Danny Jacobs v Gabriel Rosado : The Bad Blood is Real

Here it is November.  I was about to kick my DAZN to the curb for lack of evidence when suddenly my boxing radar started showing some blips.  Tonight  Brooklyn’s Danny Jacobs will meet Philadelphia’s Gabriel Rosado at the Hard Rock Casino in Hollywood Florida.  

I will be happy if the fight proves to be even half as entertaining as their press conference. Trash talk is routine these days   but in some instances the disrespect and dislike are real.  This is real.  

  For Danny Jacobs, it’s a gateway fight.   Aside from his loss to Pirog, Jacobs lost close fights with Canelo and with GGG.  A solid win over Rosado would put him back where he needs to be. 

 There’s no  doubt Jacobs is at the top level in spite of the three losses and he feels certain he could win against GGG and/or Canelo if given another chance. He is perhaps less sure of Canelo.

  This is a matchup that has some people denigrating the fight because conventional thinking is that the two fighters are not on the same level.  Jacobs is the heavy favorite mainly because Rosado has twelve losses to his record. 

Danny Jacobs has three, one of them to a 12-0  but largely unknown Russian fighter named Dmitry Pirog who hasn’t been seen in the ring for almost ten years.   Prelims start at 8 at the Hard Rock Casino in Hollywood Florida. 

There’s some interesting action on the undercard too.  One that I’m particularly  interest is rather off-the-grid but  I’m marching to a different drum anyway.  There’s a 33 year old named Something Majidov.  While there seems to be a sizable cohort of Kazak  fighters (GGG, being the most well known) I don’t think we’ve seen an Azeri heavyweight contender. 

Majidov is interesting, not only because he once beat Anthony Joshua to a world amateur title, but also because he has a big punch.  His pro resume is light, consisting only of two previous bouts, but his style is far from amateurish.    

Film at 11 - more to follow . . .  

Congrats to Teofimo Lopez, Bob Arum, and ESPN

 By now you've heard there's a new sheriff in the 135 pound boxing rankings and his name is Teofimo Lopez.  Lots of people outside boxing won't recognize the name but that's about to change as he's taken over the division and is looking to step up to a higher weight  where he says he's more comfortable. Many  viewers mentioned he did look bigger than Lomachenko -- true, but not so much.  

Just as impressive as Lopez' domination of the fight was the viewer count approached three million.  This occurs even while NFL game viewers has declined by 8 or 10 percent, depending on whose numbers you use.

Equally impressive was Bob Arum's announcement before the fight that the broadcast on ESPN would be absolutely free.  This was both a smart and generous move on Arum's part.  

It was also good for the sport.  Lopez was the 4 to 1 underdog and it seemed for a while that, amongst all my boxing buddies, that only me and Floyd Mayweather Jr. picked Lopez to win.  Okay, I'm exaggerating because there was Lopez' dad too.  And his mom?

I wasn't entirely solid in my pick -- I didn't think it would go the distance. I did however pick Lopez because I'd watched him before and noticed a little known fact.  Lopez is known as a killer puncher having knocked out nearly all of his opponents but I noticed he could box too.  Even more do I appreciate that he's the type of throwback guy who will fight anyone among the new crop of New Generation Boxers.  

I don't want to throw shade on Sergei Lomachenko -- he's a great boxer with an interesting arsenal.  None of it was working in the Lopez fight  as many observers thought he was too idle in the early going and didn't get started until it was too late and his only chance would be for a knockout.  

Both fighters showed good chins so that didn't become an issue. However, it must be recognized that this was a big upset.  

I want to say also that my pick of Lopez wasn't simply because I liked him; it was also because Loma had become something of a sacred cow. Even more galling to me was that celebrity sportswriters like Stephen Smith and Max Kellerman were always expounding about how Loma was "special."  Special, special, special, I heard it a hundred times. 

I don't like sacred cows.  This is boxing where no one is special  and the king is always dead.  Who was Buster Douglas?  Who was Cassius Clay in the first Sonny Liston fight? 

Congrats to Teofimo Lopez and Bob Arum. It's interesting to note that there was no rematch clause in the contract signed. I'm good with that.  The reason for no rematch was that Loma's team was completely certain their guy would win and so there was no reason to put it in the contract.  They didn't even expect it to be close.

Tyson Fury v. Deontay Wilder II (the nervous breakdown)

Tyson Fury v. Deontay Wilder II (the nervous breakdown)

A low-level Twitter war broke out last night as I looked through opinion regarding the Feb. 22 rematch.  There’s plenty of opinion, people seeming to look for new angles, even when there are only two worth considering.

You either believe in “The Bomb” or you believe in Tyson Fury’s boxing ability.  I didn’t even realize Fury had boxing ability until I saw Tyson-Fury I.  I was both surprised and impressed as Fury hadn’t shown me much of boxing in previous fights.   That’s not to say Fury is a brilliant boxer, just a competent   one, at least until the later rounds when he did an unexpected face plant beneath Wilder’s wild bombs. 

Just below is a sampling of people who piled on to my opinion of a Wilder KO  even after I’d admitted Fury did a superior job in the first fight.  “Superior” meaning superior to Wilder who kept waiting for the big punch which finally came in the late rounds.  I keep thinking about how wonderful it would be if Wilder had both boxing and bomb squad gifts.

So TonesLopez agrees with me even if most people do not.  I’d hazard a guess that this “most people” pile-on comes from British fans.  This is not to disparage their loyalty nor their beliefs.  Tyson Fury has won me over just as much for his entertainment and personality values as for his boxing skill.  Compared to boxing’s greatest boxers, Fury’s combinations are highly predictable.  He does everything but post neon signs announcing his next onslaught of punches.  It is during one such announcement that he is likely to get tagged with a Wilder head-seeking missile. 

Why did Fury go down from those punches from a smaller man?  I’ll ask also, on behalf of Fury’s fans, how he managed to get up.  That was something that did impress me although it seemed to me he got the advantage of a Dempsey Long Count.  Still, he did get up, whether it be eleven seconds or within ten, as the referee ruled. I’m not a timekeeper so I wouldn’t go further than stating my own impression.

I’d imagine you’ve already heard enough of my opinion, especially since it is the same opinion expressed by hundreds of other people.  Deontay Wilder will knock Tyson Fury out in the rematch, boxing skills notwithstanding.  Unless.. . . . . (drum roll and strike up the band) Tyson Fury does what he says he’d do in a recent pre-fight television interview — get to Wilder in the early rounds (round 2, he said) and knock him out.  

I can’t see that happening.   Guys like Deontay Wilder will go after you even when they’re dead.  I’ve seen it before.  Right now I’m thinking of the late Diego Corrales — beaten every which way, death and resurrection, going on to the end a winner.  So even if Fury can manage to overwhelm Wilder with an unending and furious flurry of punches in the early rounds, Wilder will rise from the crypt and punish the giant with Thor’s hammer blows.  Aren’t you nervous about that?