By Tim Fletcher: Last Friday’s fight between WBC light heavyweight champion Adonis Stevenson (27-1, 22 KOs) and challenger Tommy Karpency (25-5-1, 14 KOs) brought in disappointing ratings on Premier Boxing Champions on Spike TV from the Ricoh Coliseum, in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
The fight brought in an average of 581,000 viewers on Spike with a peak of 784,000. Those numbers likely reflect the poor match-up that the fight was. Stevenson’s adviser Al Haymon should have known from the moment the contract was signed that there would be little fan interest in this mismatch.
Karpency, 29, had never really done anything in his career besides beating an arguably shot and injured Chad Dawson recently. Even with Dawson fighting with just one hand, he still came close to beating Karpency.
In the future, Stevenson needs to be matched up against better opposition when he’s making voluntary defenses of his WBC title. He’s good enough to fight better opposition than Karpency and still hold ointo his title.
Zab Judah to fight on October 16th
Former two division world champion Zab Judah (42-9, 29 KOs) will be fighting next month on October 16th. The 37-year-old Judah’s fight last Friday fell apart when his opponent Hevinson Herrera suffered an injury when he got into it with Judah at the weigh-in. It was one of the strangest things you’ll see.
It just shows you that it doesn’t pay for fighters to get too close to each other before their fights, because sometimes sparks fly and punches get thrown. Judah hasn’t fought in two years since 2013. He did not look good at all in his last fight against Paulie Malignaggi, and it’s likely he’ll look even worse when he gets inside the ring next month.
Against Malignaggi, Judah couldn’t pull the trigger on his punches despite Malignaggi being right in front of him. Judah looked good in the first round, and then he stopped punching and stood like a statue for the rest of the fight. It was pretty sad to see because a younger Judah would have made easy work of Malignaggi.
Terry Norris: Cotto beats Canelo
Former world champion Terry Norris is picking WBC middleweight champion Miguel Cotto (40-4, 33 KOs) to defeat challenger Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (45-1-1, 32 KOs) in their fight on November 21st at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. Norris wants the 25-year-old Canelo to win the fight, but he still feels that Cotto’s experience will be too much for him,
“Cotto will pull it out,” Norris said to esnewsreporting.com. “I want Canelo to win, but I think Cotto is an experienced fighter, and he knows his stuff.”
Cotto might be too smart for Canelo just like Floyd Mayweathe Jr.r was too smart for the red-headed Canelo. If Cotto’s trainer Freddie Roach comes up with a good game plan for him in this fight, then I could definitely see Cotto winning without too many problems. Canelo is vulnerable to fighters that use movement and a strong jab. Cotto is capable of doing both of those things.
When asked if Manny Pacquiao will be the top fighter in boxing now that Floyd Mayweather Jr. is retiring, Norris said “No.”
Norris doesn’t think that Mayweather is “The Best Ever.” [TBE]. He thinks he’s a good fighter, but not good enough to be considered TBE.
“He [Mayweather] didn’t fight everybody,” Norris said in explaining why he doesn’t see Mayweather as TBE. He fought them when they were past their prime.”
It’s hard to argue with Norris about Mayweather not being TBE. How can you say Mayweather was TBE when he failed to fight Paul Williams, Sergio Martinez, Gennady Golovkin, Kostya Tszyu, Julian Jackson, Keith Thurman, Amir Khan, Shawn Porter, Keith Thurman and Danny Garcia.
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