by David P. Greisman
For the third and presumably final time, Floyd Mayweather Jr. should be the fighter of the year.
That couldn’t be said for certain on May 2, though there was the strongest of possibilities at the time that the winner of that day’s bout between Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao would wind up with the honors by the time 2015 was over. It still took time to see how the year shook out, to see whether someone else put forward a strong campaign or scored a significant enough upset to pick up the award.
Even then, it would’ve taken a remarkable effort to surpass Mayweather topping Pacquiao or Pacquiao defeating Mayweather. After all, Pacquiao would’ve beaten the best boxer in the world. Instead, it was Mayweather who made it look easy against an opponent still considered to be among the best.
Now that November is here, we might as well call the race. Nothing else that’s been done is as meaningful and nothing else to come could mean as much.
Mayweather was Ring Magazine’s fighter of the year in 1998 — when he won seven fights, the penultimate one being a technical knockout of Genaro Hernandez that made him the lineal junior lightweight champion — and again in 2007, when he won a decision over Oscar De La Hoya at junior middleweight and then defended his welterweight championship by stopping Ricky Hatton.
He was the Boxing Writers Association of America’s fighter of the year in 2007 and again in 2013, when he outpointed Robert Guerrero and then moved up in weight again to defeat Canelo Alvarez by majority decision. (Mayweather was the ESPY winner in 2007, 2008, 2010, 2012, 2013 and 2014, but those awards don’t go by the calendar year and rarely reflect reality when it comes to what’s actually happening in boxing and mixed martial arts.)
The editors of that magazine and the members of that organization would be wise to choose Mayweather again. (Full disclosure: I am a freelance writer for The Ring and am a member and a vice president of the BWAA.)
Mayweather’s September pre-retirement swan song against Andre Berto isn’t a factor, of course. Instead, what matters is the Pacquiao win. And as often must be done when deciding this award, other boxers do so little of note that they end up being removed from consideration.
That’s what happened last year. A number of of boxers had decent or pretty good years. No one had a truly standout year.
The BWAA had six finalists in 2014: Miguel Cotto, Terence Crawford, Gennady Golovkin, Naoya Inoue, Sergey Kovalev and Manny Pacquiao.
The staff of this website gave six additional names at least slight consideration, if not more: Carl Frampton, Roman Gonzalez, Wladimir Klitschko, Mayweather, Amnat Ruenroeng and Nicholas Walters.
The BWAA went with Crawford. The Ring opted for Kovalev. BoxingScene chose Inoue, with Crawford as its top runner-up and Ruenroeng meriting a third-place spot.
Mayweather’s runners-up for 2015 may end up coming from but a few of the above, plus potentially a couple of others.
Let’s go through many of the divisions, starting with the heavyweights and then moving down.
Klitschko will face Tyson Fury on Nov. 28. If he wins, that’ll give him two victories over undefeated contenders in 2015. His supporters will say he fended off a spirited challenge from Bryant Jennings this past April before winning a clear decision, while his detractors will argue that Klitschko didn’t look spectacular in doing so. They’ll also point out that Jennings’ best win had come over Mike Perez and Fury merely had taken out Dereck Chisora and Steve Cunningham.
Fury, meanwhile, could be a strong runner-up if he scores the huge upset in dethroning Klitschko. His only other bout this year, a technical knockout of Christian Hammer, doesn’t add anything to the argument.
That one upset would be enough for Fury given whom it came against, but one upset wouldn’t be quite enough for cruiserweight Krzysztof Glowacki, who came from behind to stop Marco Huck in August. He also outpointed a lower-tier opponent in Nuri Suferi earlier in the year. Alas, Glowacki has been sidelined by injuries that postponed a fight with undefeated contender Dmitry Kudryashov.
Fellow 200-pounder Denis Lebedev has a fight this week against unbeaten Lateef Kayode. A win would give him two on the year, including a decision over Youri Kalenga, a contender who’d lost once before.
The two best light heavyweights in the world haven’t done too much of note this year. Adonis Stevenson took on lesser foes in super middleweight Sakio Bika and the overmatched Tommy Karpency. Sergey Kovalev stopped former champion Jean Pascal and then met overmatched Nadjib Mohammedi. Andrzej Fonfara had a good year, though not one that merits candidacy for fighter of the year, by embarrassing Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. and then winning a war with Nathan Cleverly.
