah, two or three fighters in the table,
and Navy called me and say, you know, we want
to make this fight because we think he's more entertaining
for the people Mexico versus Puerto Rico and Belanga is
Sean John and everything. And I say, you know, I
don't care if you choose whatever you want. I'm ready,
all right.
Speaker 3: So you mentioned that part of it was the reason
that you and your team selected Edgar, who, by the way,
is one of your mandatories. Not that that made a
difference in terms of skull, but nonetheless he is. But
you faced a few Puerto Rican fighters through your career.
But I was looking at your record, I didn't realize
that it had been such a long time since it's
been you facing a port Yeah, exactly. I was a
huge fight back in twenty fifteen, so it's been a
number It's almost ten years frankly since that last type
of fight against the Puerto Rican. So tell me your thoughts,
just to describe what it means to you the Mexico
Puerto Rican rivalry. You fight, you fought Miguel, you fought
his brother, you fought Kermit Centron uh in past Mexico
Puerto Rico matchups. But what's the rivalry mean to you?
Speaker 4: You know? You know, especially with Mighan Alcoto, for me
was I feel very proudable that pie because you know Milcoto,
I watched him when I was young, to lain a lot,
one of my favorite spighters, and to beat him for
me was special. And there is a uh Canelo before
and after Helcoro, so uh, it was very special night
for me, and i'm and i'm and I'm happy to
be in other rivalry versus Mexico and Puerto Rico.
Speaker 3: And I guess for you it's probably a lot better
than taking on another Mexican like it did against Mongia,
which I know that you didn't love the idea of
fighting the Mexican country. Yeah, kind of part of it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I always say that I represent Mexico and I'm
very honored to represent Mexican and lian or like to
fight with my country man, my country people, but you know,
sometimes you need to do it, and that was happening
with Mungia, and I think was a good fight for
Mexican too. No, and I enjoy a lot, But now
is Mexico versus Puerto Rico, and I'm glad to be
to be here.
Speaker 3: So September fourteenth is a date that you fought on
that weekend often because it's the weekend of the Mexican
Independence Day holiday. It's not a secret within the sports
and entertainment business that that's a night that Canelo Alvarez fights.
This fight is going to be on the same night
that UFC scheduled their fight also in Las Vegas. The
first ever sports event at the sphere. I've seen and
read comments from Dana White from UFC who's basically talk
bad about you doing a fight on that date against
their event, even though you know he knows better than
anybody that's the date that you often fight on, and
it seems like he's talking bad about you and about
the fight. I just wonder, what what's your view of that?
And like, to me, this seems like there's room for
everybody to, you know, put on big events.
Speaker 4: No, no, like I say, the song coming for everybody, right,
And I don't complain about it. I don't say I
don't want to say anything bad about Dana Way. I
respect him. I respects his work. And you know, I
never look when we made this fire. I never say, hey,
we have the UFC there. And then I just like
to fight in Mexican Mexican independence and I enjoy a lot,
and I I'm very happy to be to be to
be here, to be fighting in the Mexican independness.
Speaker 3: All right, just have a couple more questions for you.
It's been in the news quite a bit that when
you were going on your press tour to promote the
fight between yourself and Berlanga that it seemed almost more
of a fight between you and Edgar was the back
and forth within you and Turkey Alshik from Saudi Arabia.
Obviously everybody knows that he wanted to try to make
a fight between you and Terrence Crawford, who had just
defeated Israel Majimov at one hundred and fifty four. Have
you fight him at one sixty eight. You said you
didn't want to be disturbed while you were preparing for
your fight with Edgar, and not that you wouldn't necessarily
talk to him, but it wasn't going to happen while
you were preparing. Can you just basically give me your
take on him saying then afterwards, you know what, forget it,
I don't want to pursue a Crawford Canelo fight. It
seemed like there was just a bunch of snipping between
you two back and forth. What was What was your
take on all that whole situation.
Speaker 4: Look, I never did respect anybody. I would respect everybody,
and and I liked if I respect everybody, I like
to they respect me to write and I have nothing
to do. I have nothing with with him. Maybe he's
a little bit desperate to make that fight. They call
me the night before the press conference in in in
Los Angeles and and say, you know, he wants to
meet you, and then try to make that fight with
their scoff And I say, look, I don't want to
talk about any other pie. I'm focused on the person
on September and the Verlanga pipe, and I don't want
to talk about any other pie right now.
Speaker 3: And I suppose there's always a chance to talk to
me in the future. I guess, like anything, Yeah, but I.
Speaker 4: Look he the next the very next day, he come
and say, yeah, you know, you know, it's fine. He
can do whatever he wants. And I'm gonna do my
my job like always. I'm not desperate to make up
fight with them. I don't need it. If they went
to what we mean, we can go but different.
Speaker 3: All right, So I'll just wrap it up with this. Then,
So you have the Berlanga fight in front of you, uh.
And I think it's you know, it's because of the
rivalry between the countries Mexico, Puerto Rican everything. It'll be
an attractive fight for quite a few people. But I
think every would be less and honest if people said
Berlanga was like your biggest opponent. You fought so many
great fighters. It's no no knock on Berlanga, but you've
had so many mega fights through the years, and I
wonder when you look at the landscape, what you know,
you're kind of running out of opponents that's super middleweight Frankly,
I mean there's not You've already beaten pretty much everybody,
and I just wonder in your mind, you know there's
still Benevidia's out there, and and Morale they've moved up
to light heavyweight. So the question I have for you
is do you have a desire to go back to
light heavyweight at some point to fight one of those
types of guys or what is the big fight for
you in the future.
Speaker 4: The only the only I can make one seventy five
was I need to be with very much with the yougo,
That's the only fight and I don't see other than that.
Speaker 3: And so he's obviously got an important fight coming up
for undisputed. Just wrap it up with this and would
you consider the winner then if you could against better
Be or Beevile, whoever wins that fight come up at
the end of the year.
