Undefeated “Fast” Eddie Chambers (30-0, 16 KOs) won a 12-round split decision victory last night over Calvin Brock (31-2, 23 KOs) in the International Boxing Federation eliminator bout at the Emerald Queen Casino in Tacoma, WA. The final judges’ scores were 115-113, 115-113 for Chambers and 115-113 for Brock. However, the bout looked more like a draw to me, as Brock out-landed Chambers in virtually every round of the fight aside from the 12th round. Unfortunately for Brock, his fast looked like he’d been hit by a mack truck, because he was badly lumped up with horrible looking swelling under each eye. Read more

WBO super middleweight champion Joe Calzaghe (44-0, 32 KOs) in a dominating performance tonight defeated Mikkel Kessler (39-1, 29 KOs), winning the WBC and WBA super middleweight titles in the process at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff, Wales. Kessler, 28, did well in the early rounds fighting behind a solid jab and powerful right hand. However, after the 4th round, Calzaghe’s fluid punching style allowed him to take control of the fight over the much stiffer Kessler. From there on out, Calzaghe’s speed and unorthodox punching style created huge problems for Kessler, who was unable to match Calzaghe’s blazing fast punch out put. The finak judges’ scores were 117-111, 116-112, 116-112, awarding the unanimous decision to the 35 year-old Calzaghe. Read more

For many boxing fans, the question of whether a prime Muhammed Ali (21-25 years-old) could compete against the top heavyweights in the current era of boxing, remains an interesting curiosity. Most old timers see Ali as unbeatable earlier in his career, the type of fighter that could perhaps beat any fighter in any era, no matter the size difference between them. However, I see things a little different than most. Ali, while a great champion during his time, he was after all a small heavyweight, weighing around 205 lbs during his prime years. Basically, Ali was another clone of Chris Byrd, maybe a little faster, I give you that, but not anymore powerful than Byrd.

Ali did well against the fighters of his time, the slow and crude Sonny Liston, George Chuvalo, Jerry Quarry and Joe Frazier, to name just a few. However, none of those heavyweights compare to the super heavyweights of this day and age, which makes it hard for me to give Ali much of a change against Wladimir Klitschko, Sultan Ibragimov, Alexander Povetkin, Alexander Dimitrenko, Ruslan Chagaev, Oleg Maskaev or Samuel Peter. Those guys are much bigger, punch much harder and have excellent handspeed, enough perhaps to come close to matching Ali. Read more

Former International Boxing Federation junior middleweight champion Kassim Ouma (25-4-1, 15 KOs) lost a 10-round split decision to the tough Saul Roman (28-4, 24 KOs) tonight at the Morongo Casino Resort & Spa, in Cabazon, California. Ouma, 28, appeared to take Roman too lightly, as he was outworked from the first round of the fight. The final judges’ scores were 95-93, 96-93 and 94-95, the last card going to Ouma. Read more

As I’ve perused the many various boxing websites on the net, I’ve noticed that many of them are strangely silent about the super middleweight unification bout between undefeated World Boxing Organization champion Joe Calzaghe (43-0, 32 KOs) and World Boxing Association/World Boxing Council Super middleweight champion Mikkel Kessler (39-0, 29 KOs) which takes place this Saturday night. While it does appear that the fight is hugely popular in England and Denmark, many of the American boxing sites seem to have little to say about the fight aside from an article or two. Even the major cable networks, Showtime, for example, have had very commercials advertising the fight.

Sure, they’ll be showing it live, yet they’ve done a poor job of selling the fight compared to other boxing fights, such as Oscar De La Hoya vs. Floyd Mayweather Jr., a bout which had little suspense leading up to the fight due to the match-up of an old, washed up Dela Hoya and a prime Mayweather. Still, the bout broke records and was advertised everywhere, European or American boxing sites. Part of the problem, unfortunately, is that most American sports fans have had little exposure to Calzahge, whom has held the super middleweight championship belt of the past ten years, defending the title 20 times over the course of that period. Read more

As World Boxing Organization super middleweight champion Joe Calzaghe (43-0, 32 KOs) approaches this Saturday’s bout with World Boxing Council/World Boxing Association super middleweight champion Mikkel Kessler (39-0, 29 KOs) at the Millennium Stadium, in Cardiff, Wales, a big questions is whether the 35-year old Calzaghe has a plan B should his slap happy style of fighting prove in effective against Kessler. Unlike Calzaghe’s mostly marginal other challengers, Kessler has an airtight defense, and excellent jab and a powerful right hand to go along with it. In Calzaghe’s previous 20 title defenses, he’s had much softer opposition, allowing him to get away with his slapping style and his wide open defense.

