Quickly, a look at some boxing results from this week besides the Friday Night Fights show:
- Everything about the above video is just kind of strange. Why was Marco Antonio Barrera taking a tune-up fight before what was likely to be a big-money U.K. showdown with lightweight (135 lbs.) Amir Khan in March? He had to know suffering a fight-delaying cut was a risk, and that’s exactly what happened, and now Barrera-Khan may be off. And what were regulators in Mexico thinking approving an opponent with a 1-7-1 record against a veteran and future Hall of Famer like Barrera? I can answer that one — Mexico has ZERO standards about fights they’ll approve. I’m going to call “bad karma” here. On the bright side, Barrera’s DQ win really showed that he can find a way to beat a 1-7-1 opponent into 1-8-1 submission.
- In case you missed it, the favorite on this season of The Contender got knocked out in the first round this week. Cruiserweight (200 lbs.) Troy Ross caught Felix Cora, Jr. and although there’s been some discussion over whether the ref halted the fight too early, I thought it was a good stoppage. Cora was still very unsteady. I’ve complained about this season lacking some of the reality show drama to accompany the boxing that you’d want from a boxing-based reality show, but this week had it. It’s just too bad that the drama was tragic: First Cora loses his day job so he can compete in the tournament, then he loses. Cliff Rold called it one of the single best episodes in Contender history. That leaves Rico Hoye as the biggest “name” on the show, now that Cora and Darnell Wilson are out. Who’d have thunk it?
- Lightweight Michael Katsidis came back from two straight losses to slaughter a fairly easy bounceback opponent, knocking him down four times in the Philippines and winning by decision. I still haven’t found a clip of the fight, which is too bad because every Katsidis fight is worth watching. What was thought to be his next one, against Julio Diaz, should be a bout everyone is looking forward too. But Katsidis is talking about a rematch with Joel Casamayor in Australia. It’s hard to imagine Casamayor has anything bigger lined up, and as much as I’d like to see Katsidis-Diaz, I’d definitely take a rematch of one of the best fights of 2008.
- A Queensberry Rules minor favorite, Monty Meza-Clay, suffered a TKO loss to featherweight (126 lbs.) Jorge Solis. The Boxing Bulletin has the only write-up I can find, and they’re sympathetic to Meza-Clay’s argument that the fight shouldn’t have been stopped.
- Heavyweight Toro Moreno suffered a knockout loss to Buddy Brennen. All right, it’s not an actual result, but I just saw the 1956 Oscar-nominated “The Harder They Fall” for the first time this weekend. From the boxer cameos to the depiction of seedy industry happenings to Humphrey Bogart’s last role to the story by Budd Schulberg… if it wasn’t quite as good as “On the Waterfront,” I still recommend it highly, in case you haven’t seen it before.
