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Your weekly random thoughts …
• One of the many things I love about Showtime's Super Six World Boxing Classic is that when I'm writing about it or talking about it, I don't have to think about Manny Pacquiao or Floyd Mayweather. But speaking of the Super Six, it seems awfully likely that the Andre Ward-Andre Dirrell super middleweight title bout scheduled for Sept. 25 is going to be postponed.
We're about six weeks out and there has not been a news conference, there is no site and tickets are not on sale, which you can't do without a site. That's not exactly a good way to promote a highly significant title fight between 2004 U.S. Olympic teammates and medal winners.
Keep in mind that the site for the Mikkel Kessler-Allan Green Group Stage 3 bout of the tournament -- Herning, Denmark -- which is also on Sept. 25, was announced a couple of weeks ago. Further, the site (Monte Carlo) for the final Group Stage 3 bout, Arthur Abraham-Carl Froch, which is on Oct. 2, was also announced a few weeks ago.
But with regard to Ward-Dirrell, there has been nothing but silence.
When I asked Dirrell promoter Gary Shaw about the situation the other day, he didn't want to get into it. When I asked again to please be honest about it, his response was, "I can't be honest. I'm a promoter." Maybe he was saying that in jest, maybe not. So when I pressed him further, Shaw told me to ask Dan Goossen, Ward's promoter.
So I did that. When I talked to Goossen on Thursday night and asked him to clarify the situation, he didn't provide a real answer, electing to duck it like David "The Ducker" Haye is ducking Wladimir and Vitali Klitschko.
• So if Mayweather really isn't thinking about boxing, like he said recently in reference to why he wouldn't talk about fighting Pacquiao in the fall, why exactly is he running around with Don King? And why exactly was he so interested in being at the fights with King in St. Louis last week? Just askin'.
• Al Haymon is so reviled by some in the boxing industry that there are people -- powerful people -- I hear from almost on a daily basis who are openly rooting for King to sign Mayweather.
• So Bob Arum finally said what we all knew -- that the Pacquiao-Antonio Margarito fight won't be in Abu Dhabi. Boy, I'm shocked, just shocked. All along, I thought it had a better chance of landing in Macau.
• That HBO is planning a "24/7" for Pacquiao-Margarito sounds to me like the show is about to jump the shark.
• Not only is the WBC disgusting, it's also ******. It awarded Rafael Marquez the idiotic "silver belt" at junior featherweight even though he won it as a featherweight when he stopped Israel Vazquez in their fourth fight in May. So let me see if I have this right: Now you can win a WBC trinket in a division in which you didn't even compete? Beautiful. No more making weight to win a title! You know what that means, right? Any day now we ought to see Jose Luis Castillo come in as a welterweight but be awarded the lightweight silver strap. What will they think of next!
• Giant thumbs down to Showtime for not buying a co-feature on Sept. 18 when Marquez challenges featherweight titlist Juan Manuel Lopez.
• After seeing Devon Alexander struggle against Andriy Kotelnik, how good does that make Amir Khan look? Khan, of course, scored a virtual shutout against Kotelnik last year.
• If Juan Manuel Marquez doesn't fight Khan in the fall, I'd love to see him stay at lightweight and defend the title against Michael Katsidis, who just so happens to be one of his mandatory challengers. I think that would be a barnburner.
• So Alfredo "Perro" Angulo turned down $750,000 to challenge Sergio Martinez for the middleweight championship at a catch weight with the guarantee of an HBO comeback fight if he lost and his junior middleweight ranking being protected. Hey, the man wears a dog collar. Nobody ever accused him of being a rocket scientist.
• Guarantees of life: death, taxes, Ivan Calderon by decision and Haye running from the Klitschkos like he was Usain Bolt hearing a gun go off while in the starting blocks.
• Who's psyched to see Dmitry Pirog's next fight?
• As much as I respect what Cornelius "K9" Bundrage did in laying waste to Cory Spinks last week to win a junior middleweight belt, let's be honest: A big part of the reason he did what he did was because Spinks is a shot fighter.
• I sure hope Top Rank isn't teasing us about making Fernando Montiel against Nonito Donaire in the fall.
• DVD pick of the week: There's nothing like a little Prince Naseem Hamed action to ****e up a week. I decided to go back a decade ago this month -- Aug. 19, 2000, at the Foxwoods resort in Mashantucket, Conn. -- to rewatch the second of the three Naz fights I covered at ringside. Hamed, one of the best pure punchers I've ever seen, defended the featherweight title in typical electrifying fashion when he met Augie Sanchez, who had great power but no chin. As he usually did, Hamed had predicted a spectacular knockout leading into the HBO fight and he got it, blowing Sanchez away with a massive knockout in the fourth round. Hamed detonated a ferocious and pinpoint four-punch combination -- left, right, left, right -- on Sanchez's chin that sent him from the ring on a stretcher. But before the big knockout, Sanchez, the heavy underdog, put a giant scare into Hamed, rocking him in the second round and later scoring a clear knockdown even though the referee ruled it a slip. Hamed admitted afterward it should have been a knockdown. Two rounds later it hardly mattered as Hamed scored one of his many highlight-reel knockouts.