Perhaps Calzaghe’s best opponent to date, Sakio Bika, had him plenty worried, as the African roughed up Calzaghe in the first half of the fight and him worried and confused, asking his father, Enzo, for advice at one stage in the fight. Now, Bika’s a good fighters but he’s not in anyway in the same class as Kessler, who is clearly several runs ahead of him in talent and ring smarts. If Calzaghe goes in against Kessler with his usual slapping style, he’ll likely have much more problems than the ones that Bika presented for him. Read more

World Boxing Council super featherweight champion Juan Manuel Marquez (47-3, 35 KOs) defends his title against American Rocky Juarez (27-3, 19 KOs) on Saturday night at the Desert Diamond Casino, in Tucson, Arizona. Marquez, 34, has finally healed his hand injury which caused the postponement of their bout seven weeks ago. At the time, there were rumors that the fight was postponed not because of an injury to Marquez but rather because of dismal ticket sales. Read more

With little under two weeks to go before veteran Shane Mosley (44-4, 37 KOs) takes on undefeated welterweight champion Miguel Cotto (30-0, 25 KOs), there has been a lot of doubters about Cotto’s chances in the bout, mostly due to his advanced age or 35, which will put him a distinct disadvantage against the younger 25-year old Cotto. Though Mosley is a former pound-4-pound fighter, his age and lack of top level competition in recent years will be an issue for him when he steps it up to take on Cotto, who is fighting perhaps the best he ever has in his career. To be sure, Mosley left behind his prime years as long as seven years ago, around the time that he first defeated Oscar Dela Hoya. Read more

Irish middleweight challenger John Duddy (22-0, 17 KOs) has signed on to face former European middleweight world champion Howard Eastman (42-5, 35 KOs) on December 8th, at the Kings Hall, in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Duddy, 28, was recently rumored to be negotiating a a fight with World Boxing Council/World Boxing Organization middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik. However, that bout went by the way side when Jermain Taylor elected to enact the rematch clause in his contract, making it necessary for Pavlik to fight an immediate rematch with him rather than taking on any other challengers, such as Duddy. In choosing the 36 year-old Eastman as an opponent, Duddy appears to be taking a calculated risk, as Eastman may be getting old and clearly isn’t what he once was, he still hits incredibly hard, especially in the first seven to eight rounds of his fights. Read more

British light welterweight champion Jamie Moore (28-3, 19 KOs) stopped challenger Andrew Facey (19-5-1, 3 KOs) in the the 11th round on Friday night at the Robin Park Centre, Wigan, in Lancashire, England. Facey, 35, was knocked down twice in the 11th round, prompting for referee Howard John to waive off the fight at 2:14 of the round after Facey was knocked down with a left-right combination. Facey, who sported a four inch height advantage over the 5′8″ Moore was knocked down in the 9th round after getting tagged with a big right hand while he was attempting to throw a punch. Read more

With five-time world champion Roy Jones Jr’s bout with Felix Trinidad fast approaching, I thought this would be a good time to consider whether Jones should move back up to the heavyweight division following his light heavyweight bout with Trinidad. Clearly, the 38 year-old - soon to be 39 - Jones isn’t what he once was and doesn’t have the blinding speed that he did 10 years ago, but he still seems more than fast enough to compete in the heavyweight division. Like a lot of fighters in the 40’s, 50s and 60s, Jones should move up in weight as he ages, a move which would enable him use his fast hands on the slow heavyweights in the division. Read more

According to the latest boxing news, International Boxing Federation heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko (49-3, 45 KOs) will be fighting WBO heavyweight champion Sultan Ibragimov in February 2008 in a title unification match. Klitschko has been after the other heavyweight title holders for some time now, and only now has finally found one of them with the interesting in fighting him. In terms of fan interest in the bout, it still seems rather luke warm at this point, as not too many are particularly impressed with the 32 year-old Ibragimov, who remains a mostly unknown fighter to much of the American and Canadian public. Read more

Making his first appearance since being stopped in the fourth round by Ricky Hatton in June, former two-time lightweight champion José Luis Castillo (56-8-1, 48 KOs) stopped an over-matched Adan Casillas (22-6, 15 KOs) in the 6th round on Saturday night at the Palenque del FEX, Mexicali, in Baja California, Mexico. Castillo, 33, chopped down Casillas with body shots and hooks to the head in the 6th round. The referee Juan Jose Ramirez stopped the fight at 1:10 of the sixth round. Casillas never had a chance in the fight, as Castillo attacked him fiercely with a devastating body attack from the opening round. Casillas had little offensive skills to fire back with and was out-gunned at every turn.

