By Eric Thomas: While watching former WBA super welterweight champion Junior Witter (36-2, 21 KOs) struggle in this past Saturday’s bout with Timothy Bradley, I got a general sense that Witter, 34, is past his prime and should really strongly consider ending his career. He looked well past it and his advanced age seems really has nothing to do with my thoughts on this. Many fighters still can fight effectively well past 34, Lennox Lewis, a prime example of that. But, in Witter’s case, he looked old and slow from the very get go, struggling with both his timing and his speed against the younger, stronger Bradley.

I’ve seen many of Witter’s fights and have been a big fan of his for many years, and for that reason I kept out hope for him that he would somehow eventually start fighting like his old self and take over the fight. The problem was, this isn’t the same fighter that I’ve come to know in the past. Witter’s speed was largely gone and his defense, once impregnable and nearly flawless, was wide open for pretty much anything that Bradley chose to throw his way. When Witter was dropped in the 6th round by a badly telegraphed right hand from Bradley, that pretty much clued me in that Witter just doesn’t have it anymore. Read more

By Erik Schmidt: Edison Miranda (30-2, 26 KOs) hopes to get a fair decision this time out when he takes on unbeaten middleweight Arthur Abraham (26-0, 21 KOs) in their revenge match in June 21st at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino, in Hollywood, Florida. Miranda, 27, was given what many people consider a poor decision when he lost to Abraham by a controversial 12-round unanimous decision in September 2006. Miranda, who dominated most of the rounds, breaking Abraham’s jaw in the fourth round and appearing to do more than enough to get the win over Abraham.

However, Miranda was penalized a total of five points in the fight, ranging from low blows to the use of his head. There’s no question that Abraham was guilty of using his head on one occasion but as far as the low blows go, those were punches on the border of Abraham’s beltline and it seemed way out of line to penalize Miranda for such questionable shots. Worse, however, was that the fight was stopped in the fourth round to have Abraham’s jaw looked at by a ring side doctor. Abraham ended up being allowed to continue fighting but he mostly was limited to brief flurries in every round, missing the vast majority of his punches every time. Abraham only landed a small handful of punches in each round following the fifth round, while taking tremendous punishment from Miranda, who continuously landed big bombs with both hands. Read more

By Aaron Klein: After last Saturday’s split decision loss to undefeated American Timothy Bradley (22-0, 11 KOs), a fiercely determined vowed to fight on, saying “I’m still going to carry on, no way am I retiring after that,” Witter said. “There’s a lot more in the tank. There are better nights for me to come and Junior Witter will be back - as a world champion.” To be sure, Witter, 34, still seems to have a lot in the tank based on the closeness of the fight against Bradley. If not for his tiring out in the last three rounds of the fight, Witter would have won the fight. Even then, Witter still came close to getting a draw.

The loss, however, does have a big impact on Witter’s career because he now is no longer in the running for a potential bout with Ricky Hatton. It was a long shot at best regardless of whether or not Witter won the fight, because Hatton had shown zero interest in fighting him all these years when Witter was winning constantly. Now that he’s lost to Bradley, obviously Hatton will use this as an excuse to side step Witter for the remainder of his career. Read more

By Chris Williams: Undefeated British featherweight Paul Truscott (11-0, 1 KOs) defeated Osumanu Akaba (10-4, 8 KOs) by a tough 12-round unanimous decision on Friday night to win the vacant Commonwealth (British Empire) featherweight title at the Eston Sports Academy, Middlesbrough, in Yorkshire. Truscott, only 22, traded rounds with the hard-hitting Akaba, who refused to give any ground to the highly skilled Truscott. The final judges’ scores were 116-112, 115-113 and 116-112, all for Truscott. Many of the rounds were very close and difficult to score because Akaba often wouldn’t land as many shots as Truscott, yet his punches were much harder than the weaker-punching Truscott.

