By Dave Wilcox

The Staples Center in Los Angeles played host for Joe De Guardia’s  Star Promotions and 9,126 fans for what was billed “True Champions: The Winner reigns supreme”. Glen Johnson and Antonio Tarver proved to us what we already knew, championship belts don’t mean a damn thing, the mystical “pound for pound” ranking is what the fighters are truly shooting for. Tarver and Johnson both dropped their respective Championship belts to fight each other for the ever coveted I.B.O. Light Heavyweight strap on Saturday night.

When the fighters came to the center of the ring for instructions, they both seemed to be focused and in good shape. The first round opened with Johnson being the aggressor and trying to set the tone for the fight. He came right at Tarver and worked the body effectively and took the round easily. Tarver settled down a bit in rounds two and three and got back into the fight on activity alone. Rounds four and five went to Johnson and in round five Johnson landed a left uppercut and big right hand that seemed to daze Tarver. In round six, Tarver seemed to be wincing from Johnson’s body attack. Rounds seven through ten went back and forth with Johnson the aggressor and Tarver landing more shots. Round eight in particular had some good action with both guys doing their share of landing. I gave round eight to Tarver.

Going into the final two championship rounds, it was anybody’s fight. Johnson seemed to be the stronger fighter and pushed the fight, but Tarver was landing more shots and has the “name” the judges seem to favor, whether we are in Vegas or not.  Johnson won round eleven in my opinion to set up what looked to be a must win round for Tarver in twelve.  Tarver looked dead tired in round twelve, but managed to pace the action in the first half of the round. The straight left was finding a home for him. As was the case all night, Johnson took it well and came on strong in the latter part of the round to make it yet another hard to score round.  I gave the last round to Tarver. 

As the final bell sounded, my first thoughts were that Johnson was the aggressor and deserved the nod. Tarver threw more punches, but not as effectively as did Johnson.  Then I tallied up my scorecard to find my score 114-114…A DRAW!!!  I hate draws, they have got to be my least favorite thing in Boxing. Now I knew we would be in for an interesting decision. “Slick Willy” Buffer read the cards as follows: Melvia Lathan and Chuck Giampa both had the fight scored 115-113 for Johnson. The honorary “Vegas judge” scorecard award goes to the usually reliable Marty Denkin. He scored the bout 116-112 in favor of Tarver?  A case could be made for a close victory either way, but no way did Tarver win by that margin.

In the end, it was a good bout between two seasoned professionals.  Glen Johnson opened a lot of eyes with his performance and Tarver did nothing to embarrass himself here.  Although I had it a draw, it seemed to me the right man got the decision.

Ringside views:

As is the case at most big fights, press row was split on who won the fight.  I had the pleasure of sitting with Rich Marotta, formally the great Boxing analyst for Fox Sports and now hosts the best Boxing show on Radio, “The Neutral Corner” out here in Southern California on the Super Station XTRA Sports 690/1150.  He also had the fight scored a draw.

Dave Smith, drive time radio host on Los Angeles’ 1540 The Ticket had the fight scored 115-113 for Glen Johnson.

I ran into Harold Ledderman in the press room after the Press conference in of all places, the food line. (Go figure)  As most of you already know from watching on HBO, he had the fight scored 115-113 for Tarver. He told me Tarver was landing more effective blows in his opinion.  Tarver is the house fighter, right?

Press Conference:

Antonio Tarver- “I thought I won.”  “As we all know, I’m great in rematches and will do better in the rematch.” “”Johnson is a great fighter and we are the two best in the world.”  “Let’s do it again!”  

Tarver briefly mentioned a hurt hand during the press conference but quickly changed the subject when nobody was buying it.

Glen Johnson- “I keep coming forward and don’t make excuses.”  “I fought my best fight tonight.”  I will fight Tarver again, anyplace, anytime.”  When asked what he plans on doing right now, Johnson replied, “I’m going back to Jamaica for awhile.”

Dan Goosen- “These guys proved they are the best two light heavyweights in the world.” “Thank you to Joe DeGuardia and HBO.”


