On October 6th, Andrew Golota (39-6-1, 32) returns to action against one-time Mike Tyson conqueror Keven McBride (34-5-1, 29 KOs) at Madison’s Square Garden, in New York. Golota, 39, is making his 2nd bout since starting his boxing comeback against Jeremy Bates in June 2007, following a two-year absence away from the ring. Golota looked considerably slower in his last bout than he did in his prime 10 years ago.

In fact, he seemed only a shadow of his former self. However, Bates (21-14, 9 KOs), didn’t have nearly enough skills to expose Golota and perhaps send him packing. Not much will change in that respect, however, against the 6′6″ Kevin McBride, who has size and little else going for him. In his last bout, McBride bit off a little more than he can chew against the hard-punching Mike Molla, who took him out in the 2nd round on October 7, 2006. Read more…

As WBO super middleweight champion Joe Calzaghe (43-0, 32 KOs) and WBC/WBA super middleweight title holder Mikkel Kessler (39-0, 29 KOs) prepare for their November 3rd showdown at the Millennium Stadium, in Cardiff, Wales, a lot of talk has been made about Calzaghe’s future plans after the bout. Specifically, Calzaghe, 35, has made frequent references about his desire to move either take on the winner of WBO/WBC middleweight champion Jermain Taylor and challenger Kelly Pavlik.

Calzaghe has also mentioned on a number of occasions that he’d also like to fight Bernard Hopkins, considered to be one of the best (read: fighter most likely to bring in a big payday for Calzaghe) in the light heavyweight division. Hopkins, however, would be Calzaghe’s second choice, if his plans for a bout with either Pavlik or Taylor don’t pan out like he plans for it to. Read more…

Former WBA/WBC/IBF welterweight and IBF light welterweight champion Zab Judah (35-5, 25 KOs) won a more difficult than expected 10-round unanimous decision over veteran Edwin Vazquez (22-11-2, 8 KOs) at the Hard Rock Casino, in Biloxi, Mississippi, on Friday night. Judah, 29, was cruising along in the first three rounds of the bout, peppering the slower and less-skilled 35-year old Vazquez with jabs, uppercuts and combinations. However, was cut over the left eye in the fourth round from a head-butt, which had a substantial effect on Judah’s offensive output, making him much more economical with his punches until late in the bout when Judah suddenly began firing on all cylinders again.

Though he was not in Judah’s class in terms of skills, Vazquez, who was fighting for only the eighth time in seven years, he did a remarkably good job at pressuring and landing punches on against Judah, especially up until round six when he was fighting at his best. However, Vazquez couldn’t stay competitive with Judah after the fight passed the sixth round, at which time Judah turned it up a notch with his offense, badly outclassing Vazquez for the remaining four rounds of the fight. Read more…

2004 Olympian and amateur standout, bantamweight boxing prospect Abner Mares (14-0, 9 KOs) defeated tough Mexican veteran Ididro Garcia (24-4-2, 8 KOs) in the seventh round on Friday night at the Desert Diamond Casino, in Tucson, Arizona, when Garcia, 31, failed to come out for the 8th due an eye injury he had sustained during the fight. In the early rounds, Mares and Garcia took turns landing power shots with Mares coming out slightly ahead. However, as the fight progressed, Mares pulled away from Garcia, largely due to the power in his right hand which began to swell Garcia’s right by the 5th round.

Mares, 21, ranked #14 in the WBA, picked up the vacant NABF bantamweight title along the way in defeating Garcia. Considered to be a can’t miss future star, Mares was put in with a very tough fighter despite this being only his 14th professional bout in his career. It harkens back to the old days, when young fighters where frequently placed up against tough veterans in an effort to teach them skills faster and to toughen them up. Frequently, this backfire, causing the young fighter to be ruined, a reason that it’s rarely done now a days. However, it’s interesting that Mares’ management feel comfortable placing him in against Garcia, a former WBO flyweight champion in 2000. Read more…

In a bout marred by constant fouling, up and coming heavyweight talent Adam “Swamp Donkey” Richards (19-1, 13 KOs) won by fourth round disqualification over Rafael Pedro (20-7-1, 14 KOs) on Friday night at the Hard Rock Casino, in Biloxi, Mississippi. Richards, 26, was far and away the better fighter of the two, as he showed in the first round, landing punishing hooks to the head and body. However, despite a good start, the bout soon after descended into an ugly affair in which both fighters threw rabbit punches and held & hit, addition to several accident head butts that occurred in the bout.

