By Eric Thomas: In the latest boxing news, undefeated super middleweight Joe Calzaghe (45-0, 32 KOs) injured his right wrist while training on a heavy bag for his upcoming September 20th bout with Roy Jones Jr. (52-4, 38 KOs) at Madison Square Garden, in New York City. However, the bout will go ahead anyway a month in November unless the 36 year-old Calzaghe re-injures his wrist again. According to his father, Enzo Calzaghe, who told Setanta Sports that the fight will continue and that Joe just needs a little extra time to recover from his wrist injury, which suddenly swelled up after a heavy pad workout.

Joe Calzaghe has a history of injuries usually involving his left hand rather than his right, which has caused him to postpone other bouts. However, given his history of hand injuries it makes sense for him to take the time off rather than risk taking the fight and end up fighting with only one hand and losing to Jones. Calzaghe didn’t exactly impress in his last fight against Bernard Hopkins in April, a fight that Calzaghe narrowly won by a 12-round split decision. Many boxing fans felt that it was the 43 year-old Hopkins that actually should have been awarded the fight due to his harder and cleaner landing shots in comparison to Calzaghe’s slapping shots. Read more…

By William MacKay: For those boxing fans who didn’t see Cuban featherweight Yuriorkis Gamboa (11-0, 9 KOs) take out Al Seeger in the 1st round on Friday night, they missed out on an impressive performance from the young Cuban star, who at this point looks almost destined to be a champion in the featherweight division. Though he was no less impressive while fighting as a featherweight, there was some question as to whether Gamboa was seasoned enough to beat a top super featherweight like Edwin Valero, Humberto Soto or Juan Manuel Marquez.

Any of those fighters, in particular Soto, would have been a very tough fight for Gamboa given their size and power advantage they would have over the smaller Gamboa. With Gamboa’s recent move down to the featherweight division, he effectively removes all of the bigger threats to him from the face of the map, leaving him as perhaps the best fighter in the division. Of course, I’m sure featherweights Jorge Linares, Chris John and Steven Luevano might have something to say about that. Read more…

By Chet Mills: Light middleweight Richard Gutierrez (24-2-1, 14 KOs) fought to an eight-round majority draw the Jerome Ellis (11-8-2, 10 KOs) on Friday night at the Buffalo Bill’s Star Arena, in Primm, Nevada. The bout was another bit of disappointing news for Gutierrez, 30, a one-time top 10 ranked fighter in the welterweight division. He was coming off a 5th round TKO loss to hot light welterweight prospect Alfredo Angulo in May, and was doing himself no favors by fighting so soon and in only an eight-round bout, which would greatly benefit Ellis more than him. I personally had Gutierrez winning easily, seven rounds to one due to the much bigger shots he was landing in every round of the fight, even if he was hit slightly more often by the light-hitting Ellis.

Gutierrez fought well in the 1st round, throwing good combinations to the head and body of Ellis. Although he didn’t have nearly the same blazing hand speed as Ellis, his punches landed with much more force. Ellis, 29, who had previously lost his last four fights coming into Friday’s bout with Gutierrez, fought reasonably well when he was in the center of the ring, which allowed him to take advantage of his faster hands and better movement. Read more…

By Jim Dower: If there was ever a fight that will likely end with a disqualification, it’s the upcoming non-title fight between unbeaten Kelly Pavlik (34-0, 30 KOs) and 44 year-old Bernard Hopkins (48-5-1, 32 KOs) on October 18th, in Atlantic City, New Jersey. In his prime, Hopkins, a champion whole held the middleweight title for 10 years, was nearly unbeatable against the mostly limited opposition he faced during that time. That, however, is over with, and he’s been on the serious decline in the past three years, losing three out of his last five fights during that stretch of time.

