By David P. Greisman
It is a classic, time-tested practice: superstars cutting promos, building heat from interested fans, attracting viewers by spewing venom at their athletic rivals, inviting, enticing audiences to open their eyes and their wallets and buy pay-per-views. Meanwhile, the ringside announcers work to get their rising stars over, building the next franchise, lining their coffers.
But to paraphrase the marketing slogan: It’s not the WWE, it’s HBO.
This week’s edition of Fighting Words argues that HBO, once the top network for boxing broadcasts, has taken to using methods evocative of professional wrestling, limiting the quality of its normal programming so as to enhance buy rates for PPV shows that are coming on an increasingly regular basis.
Following that is The 10 Count, which contains previews of the major fights scheduled to take place in August, including Jeff Lacy-Robin Reid, Fernando Vargas-Javier Castillejo, In Jin Chi-Rocky Juarez and Hasim Rahman-Monte Barrett.
The Fiscal Philosophy
Why give away for free what people will pay for?
The essential model behind which professional wrestling cards are drawn up is one in which feuds are built up until they culminate at a pay-per-view that looms on the horizon. Storylines are written up, tension is ratcheted to the point that viewers are compelled, by virtue of the drama, to pay to see the climax that the rising action has led to. Very rarely do the combatants face off in a match until the ordained date.
Yes, professional wrestling is scripted sports entertainment, but the same principles seem to apply to HBO’s recent broadcasts.
For example, on September 10 crowd-pleasing warriors Manny Pacquiao and Erik Morales will return to action for the first time since Morales’s unanimous decision over the Filipino Firebomber on a March PPV. Pacquiao’s opponent is Hector Velazquez, while Morales is set to face Zahir Raheem.
The intention is for the two noteworthy pugilists to win their respective bouts, setting up an eventual rematch that will take place on pay-per-view. And while both men may deserve easier matches following their fight-of-the-year candidate, their opposition is less than overwhelming.
Velazquez, 42-10-2 (35), holds losses to Rocky Juarez, Robbie Peden and Israel Vazquez, his only noteworthy wins being a split decision over Guty Espadas in 2002 and a technical victory over the faded Marcos Licona earlier this year.
Raheem has only one loss on his record, from a bout with Rocky Juarez last year in which he had to contend with a referee that seemed to clearly favor his opponent, the house fighter. But Raheem’s career has stagnated, quite a disappointment when considering his credentials as a bronze medalist at the 1996 Olympics.
But the hook is firmly planted in our mouths. We long to see our stars, salivate when we can catch them on television, and even though we already pay massive cable bills that include fees for premium channels like Showtime and HBO, when the big showdowns truly worthy of our money come around, we’ve been caught, line and sinker.
HBO did it twice within the first two months of 2005: January brought us consecutive weeks of programming, with Floyd Mayweather toying with Henry Bruseles one week and Arturo Gatti retiring Jesse James Leija the next, setting up their June 25 PPV. And on the same card in February, Jermain Taylor beat down Daniel Edouard and Bernard Hopkins dissected Howard Eastman, plotting the course for their July middleweight torch passing.
It’s okay to follow this outline most of the time, especially as Gatti-Mayweather and Hopkins-Taylor were intriguing match-ups that sold themselves, but just needed publicity and whetting of appetites in order to guarantee more buys. Excepting Bruseles, who never should have seen the lights of the small screen, the opposition was decent on paper. People were predicting potential fight-of-the-year for Gatti-Leija, Eastman was a mandatory challenger and Edouard was a “keep busy” foe for a still-learning prospect in Taylor. That Gatti and Hopkins’s victories were so lopsided served to further enhanced their momentum.
Yet the scheduling has become so full of these set-ups in a manner that it is apparently detrimental to the competitiveness of a majority of the regular World Championship Boxing and Boxing After Dark broadcasts. Aside from June’s rematch between Glencoffe Johnson and Antonio Tarver, there is been a stunning lack of must-see bouts that guaranteed a quality fight on the level of five of Showtime’s America’s Fight Night cards this year.
In the past, HBO’s expensive long-term multi-fight contracts with Oscar De La Hoya and Roy Jones Jr. required PPVs, especially as De La Hoya was a guaranteed draw with immense popularity.
Then again, it has become essential for networks to sell pay-per-views to offset the costs for the marquee names to get together and risk their belts, reputations and further paydays. It’s just a shame that with near-monthly PPVs, there has been so much that fans have had to shell out in order to cover the combatants’ bills.
The 10 Count – August Preview Edition
1. Jeff Lacy vs. Robin Reid, August 6. Lacy, the IBF super middleweight champion, does not know how to have a boring fight, which means that the newest installment of Showtime’s America’s Fight Night has the potential for explosiveness. Lacy has become a staple of Showtime broadcasts, and the 2000 Olympian became the first from his American team to win a title last October when he knocked Syd Vanderpool out. Since then, he has gone toe-to-toe with Omar Sheika, triumphing with a hard-earned, gritty decision, and kayoed the underwhelming Rubin Williams. In Reid, Lacy is facing an experienced opponent that has distance losses to other 168-lb. titlists Joe Calzaghe (WBO) and Sven Ottke (who retired last year as the WBA and IBF beltholder). Despite his tendency to begin slowly, Lacy has shown a will to throw each and every punch with bad intentions, and has one-punch knockout power. Should Lacy win, he’s looking for a unification bout with Calzaghe, but he should make sure to not write off Reid.
