Abraham, Arreola and Berto arrive with a Bang

Arthur Abraham jumps from relative obscurity into the mix of middleweights, Chris Arreola separates himself from the pack of contending heavyweights and Andre Berto announces his presence with authority in the welterweight division. On Saturday night June 21rst, 2008, punchers carried the day.

Chris Arreola v. Chazz Witherspoon - I'd watched Arreola once before and wasn't that impressed and to be honest, I'm still not...but he did show up to fight. In this battle of young unbeaten American heavyweights, I favored Witherspoon, mostly because I recalled being underwhelmed by Arreola's simple style when I last saw him and being impressed with Witherspoon's pedigree and boxing ability when I saw him. It just goes to show that boxing agility and ability goes only so far. It was well put when Witherspoon's fight plan was discussed and the commentary was "everybody's got a plan until they get hit...." Arreola must indeed hit hard because he put Witherspoon back on his heels from the start and he kept coming. He's a plodder who wades in and if I'm to be convinced that he is applying some craft, he's going to have to go deeper with someone who can take a punch. Witherspoon clearly can't.

Now...I'm going to say something mean here...so get ready. Chris Arreola's mom surely loves his mug, but I'm betting she's the only one. This guy looks like he fell from the mighty oak of ugly trees, hit a trampoline at the bottom and hit every branch going back up too. I tend to think there's no way this guy can get but better looking the more beatings he takes...so I guess there is real upside to the fact he seems to lead with his face. If he ever gets to be heavyweight champion, maybe he'll be a matinee idol for all the flush shots he's going to take on the way up. So we'll have that to look forward to.

But he can punch. I guess that's going to be enough for now. When he advances a little further, he's going to find that he can't chop down opponents with the ease that he did Witherspoon...but that's okay. He KO'd Witherspoon in round 3 after knocking him down three times going back to round 2. He walked forward, hit hard and showed a finisher's instinct. God help us though if his is the face of the future of American heavyweight boxing.

Andre Berto v. Mickey Rodriguez - Rodriguez, whom I'd never heard of, came in at 23-2 and looked to have some boxing skills...but he never really got to show them. Andre Berto is very fast. Did I say fast? I mean very fast. He started slow (but still won every round, on my card), but by halfway through the second round started to catch his stride and by the fourth was hitting Rodriguez at will, even toying with him. Rodriguez had a significant reach advantage and clearly some technical skill, but he was badly outmatched. Once Berto got his legs fully under him, he was throwing in rapid combination and jumping in and out. Some of his flurries were wildly impressive, like the five left hooks thrown in succession in about a seconds elapsed time. He also showed some pinpoint punching prowess, with his accuracy matched only by my alliterative skill.

But he's young since I'm being unfair and overcritical, Berto wasted a lot of punches and started slow. He should now get a fight with a big name to get his feet wet. With Mayweather out of the picture, the Cotto/Margarito match looms largest and Berto would be in deep with either of them. He's probably not ready. Paul Williams? maybe. Carlos Quintana? Definitely. How about Berto makes his bones with Kermit Cintron? Okay...it's settled...that's the match I want to see. If he can get by Cintron, then he's ready for anyone. And that makes me wonder in turn if Cintron will now be reduced to a gatekeeper fighter! If so, that's quite a gatekeeper...but maybe a test fighter who is that good is appropriate for a division this deep.

Arthur Abraham v. Edison Miranda - Now, I should cop to a truth. If I had written a prediction on this fight, I would have called it for Miranda. Knowing what happened in their previous fight, I would have predicted Miranda by KO. I have (or had?) a high regard for Miranda as a puncher and as a tough guy. The heavy-handed Columbian native lost a close decision to Abraham two years previous after breaking Abraham's jaw in two places and after losing multiple points for low blows. Whatever credit I could accord Abraham for gutting out the decision in spite of the alarmingly disfiguring fractures in that fight was tempered by the knowledge that, as he always had before in his unbeaten career, he fought a home game. He was far more likely to get a decision and get points deducted at home. This time (for the first time) Abraham was fighting in America.

Miranda meanwhile had beaten Howard Eastman soundly, thrashed an intimidating Allan Green and fulfilled the worst nightmares of the Contender's David Banks. He'd even looked very tough for Kelly Pavlik to handle, until Pavlik walked him backwards and seemingly solved him that way. Pavlik had commented post-fight that they'd correctly speculated that Miranda, as a very aggressive come-forward puncher, wouldn't fight well if forced to fight moving backward. At the time, I recall writing that while Miranda seemed indeed solved by Pavlik, the solution would likely prove so dangerous to nearly every other fighter in the division that the cure would almost always kill the patient.

