Junior Middleweight: 2013, Nov 11-17
Vanes Martirosyan fighting in Texas. Could controversy have been any more likely? In two of Vanes’ biggest career fights- against Lara and Kassim Ouma- he received offensively kind treatment from the judges in order to achieve a draw and a win, respectively. And I don’t even know where to start on Texas’ long record of officiating outrages. Here’s the thing: it was actually a really close fight. I had it 114-114, though in fairness I should say that I happened to have given Vanes all of the close rounds to get to that score. It might have been as wide as 117-111 in favor of Andrade.
The Texas judges couldn’t let it rest at merely a close fight, though. They had to throw their own bit of crapiness into the equation, too. First of all, they all three had round 1 scored 10-8. Bad call. Vanes scored a knockdown, but Andrade won the rest of the round by a wide margin, which means Vanes should only have gotten the benefit of a 10-9. Not even a close call. Don Griffin’s card was just fine, that mistake aside. He had it 114-113 for Andrade, which agrees with my card otherwise. Jesse Reyes scored it 117-110 for Andrade, which means he had one pretty clear Vanes round for Andrade, in addition to all the close rounds. But the real nutball in the group was Javier Alvarez, who somehow found an extra round to give to Vanes, in addition to all the close rounds that I gave him. I can understand Reyes’ card a little more, despite being much further from my own numerically. Why? Because in addition to the three close rounds I gave Andrade, the next two closest rounds of the fight were also ones I had already scored for Vanes. So to get Vanes into the win column, it means that after scoring all of the close and knda close rounds for him, Alvarez also found one of the clearest rounds of the fight and just blatantly scored it wrong. This isn’t one of the greatest judging disasters I’ve chronicled here, to be honest. I’ve seen guys score at least 4 clear rounds the wrong way before, and the most that any judge blatantly messed up here was 1. But still…shame on Reyes and especially Alvarez. This sport deserves better.
So now that I’m done talking about bad judging in Texas, it’s time to move on to, unfortunately, bad judging in New York. Not dispositive bad judging. Just embarrassing. I’m talking about the Saturday fight between New York-born, Tokyo-based fringe contender Charlie Ota (originally Charles Bellamy) and New York-based Puerto Rican Mike Ruiz, who was the crowd favorite by a significant margin. Ota looked aggressive, powerful, and pretty much dominant. He cut off the ring pretty well on Ruiz, whose style was essentially shoeshine-and-run. I had it an 80-72 shutout. There were three close rounds, which makes Waleska Roldan’s 77-75 scorecard somewhat palatable. Robin Taylor at 76-76 was totally out of bounds. Easy win for Ota, plain and simple.
Rounding out the week in Reims, France was fringe contender Michel Soro, who outpointed journeyman Jean Michel Hamilcaro over ten to retain the French title.
As I mentioned in last week’s preview, Andrade entered last week’s fight as very much a peer to Martirosyan, and was unranked only to technicalities regarding contract weights. In fact, I calculate that I would have ranked him at #14 right below Vanes, if my rules allowed for it. As a result, there is very little movement in the rankings based on what was a very slight win for Andrade. The only movement comes from Andrade’s long-overdue debut, at #12. Vanes holds his position, except the spot he is bumped back by Andrade, along with everyone else ranked #12 or below last week. Kell Brook exits in the transaction, after 17 weeks in.
Dan’s Top 20 (Weeks in Current Position-Weeks in Top 10 if applicable-Weeks in Top 20) Champ: None 1) Carlos Molina (41-123-138) Last Fight: 9/14/2013- W (SD12) vs. #5 Ishe Smith Next Fight: Unknown Molina is dreaming of a fight with Canelo. But it’s just a dream. Molina’s style and low-profile makes him essentially unpromotable, and he would be a serious threat to win that fight. No chance Golden Boy puts it together. 2) Floyd Mayweather, Jr. (9-9-9) Last Fight: 9/14/2013- W* (MD12) vs. #2 Saul Alvarez Next Fight: Unknown Mayweather intends to fight twice in 2014: on May 3 and September 13, if all goes to plan. Amir Khan is the rumored opponent for May 3. Bradley is getting a bit of buzz lately, too, as is Bernard Hopkins, at middleweight- though Floyd Sr. has said the latter will never happen. 