With about two weeks to go before the debut of boxing at the Barclays Center, chatter grew louder that the show wasn't doing bang-up ticket sales. We started to see ads for discounts, for group rates, and a few days before the Saturday night unveiling of the sweet science in the rust-topped barn in Prospect Heights, I heard about a link to an offer that would get you four free tickets to the show, yours for the taking if you were a Brooklyn resident who would walk to the arena and get your freebies.
Being the Mensa-level brain surgeon I am, I deduced that ticket sales to see a nine-bout card, topped by Philadelphia's Danny Garcia defending his junior welterweight crowns against Mexico's Erik Morales, weren't flying off the shelves or, in this case, out Ticketmaster's doors.
And then I moved on to other matters.
I interviewed Danny Jacobs about three times, took a couple of videos of him for NYFightBlog, queried him about growing up in a rough part of town, Brownsville, which he told me some folks there called "Little Iraq" when it resembled that war-torn Middle Eastern country. Jacobs told me he saw a family member get shot right in front of him -- and survive, thank goodness -- when he was a little boy, and he told me about his tussle with a tumor that attached itself to his spine and tried to steal his life.
I talked to Paulie Malignaggi about how amped he was to fight so close to where he grew up, in Bensonhurst, where he said he went from being a little dark-haired punks to become a welterweight champion.
I concentrated on stories like those, and of other Brooklynites fighting on the card, which was promoted by Golden Boy, the first of what is said will be a regular slate of fights to run for three years.
And I hoped, to be quite honest with you, that those rumors about cruddy ticket sales were false, or that if they weren't, that there would be a late surge and the joint would be, if not packed, then reasonably jammed with fight fans. I hoped not because I'm a shill for the promoter or arena, but because if boxing succeeds at the Barclays, it will benefit me, as I live in Park Slope, located a neighborhood over from the arena. I can walk to bouts here, and that's good -- for my wallet, for climate-change reasons and more. And also because boxing doing well benefits all of us who dig boxing. Because if boxing at the new arena does well, then that means this new platform for fighters will stick around and there will be more gigs for fighters.
Read More: Give boxing time to take root again in Brooklyn - ESPN
A Russian boxer suspected of killing a man in a fight outside a nightclub has been charged with manslaughter, investigators said on Tuesday.
The 22-year-old suspect, Valery Tretyakov, faces up to 15 years in prison over the weekend incident near the Ural Mountains city of Yekaterinburg.
"He's been charged," a spokesman for the Sverdlovsk regional branch of the Investigative Committee said. "He explained what happened that night during a check of the evidence at the scene."
"He has made a partial confession."
The body of a man in his late 20s was found with facial bruising outside a club in Kamensk-Uralsky town early Sunday morning, police spokesperson Valery Gorelykh said earlier.
The two men came to blows after getting into conflict in the Shokolad nightclub, presumably over a girl, Gorelykh said.
The boxer fled the scene but was later found with relatives.
The investigators' spokesperson said authorities were considered whether to remand the suspect in custody.
There is a developing theme among many of New Zealand's top rugby and league stars that an off-season celebrity boxing bout will improve their on-field performance.
Rugby World Cup winner Sonny Bill Williams mastered the cross-code transition, Liam Messam backed up his 2011 Fight for Life bout with his first Super 15 title, and Issac Luke gave Christian Cullen a thumping before leading the South Sydney Rabbitohs into the NRL playoffs last season.
So when Chiefs hooker Hika Elliot was announced today as one of the latest 2012 Fight for Life participants, the question was not why, but how?
Elliot is fighting for a spot in the All Blacks' three-week European tour which ends 14 days before his bout on December 15, likely to be against New South Wales State of Origin skipper Paul Gallen or Gold Coast star Greg Bird.
The 26-year has evolved into the heir apparent to the All Blacks' front-line No 2s - Kevin Mealamu and Andrew Hore - but will be a lock for the Maori All Blacks who are also touring Europe at the same time.