Speaker 4: Like I said, I use I just wanna go up
to have that very much with the ball. If he wins,
we can we can see before after that.
Speaker 3: All right, very good. Well, first you've got Edgar Berlanga
to defend your titles against on September fourteenth. Canelo, thank
you so much for your time. Look forward to seeing
you next month and I appreciate.
Speaker 4: It my pleasure.
Speaker 3: Thank you again.
Speaker 2: Take care all right, Canelo walking in for Edgar Berlanga
next week in Vegas. Again you got the chance to
see him and talk to him as well. Final impressions
here as we get you for fight week next week.
Speaker 3: Canelo, cool as cucumber, is always poised in a good mood.
I've always found him a pleasure to deal with in
terms of the media obligations that he has when he
does interviews. You know, he's he's happy, go lucky in
that sense. You know, I think he he reminds me
a little bit about of Clitchkow when I used to
do interviews with Vladimir Klitchkow before every single one of
his fights for many many years. You know, I got
the impression, and he's told me this also just flat
out when I asked him one time, like he enjoyed
the training camp. A lot of guys, you know, they
don't really love the training camp. It's, you know, it's
hard work. You're away from your family' you're isolated. You know,
you're not getting paid during the training camp. It's it's
a lot of stuff going on. It's kind of boring
when you're not doing your actual boxing stuff. But Clitchko
always reveled in the in the serenity, if you will,
of the solitude and being up in the mountains, in
the in the Alps, you know, on the border of
what Switzerland where he was when he would do with
his camps. And I kind of get the feeling when
Canelo does his camps. He has that same kind of thing.
It's a chance for him to be within his own team.
There's it's things are quiet, it's you know, there's a
good schedule. He's doing this camp. Now, he's moved his
camps around a little bit. Klitchko for years was always
doing them pretty much in the same place. For the
last few camps or last couple of camps at least. Anyway,
Canelo has been training. You heard him mention I think
at the beginning of the interview he's doing this camp
once again in Lake Tahoe, like likes the altitude. But
he's in a good mood. He's we're looking forward to
the fight. You know. He talked as you heard about
being involved in another Mexico Puerto Rico fight, which you know,
is kind of like a swing of the the complete
opposite of what was his last fight, where he's fighting
a fellow Mexican. And it's, you know, a well known fact.
And Canelo has been on the record many times about
how he doesn't he never loved fighting Mexican opponents. You know,
talked about maybe letting Mungia off the hook a little
bit and not going for the knockout when he had
him hurt because he wanted to show respect for his
Mexican countrymen. I don't believe there'll be that kind of
respect against Edgar Berlank if he has him in position
to score with the ko, we'll say. But look, I
know that a lot of people are maybe not they
don't love this matchup. But any time Canelo is in
the ring and he's still doing his thing at the
highest level, it's it's exciting. You know. I'm always happy
to go out and cover Canelo I'll be going out
to Vegas on Wednesday. This will be I actually looked
this up and I mentioned this. I don't know if
it was on the interview, but maybe I mentioned it
in small talk with Canelo before the interview. It's me
my twenty third Canelo fight that I've did to cover.
That's a long fight. It's a lot of fights. I mean,
he's got sixty something fights. I've covered like literally a
third in terms of just being present, not to mention
the fights I've written about that I wasn't.
Speaker 2: At and he hasn't gotten a temporary restraining order against
you yet, not yet. All right, that's good, good interaction
there with Canelo Alvarez before the Berlanga fight week and
all of that. And that's why you've got to be
following and subscribing on this podcast feed to get conversations
just like that. When you heard from the man himself
on that we got some news and we've got some nostalgia.
Can this get any weirder? With Jeron Annis and your boy,
you're not saying what the latest is. They had the
purse bed and hold the Can you explain to me
how Matchroom did not win the purse bid, his promoter,
Innis's promoter, What what is going on?
Speaker 3: Dan?
Speaker 2: We've been over this eight different ways and here's a
ninth way. So what is up?
Speaker 3: So when you when you go to the point where
you're trying to make the unification fight for Ennis against
Brian Norman, as we've detailed, the only way for them
to get out of the mandatory fight with the IBF
before a purse bid was scheduled was to sign for
a unification fight. That's the one thing in the IBF
rules that allows you to bypass the mandatory you know,
for at least the one to one fight. And they
were unsuccessful in making the Brian Norman fight. They were
about five hundred thousand dollars apart. That's according to Carl
ma Ready from Top Rank, which is the promoter for
Brian Norman. They didn't want to do the Chicazian fight
at all, not because they're afraid of them, but because
Boutsennis gets nothing out of it. That's beat him six
ways from Sunday twelve to zero in an interim titled
fight when he won the interim title back in January
twenty twenty three in Washington, DC on the undercard when
Tank Davis fought Hector Luis Carcia. As I have said,
I'll never get the hour of my life back that
I sat through that one in the arena that night.
It was a terrible fight, but Boots won every round.
It wasn't like his fault. Chickanzi was on his bicycle
and was not really there to engage, and it was
a shitty fight. So the combination of having to fight
an opponent in Chikazi and who's got zero accomplishment, combined
with the fact that Jerdy kicked his ass last year, right,
they wanted nothing to do with this fight, but as
long as they're now forced into it because they were
not willing to spend the money that the Brian Norman
camp was asking for, which is certainly their prerogative. If
you're not going to do that, then you gotta go
and you gotta win the fight because you can't let
you're the guy that you basically said, is the next
Sugar Robinson who you talk up all the time. He's
our best guy. He's this, he's that, you know, you know,
I think Eddie Hearn thinks that Boots can walk on water.
And then you go out there and you lay an
egg in the purse spit and you get blown away.