At the start of the fourth round, Pedro, a 6′7 247 lbs muscular fighter originally from Cuba, marched across the ring and angrily landed a punch to the back of Richard’s head. As the referee attempted to intervene, Pedro tried one more time to land another rabbit punch. The referee halted the bout at this time and disqualified Pedro. It was later learned that Pedro had been previously disqualified on two other occasions for fouls in earlier bouts. Read more…

Former WBC heavyweight boxing champion of the world Vitali Klitschko (35-2, 34 KOs) was reportedly injured yesterday while training for his bout with Jameel McCline on September 22, requiring that Vitali undergo spinal surgery at a clinic in Austria to relieve pressure on a pinched nerve in his back. This is the third back surgery for Vitali, 36, who previously had back surgery while training for Larry Donald in 2002, and then re-injuring his back in 2005 while training for title defense against challenger Hasim Rahmanm, causing Vitali to need back surgery for a second time.

In addition to this, Vitali injured his leg twice while training for bout with Rahman, making it necessary for him to have major surgery to repair a torn meniscus, a bone bruise, plus an undiagnosed MCL tear. The combination of back and knee injuries prompted Vitali to retire from boxing on November 9, 2005, having never been defeated as a world heavyweight boxing champion. During his bout with Chris Byrd, in April 1, 2000, Vitali, then the WBO heavyweight champion, suddenly quit after the 9th round, saying that his shoulder had been injured. At the time of the stoppage, Vitali was ahead on all three judges’ scorecards 89-82, and 88-83 and 88-83. Read more…

Heavyweight knockout artist David Tua (49-3-1, 42 KOs) destroyed a badly over matched Cerrone Fox (8-6, 8 KOs) in the 2nd round and in the process knocking him down three times on Friday night at the Soaring Eagle Casino, Mt. Pleasant, Michigan. Fox, 28, a fighter with a poor record, must have felt like he’d won the lottery by getting a shot at Tua. However, by the end of the fight he probably felt otherwise as he badly hurt in the first round by a big right hand from Tua. However, after hurting him, Tua backed off as if were toying with Fox in order to prolong his suffering for a while longer. Fox was able to get off some shots when Tua backed off, but he looked wild and dreadfully unskilled as a fighter, not so much different than the skill of a typical MMA fighter.

In the 2nd round, Tua was through play nice guy, as he opened up with cannon-like hooks to the body and head, using both hands. However, it was Tua’s left that did most of the damage, sending Fox down to the canvas three times in the round. After the 3rd knockdown, the referee stopped the bout due to Fox being badly shaken from the hook and unable to clear his head enough to continue further in the fight. Read more…

Former world heavyweight boxing title holder Hasim Rahman (43-6-2, 34 KOs) stopped the normally durable journeyman fighter Dicky Ryan (55-10, 44 KOs) in the 2nd round after landing several tremendous body shots that sucked the wind out of Ryan and sending him crashing to the canvas on Friday night at the oaring Eagle Casino, in Mt. Pleasant, Michigan.

Rahman, 34, a former two-time heavyweight champion, showed that he still has his awesome power as he blasted with sledgehammer right hands in the first round, sending Ryan down to the canvas twice. He arose each time only to be greeted by more right hand shots from Rahman, who appeared to want to end the bout early. In the 2nd round, Rahman continued to land mostly right hands, which Ryan, 40, had no defense for. A short time later, Rahman unloaded with three shots to Ryan’s soft midsection, which doubled him over and sent him to the canvas where he laid in pain as the referee counted him out. Read more…

Woman’s WIBF/WBA/GBU super middleweight boxing champion Natascha Ragosina (15-0, 11 KOs) took apart Gardy Pena (8-1-1, 5 KOs) by 2nd round TKO to win the vacant WIBA woman’s super middleweight title belt on Saturday night at the Maritim Hotel, in Tiergarten, Berlin. Pena, from the Dominican Republic, was dwarfed by the giant 5′11″ Ragosina, who used her jab to keep keep her on the outside in the first round of the bout. In the 2nd round, however, Ragosina, 31, began landing a slew of hooks that had Pena reeling in response.

