Speaker 1: Well off of a weekend that has seen Archer better
bv make history as the new undisputed light heavyweight champion
of the World via a decision over Dmitri Vvol. We're
ready to recap that the entire read season card, fights
in Japan, news, nostalgia, and much more. It is the
Fight Freaks Unite Recap podcast. I am the somewhat competent,
somewhat rested host TJ.
Speaker 2: Reeves.
Speaker 1: He is our insider, Dan Rayphael. Fight Freaks Unit is
a substack. Why are you not subscribing? Why you're not
on the newsletter?
Speaker 2: You should be.
Speaker 1: You get up to speed on everything. Thank you for
finding us on the recap pod on the feed. Make
sure that you're following subscribing on Apple, Spreakers, Spotify, because
we come your way previewing, going into the weekend, recapping
coming off the weekend. Full disclosure, I've been in New Orleans,
Louisiana after Hurricane Milton Big Dan have gone there and
have now come back after a wild buccaneer win on
Sunday night.
Speaker 2: But we got a post.
Speaker 1: We got to be here for what happened with this
showdown that we've been waiting for the better part of
two plus years for Better BV and b Bull, maybe
even longer it has happened. Better BV is one. We've
got all kinds of insight from you. By the way,
Dan is ready to go swinging at I mean, two
handed Barry Bond style to the upper deck on de zone.
Speaker 2: Stand by for that.
Speaker 1: But first the fight, my friend, how are you off
the weekend? And there certainly was a lot to talk
about from this read season card.
Speaker 3: Oh, no doubt about it. I mean, a big fight,
a big, huge win for Better BV. I didn't expect
it to be the fight of the year, even though
it was, as I've said numerous times, the best fight
on the schedule for the year so far, because of
the contrasting styles and the stakes and the fact that
you know, you mentioned that they we've been looking forward
to this fight for you know, maybe two whatever, it's
been two or three years. The reality is both of
these fighters won their titles, you know, within a few
months of each other in twenty seventeen. They've held their
titles for seven years, and they're the last men standing
among a group of you know, pretty solid light heavyweight contenders,
and they have beaten everybody basically, you know, one by
one they've got you know, like even common opponent like
a Joe Smith for example, and so it's about time
to fight. Happened it was able to be made because
the Saudi's and Turkey al Chic put up a huge
amount of money ten million dollars apiece for these guys
to get in the ring and do the business. And
now look, both guys, I feel like they elevated themselves.
And that's what I always want to see in a
big time fight is whatever that result is, whoever wins,
whoever loses, that both fighters come out bigger and better
and more well known and all that. And I know
probably stings quite a bit for Beevoll having lost the
way that he did such a close fight, but you
know it's going to make his name even bigger. He's
nothing to be ashamed of. But in terms of better
be it, we got to start with the winner and
we'll get to the controversy the scoring in just a minute.
This is a man who is if there's an and
I don't even know he looks at it as a negative.
I mean, but some people might. It's the first time
in his professional career he went the distance. He was
twenty and oh with twenty knockouts coming in. Now he's
twenty one and oh with twenty because Beevoll stood up
to the power for twelve four rounds and he went
the route. But he made the point in the post fight,
both in the ring. I don't know was in the ring,
but I watched post postfight press conference. He was kind
of funny, but he goes. You look, even Mohamad Ali,
the greatest boxer of all time, you know, went to
distance and fights, so you know, he wasn't really disappointed.
It didn't seem to go to twelve rounds, but he
didn't love his performance. He was critical of himself, but look,
he he won a close fight. I've seen a lot
of people talk about the controversy, but in terms of
his career, this is a historical situation because he unifies
the four titles. He wins the WBA belt, which is
the one that was missing from the collection. He's already
had the other three, plus he's been the lineal champion already,
first ever four belt light heavyweight champion since four belts
became a thing, first undisputed in the division. I think
this is even a bigger deal since back in the
days when Roy Jones did in nineteen ninety nine, in
the three belt era, when you needed the three to
become undisputed. Some people confuse the four belt era, quote
unquote as since the WBO existed, but that's not really
the way most people view it, because yeah, they existed
for a long time at the same time that you
needed three belts by public acclamation to be undisputed, and
while the WBO existed, nobody considered it necessary to have
to be called undisputed. So that's a little bit of
a you know, a caveat there. But nonetheless, Roy Jones
had the three twenty five years ago, so better BM
does something that hadn't been done in the weight less
than twenty five years. He also, by the way, since
there became like two belts in the sixties in the
weight class. At one seventy five, he's only the seventh
guy to become the undisputed champion. I mean, there's been
a lot of top light heavyways through the years, but
no one's been able to do what he was able
to do. But other than just a select few Michael
Spinks for example, you know, we can name you guys
Roy Jones, Bob Fosster and so on, and you know,
he fought a very intelligent fight. He was you know,
he was pressured him. He showed a good chin, he
worked a body to some degree. His jab was very stiff,
and when he got in a situation where he might
have be losing some rounds because Bivol was such an
outstanding uh boxer, mover, jabber, you know, high high guard
and didn't get hit with too much clean stuff, he
never really like let it get to him. He never
I never the way that people has won some other fights,
including like the Canelo fight. I feel like he was
able to frustrate the opponent. I never got the feeling
that even though better bv may have known, hey, you
know what I mean, I got to get to this guy,
never really sensed anyway at least watching frustration from him.
And in the end, you know, people are gonna have
their opinions about it. One judge had at one sixteen
to one twelve that Peiwell Cardini from Poland that's the
one that draws the ire from a lot of people.
Glenn Feldman, who's been an excellent judge for a long
long time, that at one fifteen, one thirteen for Demita
for better bv and Emanuel Oliver Palomo had at one
fourteen to one fourteen. I scored the fight a draw,
but I was a couple of very specific rounds that
I felt were like really big time swing rounds that
could have gone either way. So absolutely, I can see
why a lot of people feel like Bivol was the winner.
I can certainly see why better Be it was a winner.
I was texting with people in the business whose opinions
I greatly respect, and I think three or four different
people who are in the business who I've known for
a long time, We're all in agreement. These are separate,
like the decision either five either way or a draw,
and that's really what it is. So the iro that
the one sixteen one twelve card from Cardini, which may
not be great, is a red herring. So when somebody
like Eddie Hearn goes off and calls that fight a
robbery because of that score, if what if he had
had it one fifteen, one thirteen and changed one round,
your man still loses on a majority decision. So to me,
that's not I mean, yeah, if you don't love to
see that score, but there's a lot of close rounds. Man.
Speaker 1: All Right, So what I thought in watching the fight,
and again I'm in New Orleans watching the fight. I
fought Beevil Bank several early rounds. Did you think just
while we go back and what did you think he
several rounds of the rounds that he was winning on
your six sixth card that Yeah, I mean, I think
I was the.
Speaker 2: First half of the fight.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think I the one early round I gave
to better BV and I can't remember. I think it
was the third round, but there were some close ones.
But yeah, certainly in the early the early going, Bevo
box really well. And it was after maybe like round
five or so where better BF finished around I think
it was round five. He finished with a really good flurry,
landed some very solid shots, and uh really at that
point started to pick things up. Because the thing about
better BF, even though he's got a tremendous knockout record,
he's got obviously, you know, any fighter who starts off
the way he did, you're gonna have some early knockouts.
But a lot of the fights that he's done over
the last few years, it's taken a few rounds to
warm up Joe Smith decide that was a secon round knockout.
But other fights, you know, he's gone into the tenth, eleventh,
he's gone into the seventh, eighth rounds and against guys
you know, uh Callum Smith and Anthony Yard and guys
like that who are good, solid contenders. Also, he's not
going in there and just rolling them over in one round.
And Bibol's got such pedigree and such skills that it
didn't surprise me that the fight was going to go
deep in the match.
Speaker 1: So in the seventh round is the round where Bevill
was really backing Better BV up some and maybe even
stunned him a little bit with a couple of punches
and the crowd was on its feet, et cetera. But
I really think after that Better BV came forward and
that's where I think here comes the rub on how
he won the decision. He was winning eighth round, ninth round,
tenth round, and the eleventh round was a really good
round for him. I mean, there were no knockdowns, nobody
was significantly hurt, but he backed up Bevol and I
thought may have stunned him. I really thought the back
four or five rounds that's where he won the fight.