In the first round, it appeared that Akaba would simply be too strong for the rail-thin Truscott as landed a high number of powerful hooks to the head of Truscott. However, after being dominated for the first two minutes of the round, Truscott showed what was in store for Akaba later on in the fight, as he began to return fire with piercing combinations and excellent hooks. Though his punches were not even close to being as hard as Akaba, they were thrown with excellent form and were quite constant in nature. Read more

By Manuel Perez: Fresh off his 6th round stoppage at the hands of Julio Cesar Chavez Jr., in December 2007, light middleweight Ray Sanchez (21-2, 15 KOs) squeezed out a close 10-round majority decision over Patrick Thompson (13-13-1, 5 KOs) on Friday night at the Isleta Casino & Resort, in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The final judges’ scores were 97-93, 96-94 and 95-95. It was a mostly ugly fight with Sanchez doing a lot of running and clinching for most of the bout, and landing counter shots whenever he’d spot an opening in the defense of Thompson.

For his part, Thompson, 35, put a lot of pressure on Sanchez for the entire fight, keeping him against the ropes for much of the action where Thompson would land mostly body shots and a small amount of uppercuts. It looked overall as if Thompson had done more than enough to get the decision but the outcome came to no surprise to me because Sanchez was fighting in his own hometown. Some in the audience weren’t in full agreement with the ultimate decision, however, as they loudly booed Sanchez afterwards. Like I said, he looked to have lost the fight by at least 1-2 rounds, and wasn’t the one making the fight. Read more

By Scott Gilfoid: In an especially badly scored fight, BBBofC English lightweight champion John Murray (24-0, 12 KOs) defeated Youssef Al Hamidi (4-9-1, 1 KOs) in a scheduled 8-round bout at the Nottingham Arena in Nottinghamshire, England on Saturday night. Murray, 23, won by the score of 77-75, which seemed like a gift decision because it was Hamidi who appeared to win six of the first eight rounds of the fight. Many in the crowd hated the decision and gave a chorus of boos to Murray, letting them know what they thought of the decision. To say that Murray struggled against Hamidi would be putting it lightly.

In most of the rounds of the fight, Murray couldn’t lay a glove on Hamidi, as he followed him around the ring taking repeated shots from the 5’5” Syrian born fighter. Up until the 7th round, Murray was only able to land in the single digits against the elusive Hamidi, who used foot movement and twists of his torso to dodge the slow and labored punching style of Murray. In terms of speed, Murray has got to be one of the slowest punching lightweights I’ve seen, and it’s frankly astonishing that he’s a champion of anything. Whatever the case, he may have got the decision but he didn’t win the fight, not as far as I’m concerned. That was a case of a fighter winning when they shouldn’t have. Read more

By Eric Thomas: WBC light welterweight champion Junior Witter (36-2, 21 KOs) lost a narrow 12-round split decision to undefeated American challenger Timothy Bradley (22-0, 11 KOs) at the Nottingham Arena, Nottingham, in Nottinghamshire, England, on Saturday night. Witter, 34, was knocked down once in the fight after getting hit with a big sweeping right hand in the 6th round. Witter trailed in the first half of the fight, looking four of six rounds. He then rallied and appeared to win rounds seven though nine. After the 9th round, however, Witter faded badly and allowed Bradley to retake command of the fight.

In turn, Bradley would go on to win the remaining rounds 10 through 12. The final judges’ scores were 115-113, 114-113 for Bradley and 112-115 for Witter. I personally scored it 115-113 for Bradley. I had hoped that Witter would win the fight because I wanted him to continue exerting pressure on former light welterweight champion Ricky Hatton, who has been reluctant to fight Witter for some reason. With this loss, this now gives Hatton an even better excuse not to fight Witter. Though I highly doubt Hatton will get anywhere near the new champion Bradley, who like Witter, would box circles around Hatton and very likely knock him out like Floyd Mayweather Jr. did in their recent championship bout in December. Read more

By Dave Lahr: In a stay busy fight, undefeated super middleweight contender Carl Froch (23-0, 19 KOs) destroyed his Polish opponent Albert Rybacki (15-1, 8 KOs) in the 4th round on Saturday night at the Nottingham Arena, in Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England. Froch, 30, the #1 ranked fighter in the WBC super middleweight division, controlled every round, hurting Rybacki with tremendous shots. The end came in the fourth after Froch landed a series of hard combinations, ending with a big uppercut that snapped the head back of Rybacki. The referee John Keane them moved in and stopped the fight at 2:35 of the 4th round. Froch looked good throughout, although he tended to load up a bit too much in the fight, making him seem kind of slow and mechanical in the process.