Several hard jabs from Ragosina backed Pena to the ropes where he then began unloading hard combinations to the head. Pena was stunned by a right hand at one point. Seeing this, Ragosina fed her three more in succession that sent her to the canvas. The referee then moved in and after taking a glance at Pena, he put a stop the bout. Ragosnia, born in Karaganda, Kazakhstan, boxed carefully in the first round of the fight, putting pressure on her shorter opponent constantly with stinging jab. Read more…

On Friday night, future boxing star light welterweight Lamont Peterson (22-0, 10 KOs) put on a stunning show of punching power in a sixth round stoppage of 36-year old Frankie Santos (15-4-3, 7 KOs) at the Hard Rock Casino, in Biloxi, Mississippi. Peterson jumped out to a quick start in the first round, throwing shots to Santos’ midsection and trying to take him out early in front of a capacity crowd. After pounding him at will for six rounds, Santo’s trainer stopped the bout after the sixth round to prevent his fighter from sustaining any more punishment at the hands of Peterson.

Peterson, 23, traded shots with Santos in the early rounds, not seeming to mind whether he was hit or not as he looked to take him out with body shots. Santos, however, proved to be a tough opponent, as he refused to give ground despite this only being his first fight in 27 months time. The 28-year old Santo landed some excellent body shots in the first several rounds and gave almost as good as he got. Read more…

With the recent comeback bouts for former two-time heavyweight boxing champion Hasim Rahman (43-6-2, 34 KOs) and one-time heavyweight challenger David Tua (49-3, 42 KOs), the question on the minds of most fans is whether either of them have a chance at winning a title given their relatively old age (both being 34-years old), their tendency for being overweight, and for choking in important bouts.

While both have been successful in winning their bouts since they’ve started their comebacks, neither of them have came close to fighting quality opposition, largely fighting sub par fighters that are made to order to look good against. Tua recently stopped a fighter named Cerrone Fox (8-6, 8 KOs) last Friday night, a fighter that that had no business being matched up with someone of Tua’s class. Read more…

Women Boxing Association female flyweight boxing champion Susi Kentikian (18-0, 14 KOs) destroyed Shanee Martin (8-4, 4 KOs) in the 3rd round on Friday night at the Burg-Wächter-Castello in Dusseldorf, Germany. It was 19-year old Kentian’s 3rd successful title defense of her flyweight belt. The fight was terribly one-sided from the start, with Kentikian pounding Martin with head shots from the opening moments. In the 3rd round, Kentiakian landed an arcing right hand that exploded on impact with Martin’s face, sending her crashing to the canvas in a ball. She got up and appeared to be able to continue but due to the violent nature of the knockdown, the referee didn’t let her continue. The fight was officially stopped at 1:14 of the 3rd round.

Kentikian, originally from Yerevan, Armenia, and now living in Hamburg, Germany, was very busy in the first round as he attacked Martin like a little pit bull. Over and over, Kentikian would move inside and rip combinations and uppercuts to Martin’s head. By the end of the first round, Martin looked bad, her face red and her nose swelling up. Read more…

Former Lightweight and welterweight champion Shane Mosley (44-4, 37 KOs) is reportedly looking forward to his November 10th bout with WBA welterweight champion Miguel Cotto (30-0, 25 KOs) at New York’s Madison Square Garden. Mosley, who turns 36 on Friday, September 7th, knows what it’s like to hold a welterweight, having previously held the WBC title among his other titles won at both lightweight and junior middleweight. Mosely is un-fazed by the fact that he’s the underdog going into the bout, even though he’s got the more extensive boxing resume against much better opposition that Cotto, 26, has faced thus far in his career.