They bid one million, fight five hundred and sixty six thousand,
six hundred and sixty six dollars and the and remember
they get sixty five percent of that money. So that's
a that's that's a distinct advantage for the champion. It's
always an advantage in a perspid if you're the if
you're the champ over the challenger. But the promotion company
that works with Chikazi in Germany called P two M
Box Promotion, they bid two million, nine hundred and ninety
one dollars and eighty eight cents. Now, when the perspit
occurred on Tuesday, I put out that it was one
point eight million in change. What it was then explained
to me was in reality that one point eight something
figure that was in euros, right, so it's actually was
even higher in American money. So they bid over two million,
and that's how they have to pay for it, over
two million dollars in American money. So Mattrim loses the
perspid by almost a half a million dollars. That's absolutely outrageous.
So now in a situation, hold on, he's in a
situation where he's got to decide. Am I going to
go fight in Germany for that money on somebody else's card.
Speaker 2: I'm saying, where my guys.
Speaker 3: Don't control the broadcast, you know, the P two M promotions,
they can they can sell it to the Zone, but
they could go to ESPN Plus in America I'm talking about,
they could try to sell it to you know, Amazon
Prime whatever. They can go anywhere they want. They can,
you know, do anything with it. So it's a it's
a really in my mind, it's a complete mess for
for Mattroom.
Speaker 2: So that leads to is he just gonna vacate the belt?
With everything you just described, We've been in agreement this
fight is worthless. His promoter didn't win the purse bid,
do you believe because my belief is that's the next step.
Now he's just gonna say, okay, fine, I'm not fighting
this guy. I'm certainly not fighting him in Germany or
wherever else now.
Speaker 3: So the Boots Ennis legacy at welterweight will then boil
down to I was an interim champion for a minute.
I made one defense against a second rate fighter like
David Evans, and and then I vacated because my promoter
did not make a good enough effort to win my fight,
so he went from But you could essentially having a
unification fight in his hometown, but my promoter too cheap
to spend the money on Norman's You.
Speaker 2: Can make that. You can make that argument. But by
the same token is he's being forced to fight somebody
he doesn't want to fight, so he vacates and stays
at Welton Waite and maybe goes and fights for another
title somewhere else.
Speaker 3: Well, where's he gonna fight for another title? Barrios is
not fighting him, as Stanionis is not fighting him. We've
already been down all the road with Brian Norman. So
now you go to one fifty four. There's no title
available form at the moment, certainly not for November. So
you're in a bad situation right now, you know, because
Boots Ennis is a tremendous fighter. We've discussed out a
thousand times. This is nothing but that Ennis. Here's the
point though, he's still had a point in his career
where he needs the title. You know, we just did
the interview with Canelo Alvarez. Canello, you know he was
stripped of the IBF title at supermid away. He doesn't
need that title. Frankly, Canelo Alvarez could put on big
events and make a shit a load of money if
he had no titles, because that's who he is. And
certain fighters get to that level of start of many
pack out Floyd Mayweather, Oscar del Loye at Canelo Alvarez,
certainly the Mike Tyson's and Holy Fields and fighters of
that caliber going back years ago. But a younger fighter
in terms of his professional career as a champion in
Botenna still needs the belt that helps make his legacy.
So what should have happened if Matrim had done this
the right way? In my opinion, I'm not knocking them
because they did a great job promoting the Abanescent fight.
They should have been able to figure out a way
to get the Brian Norman fight done. Give your man,
Boots senn Us a chance to go and become a
unified champion in front of his hometown, and then you
vacate and move up. So now you lose four over
five hundred thousand dollars or less on a mandatory where
now your guy might have to go to Germany. Now
Boots could say, you know, what fuck it. I want
the title. I'm gonna show this. I'm gonna take my
money from this fight, and I'm gonna go kick his
ass in his home country. He's gonna be heavily favored.
I don't care if they can fight the fight in
his backyard, in his kitchen, in his mom's bedroom, and
boots and is ain't losing that fight, all right. And
by the way, it's not like he's not getting paid.
If he goes under the terms of the PURSPID, if
he takes the option on the two million dollar per
spit and he goes and fights in Germany, his share
of that money is almost It's like over one point
three million dollars, which is around the same amount of
money I think that Boots has been making in his
last couple of fights, So it's not like he's making.
Speaker 2: Maybe he actually go to Germany and beat the crap
out of the guy or wherever they hold the fight.
Come on out, we'll step stand by. It can't it
can't get any crazier, can it?
Speaker 4: Uh?
Speaker 2: Maybe it can. I shouldn't ask.
Speaker 3: That it's boxing.
Speaker 2: Uh, it's boxing. But let's move on to a couple
of other news items.
Speaker 3: Don't know, we got the other person, we got the
other perse.
Speaker 2: Oh wait a minute, yes, and another surprise right yeah.
Speaker 3: So they had these both on the same day at
the same hearing in Springfield, New Jersey, and also via
conference call video conference. So remember back in the summer
he had the mandatory fight between Jannebec al mccannooley and
his mandatory against the Russian fighter who's based out of
Australia who's with No Limit boxing. That was the fight
that with this post app with Malakovich where Jannebec you know,
was dehydrated, ended up in the hospital a couple of
nights before the fight passed out. You got, you got.
Poor Malakovich has traveled seven thousand miles to come to
the United States for this fight, doesn't get the fight.
They have to cancel the fight, and and Andre Malakovich
is just totally shit out of luck. They I guess
Top rank gave him some money to you for the trouble.
But now Janebec announces I'm staying at middle eight. So
now it goes back to a perse bit because they
didn't make a deal, so they do the per spit
and this is like, I mean, I can't say, this
is the closest perspit I've ever seen, but in my
in my memory bank, and what you're.
Speaker 2: About to say, it can't get much closer.
Speaker 3: Go ahead, I mean they could, but it's very rare.
