By Cliff Rold
Freshly tri-belted Super Flyweight titlist Vic Darchinyan (31-1-1, 25 KO, WBC/IBF/WBA Super) wasn’t the only one with something to celebrate on Saturday night. In terms of Darchinyan’s future plans, his promoter Gary Shaw could feel just as elated. Already one of the few marketable sub-Featherweight fighters in the U.S. market prior to the fight, Darchinyan may look forward to the biggest paydays of his career following Saturday’s upset knockout win of Mexico’s Cristian Mijares. Shaw will have a lot to say about where, and with whom, those paydays come.
Speaking with Shaw the morning after the fight, the promoter was open to what most would already assume as the obvious possibilities when asked for thoughts on where Darchinyan goes from here. “He goes wherever he wants because he’s the first fighter ever to unify that division. Probably a fight that we’d like would be (Jorge) Arce. To us, that’s a little unfinished business in that two and half years ago Vic was chasing Arce all over the world. We chased him to Mexico; to Texas…that’s a fight we would do.”
Arce-Darchinyan was once big talk when both were still three pounds south in the Flyweight division, but promotional interests and other options. Arce was a winner on a separate Top Rank show Saturday night. Considering the regular appearances of both on U.S. TV, and their all-action styles, it would be an easy sell to fight fans.
Further, complete unification was also discussed. “Fernando Montiel is another one we would do for the fourth belt.” Shaw stated, referring to the current WBO 115 lb. titlist viewed before, and still after, Saturday’s Darchinyan-Mijares bout as no less than the number two man in class. “Arce is a bigger fight when you talk about marketability. Montiel would be meaningful in that nobody’s ever unified 115. The thought of one fighter having all four belts probably would never be duplicated again.”
“If I told you the other two fights he wants, you wouldn’t believe me.” Shaw continued. “He wants to fight (Rafael) Marquez and (Israel) Vasquez. When he said Marquez, I had to ask him ‘Who’s Marquez at 115?’ He said, ‘No, Marquez at 122.’”
One fighter who, according to Shaw, will not be under consideration is the only man to defeat Darchinyan, current IBF Flyweight titlist and Top rank charge Nonito Donaire. Asked if Donaire would be a difficult rematch to make considering previous contract issues between he and Shaw, Shaw was clear in stating it would. “That fight won’t happen, not because of Vic but because of me. When a fight is as disloyal as he was to me, when I did nothing to him, why would I give him a shot at winning three belts. Had he been with me, obviously he would have had the shot. It would have been a rematch and it would have been for all the belts. What could have been better for Donaire but to have had the 112 lb. belt and move up in his next fight for all the belts at 115. My suggestion now is that he stays at 112 or moves to 118 or,” he continued, referring to the mutual Top Rank promotion of both men, “let him go fight Arce.”
Shaw also answered questions about the overwhelming numbers in the press who’d picked against Darchinyan. “I think it shows the press doesn’t know as much as the press thinks it knows…Darchinyan had no respect for the resume of Mijares. He thinks Arce is a B-fighter who he’d knock out within three rounds; Navarro, Mijares had a lot of problems with…Don’t get me wrong, I have a lot of respect for Mijares. He’s a great Mexicano, a very, very good fighter who throws very accurate punches. If you read every interview I gave before the fight, I had the highest respect for Mijares. I drank the Kool-Aid; I didn’t want the fight. It’s Darchinyan who wanted the fight; I drank the same Kool-Aid you guys drank.”
Asked about what he thought as he saw the fight unfold on Saturday, as Darchinyan’s advantage in handspeed exploded through the defense of Mijares almost from the beginning, Shaw compared the bout to another night in his career with a result almost completely opposite to Saturday’s. “I’ve had two out of body experiences in my life. One was (former Shaw charge Jeff) Lacy getting torn apart by (Joe) Calzaghe. The other was watching Vic Darchinyan just destroy Mijares as if they weren’t even on the same level.” In terms of his favorite career night’s as a promoter, Shaw put it only slightly behind the Vasquez-Marquez trilogy and the first 2005 bout between Diego Corrales and Jose Luis Castillo, still the leading candidate for fight of the decade.
Shaw also took the time to address other fighter’s he’s currently working with, including rising young Light Heavyweight star, IBF titlist Chad Dawson (27-0, 17 KO). Of particular interest, as stalwarts Joe Calzaghe, Bernard Hopkins, and Roy Jones play out the late phase of their inter-era rivalry, was what big fights are out there for Dawson after toppling veterans Glen Johnson and Antonio Tarver in 2008. Shaw was asked first about a potential IBF mandatory with currently #1-rated Tavoris Cloud (19-0, 18 KO).
“Tavoris Cloud will not be fighting Chad Dawson. That I will guarantee you. I wouldn’t know Tavoris Cloud, and the public wouldn’t know Tavoris Cloud, if he passed through here to get a cup of coffee in the snack bar I’m sitting at. That’s not gonna’ happen. Chad wants to narrow the old guys in Boxing, which means Winky Wright, Hopkins, Calzaghe and Roy Jones, and clear the way for the young guys (the press) should be concentrating on. They are the future of Boxing, which means Dawson, Andre Dirrell, Andre Berto. They’re the future of Boxing and that’s what Boxing needs; young, new bright faces rather than keep bringing back the old guys.”
With the older faces Dawson is interested in, at least for the moment, tied up, Shaw was asked about a potential bout garnering buzz amongst some of the sports hardcore fans between Dawson and a man seven pound south of him, WBA Super Middleweight titlist Mikkel Kessler (41-1, 31 KO). “If Kessler wants to come to 175 and come over here to the United States, that would be a possibility.”
In terms of young stars, Shaw also discussed exciting Jr. Middleweight hopeful Alfredo Angulo (14-0, 11 KO) and his desire to match Angulo with former World Welterweight champion Ricardo Mayorga, but noted that’s still well in the discussion phase.
Cliff Rold is a member of the Ring Magazine Ratings Advisory Panel and the Boxing Writers Association of America. He can be reached at roldboxing@hotmail.com