You could easily make the argument that Hopkins should really have four losses out of his last five fights, because many boxing fans feel that he actually lost to Winky Wright, whom he beat by a 12-round unanimous decision in June 2007. I, too, felt that Wright did enough to get the win based on his better punching in the bout. Whatever Hopkins once was as a fighter, he’s not nearly as good as he used to be, especially with his offensive capabilities. Read more…

By Nate Anderson: Making his first appearance after a crushing defeat to Brian Vera four months earlier, middleweight Andy Lee (16-1, 13 KOs) took out Willie Gibbs (20-4, 16 KOs) in the 10th round at the University Arena, in Limerick, Ireland. Lee looked a lot improved since his last fight, keeping both his hands up most of the time to protect his chin, moving more often and mixing it up much less often than in his last fight with Vera. In the 10th round, with Gibbs attacking him fiercely and landing big right hands, Lee suddenly dropped Gibbs with a right-left combination to the head.

Gibbs got up, staggering visibly, and attempted to fight on. Almost immediately, Gibbs retreated along the ropes, or rather he slid along the ropes as if they were greased with oil. In reality, his legs were completely gone and he could barely stand up. Lee calmly went after him and drilled him with four consecutive straight left hands to the head, further staggering Gibbs, and causing his corner to throw in the towel, which landed around Gibbs’ head, obscuring his vision briefly while being attacked by Lee. Read more…

By Chris Williams: Welterweight Chas Symonds (14-1, 5 KOs) defeated Alexandrs Spitko (4-6, 3 KOs) in a quick controversial stopped in the 3rd round on Friday night at the Goresbrook Leisure Centre, Dagenham, in Essex. Both fighters were trading shots in the 3rd round, when Symonds landed several big shots that caused Spitko to back up to the ropes temporarily where he then clubbed him with a left hook that pushed him off balance against the ropes. At this point, the referee Jeff Hinds moved in and halted the fight at 2:16 of the round. However, Spitko, 22, looked fine and ready to continuing fight.

Neither fighter focused much on defense or the use of a jab in the fight, as they threw bombs at each from the very first round. Symonds, 26, appeared to get the better of the action in the first round, land some big hooks to the head and body. However, Spitko continued pressing the fight to Symonds and hitting him with big shots repeatedly. At first, it seemed as if Symonds would be too much for Spitko, because he was hitting him with some really big right hands in the 1st half of the round. However, Spitko returned fire in the second part of the round, and hit Symonds with some tremendous shots to the head. Symonds, a good fighter, didn’t focus much on his defense during any part of the round, which made it easy for Spitko to land his shots. Read more…

By Aaron Klein: In easily the biggest, toughest fight of his short boxing career WBA welterweight champion Miguel Cotto (32-0, 26 KOs) will be putting both his unbeaten record and title on the line against the punching machine Mexican Antonio Margarito (36-5, 26 KOs) this Saturday night in a 12-round bout at the MGM Grand, in Las Vegas, Nevada. Cotto, 27, a former light welterweight, is going up against one of the biggest welterweights he’s faced since moving up to the division in December 2006. Up to this point, Cotto has faced mostly smaller, less offensively skillful welterweights than Margarito, ones that he could either out-slug or out-out-punch on the inside.

However, he may need to find a new way to win if he plans on being successful against Margarito, who appears to be a level or two above the competition that Cotto has faced thus far since moving up to the welterweight division. That’s not a knock on fighters like Zab Judah, Shane Mosley, Oktay Urkal, Carlos Quintana or Alfonso Gomez, because each of them are good fighters, but as far as being in the same class as Margarito, they’re clearly not. Read more…

By Manuel Perez: For most people, the thought of Manny Pacquiao, currently the WBC lightweight champion, every fighting a fighter as big as welterweight Oscar De La Hoya, seemed laughable due to the huge size differences between the two fighters. Indeed, most boxing fans that dared mention such a match up in boxing forums on the internet were quickly ridiculed and laughed off the board.

However, things may have changed with De La Hoya, 35, planning on fighting for the final time in his career in December, and with Pacquiao’s recent move up in weight to defeat WBC lightweight champion David Diaz in a 9th round TKO in June. Now, Top Rank promoter Bob Arum is reportedly in meetings with Golden Boy Chief executive officer Richard Schaefer about a December 6th bout between Pacquiao and De La Hoya. For Pacquiao, 29, this fight would work out perfectly, because he’s got an open date around that time with no scheduled opponents. He had been hoping to fight Ricky Hatton at that time, but Hatton isn’t interested instead in fighting IBF light welterweight champion Paulie Malignaggi in November. Read more…

By Sean McDaniel: Middleweight prospect Andy Lee (16-1, 13 KOs) looked impressive on Saturday night in the process of stopping American Willie Gibbs (20-4, 16 KOs) in the 10th round at the University Arena, in Limerick, Ireland. Lee, 24, fought much more cautiously than he had in his past fights, that is, until the 10th round, when he found himself under a heavy attack by Gibbs, who was disparately behind in the fight and trying to score a knockout.