Final Punch stats-

The meaningless but popular punch stats as follows:
Total Punches-     Tarver 853       Johnson 796
Total Connected-  Tarver 296       Johnson 217
Jabs Thrown-        Tarver 356       Johnson 425
Jabs Connected-    Tarver 76         Johnson 77
Power Punches
Thrown-                Tarver 497      Johnson 371
Power Punches
Connected-            Tarver 220      Johnson 140 


Other fights on the card:

Maddalone-Smith:
The first fight of the night was a couple Heavyweights. Vinny Maddalone from Queens, New York won a painful fight to watch against juggernaut Ronnie Smith of Hawaii. All three cards had it 60-54 for Maddalone. He improved to 22-2 with 15 KO’s. Smith has some work to do with his 6-32 record. On the bright side, he does have six knockouts

St.John- Archuleta:
Pin up girl Mia St. John fought my grandma and came away with the knockout at 1:46 of round one against Janae Romero Archuleta. St.John improves to 39-4-2 with 16 KO’s. Archuleta falls to 4-10-1 with 2 KO’s. The less we talk about this one, the better we will all be. The word on the street is that St.John might have broken a nail in round one.  I love watching talented women fight, but this wasn’t that.

Ward-Molina:
Our Olympic Gold Medalist was making his Professional debut and got a rousing ovation from the crowd.  Andre Ward from Oakland, CA. showed his speed and totally outclassed Christopher Molina of Odessa, Texas.  Ward landed a nice straight left hand in round one that sent Molina reeling to the ropes. The referee gave him the standing eight count.  Molina continued on, but the inevitable would happen at 40 seconds into round two. Ward landed two nice rights, followed by a left and again Molina would fall back into the ropes. He took a knee and the ref gave him another standing eight. He looked ready to continue, but didn’t respond quickly enough to the referee and the bout was stopped. Probably stopped a bit early, but no worries, the out come was obvious.  I will look forward to seeing Ward in the future. He seems to have the total package. Only time will tell if he has the heart and chin.  Ward is 1-0 with 1 KO. Molina falls to 2-2 with 1 KO.

Simms-Bojorguez:
Undefeated Tarvis Simms Norwalk, CT. survived a second round knockdown at the hands of tough veteran Carlos Bojorquez of Riverside, CA. to win a split decision. Simms outworked Bojorquez in a snoozer. I scored the fight 77-74 in favor of Simms. Simms improves to 20-0 with 11 KO’s, while Bojorquez falls to 23-6-6 with 19 KO’s.

Gonzalez-Telesco
Two former Roy Jones opponents followed the main event. These two guys didn’t quite have the same luck against Jones as those other two guys, but they are good fighters in their own right. Julio Gonzalez of Huntington Beach, CA. was in there against David Telesco of  Portchester, N.Y.  Telesco seemed to set the pace early and was landing some hard shots on Gonzales. I had Telesco winning the first three rounds, but he was tiring fast. As is the case in most Gonzales fights, he can take a beating and keeps coming forward. That’s just what Julio did. From round three on, Gonzales took control and won every round until the eight and final round. Gonzales landed a big right hand to the chin of Telesco and followed it up with a barrage to force the referee to halt the bout at 1:06 of round 8.  It was a good win for a nice kid in Julio Gonzales. He improves his record to 37-2 with 23 KO’s. David Telesco falls 29-5-1 with 24 KO’s.

Random thoughts:

- All night I couldn’t help think I was missing something by not watching on HBO. With Roy Jones doing the fight, it must have been interesting. Then in round eight when the Arena showed Roy’s face on the big screen, the crowd erupted for the loudest response of the evening. Unfortunately for Roy, it was all boo’s. I guess the old adage is right, “what have you done for me lately?”  Maybe if Roy Jones wasn’t so arrogant, people would have more sympathy for him.

- It was sure pleasant to watch to well spoken and talented guys like Glen Johnson and Antonio Tarver fight each other. As much as Tarver talks, he is still a class act and gave Johnson his due at the Press Conference. As far as Johnson goes, how could you not like this guy? He did it the hard way. He is our “lunch pail” guy.

- Fighter of the year front runner has to be Glen Johnson. Two big wins against Jones and Tarver is quite impressive. Runner ups would be Marco Antonio Barrera and Diego Corrales in my opinion.

- Pat Russell is still the best Referee in the business.

- Iron Mike Tyson and James Toney were ringside for the fight.  It’s a good thing I was too busy, or else I would have whupped both their asses!! Well ok, maybe not, but I might be able to take Merchant.

- One final thought, I saw the former great Decathlete, Bruce Jenner at the fight. I think he stole Michael Jackson’s nose.

I will look forward to the Johnson-Tarver rematch. Who needs the WBA/IBF/WBC when the two best fighters in their division will fight each other for the I.B.O. strap?

Until then, keep punching!