The fight was never expected to be a competitive bout, since Rybacki, 37, was nowhere near the same class as Froch. However, the win served a purpose in that it kept pressure on WBC champion Joe Calzaghe, who will either have to make a decision to fight Froch, the number one contender, or vacate the belt. Froch said afterwards about Calzaghe, “He has to give it to me (a fight) or vacate the belt.” Read more

By Erik Schmidt: Undefeated WIBF Women’s International Boxing Federation flyweight and WBA Female flyweight champion Susi Kentikian (21-0, 16 KOs) successfully defended her titles with a destructive 1st round TKO of American Mary Ortega (29-5-2, 8 KOs) of a scheduled 10-round title bout at the Brandberge Arena, Halle, an der Saale, in Sachsen-Anhalt, Germany, on Saturday night. Kentikian, 20, making her second defense of her WIBF title, dropped Ortega twice in the 1st round and was pummeling her against the ropes afterwards causing the referee to come to Ortega’s rescue and stop the fight.

Ortega, 27, never had a chance in the bout, as she was stopped with a blistering 1-2 combination from Kentikian just seconds into the fight. I’m not quite sure whether Ortega ever recovered from the knockdown because it was a devastating combination, which Ortega seemed to never see coming. The reason for that, perhaps, is because Kentikian started slow in the round, mostly throwing weak combinations with very little power put on the shots. She seemed to just be trying to make contact with Ortega and wasn’t loading up with her shots like she usually does against her opponents. Ortega, though, should have had an idea that Kentikian can punch a little because she’d knocked out 15 of her 20 opponents going into the fight, which should have been evidence enough that Kentikian is a fighter that you have to be very careful with in the ring. Read more

By Nate Anderson: #15 IBF ranked light welterweight contender Mike Arnaoutis (19-2, 9 KOs) easily defeated a badly overmatched and previously unbeaten Lanardo Tyner (19-1, 11 KOs) by a lopsided 12-round unanimous decision on Friday night at the Bally’s Hotel & Casino, in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The final judges’ scores were 118-110, 118-110 and 116-112. Speaking of overmatched opponents, on the undercard undefeated heavyweight prospect Devin Vargas (16-0, 7 KOs) flattened Dave Brunelli (8-4, 2 KOs) in the 1st round.

Going into Friday’s bout, Tyner, 32, had done a lot of talking about how he was going to take Arnaoutis to school in the ring. However, it was immediately clear in the first round that Tyner didn’t have the skills with which to back up his claims and it would be he who would be getting a boxing lesson. The southpaw Arnaoutis, 28, used a lot of jabs and straight left hands in the 1st round to easily win the round. Tyner attempted to crowd him as much as possible, working his way in close where he was able to land some good shots. However, Tyner’s hand speed was lacking and so was his work rate, which wasn’t nearly as high as the busy Arnaoutis. Read more

With the poise of a seasoned veteran, Palm Springs, California’s Timothy ‘Desert Storm’ Bradley made the most of his first world title shot Saturday at the Trent FM Arena in Nottingham, England, decisioning highly regarded hometown hero Junior Witter over 12 rounds to win the WBC junior welterweight championship of the world.

