By Michael Amakor
The division that once featured the likes of Evander “Real Deal” Holyfield, David Oawi, Orlin Norris, James Toney, Vassily Jirov, and Virgil Hill, has been lackluster for the past couple of years to put it mildly. None of the past champions, except Holyfield had the star personality to draw boxing fans towards the division.
The insignificance of the division has been repeatedly exposed by the likes of Light Heavyweights Roy Jones and Michael Moorer respectively, who bypassed the division to fight as heavyweights, with the former, Jones beating John Ruiz for the heavyweight title, and Moorer sustaining a campaign that eventually led to his capturing the title a few years later.
In other cases star fighters of the Division like James Toney and veterans like Juan Carlos Gomes have cited the lack of prize money or the lack of depth in the division for relinquishing their titles to begin long, ill advised and so far fruitless searches for more money and a Heavyweight title. Orlin Norris, Al Cole, and Imamu Mayfield can testify to that fact, but Toney’s gambit may pay off if he can past WBA Heavyweight Champion John Ruiz next month.
However things are about to change, the alphabet organizations recently increased their various weight limits to 200 pounds, this will make it much harder for blown up light Heavyweights to bypass the division and keep the talent within the division.
This move if enacted sooner may have saved the legacy of Jones, who may have remained undefeated if he did not have to jump up from 175 pounds all the way up to astrong 193 pounds, take a pounding from a full blown up Heavyweight in a winning effort and then after that having to lose weight all the way back down to the Light Heavyweight limit of 175 pounds, needless to say he was a shockingly discombobulated ghost when he lost his Light Heavyweight crown to Tarver in two rounds.
On the heels of that decision is the coming unification bout between WBA Champion Jean-Marc Mormeck and WBA Champion Wayne “Big Truck Braithwaite on April 12. Not since the days of the “Real Deal” back in 1988 have we had a unified champion of the division. It is sad that both guys lack name recognition or star power, because they can Fight, do not believe any press articles to the contrary.
Braithwaite is an angry and brutal puncher who breaks his knuckles looking for the KO, if you watched his latest fights against Louis Azille and Ravea Springs you will believe, even Toney, Jones and Jirov view him as a risky gambit and did not risk their their guts against his, he remains undefeated. Mormeck is an unknown variety but got through former long time reigning Virgil Hill twice and is ranked Number three at cruiserweights ahead of “Big Truck” according to Boxrec.Com.
Hopefully, the winner will seek to unification bout against vetted and tested WBO champion Johnny Nelson or the winner of the IBF championship contest between O’Neil “Give’em Hell” Bell and Dale Brown.
The event takes place at the Seminole Hard Rock Casino, in Hollywood Florida on Showtime at 11pm est/pt. Do not miss this fight as the new Cruiserweight Champion of the World will emerge.
Stay Tuned
As in September, I once again ran out of gas in the 10th & 11th championship rounds of October & November with this column, but I recovered to complete them and will unleash a few more flurries to close out the 12th and final round.
In the first week of October, Hassan N’Dam won a UD over Curtis Stevens in an eliminator for the right to challenge Jermaine Taylor who defeated aging Sam Soliman to regain the IBF Middleweight title. How Taylor even earned this title shot is another story altogether, but it is all irrelevant as he is now the champion. However he will not have too much time to savor his victory as he has assault and battery charges pending against him and an upcoming court fight that may turn out to be the toughest fight of his life, just when things started to look up for him in boxing, we wish him luck.