So the winning bid by no limit boxing. So that's
an upset on its own that the challenger wins the
purspit and they're at even more of a disadvantage because
they only get twenty five percent on this perspit and
top rank slash Janebek seventy five percent. But the winning
bid was three hundred and fifty one thousand dollars. Top
ranks bid was three hundred and fifty thousand dollars. You
do not see per spins that close, and it's just wow.
So over one thousand dollars. Most likely janebec is on
his way to Australia to challenge to defend the title
against the mandatory challenger, and you just don't see that
happen when you're talking about perspit for you know, hundreds
of thousands of dollars. I mean, I've seen there's close ones.
I've seen one that have been a few thousand dollars
apart here and there, but a grand on a three
hundred fifet thousand dollars fight. That's, like you said, that's
about as close as you're gonna get. I actually kind
of thought to myself, and I don't think this has
ever happened that I can think of, Like what would
have happened? What's the rule if they both bid three
hundred and fifty one thousand, I need to ask the IBF.
Speaker 2: If it's a tie, I flip a coin.
Speaker 3: I don't know this time I go to the champion tiger's.
Speaker 2: Straws. Do we throw dice? Do we Yeah? I don't know.
Speaker 3: But it goes to show you, though, that both promoters
valued the fight in a similar level for what they
could generate in terms of television, in terms of sponsors,
in terms of tickets, which frankly isn't much because this
is not the most attractive fight because Janebeck is not
a popular champion, and even though Mikalovich is, you know,
maybe a very good fighter and undefeated and good power,
he just doesn't have that worldwide profile. So again, maybe
he wins the fight. I'm not even saying anything bad
about him. It just when it comes to name recognition,
it's not the kind of fight that's going to bring
in a huge amount of money. So anyway, so that
was a while Tuesday early afternoon where we got Matthroom
losing in a shocking fashion. This purspid which Jakazi and
for Ennis and then he got no limit with the
challengers promoter winning the perspuit by one thousand dollars. I mean,
if you're into the the business side of box and
that was like a feast from heaven.
Speaker 2: How about that?
Speaker 4: All right?
Speaker 2: Some more news items quickly. Here WBO has ordered the
mandatory fight between featherweight champ Raphael Espinoza and the former
champ robes C Ramirez. Again, Espinoza upset Ramirez. This is
not something though that they haven't been working on. They
have been working on this, trying to make it. It's
just now that the WBO has stepped in and said, okay,
this is the next fight, right correct.
Speaker 3: Yeah, pretty much. I mean, like you said, in December
of last year, they had the Fight of the Year contender,
tremendous battle and obviously Spinoza scored the humongous upset to
win the bell from Robasi Ramirez. Remember he came he
Rafael Spinoza's twenty five and twenty one knockouts, great record,
and now he's got the title. But going into that
first fight against Ramirez, totally unknown right and picked you.
Speaker 2: Know, knocked down early in the fight. People got up
and then put it on Robes Ramirez.
Speaker 3: So so when the fight was over, right away, Top
Ranks plan was we're going to do an immediate rematch.
And they work closely with Zandfer Promotions, which is the
promoter of Espinosa. They've now signed Espinosa to a co
promotion deal with Zandfer and obviously they're the promoter for Ramirez,
and so they're gonna do the immediate rematch. The Ramirez
camp was like look or another is The Espinosa camp
was like, look, we'll do the rematch, but we needed
we want to defend our title first. We want an
interim title. Obviously he wants a chance to defend it,
get a chance to make a payday, not have as strenuous,
strenuous a fight, I guess. So they gave him that
fight in June, uh and he knocked out Charino pretty easily,
and while he was getting his interim fight, Robas got
his interim fight and like a week later he went
out there and he got his own win. And so
then the plan, as it was expressed me by Top
Rank all along, was now we're doing the rematch at
the end of the year, and with the limited number
of dates on ESPN that get in the fourth quarter
because of college football. Their plan was, and this still
could happen. They're looking to do the rematch between Emmanuel
Navarette and Oscar Valdez on December seventh. Not done yet,
but it'll probably be announced in the near future. But
they were going to beef up the show by giving
you to close out their year a world title doubleheader
of rematches, but Navarette and Valdez on the card, and
do the rematch with Espinos and Ramerez on the card.
The problem is, like you said, the WBO ordered yesterday.
I guess so when we were taking this on Thursday.
So on Wednesday they order the or the negotiation, and
if they don't make a deal, they'll have a purse
bid for the fight, you know, within a few weeks.
My understanding is that it's not because Zandfer and Top
Rank can't make a deal. It's not even really about
Ramirez who desperately wants to rematch to get a chance
to reclaim his title and start having trus closing a
deal with Espinoza, who either doesn't want to do the
rematch or wants more money. I don't know the particulars,
so I think that's where the WBO comes in and
they're like, listen, just get this shit done. So it's
not as easy as I think top rangon zan Forer
hoped it would have been. But then again, it's a
boxing business. They'll win of things ever easy.
Speaker 2: Kind of like parenting you and me, you would little
Ray feel me with the twins. At some point you
step in and say, I've said three times, pick the
crap up all the floor in your bedroom.
Speaker 3: So the bottom line is WBL the wo gave them
fifteen days from the time of the order on Wednesday
to make a deal. If they don't make the deal
within the fifteen days, they'll schedule the purspit. Now either
side can say I want an immediate perspit and not negotiate,
which is actually what happened in the IBF situation with
Chickatzian and Ennis that was ordered a little before the
deadline because the Chigazian team stepped in and said, fuck it,
we just want to do the purspid. So I suspect
that the deal will get done. And by the way,
if it does get done, that's a pretty damn good
double header. If that's the plan they stick to and
do both of those rematched title fights on the same
card in December. They're looking to do that somewhere in Arizona.
That'll be a nice way to close out the ear
if they get that all wrapped up.
