Just about twelve months
ago I wrote an article looking forward to the year 2007 and the
possible match ups that could happen. Most of them did take
place and we have seen a great year of boxing filled with
quality fights and the best fighting the best.
Here is a review of lucky
number ’07.
The heavyweight division
was supposed to have somewhat of a breakthrough this year with
the hope that a unification title fight would occur. Although
that has not happened, the first scheduled unification fight
since Holyfield fought Lewis, is occurring early next year when
Wladimir Klitschko will face off against Sultan Ibragimov for
the IBF and WBO heavyweight titles.
Sultan became the WBO champion after his
clinical and technical unanimous decision over Shannon Briggs.
2007 also saw the first loss for the “Russian Giant” Nicolai
Valuev when Ruslan Chagaev outworked him over twelve rounds to
capture the WBA title.
In the beginning of the
year, Samuel Peter out boxed and at times embarrassed James
Toney to be recognized as the #1 contender for Oleg Maskaev’s
WBC title. However, due to Maskaev’s injuries, that fight never
took place; instead Peter fought Jameel McCline in a fight where
he was knocked down three times, but still managed to keep his
title with a unanimous decision.
Samuel Peter is slated to
fight Maskaev in March of next year, and Ruslan Chagaev is
scheduled to fight Matt Skelton. There is hope that the two
winners will meet in an effort for another unification title
match. Although 2007 did not provide us with a lot of progress
towards a unified champ, 2008 may, especially since we already
have one unification fight scheduled for next year.
2007 was a good year for
the cruiserweights who had a few good fights. David Haye beat
Jean-Marc Mormeck to capture the WBA and WBC
titles in an absolute war. Haye came off the mat to stop
Mormeck in the seventh round. Welshman Enzo Maccarinelli won
all three of his fights this year to set up a unification fight
with Haye for the WBO WBC and WBA cruiserweight titles. Steve
Cunningham also had a successful year. The
Philadelphia native avenged
his only loss and just days ago knocked out Marco Huck in the
final round of their 12 round bout and he heads into 2008 as the
IBF Champion. It is very likely that we will have an undisputed
Cruiserweight champion by the end of 2008.
The light heavyweight
division -on the other hand- is struggling. It seems that the
only meaningful fights in the division are the same three or
four fighters who seem to just be fighting each other.
Hopkins is considered the best
in the division, even though he seems to fight once a year. His
lone fight this year was against Winky Wright in a snooze-fest
which was ironically dubbed, “Coming to Fight,” even though it
seemed like there were more clinches than punches.
There are a couple of
bright spots for the division, though. Chad Dawson emerged as a
candidate to be the best in the weight class by remaining
undefeated with three wins, and a key one against another
undefeated fighter at the time, Tomasz Adamek. Also, the
talented Rico Hoye was stopped by Adrian Diaconu in the third
round of their fight. He is currently the #1 ranked contender
for
Dawson ’s WBC title. Danny
Green also moved up from super-middleweight to capture the WBA
title in his first fight at 175 lbs. just weeks ago with a wide
unanimous decision win over Stipe Drews. Zsolt Erdei also kept
his undefeated record intact by going 3-0 during the year. The
Hungarian is now 28-0.
Although it is Roy Jones
Jr. and Bernard Hopkins who seem to get the attention when it
comes to the light heavyweight division, it is these fighters
who could improve the light heavyweight division in 2008.
The super middleweight
division definitely had its best year ever. The division has
only been in existence since the 1980’s, nonetheless, the super
fight between Mikkel Kessler and Joe Calzaghe ultimately showed
what talent exists in this division. Both fighters had a
tune-up match earlier in the year before meeting in
Wales on the third
of November. In a classy exciting performance Calzaghe showed
once again why he is indeed the best, even at the age of 35, by
beating Kessler in front of over 50,000 fans. It is not as if
Kessler did anything wrong, Calzaghe just did everything to
perfection. Calzaghe took a comfortable decision to solidify
his stance in the division, and many fans are hoping that he
comes to
America to fight
Hopkins . Yet, this fight may
not occur since
Hopkins has stated he is not
willing to go to the
United Kingdom , and
it does not make a lot of sense for Calzaghe to travel away from
home where he has always attracted fans in tens of thousands.