When I saw Abraham come out and fight in spots, move laterally instead of trying to move Miranda backwards and adopt a thoroughly different approach than Pavlik, I was certain he was doomed. I was wrong. First of all, I guess Abraham can punch a little. Certainly after being deposited on his back three times before the 4th round stoppage, Miranda agrees. Now...I tend to think that maybe Miranda had a bad night and maybe he's been softened up a bit. But then, don't tell David Banks that. Miranda highlight reeled him through the ropes not long ago. So ...I guess Abraham can punch a bit.

Having read about him and having seen his ranking, I tuned in to see if maybe Pavlik has someone to challenge him. Maybe he does. Abraham is a counterpuncher and clearly a pretty effective one. He remains unbeaten and after taking that disfiguring beaten against Miranda in the first tilt, he clearly has a chin (what's left of it). Can he give Pavlik a run for his money? We'll see...but he definitely jumped into the consciousness of this realfightfan by dominating a fighter whom I regarded as a very tough customer.

Pavlik Dominated, Williams Rebounds and Mora Finally Emerges

Another fun night for realfightfans on Saturday June 7th, 2008! Let's start with Kelly Pavlik defending the WBC middleweight title against Gary Lockett.

What a pleasure to watch this fighter work. Now...I should add that poor Welshman Gary Lockett having been served up as a mandatory by the WBC seemed almost unfair, but Pavlik deserved a break. Having dispatched the still widely feared and heavy handed Edison Miranda by KO, then taken the middleweight title by KO from the undefeated Jermaine Taylor, then defended the win (if not the title, since it was fought 8 pounds higher at Taylor's request) by decision...Pavlik deserved a walkover. We just hoped that the workmanlike demeanor he displayed in his rise to glory would not abandon him once he stood atop the heap. Indeed it did not. Kelly Pavlik is every bit the "Godzilla" of the division he was acknowledged to be by Max Kellerman of HBO (in a bit of excellent off-the-cuff commentary by Kellerman, when throwing it back to Jim Lampley, after Pavlik said he'd "fight Godzilla" if his promoter told him to).

Clearly prepared, Pavlik dismantled the shorter Brit without much seeming difficulty. Dropping those right hands in behind his long jab, he buckled Lockett's knees in the first round and had him taking a knee three times in the two successive rounds until trainer Enzo Calzaghe wisely threw in the towel in the third to save the courageous, but badly outmatched Lockett from having to endure any further beating. Pavlik exploited his reach advantage practically perfectly and post-fight was the same class act we're getting used to seeing. He gave Lockett respect that he may not really deserve at this level and humbly said he'd fight whomever they put in front of him.

Interestingly, he all but called out Joe Calzaghe. Now...we all know that Calzaghe is on his "Champions Tour", having just dispatched Bernard Hopkins and apparently setting up Roy Jones as his next mark. There's no way Calzaghe wasn' t watching this fight because he's not only a Welshman himself, but his dad is Lockett's trainer. Would I love to see that fight? absolutely. Will Calzaghe take that fight? Not a chance. Pavlik is too technically sound, hits too hard, is too yound and is therefore too great a threat to a man who is now taking his tour of the best fighters whose reputations now far exceed their skills. I'd love to see it, though.

Moving on to Carlos Quintana v. Paul Williams II. I settled in for a long fight, scorecard at the ready. I figured that I'd see round 13 after seeing Quintana time Williams so well in the first 12 round tilt where Quintana not only clearly outworked and timed the until-then seemingly unsolvable (and then-undefeated WBO champion) Williams. Recall that until Quintana exposed him, Williams was by all accounts the most avoided man in the division next to Antonio Margarito...until Williams beat Margarito! Quintana, having lost to Miguel Cotto by KO (for his only loss up to that point), was sure to be easy pickings for Williams. When Quintana outworked and so thoroughly out-timed Williams, it seemed Williams was solved. Many a fighter has been destroyed just this way. Their invincibility shattered, they recede only to re-emerge as lesser beatable versions of their once-formidable selves. Take Ricky Hatton, for example (though to be fair, that whole story is not yet writ).