Lee, however, seemed pleased to finally lift the restraints on his own offense and went after Gibbs with some big shots, dropping him with a perfect right hand to the head. Badly hurt, Gibbs dragged himself off the canvas and attempted to fight on. Lee, however, smelling blood now, teed-off on a shaken Gibbs with a flurry of shots, which led to Gibbs’ corner to throw in the towel to signal surrender. The fight was officially stopped by referee Emile Tiedt at 2:46 of the 10th round. Read more…

By Erik Schmidt: Looking as if he wanted to be anywhere rather than the boxing ring, journeyman Taurus Sykes (25-5-1, 7 KOs) was stopped in the 4th round of a scheduled 10-round bout tonight by IBF number #1 ranked contender Alexander Povetkin 16-0, 12 KOs) at the Olimpyskiy Sports Palace, in Chekhov, Russia. Sykes, 33, whose body language seemed to indicate that he wasn’t interested in fighting, was eventually taken out by Povetkin in the 4th after the Russian landed two consecutive right hooks, neither of which landed flush, but none the less sent Sykes down. He stayed down for the count, only attempting to get up after the referee had counted him out at 0:48 of the 4th round. The win sets up Povetkin, the IBF mandatory challenger, for bout with heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko likely later on this year.

Povetkin, 28, a former 2004 Olympic Gold Medalist for Russia, whose biggest problem in the fight was catching up to the constantly running and clinching Sykes, who made it tough for Povetkin in the first three rounds to land his powerful punches. However, Povetkin adapted well to Sykes’ defensive posture by charging at him frequently and landing two to three shots before being clinched by Sykes. Read more…

By Thomas Hanson: Former WBC heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko (35-2, 34 KOs) turned 37 today. At an age where most fighters are in retirement, Vitali is making a comeback on October 11th against WBC heavyweight champion Samuel Peter. It’s been nearly four years since Vitali last entered a boxing ring in a professional fight, and with that vast amount of time that has gone by, there are big questions whether Vitali can even make it into the ring, let alone beat a fighter as good as Peter.

There’s a lot riding on Vitali being able to avoid getting hurt again, for if he does this it may signal the end of his plans on getting a title shot without having to work his way back to the top by fighting a number of fights. That obviously will probably never happen if Vitali is injured before he steps foot in the ring with Peter in October, as I see him quickly retiring rather than trying to push himself through training, praying that his brittle body doesn’t let him down one more time like it has in the past on numerous occasions. If his body can hold together for one fight, he may very well end up winning the heavyweight title from Peter, because even with the vast amount of time away from fighting, Vitali has much more boxing skills than Peter has at this point. Read more…

By Nate Anderson: Despite being penalized on three separate occasions in the final two rounds, British heavyweight Danny Williams (40-6, 31 KOs) was able to defeat John McDermott (25-4, 16 KOs) by a 12-round majority decision to win the BBBofC British heavyweight title last night at the Goresbrook Leisure Centre, Dagenham, in Essex. The final judges’ scores were 114-111, 114-113 and 113-113. I personally had Williams winning by 114-111, even with the three penalizations, which I felt was way out of line for the minor things that Williams was doing in the fight.

