Now I don’t know what you all think, but I just witnessed a slightly over the hill WBA welterweight champion Paulie Malignaggi (32-5, 7 KO’s) losing a very close hometown 12 round split decision to a very over hyped and somewhat overrated young fighter in Adrien Broner (27-0, 22 KO’s) at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.
In Malignaggi, he struggled to beat the weakest of the three main welterweight champions by scores of 115-113 117-111 Broner and 115-113 the other way to Malignaggi. If Broner thinks he can just waltz into the ring and clown around against WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley and IBF welterweight champion Devon Alexander like he did against Maglinaggi tonight, then he needs to clock himself on the whiskers and wake himself up, and don’t even start thinking about him fighting Floyd Mayweather Jr.
Observation number one:- Paulie put up a spirited performance but he seemed to know that he could not win by the seventh onwards, but saying that, he did finish like a champion. Observation number two:- This was a guy who lost to Ricky Hatton five years ago and Amir Khan three years ago, both by late TKO, and who was a much better fighter back then and Broner could not do the same last night so shame on him.
Observation number three:- With a young guy like Broner all of twenty three years old, carrying all that arrogance and self confidence on those broad shoulders, you would think that he has just beaten Mayweather, Miguel Cotto, Bradley and Danny Garcia in the same night while shafting Miss World in between rounds! I mean it’s one thing to talk the talk but you gotta walk it, and this guy aint even started crawling yet. Where is Broners work rate? He obviously had lots left afterwards but he seemed to run out of ideas half way through the fight.
As for Malignaggi, I seriously think that Paulie should now retire as he has proven his worth in a great career and without ducking anyone and he should become a full time analyst as he is great to listen to and doesn’t mince his words, very truthful. As for Broner, now there’s a problem? He did not prove that he was a better fighter than Paulie last night, He landed less punches, although the ones he did land seemed more hurtful and for me, he did not do enough to win the fight. Like Malignaggi said “To beat the champ, you gotta take the belt away, not be gifted it” especially against the hometown fighter, so after Paulie dominated the early rounds and finished the stronger, I had the fight a draw.
To conclude, Broner is still a young man with lots to learn inside the ropes and humility and class wise outside, and after his post fight trash talk “Tonight I took away Paulies belt and his girl” I wouldn’t hold my breath on the latter. I don’t think “the problem” is named after his fighting style but more as to how can he improve, where does he go from here, who does he fight next, can he be as great as he thinks he is? here in lies “The Problem.”
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