Mosley, a fighter made famous for twice beating the great oscar de la Hoya and a one-time pound-for-pound top fighter in boxing, is known for his speed and strength. He fights exceptionally well in exchanges with opponents, and often comes out on top in most of them. Mosley knows when to move to the outside, especially when facing tough opposition like Vernon Forrest and Winky Wright, both of whom beat Mosley twice. Read more…

Hasim Rahman and David Tua both weighed in for their bouts on Friday night at the Soaring Eagle Casino, Mt. Pleasant, in Michigan. Rahman (42-6-2, 33 KOs) weighed in at 250 lbs for his bout with journeyman Dicky Ryan (55-9, 44 KOs), who weighed in at 238. Rahman, 34, is still trying to rebuild his career after having lost his WBC heavyweight title to Oleg Maskaev last year on August 12, 2006. Since then, Rahman has had only one fight, a 10-round unanimous decision victory over Taurus Sykes on June 14, 2007. Rahman came into that bout at a bloated 261 lbs and performed badly en route to winning the fight by decision.

Tua (48-3-1, 41 KOs) weighed in at an excellent 234 lbs for his bout with Cerrone Fox (8-5, 3 KOs). Tua, 34, is coming off a 2nd round knockout victory over Saul Montana last month on August 18th. At 234, this is the lowest weight for Tua since losing a 12-round decision to Chris Byrd six years ago, on August 18, 2001. Tua looked outstanding last month in defeating Montano, and one hopes that Tua has finally gotten serious about his career after dealing with a two year absence from the ring due to problems with managerial issues. Upon returning to boxing in 2005, Tua spent the next two years - and six fights - fighting exclusively 2nd tier competition and frustrating many of his fans in the process.

Recently, the IBF came up with the brilliant idea of having a box-off competition to find out who will be the mandatory challenger to IBF heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko. This in itself is fine with me, but when they revealed who they had picked for the box off competition - Chris Byrd, Eddie Chambers, Calvin Brock, and Alexander Povetkin - I was less than pleased with the names that had been chosen. the competition goes like this, Chris Byrd faces Alexander Povetkin on October 27th, while Calvin Brock fights Eddie Chambers on November 2nd.

The main problem, however, is that two of the names - Brock and Byrd - have been recently beaten by Wladimir in the past year, which makes the box-off potentially a problem if one of them two were to win. Luckily, neither of them are likely to come out the victor in the long run given the fact that the Russian fighter Povetkin is expected to win the box-off. However, that opens up a problem as well, considering that he has only 13 fights under his belt, and is not ready to face a fighter as skilled, and as large as Klitschko at this point in his career. Read more…

Oscar de la Hoya (38-3, 30 KOs) wants to get back in the ring in early 2008 against a fighter that “doesn’t run,” he says, possibly taking a swipe at Floyd Mayweather Jr., who recently defeated De la Hoya by 12-round split decision in May 2007, in a fight that Mayweather employed his usual hit and run fighting style, causing De la Hoya to become very frustrated late in the fight as he attempted to engage him. De la Hoya, 34, plans on moving back down to the welterweight division, fighting there for the first time in seven years since beating Arturo Gatti in 2001.

It’s unclear why De la Hoya has opted to move back down to the welterweight division, but one can only guess that it’s because he has his eye on someone in particular, likely Kermit Cintron or Ricky Hatton. Though Hatton fights as a super lightweight, he has formerly fought as a welterweight, albeit not very effectively, for a short period of time and would have no qualms about gaining a little weight to fight De la Hoya at that weight, especially if it meant that he was going to get a huge mult-million dollar pay day in the process. His reputation, however, will be a little tarnished by them, considering that Hatton will have already fought - and lost badly - to Mayweather by then, but that matters little to most of the public, who don’t care how many times some of their heros lose. Read more…

In the lead up to WBO super middleweight champion Joe Calzaghe’s (43-0, 32 KOs) mega bout with super middleweight champion (WBA & WBC) Mikkel Kessler (39-0, 29 KOs), Calzaghe had been prematurely discussing plans for fighting either the winner of the Kelly Pavlik vs. Jermain Taylor or leaving the super middleweight division altogether and fighting Bernard Hopkins at light heavyweight. However, one thing that seems odd about the whole thing is his presumption that he’s in fact going to beat Kessler.