Speaker 2: That's what I thought a question.
Speaker 3: I mean, that's the reality. If you take a look
at the official score cards, you know, which were all,
you know, fairly close. I mean, I know the one
judge had eight rounds before. But if you look at
the way they scored the rounds, the way that they
got to the scores that they did, was that going
into the tenth round, better bee of his down on
two score cards. Now, the one scorecard that he won,
he was already gonna win anyway because he was already
pretty well ahead. But on the other two cards, he's
down on the two score cards, and he wins all
the last three rounds ten, eleven, and twelve. He wins
on all three cards. So he goes from down on
two to a draw on one and a lady you know,
leading on the wider one, and takes the lead on
the one that was close on the Feldman card. So
bie Ball gets off to the big start relatively speaking,
and better be a finished as strong on those cards.
And that's how he pulls out the fight. So to me,
and we talked about this a million times, what you
do in round one and what you do in round
twelve is worth the same in terms of the mask.
Maybe it's not like that in somebody's mind, but you know,
Bieball was certainly in the lead. And we've seen plenty
of fights that are the opposite, where a guy might
start out quick and another guy, you know, maybe fades,
but he's already banked those rounds. So my point here
is that Beeble may have banked in those early rounds,
but it wasn't enough. So a lot of people thought
maybe he's going to win the fight, but he didn't
finish drunk.
Speaker 1: It is interesting when you point that out, and we'll
just reemphasize it one more time. The judge that had
the fight a draw, you're saying, had six to three
Bevil and then gave better b of the last three
rounds to make it six six correct. And then Glenn
Feldman had Bevil ahead until the final three rounds and
that gave a better be of a two point win.
Speaker 3: Wow. So I mean I'm looking. I'm looking at the
official card because I in my substack when I wrote
my story, I posted a photo of the cards like
I always do. If people are interested to see that,
they can certainly do that. So Cardini had the fight
sixteen to twelve. So I'm talking about after round number nine,
because again better be got all the last three rounds
on all three cards. So after round number nine, yep,
on the Cardini card, he was already ahead eighty six
eighty five. That's what just continued to extend his lead.
Speaker 1: Well, what I'm saying is better Beev had to win
last three rounds on the judges card that scored it
a draw to make it a draw. And if Feldman
had given bevol one of the last three rounds, then
the fights a draw.
Speaker 3: So yeah, so Feldman Felton had to fight. He had
Beville eighty seven eighty four going into round ten. Wow,
and now he gives a better b of the last three.
So now he's down ninety six ninety four after ten,
he's down one oh five, one oh four after eleven.
This is the Palomo card by bad and then he
gives them the ten the twelve round and gets him
to fourteen fourteen on the Feldman card. Going into round ten,
he's got Bevoll down eighty six eighty five. He gives
them the tenth round that scores it an even fight,
ninety five ninety five. He gives them the eleventh round,
that makes it one oh five, one oh four, and
he gives them round twelve, which makes it one fifteen
to one thirteen. And that is uh what you call
closing strong making your point known to the judges. Now,
I must say in the twelfth round, where Beevill finished
really strong the last thirty seconds, hm, maybe I was
wrong about this, and I did go back and watch it,
and I don't do this often, but I got a
lot of grief about it. I gave that round in
the twelfth to Beevill.
Speaker 1: I thought he won the twelfth round too, so it
surprises me that none of the judges did right.
Speaker 3: So that was based largely on that big, big finish,
even though yes, Beeble had done much better in the
first couple of minutes. But I get the point that
he was better longer in the round, and maybe I
was swayed inappropriately, I guess by what Beevoll did in
those last you know, thirty seconds. So that's how I
ended up having to fight a draw because I gave
Bevoe the last round of the fight. But if you
tell me the better, bev won that last round, and
you therefore you have him winning the fight. I have
no problem with that. Like I said, the sixteen twelve
is not a great card. But the righteous indignation of
Eddie Hearn and others and again, and I'm not trying
to rip on Eddie love that and Vedie and Scornelove,
who is the evil manager who have always had a
very good, pleasant relationship with for many, many years, almost
twenty years, go back to the days of when he
was managing Ruslan pra Vadenniakov. I have nothing but respect
for him. I feel like that Iyre is misplaced because
it wasn't going to change anything even if he gets
the quote unquote right card, which is to maybe have
it seven to five or perhaps even a draw. So
but the bottom line is there's probably gonna be a rematch.
Speaker 1: That's what I was leading to. I was going, right there,
Do we need to see this again?
Speaker 2: In your mind? Do we need to see it again?
Speaker 3: I don't think we need to, but I think it's
going to happen. I'm not opposed to it. What I
like about the fact if there is a rematch is
it's not being forced on anybody. There was no rematch
clause in the contracts. It was you know, winner can
move on. But I think because of the fact that
Turkey al Chic, who said in some comments after the
fight that he thought that Bevo won PI two rounds,
even though he has a relationship with both of the fighters,
that he's going to be and he said, we must
see this again. So when he goes to the teams
and puts the big bag of cash on the table,
pretty sure you can bank on the fact that we're
going to see it. Right now. What happens with the belts,
you know, whether the organizations will all go along with that.
There's obviously mandatories backed up. But the good thing about
that is that in the WBA and the WBC, their
mandatories are not going to be a problem because their
guys are fighting each other in morel and Benevitez and
Joshua Batzi is the other the WBO mandatory as the
interim champion and so therefore he's also in his promoter
has been doing events with these fights, with these fights
in Saudi Arabia also, so maybe they can get rid
of that. In terms of the IBF, they're always the
ones that like to dick around. I'm not really sure
what the status of their mandatory is at the moment,
but the point is mandatories undisputed or not, a titles loss,
a vacated strip, whatever the case may be. I believe
that this fight will probably happen again because Turkey wants it.
Whether you and I agree with it, there is in
the minds of a lot of people unfinished business controversy
because of the scoring and all. A lot of people
thought that Bibol was the rightful winner. And you know,
we'll see. I'll be happy to see the fight again.
It was a classy fight, a high level, high skill level.
I think that the boxing skills that better BF showed
were are still underappreciated and underrated to a degree. Even
if he didn't land the big bomb. And you know,
Bivol box a very very solid, good fight. And the
funny thing about it was his eye was all busted up,
and he was talking about after the fight. It wasn't
because he got hit with a clean shot from better BF,
but he had a high guard and better BF kept
hitting him in the gloves and kept forcing his own
glove into his face. He basically is the one that
gave himself the swelling yeah, because his own glove was
punching himself in the face.
Speaker 2: Again.
Speaker 1: Both guys were tough. No nobody seriously hurt, nobody knocked down.
Interesting that Bevoll lasted the distance, but he didn't get
the decision this time.
Speaker 2: So you gave us.
Speaker 1: He gave us a great accounting and a great recap.
And maybe we will see this again, all right.
Speaker 3: And by the way, and Raphael cashed on the plus,
well you.
Speaker 1: Did, you had better BF. I had b vol on
the bet Us Show. Did I get anything right on
the beat Us Show?
Speaker 3: A couple of things.
Speaker 1: I think I got my name right post post Hurricane Milton.
I think I got my name right and the name
of the show right. But we'll get into that here
in just a second.
Speaker 2: So there you go.
Speaker 1: There's the undisputed and you laid it out. That's the
first four belt undisputed light heavyweight champion ever history made.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 1: Now on the undercard, I've got to confess to you.
Because of the travels situation getting to New Orleans, et cetera,
I was not really able to see a lot.
Speaker 2: I've seen a highlight.
Speaker 1: I've read your substact. So Jio Patiah defended his the
coatre fight. I was looking forward to trying to get
in the hotel and see Fabio Wardley and Fraser Clark
and see that fight and it's over in one round,
which shocked me.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 1: So those were the two most prominent ones there on
the on the main card. Give me, give me thoughts.
The wordly fight. What did it last? Did it last
two minutes?
Speaker 3: It lasted two minutes and twenty eight seconds, okay, And
the hype on the rematch was pretty significant because it
was a tremendous first fight back in March when they
battled it out in a extraordinarily outstanding fight, fight of
the AAR type contender, a fight that was a draw,
and like not a draw where people were you know,
claiming controversy or a robbery or this or that, but
a bonom fid fight.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 3: So seven months ago they do that, just an outstanding
match and a big, big event in in in London
March thirty first, and now they make the rematch that
was talked about from the moment the first fight ended.