3) Saul Alvarez (9-141-156) Last Fight: 9/14/2013- L* (MD12) vs. WW Champion Floyd Mayweather Next Fight: 3/8/2014- vs. Unknown Opponent Alvarez will be back on March 8. He’s hoping for either Cotto or Sergio. After that, he expects to fight two additional times in 2014. 4) Austin Trout (9-76-145) Last Fight: 4/20/2013- L* (UD12) vs. #2 Saul Alvarez Next Fight: 12/7/2013- vs. #5 Erislandy Lara It looks like Lara-Trout for December 7 is a done deal. 5) Erislandy Lara (9-123-145) Last Fight: 6/8/2013- TKO10 #8 Alfredo Angulo Next Fight: 12/7/2013- vs. #4 Austin Trout See Trout’s note, above. 6) Ishe Smith (9-38-38) Last Fight: 9/14/2013- L (SD12) vs. #1 Carlos Molina Next Fight: Unknown Smith sounds like he’s open to a variety of options for his next fight. Anything from a Molina rematch, to Trout, to Angulo or Lara. And even more various than that- he says he wants one UFC fight. He’s also been in a war of words with Shane Mosley recently. 7) Miguel Cotto (9-180-180) Last Fight: 10/5/2013- TKO3 #11 Delvin Rodriguez Next Fight: Unknown Cotto reportedly has a $10 million offer to fight Canelo on the table, and is also being courted by Sergio Martinez. 8) Cornelius Bundrage (9-171-171) Last Fight: 2/23/2013- L (MD12) vs. Ishe Smith (UNR) Next Fight: Unknown Bundrage has been approved to fight Joey Hernandez in an IBF eliminator. No date or contract yet, though. 9) Alfredo Angulo (9-216-216) Last Fight: 6/8/2013- L (TKO10) vs. #4 Erislandy Lara Next Fight: Unknown Angulo may be returning in January, and Carlos Molina has been discussed as a possible foe. 10) Sergey Rabchenko (28-28-74) Last Fight: 7/16/2013- TKO3 Gari Abajian (UNR) Next Fight: 11/16/2013- vs. Bradley Pryce (UNR) Cedric Vitu has been replaced in Rabchenko’s Saturday fight with comparatively weak Welsh journeyman Bradley Pryce. 11) Javier Maciel (3-3) Last Fight: 10/26/2013- Robbery L (SD12) vs. #14 Brian Rose Next Fight: Unknown The one upside to a guy being robbed of a win that should have propelled him very near the top 10 is that it allows me to shine a light on the incompetence and/or corruption that caused the situation by ranking him exactly where he deserves, despite their attempts. 12) Demetrius Andrade (1-1) Last Fight: 11/9/2013- W* (SD12) vs. #13 Vanes Martirosyan Next Fight: Unknown Andrade now holds a major belt, and thus theoretically should start getting a steady stream of good opponents. 13) Delvin Rodriguez (1-122) Last Fight: 10/5/2013- L (TKO3) vs. #7 Miguel Cotto Next Fight: Unknown Rodriguez appears to be solid against borderline top-10 types (see Wolak), but completely out of his depth at just a tad higher level. 14) Vanes Martirosyan (1-128) Last Fight: 11/9/2013- L* (SD12) vs. Demetrius Andrade (UNR) Next Fight: Unknown 15) Willie Nelson (1-37) Last Fight: 6/29/2013- UD10 Luciano Cuello (UNR) Next Fight: Unknown Nelson has injured his elbow, and his middleweight fight with Macklin has been cancelled as a result. 16) Brian Rose (1-34) Last Fight: 10/26/2013- Robbery W (Draw at best) vs. Javier Maciel (UNR) Next Fight: Unknown Rose will be fighting Andrade for his alphabet title at some point. Totally undeserved, although the WBO title at 154 is particularly meaningless already, having been handed to the very mediocre Zaurbek Baysangurov before being contested between two prospects. 17) Jermell Charlo (1-23) Last Fight: 10/14/2013- TKO10 Jose Angel Rodriguez (UNR) Next Fight: Unknown Charlo would like to fight Carlos Molina for an alphabet title, after saying he is above the level of Victor Ortiz, and would not be interested in that fight as a result. 18) Yuri Foreman (1-42) Last Fight: 7/24/2013- UD8 Jamaal Davis (UNR) Next Fight: 11/12/2013- vs. Javier Gomez (UNR) Foreman is back on November 12 in Hollywood, Florida against low-level journeyman Javier Gomez. 19) Jack Culcay (1-6) Last Fight: 10/26/2013- W* (UD12) vs. #17 Guido Pitto Next Fight: Unknown Culcay barely squeaked by Pitto in a rematch of a fight in which Pitto barely squeaked by. For my part, I had them both scored a draw. 20) Guido Pitto (1-29) Last Fight: 10/26/2013- L* (UD12) vs. #20 Jack Culcay Next Fight: Unknown Pitto wants a 3rd fight with Mateo Veron, whom he pretty much dominated- but still somehow lost to- in 2012.
The Week Ahead: Tuesday in Hollywood, Florida, #18 Yuri Foreman keeps busy with low-level journeyman Javier Gomez of Mexico.
The next night in Sao Paolo, Brazil, undefeated local prospect Patrick Teixeira meets Argentine journeyman and former fringe contender Alejandro Falliga.
Saturday, #10 Sergey Rabchenko takes on a late replacement in Welsh journeyman Bradley Pryce in Vratsa, Bulgaria.
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