Speaker 2: All right, stay tuned on that, all right, We'll move
quickly through a couple of other things. Wait a minute,
what is this that the read season promotion and the
upcoming Anthony Joshua Daniel Dubois fight. Turkey Alaschic and the
promotion are saying, we don't need to soak the buying
public here with a ridiculous pay per view price. They're
actually being reasonable with a pay per view price. Tell
us a little bit more real quick.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so, I mean, Turkey has been been posting on
his social media and he did one podcast where he
talked about the cost of boxing. Now they've been charging
money for their pay per views. They're not cheap. They're
in that seventy five to eighty five dollars Ranger, so
that they've done for the Crawford fighting for previous you know,
the Tyson Fury Alexander Sink. There was one show where
they had a very reasonable price where I think they
knocked it down to thirty nine to ninety five. That
was the Day of Reckoning Card, which kind of was
a late situation because originally that was going to be
Ooh Sick against Fury before it got moved to a
different date. But his perspective is that we know, if
we're going to do these shows on pay per view,
we're going to charge a lesser price. That's like his
new thing, which is you know, he's you know he
can do that because it's their product. So Anthony Joshua
against what obviously in the United States is not a
mega fight. But what they're doing is they're only charging
twenty bucks for it nineteen ninety nine, and that's if
you buy it on PPV dot com, if you buy
it on your linear television through in demand, which is
so the same company that owns PPV dot com, if
you buy it on his own pay per view, but
they also reduced the price in the UK, where it's
I guess nineteen ninety nine pounds, which is cheaper than
your average Anthony Joshua fight. So for them, they're getting
it at a real discount based on what the beginning before.
And if this is you know, a new sort of
way of doing things from them, you know that'd be tremendous. Now,
I don't know what they're planning to do in terms
of how they're going to price the pay per view
portion in the United State of the better be of
and b VOW card, or what the rest of the
world is going to pay for it, or how they're
going to price the rematch with Tyson Fury and Alexander
you can you.
Speaker 2: Can bet that Fury and Usik is not going to
be nineteen ninety five us. I don't know what it's
gonna be, but.
Speaker 3: It's gonna I don't know that. I mean, I'm not
gonna put anything past Turkey. If he decides he wants
to charge less for it, he can charge less for it.
But I just know this as a die hard boxing
junkie fan and longtime pay per view consumer who's bought
thousands of dollars worth of pay per views in my life.
For them to offer the Joshua Duba fight and that
car is a good car too. I know it's British centric,
but if you're a junkie like me, you know, I
don't care if it's a British fights or American fights
or what have you. Twenty bucks for that card is
definitely worth it in my mind. So I think that's
tremendous value, and I'm glad to see that he's doing that.
I hope that it keeps up. Now. In a perfect world,
they just won't be pay per view at all, obviously,
but I live in the real world and I understand
that these events, a lot of them are pay per view.
He's been saying on his social that he's been talking
to Oscar. They're trying to plan some kind of Latin
version Riad season card where he's talking about not doing
it on pay per view at all and just offering
it to any network or channel that wants to pick
up the broadcast or the feed. That's a fight where
they're looking to do. You know, these are this is
still a work in progress to take place later the year.
The Hosing Ramirez ar a Barboza fight, another fight that's
being heavily discussed that I think will probably end up
getting made. Maybe is the unification in the cruiserweight division
between Zero Ramirez and Chris Billum Smith. We'll see about that.
The WBA put out a thing today about how the
time frame for the order for Zero to make a
deal for his Mandador against Dordikos had been that they
had canceled the first bid because there was a deal.
They're going to put out some particulars. I'm assuming they're
going to step aside and allow Zero to do the
Chris billam Smith fight. Bill and Smith's been doing interviews
on his home broadcaster in the UK on Sky talking
about that fight. So that's not really a pay per viewfight,
I don't think. But if they can do that kind
of show, with those kinds of quality fights, you did
me a double header plus whatever, I say, my dad,
and you're talking about a unification with Zerdo and Bill
and Smith and go by the way Ramirez against Barmosa,
I mean, and I don't have to pay anything extra
for it. That's the way it's supposed to be, and
that's a good thing. So if Turkey has seen the light,
you know, I'm happy to hear that, happy to see that.
Speaker 2: And again, you know math all right, how appealing is
an Anthony Joshua what Daniel Dubois fight in the United States.
We'll just go over this real quick. And we both
went to public school. I don't know that that fight
would do one hundred thousand pay per view buys. Maybe
it would if you were pricing it at like fifty
nine to ninety five sixty bucks, so sixty times one
hundred thousand would be six hundred grand. Right that you
would make from that, if I have my math correct.
But now you knock it down to twenty bucks and
make it more appealing, and let's say a whole bunch
more people four hundred thousand in Europe in the United
States say that's a better price. That's eight hundred grand.
Speaker 3: I mean more people are going to buy it in
the UK at that price.
Speaker 2: I mean I would agree.
Speaker 3: But here's the thing about it, though, when you when
you price an event like that for somebody that actually
is interested, where they would even consider stealing it, let's
say at twenty bucks, like your your motivation is stealed
is less. Now compare that to Canelo against Berlanga. That
pay per view is eighty nine to ninety five.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 3: Once you reach a certain level. On the price point
you're more. I mean, I don't do this because it's
like I sleep an I buy my pay per views.
But I get it that you're it's almost like you're
insulted that they charge that much, even though they're trying
to cover their cost and make sure they don't lose money. Because,
believe me, the fight between Canelo and Berlanga, PBC and
everybody involved, they got a lot at risk in terms
of the finances. But that's not our problem. If you
price a pay per view at ninety dollars, it's going
to be a lot easier for somebody to, in their mind,
I believe, justify stealing the signal if you're pricing at
twenty bucks and that's like I can pay twenty bucks,
what's the best under big difference. So we'll see how
that works out for them. I hope that this is
the beginning of a trend where they're trying to do
this now. It can also some people might say it's
like it's another element of their trying to disrupt the
pay per view model to hurt other promoters potentially who
price their events at a higher level. I'm not saying
that's the case, I can understand why somebody might look
at it and see it that way. All I know
is this September twenty first, I'm watching Joshua Duboi and
instead of costing me sixty seventy eighty bucks, it's gonna
cost me twenty and I'm happy about that.