Everybody's expecting another, you know, excellent fight, another close contest,
and for like the first maybe minute, let's say, of
the fight, you know they're feeling each other out. They
both land a couple of shots. You're like, okay, this
is going to settle into a good fight, and you
know we're going to see something you know, similar I
guess to what we saw a few months ago. Then
Fabio Wardley, who I said in the pre fight, in
my opinion anyway, was the more skilled fighter and maybe
the more versatile fighter. Let's say, you know, he heard,
he heard them, and in heavyweight boxing it only takes
to one shot. He hit him with a good, solid
right hand and that was sort of like the beginning
of the end. Now, Fraser Clark came back with an
uppercut that landed, but Wordley just shook it off, didn't
even budge really, and then he's got him in the
like on the rope, slashed in the corner, and he
just lands like unloads the punches. Two three punches, a
massive fucking shots ended up breaking Fraser Clark's not his job,
but his cheekbone. He had to go to the hospital
after that. But the right hands, it was like the
last three punches were a left hand that he got in,
two more right hands that were basically like pulverizing type
of shots, and Fraser Clark has like stood up in
the corner and then sinks down and his eyes roll
up in his head. Now, to his credit, he's you know,
he's a brave guy at a big heart. He tried
to get up but could not beat that count, and
obviously he was not gonna be able to continue. They waved
it off, and that was a shocker because you know,
even if you expected a knockout, I mean there was
there was a knockdown in the first fight, but he
got off the deck. But this was just a real
it was a huge win for Wardley, and you know,
certainly a shocker I think, uh again, not that Wardley
was the winner, but that he did it in the
in the in the devastating manner that he did because
and quickly, yeah, like two minutes. I mean again, he
had him down in round five in the first fight,
but he kept him down, you know, basically in this rematch,
and uh, you know, that really is a big win
for Fabio Wardley. You know, he gets to now put
himself in position I don't I can't tell you what
his next move is going to be, but you know
he's gonna get another big fight. He's he had signed
with Frank Warren not too long, you know. He signed
with Frank in between the time that he had got
the draw in the first fight and the time that
they made this rematch. Uh. And Frank Warren, you know,
obviously is closely affiliated with the Riad Seasons folks. He
is the promoter for all their shows. And he's got
his own good quality heavyweight stable and we're going to
see him in a big fight. He retains the British
heavyweight title, retains the Commonwealth heavyweight title, and h he's
a very appealing fighters. Got kind of I find him
to be a when I listened to his interviews, I
see him as got like a little bit of a
quirky personality, which is I kind of like, and you know,
he's going to be in some good fights, you know.
And he's he's a little bit older as was Fraser
Clark in terms of where he is in his career
in terms of the experience level, but he's he's a
guy that came from nowhere with the amateurs into the
basically learning on the job. He's now eighteen oh to
one with seventeen knockouts, so he's showing punching Power's got
the draw with Clark obviously, and he's got you know,
he made a name for himself on a read card
last October on the on the Tyson Fury the Guy
New card where he's knocked out the undefeated David Adelier,
which at that time was supposed to be like this
crossroad just type fight between two unbeaten Brits that had
never really taken a step up, and he got that
job done. You know, look good despite the draw against
Clark in the rematch, I mean in the first fight
rather than just pummels him, blows him out in the
second fight. So you know, we're gonna see more of
a Worldly I believe in some good fights.
Speaker 1: And by the way, he shout out to my guy
David Payne, the boxing writer who often reference and we've
had him on the pod and love his work, and
he said, hey, I'm leaning in a little bit on
Fabio Worldly after seeing this performance after the draw.
Speaker 2: So for what it's worth, there you go.
Speaker 1: All right, So Opataiah, what did you think it's a TKO?
Speaker 2: What did you think I got it?
Speaker 3: He thought, as as as good of a fight as
you can fight. And the thing about it is, Massy,
I think is a pretty good fighter. He had a
seemed to me like he had a good plan of
what he wanted to do. Uh, but he just couldn't
get anything going offensively. And Opataiya is not a guy
to mess around with offensively because he's an excellent puncher
and when he gets going downhill, so to speak, he's
a very hard guy to deal with. And you know,
he was just bigger, stronger, faster, you know, like the
six million dollar man, as they say, and I'm dating
myself to the nineteen seventies.
Speaker 1: I don't know that we would get a lee major
six million dollar man reference, but I'm all about it, brother, and.
Speaker 3: I he did that was like my favorite show and
I love it.
Speaker 2: We can't rebuild we can rebuild him.
Speaker 1: And then he was bionic, and so Pataya was not
necessarily bionic, but he was good.
Speaker 2: Huh.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And listen, Opataia is a very very good fighter.
He's twenty six and zero now twenty knockouts. He's got
good power, he's in good condition. He's a south paw,
which is never easy for guys to deal with. And
like I said, Massy not a terrible fighter by any
means at all, but he just could not deal with
the pressure with the power, and he just broke him down.
And it was you know, I'm sure that when he
and his training team look at the video and they
look at it, they'll find little things that they feel
like they can do better on. But from my perspective,
as not a trainer, but you know, just a guy
that watches a ton of fights, and I've been doing
so for a long long time, I thought that's about
as flawless up performance as you could get. I mean,
there was no real nothing that you would look at
and say, oh my god, you know, he should have
done this better. He was good with his feet out
of his hands. You know, he was in good shape.
Like I said, the power was there, he didn't get
hit with a lot of stuff coming back. And the
thing about it is it's a win for arm He
retains the title. He's obviously been fighting on his read cards,
and now with this out of the way, he's going
to look forward to the fight that comes up November sixteenth,
another fight in Riad when Golden Boy does their Latin
Night in Riad, which is headlined by Gilberto Ramirez, who
was the WBA Scruiserweight champ in in a unification fight
with the British WBO title holder Chris Billin Smith, and
it was clearly stated that the winner of that fight,
who's going to have two titles a read season in Turkey,
are going to look to make the match between the
winner of that bout and Jai Opataiah you know, next
year and when they come back after you know, in
other words, Opataiah fought on Saturday, the unification takes place
in a month, and then when the when the when
Opatai and the winner of that fight are ready to
do their first fight of twenty twenty five figure in
the springtime, they're going to make that match and that'll
be a unification for three of the belts. And that's
I mean, whoever it is. If it's Zerdo against Opataiah,
that's a good fight. If it's Billin Smith against Opatiyah,
that's a good fight. We got to see what happens
in the unification. But when you can get unifications going,
and the guys who are in those unifications are pretty
interesting fighters to watch, you know, the boxing becomes a
much healthier sports. So you know, they're all in to
do this, and Turkey, you know, is going to put
up the money and they're going to make these matches.
So that's that's uh, that's a very interesting matchup. I mean,
cruiserweights have always been sort of like the redheaded step
child for some reason, but they a lot of times
have made over the years some really excellent fights. They're
like heavyweights, but they're fast and and they're a little
more refined, and they've made a ton of good fights.
And I feel like the guys that are going on
right now with Zero, with Bill Smith, with Obataiyah, a
few other guys at the top, it's an interesting division
right now.
Speaker 1: All right, real quick on the rest of the car,
because I know, I know you want to launch about
his owne with the bait and switch on the pay
per view and the.
Speaker 3: Whole Okay, I'm gonna get there.
Speaker 2: I know you're gonna get there.
Speaker 1: Chris U Bank wins, Sky Nicholson defends her women's featherweight
title WBC title, and Ben Whittaker wins. What what else
out of those fights stood out.
Speaker 3: Well in terms of you Bank. I mean, he just
beat down and annihilated Zarah Metta Camille, Zarahmeda Inu knocked
him down four times. If you know who Zara Meeda
is it's probably because he saw him getting knocked out
by Haimi Mongia or you saw him get knocked out
in a Middleway Championship fight against Triple G back a
few years ago. This was and as this was Chris
Eubank coming back after about a thirteen month layoff after
he regained or he avenged, i should say, his loss
to Liam Smith. They're looking to set up to Connor
Ben fight because Ben has as you know, anybody that's
follows boxing knows that he was pulled out of the
fight and suspended because of the fell drug test during
the week of the fight that took place that was
supposed to take place, you know, back a couple of
years ago, and he's been out of the ring. I mean,
he did have two fights in America because of some
technicalities on the on the licensing thing. However, in the
UK they're going through the process where he's probably going
to get the license back early next year. He's probably
going to get licensed, I would say, probably like in
February slash March. He'll be ready to go. And so
this was to get him a fight because he actually
hadn't fought in longer time and then the suspended Ben
because he fought the two fights here in the United
States anyway. This was to give him a tune up
fight to get ready for what will be because of
everything that has happened. One of the biggest fights in
the history of British boxing. I mean it was already
a big deal because of all the legend of their
father's rivalry from thirty years ago between Nigel Ben and
Chris Ubank. We talked about the rematch which was done
our show last week because it was the anniversary. But
these guys are gonna fight. Obviously, Connor was there ringside.