At this point, there’s quite a few people that are picking Calzaghe to lose the bout, mostly because of his advanced age (35) combined with the fact that Kessler, 28, has appeared very strong in his last few bouts with impressive wins over Anthony Mundine, Eric Lucas, Markus Beyer and Librado Andrade. Kessler has knocked out two of them - Lucas and Beyer - while badly outpointing Mundine and Andrade. Read more…

Welterweight contender Alfonso Gomez (17-3-2, 8 KO’s) will be fighting journeyman Ben Tackie (29-7-1, 17 KOs) on October 16, 2007, at the Home Depot Center in Carson, California. Gomez, 26, a one-time star on “The Contender” reality television series on NBC aired in the United States. In his most recent bout on July 14th, Gomez stopped Arturo Gatti in the 7th round, causing him to retire afterwards due to the one-sided nature of the fight. Following the fight, there were numerous rumors involving Gomez potentially fighting Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. However, the fight never materialized. Good thing for Chavez, though, because Gomez figured to be a little bit more than he could deal with at this early stage pf his career, something that was echoed in many of the internet boxing forums that the rumor was kicked around in.

Tackie, 34, is on the downward slide of his career, having lost five of his last eleven bouts, including one draw. At one time in his career, in the early 2000s, he was considered one of the hottest prospects in the lightweight division with wins over Freddie Pendelton, Ray Oliveira, Golden Johnson and Roberto Garcia. Read more…

WBO Super bantamweight champion Daniel Ponce De Leon (32-1, 29 KOs has recently signed to defend his World Boxing Organization title against Reynaldo Lopez (28-4-1, 19 KOs) in September 28th, 2007, in Morongo Casino Resort & Spa, iCabazon, California. De Leon, 27, recently flattened challenger Rey Bautista in the 1st round in August 2007, at the Arco Arena in Sacramento, California. De Leon, a fighter noted for devastating power and tendency to stop his opponents quickly, immediately rushed across the ring and blasted Bautista at will, at first knocking them to the canvas, and then coming back and finishing him off for good.

Due to the fact that Bautista never landed as much as a blow, De Leon decided to get back in the ring as soon as possible to prevent ring rust from setting in. Read more…

Former WBA heavyweight champion Nikolai Valuev (46-1, 34 KOs) is set for his comeback fight against unbeaten Canadian Jean-Francois Bergeron (27-0, 19 KOs) on September 29th at the EWE-Arena, in Oldenburg, Germany. Valuev, 34, lost his WBA heavyweight title against challenger Ruslan Chagaev by majority decision in April 2007, a fight in which many people felt that Valuev had done more than enough to get the victory.

In fact, it was one of the worse decisions I’d witnessed in recent memory, particulary in point of fact that the most of the smaller six-foot Chagaev’s punches landed either on Valuev’s gloves or hit him in the chest, missing his head by as much as a foot due to Chagaev’s limited reach. In training for his fight with Bergeron, Valuev has decided to cast his long time coach Manuel Gabrielian overboard for new coach Alexander Zimin. Read more…

According to the latest boxing news, IBF welterweight champion Kermit Cintron (28-1, 26 KOs) will defend his title against challenger Joshua Clottey (28-2, 19 KOs) in December 1, 2007, to take place possibly in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Clottey, 30, ranked # 8 in the IBF, is coming off an easy 10-round unanimous decision over Felix Flores in August 2007.