Speaker 2: Like that, all right? A couple of more items here
we already knew, but now they've made both of these officially.
You've been reporting on the Kishon Davis one recently, but
now it's official. First for the IBF Junior middleweight title,
Bakram and Tim Zu officially announced by Premiere Boxing Champions
October nineteenth in my part of the world in Orlando
in Central Florida, about an hour and a half from me,
and that is still slated to be the first non
pay per view for this new deal PBC on Prime,
taking them all the way to October, taking them ten
months into the year to do one of these. And
Top Rank did officially announce the Kishan Davis fight with
Cause Davo Limo that you were talking about on the
Recap podcast for November eighth. So give me a little
more on both of these being official real.
Speaker 3: Quick, Well, I'm thrilled that they're going to do a
non pay per view on UH Prime, which you know
we've as you said, we've discussed this, but this is
a good matchup. So Zoo's coming off the loss Andndora
with that terrible laceration on his scalp. He's now healed
and ready to go. He's been training in Las Vegas.
They announced the fight. Finally they made this fight between
PBC and TGB and Bachraum's promotion, which his main events. Uh,
they didn't even go to the deadline of the Persmit.
I think they cut the deal, you know, a few
days before the Persman was even scheduled to happen. So
they get on well with each other, and everybody kind
of understood the numbers, and so Zoo's coming back to
fight in America. They'll fight this fight at the Carib
Royale in Orlando, which has become somewhat of a hot
dead for a box and they've done prospect shows there.
You saw Jake Paul fought there. We've seen Erlan earlier, right,
So they've had a number of fights over the last
couple of years there. And uh, I know Bakram Mertaziliev,
who is going to be making his first defense of
the IBF Junior Middleway title, is not a well known fighter,
but if you take five minutes and go find him
on YouTube or watch when he won the title against
Jack Coulka or any of the other fights he's been
on other PBC undercards which were part of the step
aside deals they did when Charlo was champion. He's a
good fighter, he's well schooled, he's a good puncher, he
seems to have a good chin. I believe this is
going to be a very very entertaining fight, and so
that's the main event. They're going to add some other
fights to the undercard and it'll be I think, a
good show where it's not gonna cost you pay per
view money, which is a good thing, as we've been
talking about. And in terms of the other fight you
mentioned with Top Rank. They announced this card. They actually
had a press conference indoor for Virginia on Thursday to
talk to the local folks there, the newspapers and media
and everything. And he'll have his first ever hometown fight
as a professional, his first main event on ESPN. Actually,
this will be an ESPN Plus only card where he
fights Gustavo Lemos from Argentina, who's going to be dropping
down back to lightweight. Remember in his last fight, we
Moos had a decision loss against Richardson Hitchins in an
IBF one hundred and forty pound eliminator. But now he's
coming back to one hundred and thirty five pounds to
fight Keishon Davis. This is a real fight. In my mind,
Limos is probably the I don't think probably. I think
he's definitely the best guy that Kishon Davis while at
faced and they're gonna put it on in front of
the hometown, and you know it's gonna be like a
family affair because his older brother, Calvin Davis, who's a
thirteen and oh up and comer in his own right
in the junior welterweight division, he's gonna fight on this card,
and their younger brother, Keon Davis, who was the twenty
twenty three Olympic Trials champion who didn't actually go to
the Olympics but won the trials, He's going to make
his professional debut in the welterweight division in this card.
So you got three of the Davis brothers fighting all together,
and they also are made official. They're gonna have Brian
Norman and the defense we've talked about against Darick Wavis
as the co feature on this card. So there's your
there's your November eighth ESPN Plus card. And the question
is what happens with the boutenants because he was supposed
to fight November ninth against whatever the opponent they were
going to find Chikaze or Ennis or whatever I mean,
or the unification with Norman, and now we'll see what
the germ is doing scheduling in that fight. But Brian
Norman's on the eighth and the Davis family will be
on the card as well.
Speaker 2: And one other item, Boxer has announced that Adam Mazin
is going to be back in October against Ohara Davies.
This is kind of an intriguing junior welterweight clash as well,
and we can see it in the United States right.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Like all the Boxer cards, they're on Peacock simulcast
of the Sky broadcast, which is cool if you have Peacock.
They don't. It's not even like they use the international
broadcast or they take different announcers. They literally just show
the exact same broadcast that if you were sitting in
your place in London and watching on Sky Sports, you
see the same thing. So I dig that. So as
Deem is like one of my favorite prospects. He's eleven
to zero, eight knockouts, really fast rising guy. Won the
European title very quickly ended up dacating that title. Was
so they had announced in the ring after one of
the previous boxer cards that he was going to fight
Harlem you Bank, who was the nephew of Chris U
Bank Senior, the cousin of Chris hu Bank Junior, and
that was like a pretty interesting fight. And then Zeem
got injured and they never rescheduled the fight, and I
was kind of like wondering where is he is. He's
only had one fight this year. And then suddenly in
the last couple of days, the rumors were there that
he's gonna fight Davies on this date and so now
it's done. They announced the fight October nineteenth and the
Copper Box Arena in London, a Zem against Davies. Now Davies,
who's been a pretty good pro It's coming off though,
an absolutely horrendous loss where he got knocked out in
the first round. And it wasn't even just that he
got knocked out in the first round. He didn't even
really compete in the fight. It was just just a
really bad, like as bad a night at the opposit
you can get. They had a lot of hype about it.