He jumped in the ring afterwards. Obviously you know they
knew that was gonna happen. They got that up for
a faux up and they were, you know, squawking at
each other and Zerametta was there to just be run over.
Give a few rounds to u Bank. He dropped him
four times and got him out of there and that
was it. It was a very easy victory, seventh round
and you know, look good, he's in his first right,
he was in his first fight. I should stay with
Jonathan Banks as his trainer. So they got to deal
with that union and so that'll be what's next with
you Bank and Ben. I think in terms of sky Nicholson, look,
she's an excellent boxer, but I mean, and she seems
like a certainly a nice woman, but honestly her watching
her fights is a lot like watching paint try. I
don't I'm nothing. I'm not gonna say bad about her.
She's a talented fighter, but she's now twelve to zero
with one knockout. You know, she's not gonna stop anybody.
And her opponent, Raven Chapman, was her first loss. It
was like two rounds where it was sort of like
maybe she was trying to get untracked, and you know,
Raven Chapman seemed to do a good job, and after
like the second round, Sky Nicholson just totally dominated She
She's a south bush, she gave her problems with that
and she cruised to a one sided decision. So there
was that. I'm not sure, you know, if there's some
big fight out there that I'm interested in terms of fraud,
but you know, good luck to her. And the Whittaker
fight that you mentioned that was kind of crazy. That
was you know, Ben Whittaker, flashy Olympian, big mouth, you know,
these crazy viral moments because he does so much showboating
and nonsense in the ring, you know, disrespecting his opponents
the way he does, you know, and they're not even
good opponents there. You know, it's one thing when you're
when you do that to somebody that you're you know,
a thousand to one favorite against, Like what does it
really mean? So finally they put him in with a
real guy and not a superstar opponent. But Liam Cameron
is an experienced fighter, got way way more professional fights
he had. This was like, you know, he's got almost
thirty fights as a pro, he's twenty three six, and
now this fight turns out to be a technical split
decision draw because the fight was going the wrong way
for Ben Whittaker, who, by the way, is so massively
hyped in the UK, like they think he's gonna be
mister pound for pound. Well, this was not a type
of performance where you would look at that and say, Wow,
this guy's really going places. You look at this and
you'd say I looked at that fight and he looks
like a fraud. Now maybe he can turn things around,
but he was having a really hard time. Cameron was
really coming on, and they got in a clinch and
they were sort of like, you know, shoving each other
a little bit. They were up against the ropes and
their momentum. The ropes looked a little loose and it
took them over the top rope and both guys like
splatted on the ring. It it looked like a ww
so both Cameron looked like he was a little bit
shaken up, but he got up pretty quickly and came
back in the ring. But Whitaker. Some people say, oh,
he was looking for an excuse. He was looking for
a way out because it was a tough fight. Cameron
said that afterwards in some of his comments, I didn't
really look at like that. I feel like he really
did have the right leg injury that prevented him from continuing.
They took him out of the ring. You know, it
was in a wheelchair. They took him to the hospital
and get checked out anyway, because five rounds had been complete,
you know, they were in the fifth round. Usually it's
four rounds have to be completed. So once you're past
that and it's an accidental I don't know if i'd
call it a foul, but an accidental injury the referee
deemed it was accidental and and stopped the fight and
sent the card sent a fight to the scorecards, and
as it turned out, Cameron won on one scorecard, Ben
Whitaker won on the other score card, and one of
them had a draw. So it turned out to be
so they're gonna have to do a rematch when his
leg is better. I mean, there's no doubt he's gonna
have to clean up that mess. And but that's a
that that is a big hit on his career because
not only is it a draw, not a technical draw
because they clanked heads like still is used in some jurisdictions,
but a draw because the the rounds were even and
he looked terrible in the fight. So he's gonna have
some clean enough to do.
Speaker 1: All right, good stuff there for the read season card.
And now ladies and gentlemen get ready for a high
entertaining of thing. Dan Rayfiel, who is none too pleased
because we went to great lengths to explain how to
see the fight. Is it a pay per view or
not in the United States, And suddenly on his own
it was a pay per view in the United States.
To see the cards, you have the floor my friend
go ahead.
Speaker 3: So I am so disgusted with his owne that I
almost I'm gonna try to speak in a manner that
doesn't get us sued and doesn't get us in trouble.
But I'm just gonna see, I'm gonna be real about this. Okay,
You're right. We've spent a long time detailing how this
fight could be seen in the United States and Canada
for that matter, because that was sort of part of
the deal. And I try, and as I've done my
entire career, to keep it real and to be factual
and to make sure I check my material. And one
of the things that gratifies me more than anything in
this business is when people tell me that they read
what I write and they trust what I write and say,
and if I tell you this is the deal or
this is the case, that I'm not pulling it out
of thin air, that it's legit, it's factual, it's from
real people, it's not from made up sources. And I
pride myself on that, and I have done so for
a long time, because in this business, the only thing
that you have as a journalist is your credibility. Doesn't
matter if I was working for a USA today or
ESPN or now I'm doing my own thing. All you
have is your credibility and the trust the people putting you.
And so when they they meaning disown specifically and in
detailed fashion, and I have the emails, as they say, TJ,
I have receipts, okay to go over about how this
fight is being seen in America. And it was very
very clear as fucking day that if you wanted to
watch this fight, the main event better beiving people. It
would be on ESPN. Plus we've known that for a
long time Top Rank had the rights. So what's going
to happen with the rest of the show. It was
going to be pay per view around the world because
everywhere else you're going to be able to see the
main event also, but specifically in the market where the
main event was not available, meaning the United States and Canada,
they were going to make it as part of your
regular dessone subscription. And they do that in different countries
with different events. They have the ability to switch things
up however they see fits. So I was like, okay,
and I went back and forth to them just to
make sure are we right, We're clear, We're good, and
I even like explained how I was going to write it.
They're like, yeah, that's right, okay, and everything was on
track to the extent. DJ and I went back and
I checked this. On October sixth, so well before the fight, I,
along with other people on their press list, received an
email that explained that once again in in sentences as
well as in a graphic that put Fabio Wardley in
Fraser Clark's pictures as that, you know, on the top
of the of the bill, with the rest of the
fights and the photos all the other fighters on the card,
and with the word said specifically, you know, free to
subscribers in the United States and Canada, something to that extent,
making it very very clear this is not a pay
per view. I ran the graphic and my sub stack,
I put it on social media. I explained it a
thousand times to people. Now. I don't know if it
was the day before the fight or two days before
the fight. I guess it was the day before the fight.
On Friday, a friend of mine who's in the boxing business,
sends me a text message. He says, I'm looking at
my de zone Apple. It's got the little lock on
it says it's pay per view for the fight, you know,
for the other car. I'm like, I mean, they've said
to me a thousand times. You know, it's not a
pay per view in the United States, So I mean,
maybe they made a mistake. You know, it's Jill blocked
in other places, but they just had that up there
by accident.
Speaker 2: And you know, he was giving them the benefit.
Speaker 3: I was giving them the benefit of the doubt. But
they don't ever fucking deserve the benefit of the doubt
ever again, as long as I fucking live. I was
gonna say, because they're pieces of shit, but I'm going
to reframe, all right. As it turns out, by the way,
it's a pay per view. So I didn't know this
until after the fact because I didn't watch the entire show.
They did. Dezone did a Jake Paul MVP prospects card
from Puerto Rico on Friday night some like if the
fight cars started at noontime on Saturday Eastern time. This
was like twelve fourteen hours before the fight. During the
course of that broadcast on the Zone, they advertise the
undercard as being free to subscribers. The play by play
announcer is reading that you know you've done a lot
of radio.
Speaker 2: He's reading the promo saying free to subscribers.