The timing of the fouls that were called - two in the 11th and one in the 12th - seemed somewhat strange, as it seemed to coincide with McDermott being hopelessly behind in the right. Without the points taken away from Williams, this was a pretty much one-sided fight with the pudgy-looking McDermott only appearing to win the 5th round. After the 5th, McDermott was exhausted, having blown his load and unable to muster anything other than feeble jabs for the rest of the fight. Read more…

By Jason Kim: Unbeaten Cuban featherweight Yuriorkis Gamboa (11-0, 9 KOs) stopped Al Seeger (27-4, 21 KOs) in a sensational 1st round TKO last night at the Buffalo Bill’s Star Arena, in Primm, Nevada. After eating a lot of jabs for most of the round against the taller Seeger, Gamboa finally unloaded on him with a four-punching combination, first hurting him with a left to the midsection and then finishing him off with a right to the head which dropped Seeger, 28, to the canvas on his back. Referee Robert Byrd immediately stopped the fight at 2:30 of the 1st round with Seeger still flat on his back on the canvas.

If there were any doubts how well Gamboa would perform after his last disappointing performance in his last fight, they were soon erased as Gamboa hurt at the two minute mark with a powerful three-punch combination to the head. Previous to that, Seeger had been using his height and reach to keep the shorter Gamboa on the outside, using a stiff jab to pound away at him. Read more…

By Thomas Hanson: For most of Wladimir and Vitali Klitschko’s boxing career, the two brothers have steadfastly refused to fight each other, pointing out some old obscure promise that they both gave to momma Klitschko years ago in which they promised her that they would never fight each other. However, with Vitali Klitschko (35-2, 24 KOs) about to take on Samuel Peter for the WBC heavyweight title on October 11th in Germany, I think the two brothers need to revisit that promise and perhaps get momma Klitschko change her mind. I mean there’s nothing wrong with two brothers fighting each other, is there?

I have two brothers and I fought them constantly from a kind until my teenage years, winning some and losing others. It never bothered me and I didn’t hate them if I lost or if they won, and the same with them. heck, if you brought in gloves, which we did on a couple of occasions, my mother was never afraid of us fighting. At least with gloves on, we had some padding instead of using just our fists which was more often the case. The important thing is, our egos weren’t so fragile and twisted that we wouldn’t hold a grudge if we lost. Read more…

By Matt McGrain: Matchmaking as it was understood in the 40’s and 50’s is something of a forgotten art. Fighters were often brought along much more quickly in those days, matched against tough contenders and prospects with similar records as a matter of course. Steadily increasing quality of competition led to a strict learning curve for prospects and sharp test for established stars or those attempting to rebuild careers. The difference was very simple; the 0. “Undefeated” is the word at this time, the fewer defeats a fighter has on his record, the “more elite” that fighter is said to be. A loss can turn a contender with TV support to a gatekeeper all but overnight, and later in a fighter’s career a loss can de-rail title aspirations entirely - just look at what has happened to the prospects of Junior Witter in recent weeks.

Don’t blame promoters and don’t blame fighters - this is just a sign of the times. Fighters fight less, so of course losses come to mean more. With fighters having become more protected in such a climate, undefeated boxers have become more common later in their careers and undefeated boxers are easier to market. That is just the way things are. But it wasn’t always this way . Losing used to be expected. With one title to fight for in fewer divisions prospects were running into stiffer competition much sooner. Read more…

By Dan Ambrose: Middleweight prospect Andy Lee (15-1, 12 KOs) hopes to get back on the winning tract tomorrow night against Willie Gibbs (20-3, 16 KOs) in a 10-round bout at the University Arena, in Limerick, Ireland. After being dubbed as the best prospect in the world bar none by his trainer Emanuel Stewart, Lee went out and got taken apart by Brian Vera in a t-round TKO loss at the Mohegan Sun Casino, in Uncasville, Connecticut, in March. Although Lee came close to scoring a 1st round knockout himself, Vera escaped the round, and in the following rounds he would make it a grueling bout for Lee, hurting him often with right hands, and busting up his face something awful.