Another fighter emerged
onto the scene this year. Lucian Bute captured the IBF title
with a stoppage win over Alejandro Berrio in
Montreal . With Anthony
Mundine continuing to win fights, Sakio Bika winning The
Contender and having the always exciting Edison Miranda
campaigning at 168 lbs., 2008 may provide another great year for
the super-middleweight division.
The middleweight division
was a big surprise this year. Few thought that
Taylor would end up fighting
Cory Spinks in a boring fight, and even fewer thought that
Miranda would get destroyed in the ring especially after his win
over Allen Green earlier in the year. Felix Sturm avenged his
only defeat and had a draw against a little known Randy Griffin
in an exciting contest. Nonetheless, if there was one fighter
people did not know about, it was Kelly Pavlik. Many have heard
of him and have seen his record but did not know what kind of
impact he could have on the division.
After a devastating
knockout win over
Jose
Luis Zertuche
earlier in the year, Pavlik had a huge opportunity to
fight Edison Miranda. Miranda was already looking forward to
fighting
Taylor and had been trash
talking
Taylor for some time. If he
needed a wake-up call, Pavlik gave it to him. "The Ghost"
battered Miranda for seven rounds before the referee finally
halted the contest. As soon as the fight was done, Larry
Merchant said the fight with
Taylor and Pavlik had to
happen. The composed and well mannered Pavlik simply said, “Of
course I want to fight the Champion.”
Ironically that was the
underdog to
Taylor ’s fight against Cory
Spinks.
Taylor escaped with a close
split decision and when asked by Larry Merchant if he wanted to
fight Pavlik he said he would fight "whichever fighter brought
the most money."
The fight was made after
some deliberation for the 29th of September in
Atlantic City . No one knew
who would win this fight. Picking one over the other was almost
as big a gamble as playing the slots. Both promised to come
forward and to knock each other out.
Both fighters started the
way everyone anticipated and hoped as they started heaving
bombs. In the second it was only
Taylor throwing bombs as he
landed many flush shots as Pavlik was unsteady on his feet, and
after a few more clean left hooks and overhand rights Pavlik
finally fell to the floor. Courageously, he got back up and
withstood many more flurries by the champion. He finished the
round standing and Jim Lampley said it best, “What and assault,
and what a survival”. That survival was a key factor in the
fight. The forthcoming rounds saw Pavlik using a jab that many
did not know he had. He kept backing
Taylor up and then in the
seventh two right hands sent
Taylor into the corner.
Pavlik has shown how great of a finisher he is in his fights
against Miranda and Zertuche. After a few uppercuts and a
couple of left hooks Steve Smoger stopped the fight declaring
Pavlik the new champion.
A rematch has already been
made for early next year, and we may be in for another dramatic
war.
The super-middleweight
division was relatively quiet this year. The major fight was of
course between Oscar De La Hoya and Floyd Mayweather with a
fight that broke all pay-per-view records for boxing as
Mayweather won a close decision over the “Golden Boy.” However,
there were a couple of other notable fights during the last
twelve months. Vernon Forrest showed that he can still fight,
and in his most impressive performance since wins over Sugar
Shane Mosley, Forrest out boxed and outworked Carlos Baldomir
over twelve rounds to capture the vacant WBC light middleweight
title and then made his first defense with a 11th
round TKO over Italian
Michele Piccirillo. Travis Simms lost the
first fight of his career and his title when Joachim Alcine
outworked him over twelve rounds. The Haitian who now fights
out of
Canada knocked him
down in the fourth round on way to a decision. Roman Karmazin
was also back in the win column with a win over James Obede and
a devastating knockout win over fellow power puncher Alejandro
Garcia.
2008 could see the return
of Ricardo Mayorga at 154. In his last fight he fought Vargas
at a catch weight of 162 pounds. Mayorga knocked Vargas down
twice to seal a decision victory. He may not have the skill to
compete with the best at 154, but he definitely has the mind
games and the entertainment to be a factor in the division.
The welterweight division
is probably the most exciting and talented division at the
moment. Paul Williams emerged as a start after his exciting win
over Antonio Margarito where he threw over 100 punches a round
for most rounds of the fight. Kermit Cintron extended his
knockout win streak to five. He was scheduled to fight Williams
early next year, however, a hand injury he suffered in his
last match up to a very game Jesse Feliciano put that fight on
hold for now.
Joshua Clottey had a few
good wins and hopes to get a title shot sometime next year.
Miguel Cotto had an excellent year with a win over
Oktay
Urkal and then an impressive performance
against
Judah where he
stopped him during the 11th round. He then fought
Mosley in a candidate for Fight of the Year, where he won a
close decision.
