May Flowers & Mayday hails
Cinnamon Toasts and Crunches
May 6th - Estadio Akron, Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico
Und - Canelo UD John Ryder
This was definitely not the Canelo we know and love. In the immediate aftermath, we talked on B-Sides if this was the beginning of the end for the Undisputed Super Middleweight champ and given the news that has been coming out in the last few weeks it seems to be the case. John Ryder was the mandatory challenger to his WBO belt, so that one has been satisfied but there are still three others that have mandatory fights lined up, the more notable being WBC and WBA - David Benavidez and David Morrell respectively. It seems, however, that Canelo has other plans. Word on the vine is that Canelo is looking at a fight at Cruiser with Badou Jack or the long-awaited return of Middleweight champion Jermall Charlo. As promoters are wont to do, they present a few options with the least tantalizing being the obvious probability. Getting Charlo across the aisle would be a big ask, even for a Canelo payday, and the likelihood of Canelo working with PBC, even on a fight-by-fight basis, doesn’t seem likely.
WBC - JCMartinez TKO11 Ronal Batista
Not a whole lot going on here, which isn’t a good thing. Martinez carries a belt in a relatively hot division. Bam most definitely not going to let Martinez get away with the shit he has been pulling lately and we’ll see how good Sunny looks. That’s all I have to say about that.
A Case of Mistaken Referees
May 13th - Stockton Arena and Chelsea Ballroom at The Cosmo
WBO - Zhanibek Alimkhanuly KO2 Steven Butler
Not too much to say on this other than reaffirming that Jack Reiss seems to be determined to have someone die under his tutelage. Butler was clearly not all the way there after the first knockdown, but if you wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt you could let him continue and it wouldn’t that bad of a call. However, after the second knockdown, it was obvious that fight needed to be over. Instead of doing the right thing for safety of the competitors, Reiss lets the fight continue, allowing for Zhanibek to make Butler look like a bobblehead the way he was rocking him.
WBA - Rolando Romero “TKO9” Ismael Barroso
This is a case where the referees were mistaken. Reiss’ bloodlust should have been in the ring with Romero and Barroso because Weeks’ stoppage call was unbelievable. Being a boxing fan, there are levels of fuckery you’re prepared to accept but this was egregious on a completely different level. Trigger-happy Weeks should have been in with Butler, maybe that fight would have been stopped sooner and Butler would have been spared a lot of unnecessary damage. Instead we got to see Barroso, who clearly didn’t read the script beforehand and was without a doubt winning the fight, get waved off by Weeks after a sequence of punches that did not land. The word robbery gets thrown around a lot, so much so that it dilutes the significance of it, but this was a bona fide robbery: winning that belt would have given Barroso life-changing options for follow-up fights, which at his advanced age won’t be coming again.
Undisputed^2, Haneychenko
May 20th - 3Arena, Dublin and MGM Grand Garden
Und - Chantelle Cameron MDec Katie Taylor
Katie Taylor in another barn-burner. Unfortunately she took her first L in a close and very entertaining fight, but she’s activating her rematch clause so we’ll get another one. Cameron, despite being an undisputed champion, came into this a much less known quantity, but she showed her grit and earned the win.
Und - Devin Haney UD Vasyl Lomachenko
Remember how I said that the word robbery gets thrown around too much? This is one of those cases. This is apparently a controversial opinion, but Lomachenko was not robbed; 7-5 Haney is not a bad outcome. On the flip-side, 7-5 Lomachenko wouldn’t have been bad either. But to say this was a robbery, corruption, and all the rest of it is hyperbolic to the point that it makes me want to over-correct and sing Haney’s praises from the rooftops. Lomachenko fought valiantly, I personally saw a draw, but again 7-5 either way is not corruption. People are just mad that everyone’s little darling, Boxing Jesus, didn’t get the win.
WBO - Junto Nakatani KO12 Andrew Moloney
This was a super fun fight. Fight of the night, in my opinion. Scary knockout, I was legitimately worried seeing the way Moloney went down. I clown on the Moloney brothers often, but I don’t want anyone to be seriously hurt. Moloney definitely changed my opinion of him, his grit and tenacity was very respectable and admirable. Super Fly is definitely cooled off with the old guard on their way out the door; there are a few other Japanese fighters that could make for decent shows in Japan, but if he wants to unify titles below are options. Like I said, Estrada seems to be on his way out; Martinez is across the aisle with PBC so that may be out; Franco is a Top Rank fighter, and I expect Top Rank put options on Nakatani before the fight, so that’s one to watch out for.
IBF - Fernando Martinez, Arg.
WBA - Joshua Franco, USA.
WBC - JF Estrada, Mex.
Oscar Valdez UD10 Adam Lopez
I was not overly impressed with this performance from Valdez. There were suspicions and implications of issues in Valdez’s game, but all was confirmed against Shakur. Now this was supposed to be his get-back fight and it was pretty uninspiring. Now he has a race to the bottom lined up aganist Navarrette, which is hilarious, and I don’t know who is going to be worse.
Britain wins a battle in the Aztec War
May 27th - Vitality Stadium, Manchester Arena, SSE Arena
WBA - Leigh Wood UD Mauricio Lara
Lara missed weight, so he wasn’t going to keep this title either way. That sucks. I was really enjoying the Aztec Invasion meme that I was pushing. If you’re not aware, there has been a long string of Mexican boxers being brought over to UK and beating the hometown boys. It was to the point that when Jose Felix knocked out Gary Cully on the Cameron-Taylor undercard, commentary exclaimed “we keep bringing these Mexicans over here and they keep knocking our boys out”. Lara decided to throw the Brits a bone, apparently, which isn’t true. Wood’s plan seemed to be the same as the first fight, wherein he was winning until he lost. This time, he kept winning until he won. Congrats to him. I hope he going for the unification with Lopez soon.
IBF - Luis Lopez KO5 Michael Conlan
Now this is more my speed! I have made it very clear through multiple platforms on multiple outlets that I loathe Mickey Conlan. It’s important for me to qualify that by saying I have absolutely no valid reason or basis for this, which is all the worse because he seems like a nice enough fellow. Unfortunately, being a nice enough fellow isn’t enough when you have a charging Buck in front of you. Lopez applied good pressure while the fight lasted and Conlan couldn’t hold up against it.
WBC - Rey Vargas (mandatory vs Figueroa next)
WBO - Robeisy Ramirez (defense on Fulton-Inoue undercard)
For both of these Featherweight champs, the road to undisputed is not an easy one. Vargas has his mandatory challenger, Brandon Figueroa, next. I anticipate Figueroa winning that, so that would make a redwood the WBC titleist that I don’t think even Lopez has the power to chop down. Robeisy is much more on the crafty, technical side, which would make for a fun fight with Lopez, but the disadvantages against Fig are too great. Lara is still a player at Featherweight if he wants to stay, but that remains to be seen.
WBO - Chris Billam-Smith MDec Lawrence Okolie
The ride had to come to an end at some point and thus the Okolie story takes a setback. CBS does throw himself to the top of a pretty weak division, where his only real opposition is Jai Opetaia (IBF). Badou Jack (WBC) and Arsen Goulamirian (WBA) have some considerable shortcomings that make them almost non-factors: Badou being old as dirt and Goulamirian being so unnoteworthy that I had no idea who he was until a few months ago. I mean to say that I keep up with the sport almost religiously, including divisions like Cruiserweight that people don’t really care about, and homie is a non-entity. Jai-CBS is the fight to make.