Speaker 3: In the United States. He's basically, I'm paraphrasing, you know,
we got a great show tomorrow. The undercard is are
the main event is not available in the United States
market for a de zone, but we've got the undercard,
a great undercard for our subscribers. They specifically said that,
and there's a tweet on my feed, you can listen
to it. I wake up on Saturday morning and I
see a bunch of people have hit me up on
my social saying that the fight is on pay per view?
What's going on? So I get in touch with one
of the people at the zone. I'm not going to
name names because I'm not looking to throw somebody that's
a working person trying to do their job under a bus,
trying to get an explanation of what's going on. And
this is what really set me off. Now, if they
decide why did the change and go from non pay
per view to a twenty dollars pay per view, if
they're gonna go through the efforts that they did to
explain to me personally, as well as I assume others
in the media, that it wasn't a pay per view.
You'd think they'd have the fucking common, fucking courtesy decency
to go back to those people and say, oh, listen,
it changed, Sorry about that. Here's what's up, so you
can let folks know. No, no, not the courtesy of
that whatsoever at all. I was told in this very
terse back and forth there was quote some confusion, and
when I saw that, I nearly fucking blew a gasket.
I was going to the moon. I was so pissed off.
There was no confusion, right, There was graphic representation, and you.
Speaker 2: Sent it out yourselves.
Speaker 3: And then you followed up with multiple emails to make
sure we had the verbage correct of how it was
going to be seen.
Speaker 2: As not confusion.
Speaker 3: I know how to read. That was confusion, okay. And
by the way, the thing that even more so pissed
me off is when I asked for an explanation, and
by the way, I'm still I also went out of
my way to contact the the comm's people at the
zone asking for a statement for an explanation. If I
decide to write about this or post something, you know,
I'm always happy to give somebody right else's side it
was a decent journalist, fire the information, and if there's
a difference of opinion or something like that, you let
the other side explain that. You don't give them their take.
The floor is theirs. I haven't even gotten a response,
so you know, I owe them nothing. I've waited like
two days for them to give me a response, and
my my fucking patience is through is up to here?
Can tell there's that? Now here's the big thing. If
you're going to change your mind to do that, and
I ask you, like, okay, well what happened and you
tell me it's confusion, and they still offer no explanation
about it. Now the inference would be to me. And
I don't know this to be the case, but I
think one might deduce this that the edict maybe came
from Saudi Arabia perhaps, but I don't know that, so
I can't say that, and I don't you know. Look,
the other thing that drives me wild about this is that,
going back a couple of months ago, Top Rank, which
obviously had the rights to the main event, made the
promoters that are doing the event. I don't know if
that was Saudi Arabi or Frank Warren or a matchrom
whoever was responsible, you know Sela. They offered them seven
figures to buy out any pay per view in the
United States so they could have the entire event on ESPN.
Plus they were turned down. Now they know the business,
so they did an assessment of what they felt like
the fight could generate financially and offered them what they
say is a number that would be commensurate what the
fight would generate in the United States, and they were
turned down. Now, once this thing became a pay per view,
I don't think this fight did shit in terms of business.
So that is another disrespectful thing to change it like that,
where you're not even gonna make money on it. Number two,
they made it so confusing to people. They never made
an announcement. At least maybe they put a thing on
their social media, but I don't see every one of
their posts. So all day yesterday people like, why is
this on pay per view? Why is this on pay
per view? It's supposed to be on regular the zone.
They offered no help, offered, no direction, offered, no apology,
offer nothing but their fucking arrogant selves about you know,
we don't owe you any kind of explanation. Or else
they would have answered the fucking question, which wasn't exactly complicated.
It's bait and switch. They tried to induce people to subscribe.
I feel like, this is my opinion that by saying
it was pay per view on not pay per view,
they would try to use that to induce some people
to subscribe. And there's a class action lawsuit going on
Benson right now about trying to build people for things
that they haven't asked for or that they're trying to cancel.
And then how do you get me to subscribe to
your service? And then the reason you may have subscribed
they changed the last minute.
Speaker 1: Don't tell anybody, sure clarify for me because I don't
know this because I do not subscribe to the Zone.
So to sign up for de Zone, let's say you
wanted to watch this, What did you have to pay
to sign up? Did you have to sign up for
the full year? Did you have to give them most of.
Speaker 2: The money up front? I think it's a month by month.
I don't know.
Speaker 3: Now I subscribe for a year and that's like two
hundred and twenty five dollars. I mean, when the Zone started,
it was like one hundred bucks then it went to
like I don't know, one hundred and fifty. Now it's
like two and a quarter or something later two forty.
But if you wanted to get this fight or other
fights on their service, you can either buy the year
or you can buy it by the month. And I
don't remember that, and there's different okays, but I mean
a month is maybe like twenty twenty five dollars something
like that. But and then on top of that, if
you want to, if you want to buy the pay
per view, it's kind of like and this is not
only to the zone and fairness. I mean ESPN does
the same thing if you want to let's say you
want to buy h a regular pay per view is
not the same because they'll put it on regular TV.
Let's say it's a UFC pay per view. In order
to purchase a UFC pay per view, which is exclusive
to ESPN Plus, first you'd subscribe to ESPN Plus, which
is whatever the fias what is one hundred bucks a year,
and then you subscribe to the pay per view, which
will cost you whatever they charged, right, I think you know,
sixty or seventy or whatever dollars for the pay per view.
So they that that was a giant fiasco, and the
way they handle it was about as reprehensible as anything
I have ever seen. It is just absolutely grotesque, and
that they won't even give you an explanation for it,
And it was at the last minute, like literally the
night before on their own service, they're promoting and advertising
and talking about how this Undercard for People Better BEP
is available in the United States and Canada to subscribers
of the Zone, and like several hours later, it's a
pay per view for nineteen ninety nine. I mean, you want,
and by the way, we just don't.
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna sum it up like this. What you're
saying is, how do you trust them in the future?
Speaker 3: You do?
Speaker 2: Because this is this is I'm saying this.
Speaker 1: This is a reason for you as the consumer to
be dubious my word of in the future. They're trying
to screw the boxing fan at the last possible.
Speaker 3: The amount of negative activity that I have seen on
my social is just, honestly is one of the most
overwhelming amounts of things I've seen for any issue in
boxing since I've been on social media. It's just ridiculous. Now,
one other thing, by the way, I mean, I think
it's fraud if you ask me. But that's that's my opinion. Uh.
The wild thing about it is and and I actually
put their side in this particular situation. If you remember
when his own First was created and came to the
United States in twenty eighteen, and I was at the
press conference when they launched it because I was in
New York for another fight. Pay per View is dead.
I remember standing outside, so did an he Hearn. So look,
I mean they did commercials where they showed it was
the comedian I forget to give me the where he's
blowing up stuff, you know, saying pay per view was dead,
like they're blowing up TVs. And was I forget the name.
He was an actor that's used to be on Saturday
Live by thinkright Kevin Well? No, No, was it Kevin Hart?
Maybe it was. I think it was. Anyway, I remember
going to a fight at the Team over and I
want to say it was maybe the one of the
uh maybe a Canelo fight early on Canelo versus Jacobs
maybe something like that. They literally had a booth outside
in the in the plaza at the Team Mobile that
was had a big sign pay per view is dead,
and you could go inside this big booth and take
a hammer and smash the TV literally mm hm. So
that was twenty eighteen, and now here we are. Pay
per view is dead in twenty eighteen, in twenty twenty four,
it's you got to if you want to watch it,
you don't have to do any of it. But if
you want to watch the fight, now you got to
buy a pay per view for the undercard. Now. I
always felt like that they could do some of these
big megafights as non pay per views as they were
beginning their service, but there was no way that that
could last. I can remember talking some of the executives
at that press conference, you know, having a cordial back
and forth and like saying like, I mean, I hope
this guy, hope this works for you guys, But I
mean I know the business pretty well, and I just
don't see a way how it's going to be sustainable
because boxers not want to have their money capped by
by not having the ability to be on pay per view.
And it lasted for like five minutes, and then pay
per view it went the opposite direction. Now everything is
pay per view. So the zone owes the world an
apology of to the boxing fans, who are the most
abused sports fans in the world and nobody seems to
give a fuck about them. It's a great and beautiful sport,
but the business is disgusting, and the Zone right now
was the leader in the clubhouse of disgusting behavior among
the boxing business. So I hope that somebody from the
Zone is listening, and I'm waiting for your fucking statement.