Scores were 115-113, 114-113, and 112-115 for Bradley, who used a sixth round knockdown of Witter to help earn the victory. Read more

By Jim Dower: In perhaps one of the best heavyweight fights in recent memory, the 6’5” Chris Burton (11-0, 6 KOs) defeated journeyman fighter Lee Swaby (22-20-2, 11 KOs) by an eight-round unanimous decision on Friday night at the Eston Sports Academy, in Middlesbrough, Yorkshire. Burton, 27, one of the top heavyweight prospects in the UK, traded bombs with the 31 year-old Swaby for the entire eight round fight, dropping Swaby once, in the 5th round. Burton, however, struggled much of the time with Swaby, who landed big shots frequently in the fight and hurt Burton on a couple of occasions.

However, Burton never backed off at one time in the fight, instead continuing to fire back with beautiful combinations and a big right hand that gave Swaby a lot of problems in the fight. When he was on offense, Burton looked remarkably well, showing more power and skill than most of the current top heavyweight contenders in the division, including Ruslan Chagaev, the WBA heavyweight champion. Read more

By Chris Williams: Undefeated Polish middleweight prospect Patrick Majewski (8-0, 5 KOs) survived a 2nd round scare in which he was knocked down by a big right hand from his opponent Ariel Espinal (6-3-2, 2 KOs) to come back and win by a 4-round unanimous decision on Friday night at the Bally’s Hotel & Casino, in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The final judges’ scores were 38-37, 38-37 and 38-37, all for Majewski. Aside from the 2nd round where Majewski, 28, briefly visited the canvas after being surprised by a big sweeping right hand from Espinal, most of the other action was dominated by Majewski, who showed an excellent jab and good skills despite his momentary lapse in the 2nd. Read more

By Manuel Perez: Undefeated light welterweight prospect Mike Alvarado (21-0, 14 KOs) stopped Michel Rosales (16-2, 14 KOs) in the 7th round of a scheduled 10-round bout at the Isleta Casino & Resort, in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on Friday night. Alvarado, 27, considered one of the top prospects coming up in the light welterweight division, staggered Rosales, 25, with a big right hand at the end of the 6th round. Knowing that Rosales probably hadn’t recovered from the shot, Alvarado went right after Rosales in the 7th round and took him out with a flurry of big combinations, causing referee Rocky Burke to step in and halt the fight while Rosales was still standing at 1:28 of the 7th round.

Early on Alvarado looked mostly boring, somewhat like a smaller version of Winky Wright, except that Alvarado’s defense what rather porous to say the least. Though Rosales rarely threw any punches in the first round, he scored virtually every time he let his hands go. Alvarado, however, let his offense work as his defense as he continuously threw a steady rain of jabs over and over again. Occasionally, he’d throw a decent right hand, but mostly he’d miss with his power shots. Indeed, Alvarado’s accuracy was downright terrible despite the fact that Rosales wasn’t using any head movement or attempting to duck any of the shots. Read more

By Aaron Klein: With the recent announcement of former WBC Vitali Klitschko (35-2, 34 KOs) and the current WBC heavyweight champion Samuel Peter (30-1, 23 KOs) to fight in October for the championship, one has to wonder how much Vitali will have left for the bout. If this fight were four years ago, the last time Vitali set foot in the ring, I and probably a lot of other people would assume that Vitali would win with relative ease. After all, his chin was one of the sturdiest in the heavyweight division at the time and he had one of the best right hands in the business. In addition, with Vitali’s size – 6’8” 250 lbs – and his ability to choose whether to box or slug, he was more than a match for perhaps any heavyweight in the division.

In his prime, Vitali rarely lost a round to any of his opponents, even against Lennox Lewis in their June 2003 bout. With the ability to use his long jab, left hook, and his powerful right hand, a prime Vitali would have been more than a match for Peter. Indeed, Peter would have been hard pressed to do much with Vitali at all except for to land an occasional shot or two. Read more

Hennessy Sports in association with GoldenPalace.com can announce important news… Canada’s only national pay Television Network Super Channel will now be televising the WBC Super Lightweight Championship of the world between Junior Witter and Timothy Bradley Jr. at the Trent FM Arena Nottingham at a new revised time of 10.45pm ET/PT. Super Channel will also be showing the International Super Middleweight contents between the WBC # 1 Rated Super Middleweight and mandatory challenger Carl Froch versus Poland’s undefeated and tough Albert Rybacki. Read more