However, Mayweather and
Hatton’s fight had a lot of buzz around it and it showed during
the fight. Hatton began by pressing Mayweather and even wobbled
Mayweather in the first round of the fight. He continued to
press Mayweather against the ropes and Hatton brought out the
best in Floyd. The best Mayweather was too much for Hatton
though. Mayweather began to connect with numerous right hand
leads and the lightning speed and counterpunching began to take
a toll on Hatton where he began to rush in too quickly. Hatton
attempted one more lunging punch when he was met with a
Mayweather left hook that sent him down, and on the way down he
hit the turn buckle which did not help his cause. He showed
excellent determination by getting up but Mayweather resumed his
assault and after a few more right hands and left hooks Hatton
went down again and Cortez stopped the fight, giving Mayweather
probably the biggest and best win of his career.
With Hatton going up in
weight the light-welterweight division was fairly quiet. Paulie
Malignaggi emerged as one of the best with an exciting win over
Lovemore N’dou. Junior Witter continued to entice Hatton into
an all British fight; however that fight still does not seem to
be on the horizon, at least for now.
Hatton says that he will return, and he
wants to have a fight in the
United Kingdom first
to show his appreciation to his fans who came out to Vegas to
support him.
It was another great year
for the young lightweight Juan Diaz. After making Freitas quit
on his stool, he landed a lot of leather on Julio Diaz and made
him quit on his stool as well. At the age of 24, he is already
becoming an all-star fighter. However there is hope that he
will fight Australian
Michael Katsidis. With two devastation
performances this year, Katsidis has emerged as an attraction
and a fight was actually slated for himself and Juan Diaz.
However, that fight has been called off and the Australian is
now rumored to be fighting Joel Casamayor.
The other Diaz, David Diaz,
is now scheduled to be fighting Humberto Soto in March of next
year. David edged out Erik Morales this year in what seemed to
be Morales’s last fight.
The super featherweight
division continues to succeed. Pacquiao did not have his best
year however. He seemed to have been distracted a lot by his
fans in the Philippines , and
although he did win both of his fights this year, they were not
as impressive as one might have hoped. However he hopes to
change that when he fights Juan Manuel Marquez in a rematch from
their draw over three years ago. Marquez was down three times
in the first round but got up and managed to fight back on his
own as well to salvage a draw.
Marquez beat Barrera this
year and then followed up by a comfortable decision over Rocky
Juarez. Floyd Mayweather Sr’s protégé Joan Guzman had a good
year with a win over Humberto Soto and he hopes to land a big
fight next year possibly against the winner of Pacquiao and
Marquez. Edwin Valero continued to knock out opponents, and he
hopes that he will be able to fight in
America in the
upcoming year. He may also fight the winner of Pacquiao and
Marquez, and even Guzman. Either way with the talent that
exists in that division, there are many possibilities for many
big fights. Most of them should happen in 2008.
The featherweight division
remains quiet as Chris John continues his dominance.
The super bantam weight
division created a couple of big fights this year. Both
involving Rafael Marquez and Israel Vasquez. Rafael stopped
Israel in the first
fight after Vasquez had trouble breathing. In the rematch,
Vasquez turned the tide stopping Marquez and now a third fight
is slated for next year as well. We may already have the fight
of the year for 2008 even though we are still in 2007.
Daniel Ponce de Leon will continue his
knockout power in 2008. He only had two knockouts out of his
four fights, but his first round annihilation over Rey Bautista
was very impressive. He may be able to fight the winner of
Vasquez and Marquez.
Steve Molitor emerged as well by capture
the IBF title with a knockout over
Takalani Ndlovu and then a comfortable but
hard fought decision over Fahsung 3K battery.
The flyweight division only had one big
fight. Vic Darchinyan was upset by Nonito Donaire when he was
knocked out with a counter left hand. Donaire hopes to continue
his undefeated record in 2008.
We were lucky to have seen such excellent
fights in 2007. Mayweather vs. Hatton, Mayweather vs. Oscar,
Calzaghe vs. Kessler, Cotto vs. Mosley, and Taylor vs. Pavlik
are just some of the huge fights of his year. It seems like the
number seven is lucky.
Who knows, with the way boxing is going
right now, the number eight may become lucky as well.
Enjoy the New Year everyone.
12-16-2007
