“It’s criminal what they did to Ismael Barroso” – Paulie Malignaggi

By Boxing News - 05/14/2023 - Comments

By Dan Ambrose: Paulie Malignaggi feels that Ismael Barroso was robbed of a chance to capture the WBA light welterweight title by referee Tony Weeks with him pulling the plug in the ninth round in his fight against Rolando ‘Rolly’ Romero last Saturday night at the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas.

Like many people, Malignaggi saw no reason why Weeks should have halted the fight in the ninth round, as Barroso (24-4-2, 22 KOs) didn’t appear hurt and was fighting back against Rolly (15-1, 13 KOs).

Malignaggi says he wants Showtime or the WBA to force Rolly to give Barroso an immediate rematch. If Showtime refuses to put on any more of Rolly’s fights on their network until he gives Barroso a rematch, that would be one way for it happen next.

Sadly, Rolly failed to mention doing the right thing by giving a rematch with Barroso afteer the fight. Rolly talked about wanting to fight either Ryan Garcia or Gervonta Davis next, and he feels that his WBA that he won last Saturday will entice them to fight him.

Referee mistakes always help A-side

“I thought the knockdown was a push-down. Okay, you can forgive that mistake, but you cannot forgive the stoppage,” said Malignaggi on his Paulie TV channel, talking about Ismael Barroso being given a bad deal in his loss to Rolly Romero.

“This is a theme in boxing, and it’s horrible. The reason it’s not a mistake. People talk about judges or when a ref makes a call, ‘What was he thinking?’ No, bro. They were thinking. Here’s my problem, I personally like Tony Weeks.

“Here’s my problem. These mistakes never happen for the benefit of the B-side. If these were real mistakes, they would happen for the benefit of the A-side and the B-side. Instead, they ONLY always happen for the benefit of the A-side, and for that reason, they are not mistakes.

“Nobody can convince me that these bad random scorecards or these bad random referee calls. First of all, this is the worst referee call that I’ve ever seen. Possibly worse than [Meldrick] Taylor & [Julio Cesar] Chavez. Barroso is not even hurt. He’s fighting back. He’s just fatigued, he’s not hurt,” said Malignaggi.

Showtime should demand rematch

“I don’t know if it was a panic for Tony [Weeks] where he had to get Rolly the win,” said Paulie. “It may have been a panic and you got to stop the fight. That was the most ridiculous stoppage that I’ve ever seen in my life.

“That stoppage was criminal, and when you put it into play for what Barroso needs in his life and how he probably needed this win. When you put it into play that he’s probably being screwed by whichever team has him and whatever money he did get for this fight, how much he’s being screwed out of a high percentage of it.

“How do you screw a guy like that, a guy in that position, who’s been what Barroso has been through? What is boxing going to do? Somebody should demand a rematch. Showtime should make the rematch. Should demand the rematch.

“When I fought Juan Diaz and got robbed in the Rob Diaz fight [in August 2009]. Ross Greenberg of HBO wouldn’t let Juan Diaz fight on HBO again unless it was a rematch with Paulie Malignaggi because Team Diaz didn’t want to give me that rematch.

Is Showtime going to do the right thing and force the rematch with Barroso? Number one, he deserves a rematch 100%. Rolly is talking about Ryan Garcia and all this other garbage. Bro, that rematch has to be made with Ismael Barroso. Barroso deserves it.

“Number two, is the WBA going to force it? Because that’s another thing that can be enforced. It can be enforced by the route of the WBA with the rematch. Is the right thing going to be done in boxing? This is the problem.

“Barroso is a guy that doesn’t have a lot of connections. He’s a guy who randomly shows up and hasn’t been taken care of. A guy like this who can fight. A guy like this that was in the right hands would have probably had a lot more success in his career and probably made a lot more money in his career,” said Malignaggi.

It’s criminal what happened

“Unfortunately, he’s been tossed around like this and finds himself once again at the mercy of this kind of thing,” said Paulie. “It’s a shame and absolutely criminal what they did to Ismael Barroso.

“We can talk about how they need to investigate it. They never do s**t. These commissions never do anything. It’s just a dog & pony show, and that’s why it’s so annoying to watch it. It’s so annoying to watch this sport when they do it right in front of your face and make a jerk off of all of us fans.

“We’re watching the same thing your watching. You make a jerk off of us. How do you stop that fight? Where in your right mind do you see th stoppage of that fight [Romero vs. Barroso]? That was absolutely criminal. It was not incompetence. That was criminal. Nobody is that stupid.

“Like I said, if it was about stupidity, you’d see these things happen once in a while and they’d benefit the B-side. They never ever benefit the B-side. That was absolutely criminal,”said Malignaggi.

Barroso could have used the title win

“He [Barroso] could have definitely used this title win for so many reasons,” said Paulie. “That’s not the reason you give it to him just because he needs it. He deserves it because he would have won the fight possibly. Also, you rob Rolly of possibly getting a stoppage.

“This guy [Barroso] took this fight at the last minute notice. Rolly has been training for this date for a while.  That was his date. When you watch the fight, you start to see the trouble he was giving Rolly Romero. Rolly doesn’t have the greatest fundamentals.

“A guy like Barroso, who comes in real tight and has punches that are crisper than Rolly. Rolly’s got these wider, weird punches. You can see a guy like that can get inside on Rolly and land those southpaw shots, which always complicates things a little bit more.

“I thought Barroso was winning the fight. I don’t know what the scorecards were, but I thought Barroso was winning the fight. The only thing was, Barroso took the fight at a last-minute notice. So I did think he was beginning to fade a bit at the point where he gets called for the knockdown, which I didn’t think was a knockdown. I thought it was a push-down,” said Malignaggi.

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