He was fighting first his first fight since he had
signed with Golden Boy, against the old man Ishmael Baroso
for the interim title, who by the way, Barroso lost
and got stopped on the under part of the Naway
fight the other day. But anyway, Davies. Yeah, so Davies
is coming back, and even though he's coming off that
horrible one round knockout loss for a zeem, it's still
the most credible sort of name, I guess on his
record as they try to build up the young fighter.
And so, yeah, that was announced. That's sort of a
I'm mildly interest in that because I like Azeeman. You know,
we'll see if Davies has enough inside his.
Speaker 2: Heart that Davies earlier was the Davy's loss earlier this
year or late last year, whatever, It was all time
excuse making where he claimed that the noise in the
casino disrupted his sleep and the oxygen is different in
casinos than it is in other hotels, and the dog
ate my homework.
Speaker 3: That loss was in January.
Speaker 2: In January, and he's still blaming like the made service
for the reason why he got was not a good look,
not a good night, all right. So Azem will be
back with Ohara Davies in October nostalgia time before we
are done on this year podcast. So it was twenty
seven years ago, twenty seven years ago. On Friday, September
sixth of ninety seven, Eric Morales KOed fellow Hall of
Famer and Mexican great Daniel Ziagozo. Of course we talked
about Morales and his birthday this past weekend, but he
he won the WBC Junior Featherweight title twenty seven years
ago Friday. As we released the pod, Morales's first world title,
Dan Rayfield, tell me a little more, listen.
Speaker 3: Morales was a highly touted up and coming guy at
that time, rising the ranks. No one really knew how
good he was yet. He was twenty six and oh
going into this fight, but he hadn't really ever fought
anybody at this point. And Zara Gohosa he was old,
but he was an all time warrior, you know, longtime
champion in the one hundred and twenty two pounds division.
Just a really rock solid kind of fighter. Big heart
had been in some great wars. And the question was,
like we see lots of times of boxing. Is it
going to be the old veteran and you know, take
the new kid to school or is the young guy
going to be a little bit too much and take
care in because, like I said, the resume that Morales
had prior to this going into this fight was extremely,
extremely limited. So we had a great looking record, but
he didn't know if he could fight. And Zara Gohsa
we knew great chin, you know, good power, like just
a just a tremendous fighter. And you know what, it
was a tough fight. It was a close fight, but
in the end, it was that power and that youth
and that you know desire that just wore the old
man down. And I mean the scene when he stopped
and he landed like a beautiful shot right to the
pit of Zara Goos's stomach and he went down and
he was sitting on his on his rear end had
his like arms kind of around his knees. It was
very reminiscent of the scene if you remember the way
that Argueyo looked when he got knocked out by Aaron
Pryor in the rematch. Similar when Morales himself got knocked
out in the third round by Manny Packett in their
third fight, where he was the older man at that point,
and he just like, you know what, I can't, I'm done,
Like you know, the guy's got too much, and he
kind of waved his his his glove at Morales. I
felt like that was a way he was giving him props,
like you'd got me, kid, you know, you know, passing
of the torch kind of situation. And uh, you know,
zarag Ghoson was a great champion at that time. He
was defending that title. He'd won the title more than once.
He was defending it for the fifth time. And that's
all she wrote. And Daniel Zaragosa never fought again. He
retired after that fight. He's in the all of time now.
You don't look, no, I don't think most people if
you were making your list of like the top ten
or twelve all time great Mexican fighters, you know we've
discussed that before, whether it's Chavez or Canelo or Sanchez, Breer, Morales, Marquez, Oliveries.
You know, Miguel Canto, you gone down the list. Zaraghosa
may not be in that elite, elite, elite echelon, but
he's in the next group right behind those guys that
he was a really class fighter for many years. And
for Morales to get his first title, and to do
it by beating that caliber of fighter, that kind of
launched Morales into what became his own all time great career.
But you didn't know it at the time. And that
was by the way, you know, we missed this broadcast.
That was a live fight on the old HBO Boxing
After Dark series, which I miss every day of my life.
And this was a tremendous battle on that series. All right.
Speaker 2: So you back up one year nineteen ninety six to Saturday,
September seventh of ninety six, which is now twenty eight
years ago, and I remember this one and it's for
the dubious reason of Mike Tyson's alleged knockout of Bruce
Selden to get the WBA heavyweight title. I say alleged
because to this day he did not hit him with
a legitimate punch. It was like a deflection off the shoulder,
And do I not I've not rewatched this because why
would I? But do I not remember the crowd chanting
fix Fix Fix in this fight? I think they were
that night. Remember this is Tyson just out of the
Pokey the year before accumulating another world title, the WBA
world title.
Speaker 3: So let's put that in.
Speaker 2: And Bruce Seldon looked like a guy that had robbed
a bank standing there, had not been heard, had not
been injured, And they showed the replay from a couple
of ankles. He didn't get hit right, feel.
Speaker 3: They get showed the replay upside down, inside out, in
black and white, in color. It doesn't matter. You're not
going to see a great punch. Keep in mind Tyson had,
like you said, he'd gone away to prison for the
rape conviction. He comes out of prison after being out
of the reno. He had fought Razor Roddick in the
rematch and and June of ninety one, was in prison,
comes out, has his first fight post prison against Peter
McNeely in August of ninety five, then wipes out Buster
Mathis Junior in three rounds later in ninety five, then
gets the chance to fight Frank Bruno in the rematch
who Frank crew had won the WBC title from Oliver McCall.