And I'm also waiting not an apology to me because
I'm a big boy, but an apology to the boxing
fans that you pissed off and misled very very severely
to put an undercard of a great fight on pay
per view. What world are we living in where you
can watch this main event that was one of the high,
high class main events you could possibly ask for in boxing,
and you put the undercard as a twenty dollars pay
per view. It is ridiculous. It is pathetic.
Speaker 1: As again, to clarify in the rest of the world,
as you kept saying, you bought the pay per view
because that's how you were getting the main event.
Speaker 3: Correct.
Speaker 1: So that's an important point in all of this.
Speaker 3: Let me make one more stake. If they just started
at the beginning, it said, yes, the under carter is
pay per view for twenty bucks. You know, if you
want to buy it, fine. I mean, there'd have been
grumbling and I'd be like, Okay, that's kind of fucked up.
But whatever, it's it's your honest about it. The thing
that's the aggravating in the part that pisses me off
is that I was explained to it's not pay per
view ad nauseum, and the day before the fight it
became pay per view. That is not appropriate. That to
me is grounds for some kind of class action lawsuit.
Another one that does one might face. All right.
Speaker 1: I can tell you're passionate and it's well placed. I
will just add one more thing. You have as much
or more credibility as anybody that does this, and you're offended.
Speaker 2: That's the word I'm gonna use.
Speaker 1: You're offended because you were promoting this with what they told.
Speaker 2: You, and because they were doing the right thing right right.
Speaker 1: You feel missing for putting this on pay per view.
All right, So the open wound is still an open
woond for Rayphiel. Don't hold your breath for me, big
fella on the zone. Getting back to you, maybe they
will after the pod here, maybe they will love to
hear the explanation.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 1: By the way, we've had bukoo fights in Japan of
the title variety on Saturday morning, Sunday morning, and then
we're gonna get to Monday morning. Also right now, you
were doing you and I are doing this on Sunday night.
All right, So let's recap the teak In Promotions card
real quick, where Takuma in a way was beaten in
the main event and what else on that card. This
was Sunday morning in the United States, Sunday night in Japan.
Speaker 3: Go ahead, this was a really good card. I mean,
for all the bullshit that the Zone does, the absolute
opposite of the spectrum is that Top Rank, through their
relationship with teak In Promotions and with ESPN Plus, bring
these outstanding Japanese cards to the United kins States as
part of your subscription commentary. Lots of good fights, lots
of good guys. You know, I made the point on
my social media, like the kids just don't understand. Back
in the day, I would trade VHS cassettes to get
these fights from Japan, and you would have to wait
two or three weeks to get the tape. There was
no such thing as YouTube, so you just wait and
then you know if you watch it, you know you
it was in the Japanese, so you know, you don't
need the commentary. You can still see what's happening in
the fight. Now you'll wake up whenever it's on it
you can either pop on your phone or you're you know,
it's on your and your TV and integrated with the app,
or you put on your computer.
Speaker 2: Whatever.
Speaker 3: It's such a beautiful thing. And this was an excellent card.
The main event, as you mentioned, this was the WBA
bantamway title defense by Takuma in Away who was the
younger brother of Annoya in a way, and he was
taking on his Japanese countrymen. Sayah suit Sumi, this was
a tremendous battle. A I don't know if I'm gonna
go so far to say it's like a fight of
the Year candidate, but it was a damn good fight.
And let me tell you to to me, is just
a like a whirlwind, pressure pressure, pressure, and he he
he won a clear decision this fight. He just was
absolutely relentless against takum Anyway, who, by the way, didn't
fight like a bad fight or anything like that. But
he just got out fought, out punched, you know, out
out bludgeoned basically in this fight, and you know he
got a new WBA one hundred and eighteen pound champ.
What it does do, however, is it kind of messes
up the plan. If there was this, I don't know
if it was official, but you got in a way
saying he'd like some day to fight Nakatani, who's the
WBC's bandonwaight champion, but he wanted him to have a
unification with his brother first and then he would fight
him if he won. Obviously, with Takuma losing that that
obviously that that fight won't happen at this point at
least not next We'll get to Nakatani and then he
actually defends the title on Monday. So that was the
main event, and then the co feature was another tremendous performance,
another tremendous battle. You have one of my favorite Japanese fighters,
can Shiro Taraji, moving up from the junior flyweight division
to the flyweight division. He won the vacant WBC title
in an all out war against Christopher Rosales just again
stopped him in the eleventh round of just a great battle,
a big heart from Rosales who was there with his
trainer Eddie Renoso and trailing along making an appearance in
Japan for the fans and maybe thinking about fighting there someday.
Was Canelo Alvarez because they're all in the same stable together.
So that was a big win for Taraji becomes a
two division world champion. And then there was other fights
also on that two other world title fights. He had
sego at Kui, who was the WBA Flyway champion. He
had a victory by unanimous decision over a fighter from Thailand.
Not the action of the other fights, but you know,
still good to see these guys in action. And in
the first fight you had the filling of the vacant
w BO Junior Flyway title, and that was a Japanese
fighter named Sookichi Iwada who looked really good in scoring
a third round knockout against Gyro and Noriega, a heavy
handed guy for a small guy, he looked like he
had some serious punching power. He just took his dude apart.
And you know, I love these cards, man. We've talked
about it before. It was a lot of fun and
uh just a great, great uh a great fun time.
And for whatever reason, they're doing another one of these
same promoter, same thnu in Tokyo, three more world title
fights on Monday morning, so they'll be over by the
time they people hear this, and.
Speaker 1: We need to clarify again, we're good, but we're doing
this Sunday night. And if you're hearing it Monday morning,
saying where's a Monday afternoon where's the recap of the
Monday Japanese car We don't know, we don't know what
happened read Dan substack checking.
Speaker 3: Out on necessarily.
Speaker 1: I'm just saying if they want your tank, you'll eventually
bring it up on social media or on your substack.
We don't know what happened on the Monday morning US
Time fight cards. But again, uh Na Katani is the
is the main event if I have that correct.
Speaker 3: So he's defending the main event on the first one
was the w b A Bandamway title with Takuma uh
and now the main event on this on this next
card that we're not gonna know the result when people
hear this, is Nakatani against petch soor Chit Patanya from Thailand,
and we love Nakatani again like Taraji, super exciting, like
if I can watch you know Noi in a way
and Karaji and Nakatani, I mean tremendous exciting fighters. They
got tension. Nakusawa, who's the kickboxer become a boxer, hugely popular.
He's on this card. Posy Tanaka is defending his WBO
Junior bantamwait title on the card, and the other title
fight is Anthony Alaskagua in his defense against Jonathan Gonzalez,
who's a former title holder at one aweight moving up
the challenge for the WBO Flyway title. So again you
know all the eight fights, seven title fights in two
days from top rank and teaking on ESPN Plus, not
a pay per view on the undercard, unlike his own
like that.
Speaker 1: And by the way, there was another title fight, which
clarify me my days have all run together, my friend
with the hurricane and with all the stuff and going
to New Orleans in back. This was Friday or Saturday
was Saturday morning, Saturday morning US time, Saturday night. There
was another title fight and Panki in Japan defeats seventh Thigh,
not Shinga, a fighter we've talked about on these pods
and and really took it to him, knocked him down
several times right, and took his took the title.
Speaker 3: Took the title. I mean, so Masamichi Yabuki, who is
had been a title holder in one hundred eight pound
way class of the WBC. He scored a big upset
at the time against Taraji. Well that and then in
the immediate rematch, Taraji won the rematch to regain the title.
That loss and that win has aged well considering what
Yabuki just did to non Chinga. They fought a very
good fight. Uh and this was a separate card from
the ones that we've already been talking about. I'm not
sure why all these fights in Japan over the last
couple of days, but nonetheless, he dropped non Nonchinga three times,
stopped him in the ninth round. A tremendous performance. You know,
we've saw Nonchinga in the Fight of the Year a
couple of years ago down when he won the belt.
We've seen him be knocked out by Kyria, saw him
come back and get the revenge and reclaim the title.
And now in this fight, he goes to Japan on
the road and gets knocked out. Now, the interesting thing
about this is I never Nanchina is a Matchroom Boxing fighter.