At super middleweight, Arthur Abraham has wins over Paul Smith and Robert Stieglitz and is set to face Martin Murray later this month. None of those guys is considered anywhere near a top 168-pounder. Badou Jack took a majority decision over Anthony Dirrell and a split decision over George Groves; it’s been a decent year for him. James DeGale outpointed Andre Dirrell to win a vacant world title and will defend against faded former titleholder Lucian Bute later this month.
Golovkin’s 2015 has been more notable than his 2014. He took out Martin Murray in 11 rounds, took out Willie Monroe in six, then outboxed and then stopped limited but powerful fellow middleweight titleholder David Lemieux in eight rounds. Also ostensibly at middleweight is the Miguel Cotto-Canelo Alvarez fight this month, which has a contractual weight limit of 155 pounds. It’s the rare instance of two of the best in the sport facing each other. Cotto’s only other appearance this year was a stoppage of Daniel Geale in June, while Canelo bombed out James Kirkland in May.
There wasn’t enough from the junior middleweights, and the same can be said for those not named Mayweather in the deep welterweight division. Kell Brook’s wins were against Jo Jo Dan and Frankie Gavin; an injury has postponed his fight with Diego Chaves. None of that is exemplary while he waits to get the other top 147-pounders to face him. Timothy Bradley defeated Jessie Vargas, surviving a shaky last round to do so, and has Brandon Rios this coming weekend.
Shawn Porter stayed busy with Erick Bone and then outpointed Adrien Broner. His fight with Keith Thurman is likely to take place in early 2016. Thurman had wins over Robert Guerrero and Luis Collazo as he continues to step up his level of competition. Danny Garcia got fortunate in his decision win over Lamont Peterson, then debuted at 147 in earnest with a victory over Paulie Malignaggi. And Amir Khan’s lone appearance was a tougher than expected victory over Chris Algieri.
Crawford moved up to 140 this year, won a vacant belt against Thomas Dulorme and then defeated Dierry Jean. He’s essentially resetting after leaving 135 behind. He could’ve been on track for a fight with Lucas Matthysse, except Matthysse suffered a knockout to Viktor Postol. That’s a big win for Postol, whose only other appearance this year was a keep-busy bout against Jake Giuriceo.
We can skip past 135 and 130. Not much worth consideration has happened at 126 either, barring Leo Santa Cruz’s excellent performance against Abner Mares. The best at 122 haven’t done much this year. Guillermo Rigondeaux hasn’t fought at all. Scott Quigg fought just once, making quick work of Kiko Martinez. He’s signed to face Carl Frampton in 2016. Frampton had a technical knockout of Chris Avalos and then had to rise from two early knockdowns to outpoint Alejandro Gonzalez.
At 118, Shinsuke Yamanaka was fortunate to leave with a decision over Anselmo Moreno, while Jamie McDonnell got a pair of competitive decision victories against Tomoki Kameda. Junior bantamweight Naoya Inoue hurt his hand against Narvaez last year and won’t be back until the end of December.
Flyweight champion Roman Gonzalez impressed in his appearances on HBO against Edgar Sosa and on the Golovkin-Lemieux pay-per-view against Brian Viloria. But his year will be defined more for winning over a new audience than for anything else. Hardcore fight fans still want to see Gonzalez have a rematch with Juan Francisco Estrada, who stayed busy in 2015 with stoppages of Rommel Asenjo and Hernan Marquez. Amnat Ruenroeng, meanwhile, outpointed Zou Shiming and then won in the ugliest of fashions against Johnriel Casimero.
We still have two months left in the year. It’s pretty easy to tell who from the above should be on the BWAA ballots, in conversations and under consideration: the winner of Klitschko-Fury, Golovkin, the winner of Cotto-Canelo, and perhaps Gonzalez.
There’s only one logical winner, though. This year, just like this era, will be Mayweather first — and then everyone else.
The 10 Count will return soon.
“Fighting Words” appears every Monday on BoxingScene.com. Pick up a copy of David’s book, “Fighting Words: The Heart and Heartbreak of Boxing,” at http://bit.ly/fightingwordsamazon or internationally at http://bit.ly/fightingwordsworldwide . Send questions/comments via email at fightingwords1@gmail.com
