Krusher Kovalev vs Andre The Ward of Oakland In Vegas?

Heresy I say! The boxing suits finally managed to drag out Andre Ward from his underground manger in Oakland out into the bright lights of the worst nightmare of his dreams, Sergey Kovalev @ the T-Mobile Arena, Las Vegas, Nevada, Saturday, November 19th in the aftermath of the post US presidential election apocalypse…And?

It was like waiting for the other shoe to drop as the weeks ticked forward. Son of Who? could have bung his knee, dislocated his shoulder, or even suffered a papercut or broken nail at the last minute, but since here is likely more money than he’ll ever see again, and it’s not really that much compared to the bigger boxing draws, his new beleaguered promoter, Roc Nation, finally bucked him up the best they could to send into the trenches.

“Man, how come you so down on Ward?”

Quick answer is, though he mouths off the usual pasty platitudes of respecting boxing and his opponents, in his last fight against Alexander Brand, SOW? took home $850,000 to Brand’s emaciated $30,000, so how is taking on the lowest, most pitiable bidder on the rung willing to fight him for next to nothing respecting the sport? He took 97% of the total purse, tossing the impoverished 3rd world citizen Brand 3% of the gristle, absolutely beyond the pale of common decency. He, boxing officials, establishment media, and his fans have proven to be utterly shameless in his orchestrated promotion to the top, so let’s move on to how this alleged “fight” goes in theory.

In my best loony Uncle Teddy voice shouting out abject TERROR on the air:

“Ward is the impala on the savanna and Kovalev the leopard stalking in the grass. The impala knows he makes a good lunch for the leopard, so he has to keep moving and looking sharp. THERE’S A LEOPARD IN THERE HIDING OUT WAITING TO POUNCE ON HIM AND MAYBE LIONS TOO. So, how can the impala figure to get out of this stretch of savanna alive?“

“Easy answer is he employs the smartypants loony Uncle Teddy plan.”

“The impala needs to keep irregular lateral movements to keep the leopard from setting up to time him, maybe mesmerize him with a feinting shake of his heinie a time or two until he can sprint for more open ground. Sure, Mr. Impala’s got those scary horns that could do terrible damage and all that, but the leopard is smart enough to know not to jump into a dangerous frontal attack. Ultimately the impala has no chance against a leopard, so he has to do what impalas do best if they wanna survive. Don’t slug against a slugger and don’t box against a boxer, and don’t ever fight against a leopard! You run like your smartypants are on FIRE ’til you’re a FIREMAN, and then you run so fast that the fire is extinguished and the leopard becomes but a spot on the horizon before pulling up. Mission Accomplished.

No problems until you get matched against a cheetah, but not now. Better to delay that confrontation for a year or two as you pad out your time against journeyman leopards who don’t know no better, but in the here and now, this Kovalev is a different kind of spotted leopard who knows better than the rest of those bum leopards, so best to move on to Plan C which is pray like a crazy loon and hope the judges and ref bail you out like in your other hometown fights.”

Kovalev vs Ward

In a more serious vein, this video might explain the reluctance of top light heavies, Adonis Stevenson and Ward to fight Kovalev. I know he has a family to think of, but if he’s so concerned about his life these past 5 years to effectively grind his career to a halt, he’s in the wrong business. Perhaps his master plan is to pad out his growing Imelda Marcos shoe collection hobby into a business, you know, creating a Son of Who? Museum where folks would travel from all over the world to see his personal collection of shoes. Needs some extra income for those upgrades, hence Kovalev.

Life After Death a video on the tragic Sergey Kovalev vs Roman Simakov bout, and BTW, Kovalev is reported to have donated his entire purse of his last fight in Russia against Isaac Chilemba to the Simakov family, not just a measly 3%:

So why do I think the first time poor Son of Who? gets hit clean, he’ll be wanting to take a little nappy with his shoe collection. How’s this:

Is Ward the last great African-American boxer?

“Boxing’s decline in the United States contrasts with its growth in Eastern Europe and elsewhere, writes Sunni Khalid.”

Folks, I don’t make this stuff up. Truth is Stranger Than Fiction Every Day…The End is Nearing…We’ve seen this house domestic American Ward in his home environs too many times spoil, run, butt, swinging elbows, hit on the break, low blow, and otherwise pull out all his illicit stinker tricks with no intervention by his personal referee whenever faced with a superior opponent, so this could never be a great fight unless the internationally tested Russian Kovalev knocks him out. There’s always the over and under wagers, so plan your stinker crap shoot accordingly.

 

 

Timothy Bradley vs Brandon Rios @ Crossroads

Current WBO welter champ Timothy “Desert Storm” Bradley, 32-1-1, 12 KO, and former titlist Brandon Rios, 33-2-1, 23 KO, will tee it up Saturday, November 7, at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas in what is being marketed as something of a war.