• One of the many things I love about Showtime's Super Six World Boxing Classic is that when I'm writing about it or talking about it, I don't have to think about Manny Pacquiao or Floyd Mayweather. But speaking of the Super Six, it seems awfully likely that the Andre Ward-Andre Dirrell super middleweight title bout scheduled for Sept. 25 is going to be postponed.
We're about six weeks out and there has not been a news conference, there is no site and tickets are not on sale, which you can't do without a site. That's not exactly a good way to promote a highly significant title fight between 2004 U.S. Olympic teammates and medal winners.
Keep in mind that the site for the Mikkel Kessler-Allan Green Group Stage 3 bout of the tournament -- Herning, Denmark -- which is also on Sept. 25, was announced a couple of weeks ago. Further, the site (Monte Carlo) for the final Group Stage 3 bout, Arthur Abraham-Carl Froch, which is on Oct. 2, was also announced a few weeks ago.
But with regard to Ward-Dirrell, there has been nothing but silence.
When I asked Dirrell promoter Gary Shaw about the situation the other day, he didn't want to get into it. When I asked again to please be honest about it, his response was, "I can't be honest. I'm a promoter." Maybe he was saying that in jest, maybe not. So when I pressed him further, Shaw told me to ask Dan Goossen, Ward's promoter.
So I did that. When I talked to Goossen on Thursday night and asked him to clarify the situation, he didn't provide a real answer, electing to duck it like David "The Ducker" Haye is ducking Wladimir and Vitali Klitschko.
• So if Mayweather really isn't thinking about boxing, like he said recently in reference to why he wouldn't talk about fighting Pacquiao in the fall, why exactly is he running around with Don King? And why exactly was he so interested in being at the fights with King in St. Louis last week? Just askin'.
• Al Haymon is so reviled by some in the boxing industry that there are people -- powerful people -- I hear from almost on a daily basis who are openly rooting for King to sign Mayweather.
• So Bob Arum finally said what we all knew -- that the Pacquiao-Antonio Margarito fight won't be in Abu Dhabi. Boy, I'm shocked, just shocked. All along, I thought it had a better chance of landing in Macau.
• That HBO is planning a "24/7" for Pacquiao-Margarito sounds to me like the show is about to jump the shark.
• Not only is the WBC disgusting, it's also ******. It awarded Rafael Marquez the idiotic "silver belt" at junior featherweight even though he won it as a featherweight when he stopped Israel Vazquez in their fourth fight in May. So let me see if I have this right: Now you can win a WBC trinket in a division in which you didn't even compete? Beautiful. No more making weight to win a title! You know what that means, right? Any day now we ought to see Jose Luis Castillo come in as a welterweight but be awarded the lightweight silver strap. What will they think of next!
• Giant thumbs down to Showtime for not buying a co-feature on Sept. 18 when Marquez challenges featherweight titlist Juan Manuel Lopez.
• After seeing Devon Alexander struggle against Andriy Kotelnik, how good does that make Amir Khan look? Khan, of course, scored a virtual shutout against Kotelnik last year.
• If Juan Manuel Marquez doesn't fight Khan in the fall, I'd love to see him stay at lightweight and defend the title against Michael Katsidis, who just so happens to be one of his mandatory challengers. I think that would be a barnburner.
• So Alfredo "Perro" Angulo turned down $750,000 to challenge Sergio Martinez for the middleweight championship at a catch weight with the guarantee of an HBO comeback fight if he lost and his junior middleweight ranking being protected. Hey, the man wears a dog collar. Nobody ever accused him of being a rocket scientist.
• Guarantees of life: death, taxes, Ivan Calderon by decision and Haye running from the Klitschkos like he was Usain Bolt hearing a gun go off while in the starting blocks.
• Who's psyched to see Dmitry Pirog's next fight?
• As much as I respect what Cornelius "K9" Bundrage did in laying waste to Cory Spinks last week to win a junior middleweight belt, let's be honest: A big part of the reason he did what he did was because Spinks is a shot fighter.
• I sure hope Top Rank isn't teasing us about making Fernando Montiel against Nonito Donaire in the fall.
• DVD pick of the week: There's nothing like a little Prince Naseem Hamed action to ****e up a week. I decided to go back a decade ago this month -- Aug. 19, 2000, at the Foxwoods resort in Mashantucket, Conn. -- to rewatch the second of the three Naz fights I covered at ringside. Hamed, one of the best pure punchers I've ever seen, defended the featherweight title in typical electrifying fashion when he met Augie Sanchez, who had great power but no chin. As he usually did, Hamed had predicted a spectacular knockout leading into the HBO fight and he got it, blowing Sanchez away with a massive knockout in the fourth round. Hamed detonated a ferocious and pinpoint four-punch combination -- left, right, left, right -- on Sanchez's chin that sent him from the ring on a stretcher. But before the big knockout, Sanchez, the heavy underdog, put a giant scare into Hamed, rocking him in the second round and later scoring a clear knockdown even though the referee ruled it a slip. Hamed admitted afterward it should have been a knockdown. Two rounds later it hardly mattered as Hamed scored one of his many highlight-reel knockouts.
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