By the 7th round, Lee looked as bad as Stewart pupil Wladimir Klitschko did when he suddenly wore himself out against Lamon Brewster in Klitschko’s 5th round TKO loss in April 2004. Lee would later point out that he made a major mistake by trying to slug it out with the bigger, stronger Vera, whom he probably could have easily beaten if he had focused on boxing him rather than trying to stand in front of him and trade shot for shot. Read more…

By Jason Kim: Undefeated Cuban super featherweight star Yuriorkis Gamboa (10-0, 8 KOs) fights tonight against last minute replacement Al Seeger (27-3, 21 KOs) in a 10-round bout at the Buffalo Bill’s Star Arena, in Primm, Nevada. Gamboa, 26, is hoping to make an impressive statement tonight with a quick knockout performance. Up until his recent fight against Darling Jimenez in May, Gamboa had looked impressive. However, that fight exposed him as having huge gaps in his defensive abilities, as well as problems with his stamina and conditioning. Tonight, Gamboa will be fighting as a featherweight rather than a super featherweight, where Gamboa’s excellent power will likely enable to be even more of a threat than he was in he higher weight class. Gamboa apparently has little problem moving either up or down in weight, as long as it’s only in small five pound increments.

A 2004 Gold Medalist from Cuba, Gamboa has quickly proven himself to one of the top super featherweights in the division after having fought only 10 fights. Ranked number#3 in the WBC, Gamboa is being moved forward with lightning speed by his handlers, who must see him as ready to fight for the championship. Read more…

By Sean McDaniel: After three years away from boxing, former heavyweight champion of the world Riddick Bowe (42-1, 33 KOs) is planning on making another comeback against Zoltan Petranyi (40-20, 8 KOs) in a 10-round bout on September 12th, at the Krúdy Gyula Gimnázium, in Gyor, Hungary. According to boxing writer Steven Bunce, Bowe is already in training for his comeback bout.

Bowe, 41, hasn’t fought in over three years since defeating a small 5′11″ Billy Zumbrun by a 10-round decision. At the time of the fight, Bowe weighed a hefty 280 lbs, and fought poorly throughout. In the 5th round, he was hurt by a right hand from Zumbrun and spent the better part of the round taking tremendous punishment along the ropes. Bowe, however, rallied and used his excellent jab to control the remainder of the fight, although he continued to periodically take big shots from Zumbrun until the end.

For those that saw Bowe against Zumbrun, many had hoped that Bowe wouldn’t continue on with his career, for it seemed clear that he no longer had the conditioning, youth or movement to contend against better heavyweights in the division. Read more…

By Jim Dower: In a bit of disappointing news, undefeated middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik (34-0, 30 KOs) will be moving up to 170 lbs to face 43 year-old Bernard Hopkins on October 18th, in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Pavlik, 26. had been hoping to land fights against a variety of opponents, such as Joe Calzaghe, Sergio Mora, Winky Wright and Paul Williams. However, Pavlik’s promoter, Bob Arum, was unable to work out deals with any of them, leaving only Hopkins as the best option for a big money fight for Pavlik. Unfortunately for boxing fans, this is a fight that will likely be a less than thrilling match up given Hopkins’ advanced age, which by the time the fight occurs in October, Hopkins will be almost 44 years-old.

Besides the age factor, Hopkins, as he proved in his last fight with Calzaghe in April, isn’t an opponent that will stand and trade shots with Pavlik like most boxing fans are hoping to see in a Pavlik bout. More likely, Hopkins will stay on the outside, moving constantly, and occasionally coming inside to throw a fast 1-2 combination followed by a clinch. In other words, a grind it out type of fight similar to the old style of heavyweight John Ruiz. Read more…

By Nate Anderson: Hard-punching British heavyweight Danny Williams (39-6, 31 KOs) returns to the ring tonight after only two months since his highly exciting controversial bout with Russian Konstantin Airich on May 30th in Spain. Williams, 35, will be facing John McDermott (25-3, 16 KOs) for the BBBofC British heavyweight title at the Goresbrook Leisure Centre, Dagenham, in Essex.

This is a fight that is almost guaranteed to end in an early knockout one way or another, for both fighters like to slug it out early in their fights, although McDermott, 28, the more technical of the two fighters, has the ability to box when he wants to. In two out of his last three fights, Williams has been hurt early on in his fights with Oleg Platov and Airich, but both times he came roaring back to score impressive knockouts. Williams isn’t likely going to change his brawling style against McDermott tonight, so one could expect another early knockout, whether that be Williams or McDermott. As usual, Williams will be coming into the bout in his mid 260s, which is a good weight for him, since he previously defeated Mike Tyson at that weight four years ago in July 2004. Read more…