By Scott Gilfoid: After months of negotiations former WBC/WBO heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko (35-2, 34 KOs) have come to an agreement for a bout in October, though no official date has been set as of this time. It will be the first bout for Klitschko, 37, since his defeat of Danny Williams in December 2004. Following that fight, Vitali was injured repeatedly while training for a title defense against his then number #1 challenger Hasim Rahman. After multiple cancellations, involving months of time wasted for both fighters, Vitali finally stepped away from the sport and officially retired from boxing. For whatever reason, Klitschko suddenly announced late last year that he had decided on making a comeback to regain the titles.

Rather than having to work his way back like most fighters, Vitali was given the status of champion emeritus by the WBC, thus immediately thrusting him to the top of the division to take on the champion. Most recently, the dust cleared between the two WBC champions Oleg Maskaev and the interim champion Samuel Peter, with Peter winning the fight by stoppage. This set up another potential Klitschko vs. Peter bout. The first bout, Wladimir Klitschko, Vitali’s younger brother, defeated Peter in 2005, in one of the most exciting fights of the year. Read more

Sinan Samil Sam has to take a break in preparing for his European heavyweight championship bout against Matt Skelton due to a hand injury. The title fight that was originally scheduled for May 30th in Istanbul will be postponed for about for weeks.

“It’s a pity”, states Sam. “I’m fired up to fight Skelton and I know that all of Turkey wants to see this fight. But at the moment I can’t use my left hand and I cannot take any risk before this fight. I know that this is my last chance to make it to the top. And I definitely don’t want to blow it.” Read more

By Erik Schmidt: I often wonder how would the great Rocky Marciano (49-0, 43 KOs) do against today’s heavyweights. It’s perhaps even more of a question now than ever due to the lack of talent and interest in the heavyweight division. It’s been a decade since the heavyweight division had a champion – Mike Tyson – that fans were interested in, and since that time the quality of the fighters has dropped off dramatically, along with naturally the interest in the division as a whole. Many people say that it’s impossible for fighters of different generations to fight each other due to the size differences, the more advanced training techniques, and the better nutrition available now compared to the 40s and the 50s, when Marciano was at the top of the sport.

However, I don’t buy into all that, mainly because I see a lot of really poor trainers and a lot of heavyweights with bad diets and poor conditioning, and if anything, the nutrition and training is worse today than it was before. The main difference now, however, is that there’s a larger pool of people to get fighters from due to many of the other countries now having fighters that have turned professional. Despite that, the division still is in the worst shape now than it has been in years. So for this reason, I think it’s important to throw out the belief that you can’t compare different eras. Read more

By Eric Thomas: In a bit of bad news, former light welterweight and welterweight champion Zab Judah (36-5, 25 KOs) has reportedly suffered an injury to his right forearm, making it necessary to have 50 stitches applied to the wound, and because of that Judah’s May 31st bout with Shane Mosley (44-5, 37 KOs) has been cancelled for the time being. There’s no word at this time as to when the fight will be rescheduled, but there are already talks undergoing for plans for a future date for the fight to take place.

This is particularly bad news for both fighters, perhaps even more for the 30 year-old Judah, for he’s been going through a rough period in his career having lost three out of his last six fights to opponents Carlos Baldomir, Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Miguel Cotto. There’s nothing wrong with losing to those kinds of fights, but the fact remains that there’s been little to be happy about in Judah’s career since 2005 when he was the IBF/WBA/WBC welterweight champion of the world. Since that time, Judah has experienced three losses to the aforementioned fighters, including a non contest with Ruben Galvin in April 2007. In his last two fights, Judah has defeated two little known fighters, Edwin Vazquez and Ryan Davis, both fights interesting to watch but clearly a step down for Judah in terms of career bouts. Read more