Clottey previously lost a 12-round unanimous decision to Antonio Margarito in December 2006, a bout in which Clottey easily led in the early rounds before suffering injuries to bout hands, allowing Margarito to take over the fight and pull away to decision. However, Cintron, for his part, was totally blown out by Margarito, who annihilated him in a 5th round KO in April 2005. Based on the head to head matchups, Clottey figures to be a very tough bout for Cintron, who is considered one of the hardest punchers in the welterweight division. Read more…

WBC light-welterweight champion Junior Witter (35-1, 20 KOs) defends his title on Saturday, September 7th, against challenger Vivian Harris (28-2-1, 18 KOs) at the Doncaster Dome, in Doncaster, Yorkshire, England. Witter, 33, looks to be in for a real dog fight, considering the mostly soft opposition that he has fought this far in his 10-year career, consisting mostly of European fighters not in the class of Harris, 29. One of the few good opponents that Witter faces in his career, Zab Judah, knocked him out in the 12th round in June 2000, after building a commanding lead up to that point in the fight.

Following that loss, Witter fought exclusively European opponents for the next six years of his career until defeating American DeMarcus Corley last year, in September 2006, by 12-round decision. The win, however, was tarnished somewhat by the fact that Corley had been beaten three out of his last six fights leading up to his fight with Witter, and was thought by many to be over-the-hill. Whatever the case, Witter defeated him to win the vacant WBC light welterweight championship at the age of 32. How, however, Witter finds himself matched against his best opponent since his one-sided beating at the hands of Zab Judah six years ago in having to face the tough Harris. Read more…

WBC heavyweight champion Oleg Maskaev (34-5, 26 KOs) will be making his 2nd title defense on October 6th when he meets up with Nigerian knockout slugger Samuel Peter at Madison Square Garden, in New York. Maskaev, 38, is on a 12 consecutive win streak, dating back to February 2003. Previous to that, Maskaev had been plagued by chin problems, causing him to lose a string of vicious knockout losses to hard-punching - and severely limited - Kirk Johnson, Lance Whitaker and Corey Sanders between 2000-2001.

After the loss to Sanders, who incidentally Maskaev was dominating at the time of his stoppage loss in the 8thy round in March 2002, he as considered damaged goods by many boxing experts, that he could no longer take a hard punch. However, instead of giving up, Maskaev took a year off from boxing and let his head recover from the knockouts, something perhaps he should have done after the first of the knockout losses to Kirk Johnson, a fight that Maskaev suffered a brutal 4th round knockout loss. Read more…

In the past few days, I’ve read countless reports from posters in various boxing site forums about the outcome of the WBO light welterweight championship bout between title holder Ricardo Torres (32-1, 28 KOs) and #1 challenger Kendal Holt (22-2, 12 KOs), most of which is centered on the fact that the figh was stopped too soon in the 11th round, suggesting that Holt should have been permitted to continue fighting longer by referee Genero Rodriguez.

However, having seen the entire fight - and not just clips - I’m fully convinced that the referee did the right thing by stopping the fight the fight in the 11h round. If anything, I think he should have stopped the fight earlier, after Holt got up after having been knocked down by a howitzer of a left hook by Torres at 0:58 of the 11th round. At that time, after Holt got to his feet, he was staggering and unable to stand straight without listing from side to side. To make things worse, as the referee was asking him if he was okay, Holt staggered bag, leaning against the ropes for support. Read more…

Four-time heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield (42-8-2, 27 KOs) is poised to win his fifth heavyweight title next month when he travels to Moscow, Russia to take on undefeated WBO heavyweight champion Sultan Ibragimov (21-0, 17 KOs) on October 13th. Never mind that Holyfield, 44, has done little to deserve a shot at the title since making his comeback to boxing following a two-year suspension by the New York State Athletic Commission due to “diminishing skills” following three consecutive losses to Chris Byrd, James Toney and Larry Donald.

Since making his comeback, Holyfield, ranked # 13 in the WBO, has faced in the following order: Jeremy Bates, Fres Oquendo, Vinny Maddalone and Lou Savarese. None of them, however, are ranked in the top 10, a fact which makes his shot at a title rather unfair given the fact that he’s essentially leapfrogged over 12 other fighters that are ranked ahead of him in the WBO. In the old days, a fighter had to earn his way to title contention by fighting and beating the best fighters, slowly working his way to the # 1 spot. However, in Holyfield’s case, all of that has seemed to have been thrown on the window to allow Holyfield yet another shot at a title. Read more…