Desert Storm vs Bam Bam

Unfortunately, this may well turn out to be a track meet by Bradley who continues to suffer from serious blows to his noggin that seem to have diminished his former capacity to fight at the highest level. In his last outing, the light hitting prospect Jessie Vargas had enough in him to knockout Bradley had they been officiated in a fair fight. Unfortunately, California has it’s own pitiful referees to match Vegas, so after a big punch slumped Bradley badly to the ropes with just enough time to finish him off as Vargas flurried furiously in the waning seconds of the fight, referee Pat Russell waived off the fight to stop the punishment, a clear TKO victory for Vargas.

But wait, wait, this is boxing we’re talkin’ about. Boxing reserves the right to reverse any decision in a moments notice regardless of merit with no deference to the existing rules or to the resulting controversy.

The ridiculous Russell seemingly heard ding-dongs chiming in his noggin, claiming to have heard the final bell, which is quite loud and distinctive so as to be heard over the din of sound created by the crowd suddenly lurched to their feet by the impending upset after what had been a sure lopsided decision for Bradley. Russell’s TKO verdict was promptly overruled by, ahem, himself, and, whew, close call that one. The easily bruised, sacrificial lamb in waiting, Bradley, was successfully delivered up somewhat lopsided to this date for yet another banana skin slip’em up.

Sadly, Top Rank has been propping up Bradley past his sell date after Manny beat his legs and confidence out of him in their first fight only to lose the Robbery of the Century in Vegas. Bradley wasn’t a draw back then, but the controversy made him more marketable to other fighters and fans who saw the damaged goods as I saw him. It didn’t help Bradley that the public turned on him like rabid dogs complete with death threats and a dearth of hate mail that put him in a depressive funk as anyone would suffer, he has my sympathies in that regard, after all, the decision was rendered by the typical suspect boxing judges, not by him in an otherwise courageous fight just to survive on two injured legs.

Ruslan Provodnikov was next in line after Pacquiao to get robbed, yupsir, by the same goof Pat Russell who can’t ever seem to figure what the hell is ever going on the ring. Ruslan caught Bradley in the opening round with a shotgun blast that sent Bradley to his knees clutching at Ruslan in a futile effort to stay up. Incredibly, Russell ruled a slip, and no sooner had Bradley gotten up from his “slip” than he fell into the best drunken chicken break dance since Zab Judah got one punched by Kostya Tzyzu a several years back and went down again. That’d be two knockdowns by Ruslan with one punch if boxing ever kept score that way, but he never got credit for even the single knockdown for thanks to Russell’s boner that would’ve made Ruslan the victor, not Bradley.

Most reputable refs would have stopped the bout for a Ruslan KO win right then and there, but sadly reputable and referees and boxing seldom meet in this current boxing climate.

No siree, no commie Ruskie is gonna take down an American in Russell’s court of law, so then equally blind judges awarded the “close” bout to Bradley who mostly ran around to avoid getting creamed further until his legs finally gave out and he was caught again in the last round. In his next bout Bradley got the best of a very close exchange early on with the 40 year Juan Manuel Marquez, yet then chose to run for the rest of the incredibly boring, non-participatory bout by Bradley who used to relish the good fight, but no more. Marquez was disgusted at the tactics and the decision, but then again, why should Bradley take any unnecessary chances against this new BALCO trained monstrous version of Marquez?

I can sort of see his point of view for that, but then he lost the rematch to Pacquiao where he looked utterly clueless again, almost club fighter like, and then on to a draw against an awkwardly strong club fighter, Diego Gabriel Chaves. In spite of his stellar record on paper, he lost his Ring P4P ranking in their recent staff shakeup and has further dropped down to 15th in Boxrec. Bradley used to be the alpha dog in the ring, dictating the pace and the style, but no more. His destiny now seems hellbent to cultivating the beta side of him as his physical advantages over opponents slowly decline.

So here he is against Rios who is a big, strong, powerful, pressure fighter with reasonably quick feet when on pursuit. Bradley has to run to maybe survive since he can no longer handle this kind of punching power or pressure, but now he has to worry if his legs can carry him for all 12 rounds. I’d sure like to see a fair decision out of boxing once in a blue moon, but we might as well be baying at a lunar eclipse while praying for the winning lotto ticket. Rios has had some training issues of missing weight during his lower weight classes in the past that have made him a big target of critics, but since Robert Garcia has trained him, Rios has successfully moved up in weight and been drilled into better shape with better discipline and game plan.

Rios still has to make weight at 147, so can he do it first try? That may well prove to be the key in this matchup. Can Bradley survive the guaranteed onslaught? His new trainer, the loonytunes buffo Uncle Teddy, can he even make it out of training camp without blowing everyone’s head gasket? Bradley’s damaged legs aren’t saying much yet, but we’ll be finding out soon enough.