And they go to Las Vegas and Mike Tyson once
again knocks out Frank Bruno in the third round in
the WBC title fight. He then blatantly ducked the mandatory
against Lennox Lewis, paid Lennox Lewis millions of dollars to
not fight him, ended up not defending title anyway, and
gave up the WBC title and then challenged Bruce Seldon
for the WBA title. WBA title was at stake in
this fight. Selden came in with that belt and about
one minute and forty nine seconds left without it, because
as you said, there was no real punch thrown. You
want to talk about fighters, and this is the epitome
they talk about. When Tyson was fighting fighters, they were
beat before they even got to the ring because now
petrified of the of the persona of Mike Tyson, Bruce
Seldon lived up or down if you will, to every
element of that particular thing. And Bruce Selden was a
physically gifted guy, was a great condition. Making his second
title defense, I mean I don't think anybody thought he
was gonna beat Tyson, But I also don't think that,
you know, going in, it didn't seem like he's gonna
go out, and he was a huge underdog, like twenty
to one or something like that, but that, yeah, he
should be able to make it out of the first round,
even though lots of guys have been knocked out by
round one. But this was such a horrible outcome. It
was such a blatant, nonsensical result the way that it ended,
as you said, people yelling fixed. There was like a
national movement about anti pay per view because this was
a mega pay per view event that drew you know,
over a million pay per view buys, and everybody felt
like they had been ripped off because nothing it was
the god was Look, I think we all understand that
there's a first round knockout, it happens, it's box, but
when it's so dubious, people are going to complain because
they've spent real money to watch down anything.
Speaker 2: When Tyson annihilated Michael Spinks, it was a no doubt knockdown.
You could have counted to seventeen and Michael six wasn't
going to beat the count this was not that. This
was wait a minute, was that a punch? And then
he's counted out after it's over with. So I can
understand where to this day people are still dubious people.
Speaker 3: Every time there's a fight that looks like it's fixed
or where there's a dubious knock like this, you still
hear people reference Bruce Selden in that fight, and it's
you know, it's unfortunate because Bruce Shelden, for you know,
his entire everything he may have ever done. Now, he
wasn't a great heavyweight, but you know, he was a good,
solid contender for a long time. He did win a belt,
but everything about his career boils down to you know,
you threw the took a dive against Mike Tyson where
you got hit on the shoulder, and that takes away
from Tyson also because I don't need to doubt Tyson.
You know, if he if he was able to continue
the fight, Yeah.
Speaker 2: If he beats the count and they waved Tyson in,
I guarantee, guarantee, he would have landed something to the head.
And that's what Bruce Selden knew too, by the way.
Speaker 3: Right, So that's why this was so so Tyson made
like fifteen million dollars for the lightest night ever, and
even Bruce Seldyn pathetically got five million bucks to basically
lay down.
Speaker 2: I do not remember. We don't have to go on,
We don't have to go on for the ten minutes.
Was there an investigation by the Nevada Commission? Did they
threaten to hold part of his money or his money
or what? Do we remember? Not really, not really.
Speaker 3: I mean this is a little before my time of
covering box, and although I remember watching this, I don't
remember if there was any real, actual, like like you said, investigation.
I think it was more like I can't believe this happened.
We're all mad. I'm not sure what we can do
about it. And I mean, probably probably more famous than
the fight itself was. I mean, just to put it
in historical perspective, it was after this fight that Tupacs
Corps had attended. I was that he was shot later
in Las Vegas.
Speaker 2: I was just coming there that that was later that
night that Tupac was murdered in the middle of an
intersection not far from where they fought the fight. So
that is much more noteworthy than Bruce Selden, and by
and by the way, it was only two months later
that Tyson is in the ring in November of ninety
six with the vander Holyfield. Because it was a non
fight with Selden, he could just turn right around a
couple months later and fight that was.
Speaker 3: That was the one silver lining, if you will, is
that finally and that's what they named the fight finally
that once Tyson had won this belt, they had put
together the rematch, or not the rematch rather but put
together the fight with with the vander Holyfield, which the
world that wanted to see for a long time, and
Don King had seen how bad Evander Holyfield that looked
in the fight against Ray against Bobby Chez that they
finally decided to feed him to Tyson and look what happened.
We saw one of the greatest fights and upsets he'll
see in boxing. Love it All with the if Bruce Sheldon.
It laid down in one.
Speaker 2: Though probably not in that time frame. You've got a bunch,
You've had a bunch here on this weekend preview podcast
recapping the Naia in a Way Win, we gave you
a little preview of that title fight the Strawway title
fight in Australia. You heard from Canelo Alvarez. Why don't
you and I reconvene for the bet Us Boxing Show.
We will talk a little about the Sam Noakes lightweight
European lightweight title fight that will be Friday night. We'll
talk a little more from the handicapping perspective on this.
What did you say, fresh Mart? What did you say?
Speaker 4: C J?
Speaker 2: Freshmart?
Speaker 3: Is the.
Speaker 2: Get the sponsor right for me?
Speaker 1: DP, fresh Mark, BP fresh March all right, st CP,
c PP fresh Mark fresh Mark, and we better the
tie champion, the tie champions fresh Mark. Rayphiel has all
the info.
Speaker 2: We will handicap those fights one pm Eastern Time Friday
on the bet Us platforms.
Speaker 3: No relation to the Fresh Prince.
Speaker 2: Correct or k Mart or any other March save Mark Walmart.
But in any event, we'll see each other on that
bet Us show live questions from the audience, and I'm
sure we'll get some about Canelo fight week et cetera.
And then off the weekend you and I will get
creative with the fight freaks, shoot night recap with whatever happened.
Maybe there's an upset here again if the win would
Guy in Australia wins. He's the fastest Australian to ever
win a world title. Now we got a story. Now
we got something to recap there. That's the case. Let's
see what happens with that. In the meantime, have a
good weekend, Dan Rayfield. Always appreciate the insight. Nice hustle
with Canelo Alvarez. Thank you, sir, all Right. In the
US show, there is our insider Fight for United is
a substack. Be subscribing, be on the email newsletter, be
following and subscribing on this podcast feed. We come your wage.
Twice a weekend preview going into the weekend. Recap off
the weekend for Dan Rayfield. I'm TJ Reeves. It's the
Big Fight weekend Preview.