I recall writing after the first fight that Williams seemed to have abandoned the super-workrate style that made him so difficult for anyone to handle. I thought this was because not only might he have changed his strategy (inexplicably), but because Quintana proved that even a long-armed, talented and super workrate fighter can be timed out and shut down. In the first fight, Quintana never took a breath, was at 100% the whole way and took every opportunity Williams gave him. He dominated by crisp volume counterpunching.

This time was different, though...and that's not to say that I perceived Williams taking a different tack. I'm not sure he did. He was wary as round one began and was measuring Quintana, preparing for a long match and again not jacking up his workrate. I again foresaw a 12 round marathon and the only question would be whether Quintana was as razor sharp this time as last. He clearly was not. Williams floored him 2 minutes into the first round and rising on wobbly legs, Quintana did not have any time to steady himself. Williams waded in and finished him at 2:15 of the first round on a TKO stoppage.

For those of us who saw Williams as one of the serious, tough-to-handle up and comers in the division, we see vindication. Williams had an off night against Quintana the first time, right? But there's a flaw in that reasoning. Not to detract from Williams' spectacular revenge, it could just as easily be explained by Quintana's failure to take Williams as seriously this time around as he did the first time through. The first time, Quintana was hyper-sharp, going in against the undefeated champion who'd just decisioned the universally recognized tough guy Margarito for the title. Quintana was trying to redeem himself from an ugly KO loss to Cotto too. He was high as a kite. He had an almost perfect night, repeatedly timing Williams between his punches, despite Williams' significant reach advantage. If he failed to come in that high this time, he could get beat...and I think that's exactly what happened. Of course, flip that around and Williams still redeems himself immediately against a good boxer with a glass jaw who beat him the first time around by decision and had to fight the best fight of his life that night to do it. That sounds fair, actually...Williams deserves that kind of credit. He avenged his only loss in spectacular fashion.

And now I'm left only to wonder if we'll see the workrate Williams who beat Margarito the next time out...or the "heavy handed" Williams who lost to Quintana, then KO'd him to avenge the loss. I'd like to see the workrate Williams who throws with bad intentions every now and then. That's what it's going to take to gain further position in this super-deep welterweight division which is, for my money, the most exciting division in boxing.

Finally, to the Vernon Forrest v Sergio Mora fight for Forrest's WBC junior welterweight title or as I like to call it...maybe the Contender turned out one talent after all. Now...to be candid, I have to admit that I wrote my prediction on my scorecard before the fight: "Forrest destroys Mora." I was wrong. I had the fight 116-113 for Mora and the official judges had it 114-114 even and 115-113 and 116-112 for Mora. I was loathe to give it Mora, frankly...as unfair as that may be. I hate his style. He reminds me of a young Bernard Hopkins, maybe with less power.

Forrest was classy in the post-fight, refusing to say that he had an off night, giving Mora credit for fighting with a difficult style. That jump-in-and-punch-and-hug style won Bernard Hopkins 20 straight title defenses and punched his ticket to the hall of fame...and nobody wants to buy tickets to see it. It's ugly. But what are you going to do? If we take Forrest at his word, then a long-armed, hard-hitting, sharp-punching champion was outfoxed and outboxed by the next likely long-reigning champion. Certainly, if Mora is to be believed, that's the case.

Notwithstanding his extremely mediocre resume, he had the audacity in the post-fight interview to say this was a "C+" performance. If that's true, he almost can't lose ...because Vernon Forrest, even on an off night (which I definitely think this was...where Forrest came in way over-confident and underprepared for this style, thinking his style and strength would dominate), is head and shoulders above gate-keeper type fighters. Forrest is a championship level fighter at 154 pounds. Mora beat him.

But he beat him by outworking him and by jumping in and punching. Forrest abandoned his jab, not seeming to try with it and miss, but abandoned it altogether. He was seemingly (although surely actually not) content to let Mora dictate the fight. It was an inside fighters fight and instead of punishing Mora for coming in and concentrating on timing him coming in, he let him in and tried to punish him for it. Mora deserves credit for being a better inside, dirty, turning, jumping-in fighter than I thought he was. And that's it. Unless "The Latin Snake" indeed did turn in the C+ performance he claims, he'll be exposed soon enough. Forrest took him lightly, I believe. Mora has now earned the right not to be taken lightly be the next elite level fighter he faces. That will be the true test of whether or not the Contender has indeed turned out a serious talent or simply a fighter who cherry-picked the right fight on the right night.