827 stories on BoxingScene are published under the Lyle Fitzsimmons byline.
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By Lyle Fitzsimmons - After 917 days on the shelf, Mikey Garcia was predictably anxious to get back to work. And now that he’s returned, already won a pair of fights and added a third weight class title belt to his trophy case, it’s clear that he’s not interested in another respite. Instead, the 29-year-old is te...
By Lyle Fitzsimmons - Don’t look now, but Norway is fast becoming a world boxing capital. Long dormant due to a decades-long ban, the sport has been revived thanks to the efforts of unified women’s welterweight champion Cecilia Braekhus. Braekhus is originally from Colombia but was adopted as a toddler and raise...
By Lyle Fitzsimmons - It was our first time at a live fight card … and the end of a pair of eras. When old pal Phil MacDonald and I hopped in my dad’s Chevy Caprice for a trip from hometown Niagara Falls to the Memorial Auditorium in Buffalo 33 years ago this week – Thursday, to be exact – the consensus around town lean...
By Lyle Fitzsimmons - To love Gary Russell Jr. is to love his contrasts. The soon-to-be 29-year-old went into a Saturday night date with Oscar Escandon fully expecting to beat his opponent, to look good doing so and to ride the momentum into the sorts of fights boxing fans have been drooling over both at and around 12...
By Lyle Fitzsimmons - Gary Russell Jr. admires Bernard Hopkins. But by no means does he want to be Bernard Hopkins. Even as a Saturday night defense against Oscar Escandon draws nearer, the WBC’s featherweight title-holder is already – at age 28 – pondering his career’s final stages. “I plan on finishing this c...
By Lyle Fitzsimmons - Given all he’s accomplished, it’s easy to forget Canelo Alvarez is just 26. He turned pro as a 139-pound teenager, won his first regional title before he could buy a drink to celebrate and was a world champion for the first time at age 20. It’s a level of prodigy that neither Floyd Mayweather Jr. n...
By Lyle Fitzsimmons - Anthony Joshua might have been OK with an easier ascension. But as he stood swollen-faced in a Wembley Stadium ring on Saturday night, the 27-year-old could scarcely have taken a more memorable trip to boxing's most sought-after galaxy. And following a classic 11th-round erasure of a galla...
By Lyle Fitzsimmons - It’s not your father’s TV title fight. Though Anthony Joshua and Wladimir Klitschko’s weekend encounter at Wembley Stadium will resemble their previous 86 outings when it comes to in-ring machinations, it’s by no means par for the course in terms of outside presentation. An...
By Lyle Fitzsimmons - Social media is a fun toy. But when it comes to worthwhile analysis, it frequently falls flat. Case in point. While Twitter tends to buckle under the weight of breathless 140-character missives during and after particularly violent slugfests, it often fails to recognize the litmus tests a match must pas...
By Lyle Fitzsimmons - I made a decision on Saturday night. Or, to be more accurate, I confirmed a decision I’d already considered. Vasyl Lomachenko is the best boxer in the world. Bar none. And to those contrarian masses on social media who’ve suggested such a notion is either beholden to cable conglomerates o...