You know, he's with them, along with the South Africans
that he's with because that's where he's from, South Africa.
There was not, really, to my knowledge, there was no
American viewer ability to view this legally as it turned out, didn't.
I wish they would have announced it Matchroom. I don't
know if it was live or not, but they had
it on their Matchroom Boxing YouTube channel, so it's there
if you want to watch it, perfect quality. They got
the outstanding commentator, Corey Erdman doing the blow by blow
who's one of the best in the business, and it
was a very enjoyable fight to watch.
Speaker 2: All right, fair enough, all right, news.
Speaker 1: We did talk about this on the bet Us Boxing
show on Friday, or did I imagine that post Hurricane Milton,
We did talk about this that in the question and
answer portion. Somebody asked you about Espinoza and Roba c
Ramirez his rematch, when it is where it is. They
canceled the purse bid, they made the deal and just
fill in the blanks here for the audience on the
fight for each night recap.
Speaker 3: So they were supposed to have the perst bit Friday
morning for this fight, which always truck me as unusual
for the purspit since they're both with the same teams
top rank Promotes Romas top Ranks. The co promoter of
Espinosa with remember if.
Speaker 1: I interject, we joked, do you want to take the
really good offer or do you want to risk what's
in the one and only envelope on Friday?
Speaker 2: And obviously it worked out.
Speaker 3: I mean, really, what this came down to is that
they were having trouble closing with either one of the
fighters or both of the fighters. It wasn't about Most
of the time in purse bits, the issues of making
a deal are not making a deal is because the
two promoters are at loggerheads and they can't come up
with a deal between them. But there are times like
this where it's not about the promoter to promoter deal.
It's about the promoter with their own fighter trying to
square away a deal. In this particular case, I'm led
to believe that there was issues closing with both of them,
that there was the problems, disagreements over the Espinoza camp
and what they wanted, as well as the Ramirez camp
and what they wanted. In any event, they finally came
to a deal and they're going to finish up strong
in terms the top ranks American fight cards. They'll still
have in a way on Christmas Eve from Japan, but
in terms of their main American cards that were used
to on the Saturday night or Friday night normal time,
this is gonna be a great card December seventh. It's
gonna take place in Arizona. I think I can't remember
if it's Phoenix or Glendell, but you'll have The main
event is going to be, and I've written about this
plenty of times. It's not announcing it. I'll probably get
announced that next week, but it's a done deal. It's
gonna be the rematch between Emmanuel Navarette and Oscar Valdez
for the WBO one hundred and thirty pounds title. Valdez
obviously is the interim champion. Remember when Navarette lost at
one hundred and thirty five, he had the option to
come back to one thirty in defend, which he decided
to do, and that meant that his mandatory was going
to be this rematch against Valdez. Their first fight was outstanding,
even though it's turned out to be kind of one
sided with the Naverete winning. But Valdez look good in
his last fight, and they're gonna do it over again.
And then we get a second rematch in the opener
on this card, which is Espinosa against Robes whose first
fight was the fight of the year CA today at
the end of twenty twenty three, where Espinosa came out
of absolutely obscurity and nowhere and scored a very dramatic
victory against Ramirez. They both were on the floor, just
a great battle. So you know, this is a doubleheader
and may I add not pay per view, no undercard
on pay per view. You're listening to his own to
if this was on his own. They try to make
this a fucking fifty dollars payer view probably, but anyway,
this is a great way for top ranking. Closed that
year with two very good fights on paper and two rematches.
And by the way, the winner of the fight between
Ramirez and Espinoza is absolutely going to be a candidate
to fight the winner of Valdez Navarette by moving up
and wait there one division.
Speaker 1: These things they are a lot of times aligned and
on purpose.
Speaker 2: Let's see what happens with that.
Speaker 1: By one more news item, Bruce Shoeshoe Carrington is going
to be back here. We just saw him a couple
of weeks ago, and you you've got more on when
and when what's going on.
Speaker 3: He struggled a light quite a bit in his most
recent I remember he fought on the undercard that was
headlined by the MICHAELA. Mayer winning the title against Sandy
Ryan in terms of the women's welterweight division. Uh. But
Daffi was at the Madison Square Garden Theater in one
of the fights on the main card was Bruce Hushu Carrington,
the fighter who's a featherweight with top rank, is beginning
a ton of hype and uh and and a lot
of exposure. And we talked about the mass amount of
hype that he's been getting, which I think is misplaced.
But nonetheless he's still an excellent prospect. And as it
turns out, if you follow him, you know he's from Brownsville, Brooklyn.
That is the same neighborhood where Mike Tyson grew up.
And Mike Tyson apparently is aware of Bruce Carrington and
whether he struggled or not against Suliman Segawa in that
victory where he basically, uh, you know, was lucky to
get a majority decision to win. Tyson wanted to have
him on his card because he likes the kid and
he I guess they have a little bit of of
a friendly relationship, and he loves the fact that he's
from his hometown, and so he went to the MVP
people and asked him they would put him on the card.
Top Rank was not going to stand in the way
of some kind of massive exposure for Bruce Chushu Carrington
to be on this massive card at the you know,
the AT and T Stadium on Netflix. They went they
were going to have a fight for him until probably
February or so anyway, so he's gonna be on this card.
He's a nice addition. He's gonna take on an Australian
fighter named Dana Coldwell who's thirteen and two with eight
knockout stepping up in class. But it's really kind of
it's an eight rounders I want to call it a
tune up fight, but I think Top Rank has you know,
bigger plans for him in terms of the early part
of next year. But this is an opportunity to get
some excellent exposure to you know, be around Mike Tyson,
who I think you know is one of his idols.
And and again Tyson has taken a liking to the kid,
and they'll add him to the card. So now you
got that fight on the card. There's already the fights
that have been announced with Taylor and Toronto rematch and
the title defense of Mario Barrios defending his his title
on this card. So Carrington's a nice edition and by
the way, not pay per view.
Speaker 1: Wow, the emphasis continues. All right, nestle time, because we've
been here a little bit. It was twelve years ago
on Sunday when you were ringside in Carson, California for
Nonito dounair. As it says on my trustee rundown here
that he was in the midst of his Fighter of
the Year campaign when he knocked out Nashoka to retain
the WBO Junior featherweight title. And also an interesting fight
that was in the opener on this card as well,
another fight of the year type fight. All right, so
tell me more about the nostalgia from October thirteenth of
twenty twelve, twelve years ago, Sunday as we released this pot.
Speaker 3: Well, Tji, how much you love to talk about activity
of fighters. And in twenty twelve, Donedo Dunair became the
Fighter of the Year, and not the only reason, but
part a big part of the reason was because he
fought four times, all against the legitimate opponents. He started
off the year in February, he scored a victory against
Wilfredo Vasquez Junior, won the vacant WBO one hundred and
twenty two pound title, then unified by defeating pretty handily
the IBF champion, Jeffrey Mithubula, and then the IBF title
went away because the IBF does IBF things. But he
defended the WBO title against Toshiaki Nishioka, a very classy
former champion from Japan. Excellent fighter. They did this fight
in the main event. He was on HBO at what
was then called the stub Hub Center in Carson, kal Or,
the Home Depot Center was at the time. Now, of
course it's the Dignity Health Park with the same venue
the Tennis center there. And you know, at the time,
there was a lot of people thinking this is gonna
be one hell of a fight. Really, a lot of
people looking forward to it very excited. As it turned out,
even though don Air looked good and won handily and
dominated and scored the knockout in the ninth round, knocked
Nishioka down in round six, knocked him down again in
round nine when the fight ended. It they're not, unfortunately
not to be an exciting fight and they had a
really hard act to follow. So anyway, he won the fight,
Donair did, and then it was only two months later
he then knocked out for he arse in the third round.
So that was in a title defense. That was four fights,
including unification against all against either champions, former champions, or
top names, and he just ran through pretty much all
of them. And that became the Fighter of the Air
campaign of Nonedo Donair, which is going to be one
of the big line items on his resume when he
gets into the Hall of Fame. And this was the
third of those four fights. Now, the reason it was
even more memorable though, was really because of the co feature.
This was a fight than everybody, even more so than
what we expected out of the main event to be
just a slam bang kind of fight. This was a
WBO one hundred and forty pounds title eliminator between then
undefeated Brandon Rios, who had won a lightweight title, the
undefeated Mike Alvarado, who had been in some tallacious, fucking battles.
