An uncelebrated former titlist who beat former champs John Ruiz, Nicolai Valuev, a pts loss to Povetkin and a win over the unfortunate Fres Oquendo can’t really be that bad of a fighter, We have a new WBA heavyweight Champion and his name is RusIan Chagaev – good for him, but boxing is not going crazy about this event, could it be because he isn’t in the top 10 and not a KNOCKOUT artist. Does anyone think he could unify the titles against Wladimir Klitschko, but wait, he already lost to him already, how about WBC titlist Bermane Bware Stiverne, hmm. Will he survive a challenge from Deontay Wilder..no way maybe, at the end of the day the Hwy division has splintered further just when we thought long time #1 rated Wladimir Klitschsko was going to unify all the titles after his brothers retirement. But anything can happen in the ring so lets not count the dimunitve 5.11″ Chagaev out just yet…Fightnews is reporting that more heads are rolling at Golden Boy, now I love Oscar to death but I think he is dead wrong here, he was not present to navigate the day to day decisions of his company in this our treacherous boxing business, if he were present I am sure he might have agreed with most of Schaefer’s decisions made in a changing business environment. How can he be upset at all the changes after a nearly two year rehab hiatus. He is lucky his company is still afloat and he was not robbed blind?. I hope he knows what he is doing because if he goes on another bender, in fact the countdown to the disintegration of Golden Boy in under 2 years has began. Mike Tyson celebrated another birthday on June 30, while he may have stopped fighting the undisputed and undisputed championship dreams he stirred up in boxing fans will never die, Happy Birthday Mike!!! (July 7, 2014)
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.