2. Hasim Rahman vs. Monte Barrett, August 13. The winner of this heavyweight match will be the WBC interim champion, and barring injury, will have earned the right to face Vitali Klitschko for the legitimate belt just six weeks later on September 24. Both Rahman and Barrett are promising to knock the other out, and a heavyweight slugfest is preferable over a Chris Byrd or John Ruiz fight any day. Barrett has brought himself back into contention since being bounced off the mat five times by Wladimir Klitschko in 2000, thanks in part to a majority decision loss to Joe Mesi that was followed by victories over Dominick Guinn and Owen Beck. As for Rahman, he has rededicated himself to proving that he is not the one-hit wonder who kayoed Lennox Lewis only to have the favor returned one fight later. Since that rematch loss in 2001, Rahman had a loss to Evander Holyfield, a draw with David Tua and was on the losing end of a decision to John Ruiz. Rahman’s comeback trail included four ballroom-boxing shows against journeymen and a drubbing of Kali Meehan. It’s not the most glorious manner of earning a number one ranking, but the heavyweight division is wide open, and this is the opportunity for Rahman or Barrett to take advantage and see if Klitschko is anything other than a paper champion.
3. In Jin Chi vs. Rocky Juarez, August 20. Chi, the WBC featherweight titlist, is a Korean warrior whose lone fight in America to date was a decision loss to Erik Morales in 2001. Since then, he has gone 1-0-1 against Tommy Browne, stopped Eiichi Sugama and outpointed Tommy Browne. Juarez, a 2000 Olympian, has recovered from a lackluster decision victory over Zahir Raheem last summer by knocking out Guty Espadas and Juan Carlos Ramirez in the second and first rounds, respectively. With Morales, Marco Antonio Barrera and Manny Pacquiao one weight class above, the time has come for someone to step up and challenge Juan Manuel Marquez for the top spot in the 126-lb. division.
4. Fernando Vargas vs. Javier Castillejo, August 20. In returning from a fifteen month sabbatical to handle health issues, Fernando Vargas looked to be struggling tremendously with ring rust while defeating pillow-fisted middleweight Raymond Joval via decision. Immediately afterwards, Vargas called out Castillejo in hopes of attaining his green WBC junior middleweight title belt, but thanks to the typical politics and bull that is boxing, Castillejo was stripped of his championship (not that he had won it in a fight… he had only held the interim title in 2002 and 2003). The two will still meet, as Vargas continues his comeback, attempting to gauge how far he is from regaining old form, while Castillejo needs to prove that he is more than a 37-year-old with an inflated record, a loss to Oscar De La Hoya and whose last fight was a knockout of 13-8 Enrique Campos more than a year ago.
5. And sadly, that’s it. No other must-see fights on the ledger at the moment, and of these four, only two (Lacy-Reid and Chi-Juarez) are for titles. Luckily, there are a couple others that are at the very least semi-noteworthy, all of which take place on the same show…
6. The August 13 Don King PPV featuring Rahman-Barrett also includes the return of Ricardo Mayorga, as the whirling dervish faces Michele Piccirillo for the WBC belt that was stripped from Castillejo. Piccirillo’s last opponent of note was Cory Spinks, the man that derailed the Mayorga train in December 2003. Against Spinks, Piccirillo won a controversial decision before losing the rematch, and since then he has been part of four bouts scheduled for eight rounds and one for six. Should either Mayorga or Piccirillo win, it would be interesting to see if Cory Spinks faces either, now that he has chosen to also ascend to junior middleweight.
7. Also on the card is a WBA interim 154-lb. title bout between Alejandro Garcia and Luca Messi. Should Winky Wright, the former WBA champion, be unable to find anyone willing to meet him at middleweight, he may return to junior middleweight and reacquire his old belts. Until that point, leave it to promoters and sanctioning bodies to use interim belts and other idiotic ideas to pull in any extra cash.
8. Speaking of, whenever the WBA has a beltholder that is unified with another sanctioning body’s title, it declares their champion the “super” or “world” champion and adds a “regular” title. The WBA’s regular welterweight champion (Zab Judah has the unified WBA, WBC and IBF belts), Luis Collazo, will defend against Miguel Angel Gonzalez, a 16-year veteran with losses to Cory Spinks, Kostya Tszyu and Oscar De La Hoya.
9. Since there still isn’t enough crap for fans watching this card, Owen Beck and Sergei Lyakovich will meet in a match to decide which of the two of them is the better C-level heavyweight. At least Lyakovich holds a victory over Dominick Guinn, not that that is much of an accomplishment nowadays.
10. Last, and close to being the least, Andrew Golota returns from his spot on his back at the United Center ring in Chicago (where Lamon Brewster put him thrice in May) to face Przemyslaw Saleta in a battle to see which man will be the Polish draw for future Don King shows.
Next Week’s Fighting Words – Telling Three Aging Superstars to Retire
In next week’s edition of Fighting Words, I will lay out specific reasons that Oscar De La Hoya, Roy Jones Jr. and Evander Holyfield should retire from the sweet science as soon as possible. Considering the long legacies that these members of the 1992, 1988 and 1984 Olympic teams have cemented, it is surprising that each still desires to get into the ring, and especially frightening when accounting for the dangerous nature of the sport. Like always, no punches will be pulled, not that any of these guys have the ability to slip them anymore.