After watching last night’s IBF tournament eliminator bout between Alexander Povetkin (14-0, 11 KOs) and former heavyweight champion Chris Byrd, I have to admit that I have my doubts about whether Povetkin is ready to fight International Boxing Federation heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko (49-3, 45 Kos). Of course, Povetkin still has to beat the winner of Eddie Chambers vs. Calvin Brock in order to get to a match with Wladimir, I’m pretty sure that Povetkin will beat either of those two fighters, perhaps quite easily. Wladimir, however, is another matter altogether for Povetkin. Read more

Former two-time heavyweight champion Chris “Rapid Fire” Byrd (40-4-1, 21 KOs) hinted strongly that he will continue boxing after last night’s 11th round TKO loss to Alexander Povetkin (14-0, 11 KOs in Germany, saying “I’ve yet to be beaten by an American heavyweight.” In that respect, Byrd was telling the truth, as he has only lost to Eastern European fighters Wladimir Klitschko and Povetkin and Ike Ibeabutch from Nigeria. Read more

IBF super-bantamweight champion Steve Molitor (25-0, 10 KOs) won an impressive unanimous decision over Fashun 3K Battery (58-9-1 35KO) tonight in Ontario. Molitor controlled the action, using both his superior size and power to win the exchanges against 3K Battery and winning by the judges’ scores 119-109, 119-109, 120-108. 3K Battery had his moments, however, stunning Molitor briefly in the 7th round after landing a tremendous right hand shot. However, Molitor quickly recovered his wits and resumed his assault on the over-matched 3K Battery, driving 1-2 combinations into his head and midsection and turning back the brief 3K Battery had in the round. From that point forward, Molitor turned up his offensive output to a higher gear, landing punishing shots and keeping 3K Battery to busy absorbing shots to even consider attacking back with any kind of aggression.

Heavyweight challenger Alexander Povetkin (14-0, 11 KOs) won a hard fought grueling battle tonight, stopping former two-time heavyweight champion Chris Byrd in the 11th round at the Messehalle, Erfurt, in Thüringen, Germany. Both fighter’s faces were badly swollen and cut from the many blows they landed on each other over the course of the bout. The fight was pretty even until the 11th round when Povetkin hurt Byrd with a hard combination. He followed it up with more shots on the inside, winging hooks and backing Byrd up. However, Byrd was fighting back effectively, landing sharp combinations on the inside when his father, Joe Byrd, suddenly threw in the towel after Byrd got backed into a corner.

It seemed like a foolish move, but I wasn’t really surprised because Byrd’s father had done a poor job, I think, in his corner, giving him bad advice and forgetting important things, like putting his mouthpiece in before sending him out to fight. Povetkin looked decent but not anywhere near the amount of hype that has been strewn about by many of his fans. He dished out a lot of punishment, but he’s not a really heavy puncher and had to rely on throwing lots of punches. He had major problems all fight long landing his short punches, as when he would come in side, Byrd would dodge his shots, and hit him with fast punches to the head. Read more

According to the latest boxing news, International Boxing Federation heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko in the process of working out a heavyweight unification bout with World Boxing Organization heavyweight champion Sultan Ibragimov for February 2008. Nothing has been ironed out at this point, but the talks are very serious. However, the bout would seem to have little interest for the average boxing fan, most of which have no idea who Ibragimov is other than s short Russian fighter with a double chin and a physique similar to an average couch potato. Wladimir, however, seems obsessed with the idea of a unification bout, perhaps fantasizing that it will bring him more respect from the fans and possibly more money in the future. Read more

Former two-time heavyweight champion (40-3-1, 21 KOs) Chris Byrd takes on Alexander Povetkin tomorrow night in Germany as part of the four-man elimination tournament for the rights to take on International Boxing Federation heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko in 2008. However, why Byrd has opted to fight in the elimination tournament is a looming question, because he’s already been beaten twice by Wladimir Klitschko, both bouts being one-sided beat downs. Clearly, Byrd is bright enough to see that he would stand a much better chance, albeit with less financial reward, by facing one of the other three heavyweight champions - Sultan Ibragimov, Oleg Maskaev/Samuel Peter or Ruslan Chagaev - all of which are much easier opponents than Wladimir and Povetkin. Read more

Former World Boxing Council middleweight champion Jermain Taylor (27-1-1, 17 KOs)m has decided to exercise his contractual option to fight an immediately rematch against now WBC/WBO middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik (32-0, 29 KOs), who brutally stopped him in the 7th round on September 29th, at the Boardwalk Hall, in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Though Taylor, 29, was able to drop Pavlik in the 2nd round, he was unable to finish him off due to Taylor punching himself out in the round. Pavlik rallied in the fight and was coming on at the time that he knocked Taylor out in the 7th round. Read more