And when this fight was made, you're like, there's no
chance it's not going to be something spectacular. And guess what, TJ.
It was something spectacular, and so as bad as Donair
in this year could turn out to be in terms
of the overall action, even though Donair did what he
was supposed to do, it was made even worse because
they had to follow the hell Brandon Rios and Mike
Alvarado gave me some other four seven rounds and a
spectacular fight where finally Rios was able to get the
job done and stop him in the seventh round. And
let me tell you, being ringside for that, I'll just
give you one aside. I always forget about how the
weather changes in like thirty seconds when you're in Carson,
And it was super super hot that day, even though
it was in October, and I forgot to bring my
I forgot to bring my jacket, and when the sun
goes down, you freeze your fucking ass off. And it
was so fucking cold that night, like I had my
hands underneath my laptop to warm them up. Wow. Anyway,
I have the vivid memory of getting back to the
hotel after the fight we had taken like a there's
a shuttle bus that brings you know, whoever, fighters, media, promoter, people,
pr people, whoever. You know, officials, everybody just gets to
jump on the different shuttles that they have to go
back to the hotel. And when I got off the
off the van, there was Alvarado and Rios like outside
the hotel whereing the war wounds, both guys with badly
fucking bruised and battered phases, but smiles from Brandon of
course as the winner. And even in Alvarado, even though
he had lost the fight, he knew he was in
something special. And I just remember I've got pictures of
those guys like on my phone, like standing outside the hotel,
like smiling with these giant bruises on the fix. I mean,
that's boxing when you can see these guys, you know,
an hour or so after this legendary epic fight, and
it led to a trilogy where they did it three times.
I mean the third fight was unfortunately just a piece
of shit. But the second fight was a high class,
excellent fight.
Speaker 2: Also, but YouTube up the first one.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, well, the second fight's the hell of a
fight also maybe not at the same level of outrageous
action as it was. And Alvarado got to win in
the second fight, so it was two to two. He
won a decision in the second fight, which was this
fight was the first one was October of twelve. They
did the rematch as a main event. This was the
undercard fight, but the main event was the second fight
on HBO that I also covered at Mandela. Actually I
covered all three fights. The Carson fight was one Mandala
Bay for the excellent rematch that Alvarado won. And then
in two thousand fifteen, when unfortunately Alvarado was having all
kinds of legal issues, he was having his alcohol problems.
He was in absolutely no condition. He trained about five
minutes for the fight. They went to his hometown in Denver,
and Brandon Rios knocked out on the third round in
just a miserable you know, not Brandon's fault, but Mike
just didn't show up. But the first two fights are
very memorable. In the first fight, of course, is the
best of all of them, and that was on this
night that we're talking about in Carson all those years ago.
Tremendous battle and definitely if he didn't see it, YouTube
it up because it's a fucking classic.
Speaker 1: Love it one more piece of nostalgia. It was twenty
three years ago, also on Sunday, on October thirteenth of
two thousand and one, where Mike Tyson went to Denmark
and got a ko that's really set into motion the
long delayed fight with Lenox Lewis. After that, what do
we remember what was noteworthy about he and Brian Nielsen.
Speaker 3: Well, when Tyson came back after the year biting against
and Ander Holyfield, and then he had had a couple
of fights in the United States, but people were kind
of getting tired of the antics. He had had obviously
tried to break France while both his arm. He had
the no contest against Arlin Nooris. He basically was like,
you know, he wasn't suspended, but Las Vegas was basically like, go,
you know, get out of here. Basically. He then did
two fights in a row in the UK where he
had the wins against Julius Francis and lou Savaree, where
he tried to keep punching Savaice after the ref stopped
the fight, and that was not a good situation. Then
he had the no contest where he made Angel go
out to quit in the second round, which was the
first Tyson by I covered in person where he got
no contest because he later had a foul drug test
was from marijuana, which at the time, you know, was
was a cause for a no contest, still is in
some jurisdictions. Anyway, after that fight, that was in October
of twenty twenty a year later, people are still like,
we want to see that a Lennix Lewis fight. That
was still like a big deal. But again he wasn't
really going to do business in Vegas. They didn't want
him there, and he got a big offer to go
fight Brian Nielson, who was sixty two to one at
the time and the you know, the that the Danish
national boxing hero. You know. Unfortunately for him, he was
very very derisively referred to in the American media as
the Danish pastry because he didn't really look like a fighter,
had a nice mid section, and thought he was gonna
be easy work for for Mike Tyson. His big claim
to fame before that was he had defeated I guess
he had defeated defeat Larry Holmes, maybe had gone over
to Denmark also to fight him. Oh that was actually,
I take it back, that was I think that was
so that was before he had beaten Larry Holmes. I'm
looking this, ye just looked like.
Speaker 1: And one that's still remarkable that he had won that
many fights.
Speaker 3: That was Larry at the end of his career. But
that was sort of like the big thing there, and
he thought a ton of fights in in you know,
in his home country. Anyway, it was a hand picked
opponent for Tysons and they wanted to get him a
win hopefully come out a controvert. Pretty much what happened.
He went over there and Tyson took him apart actually
on the undercard, not that it's a memorable fight, but
the great Hall of Famer Joe Calzagi defended the Super
mid Away title on that undercart. He had gone from
Wales to fight in Denmark also. But Tyson took Brian
Neilson out in the sixth round. But the key thing
here is that finally with him having win won this fight,
coming through without having any kind of wacky suspensions or
any kind of issues. They got down to the real
business of finally slowly but surely making the fight between
Tyson and Lennox Lewis, which at the time was the
biggest fight in the world. That was what everybody wanted
to see, even though Mike was clearly passed his best.
Even Lennox at that point was even though he was
still champion, he was you know, he was getting on
in years. So that was October. Finally October of two
thousand and one, he beats Nielsen. Finally, June of two
thousand and two, they have the Lennox Lewis fight. Obviously,
there was the time where the fight was made in
the earlier part of two thousand and two, where they
had that bill conceived situation happened in New York City
where Tyson bit Lennox Lewis and the brawl to announce
the fight, it had to get postponed and moved because
Vegas went licensed Tyson. It wound up in Memphis. The
fight still happened, but he had to get through the
Nielsen fight, and so while the fight itself is not memorable,
it was critically important to the heavyweight division to boxing
as a business and to fans around the world that
wanted to see Lewis Tyson that the Danis patry got
gobbled up. Tyson was finally about to get in the
ring and do the fight with Lennox that was at
the time the biggest money fighting history of the sport.
Speaker 1: All right, listen, it has been a full show. It
has been a full last few days. I mean, I'm
at the point right now at the end of this
Sunday night into Monday, where we've been through a hurricane
and again there are hundreds of thousands still without power.
Dan as I come back to the Tampa Bay area
Sunday night after being in New Orleans for the NFL
game with the Buccaneers. So this is not going to
be right for a week, for months, for probably several
months that we're going to be dealing with this in
West central Florida, not one but two hurricanes, but some
boxing normalcy here for you, and I thank you for
helping me with some welcome distraction.
Speaker 2: We love the sweet science.
Speaker 1: You gave excellent analysis and at the end of the day,
I would love to know how many people actually bought
the Dezone under card pay per view. I can't believe
it was that many when they found out they were
being charged for it on Saturday and not even getting
the better Bfbvol.
Speaker 2: Main event as part of it. But listen, good stuff.
Speaker 1: Let's get ready for another week as we put the
pieces together.
Speaker 3: To your favorite fight coming up next week.
Speaker 1: Listen, uh, Tim Zoo and it's still scheduled for Orlando,
Tim Zoo in.
Speaker 3: Action that that's not your favorite fight. Your favorite fight
is William Skull against Vladimir Shaw for the vacant IVF
Super Midleway topic.
Speaker 1: We had We had gotten very close to a getaway
here before you're bringing that up, Zoo in Action. We
believe in Orlando as far as we know, and they
took a hit with the Category two Hurricane Milton coming
through on Thursday morning.
Speaker 2: This fight still slated to be in Orlando, as Dan
has been reporting, so we'll be talking about that later
in the week as well.
Speaker 1: Other than that, my friend, have a good week and
appreciate to as always again follow, Subscribe, Apple, Spreaker, Spotify.
I am merely TJ Reeves for Dan Rayfield. You've been
listening to the Fight Preach United Recap podcast