Elliot denied that his involvement in the fight symbolised that he was out of the running for the All Blacks spot after a "disappointing" ITM Cup season with Hawkes Bay.
"I don't think my provincial team helped me in terms of making the All Blacks end of year tour. But I like to think that because I have been there and done that before that the selectors can look past that.
"I confirmed that I would be involved in this fight a while back, but all things going well I hope to be on that All Blacks tour."
Fight for Life promoter Dean Lonergan said that they would send a trainer away on tour with Elliot to get him in fighting shape.
"On these tours the guys always have a lot of spare time," Lonergan said. "It's only an hour a day probably five days a week, and I can promise that if Hika does make the tour; and I've got my fingers crossed that he does, he will be the fittest he's ever been and I think his rugby will improve as a result.
"He's already dropped two or three kilos through the hard training."
Elliot has no formal boxing training, but is a black belt in karate, a skill set he doubts will help him much in the ring.
"Not being able to throw kicks has been the biggest adjustment I have had to make. To a martial artist or kung fu expert, throwing a kick comes second nature and that's been a hard thing to hold back on.
"Boxing is refreshing. A new challenge. Doing rugby week in week out, day in day out, eating, breathing rugby - sometimes it can get a bit mundane. To mix it up with a bit of boxing here and there, bit of martial arts puts me in good stead."
Elliot is joined on the rugby fight card by former All Blacks Troy Flavell, Carlos Spencer and Rene Ranger, while the League side will be represented by Knights NRL star Willie Mason, Kiwis great Jarrod McCracken, Bird and Gallen.
Boxing: Elliot the latest to enter ring - Sport - NZ Herald News
Emanuel Steward, earnest yet easygoing, proved rough and tough wasn't the only way to win in boxing.
With a twinkle in his eyes, a smile on his face and a soothing voice, Steward developed unique bonds in and out of the ring with a long line of champions that included Thomas Hearns, Canadian Lennox Lewis, Oscar De La Hoya and Wladimir Klitschko.
Steward, owner of the Kronk Gym in Detroit and an International Boxing Hall of Fame trainer, died Thursday. He was 68. His executive assistant, Victoria Kirton, said Steward died Thursday at a Chicago hospital. She didn't disclose the cause of death.
"It is not often that a person in any line of work gets a chance to work with a legend, well I was privileged enough to work with one for almost a decade," Klitschko said Thursday. "I will miss our time together. The long talks about boxing, the world, and life itself. Most of all I will miss our friendship."
Longueuil boxer Adonis Stevenson, who was trained by Steward, issued this statement Thursday night:
"It is with great sadness that I learned today the death of a man that I admired a lot; my trainer and mentor the legendary Emanuel Steward. And since a tragedy never happens alone, I also lost my grandmother Olive Florental, 88 years old, this week. (She was) woman whom I'll always have unconditional love for. My most sincere sympathy to the Steward family, a family that did a lot for me."
Steward, whose father was a coal miner and mother was a seamstress, was born in West Virginia. He got boxing gloves as a Christmas present at the age of 8, the start of what would become a long career in the sweet science.
He moved to the Motor City just before becoming a teenager and trained as an amateur boxer at Brewster Recreation Center, which once was the home gym of Joe Louis.
Steward, at the age of 18, won the national Golden Gloves tournament as a bantamweight. Instead of trying to make it as a professional boxer, he went to work for the Detroit Edison Co. and in 1971 accepted a part-time position as head coach -- for $35 per week -- of the boxing program at the Kronk Recreation Center.
A dynasty was born.
The Kronk's first professional champion was Hilmer Kenty, a lightweight from Columbus, Ohio, who started training there in 1978 and won the WBA title two years later.
But It was Hearns who really put Kronk -- and the trainer known as Manny -- on the map. The boxer known as Hitman was the first man to win titles in four pisions -- he won five overall -- and topped his 155-8 amateur record by going 61-5-1 with 48 knockouts as a pro.
Even though Steward had a lot of success with Hearns, some of his setbacks from his corner were among the most memorable in the sport. Hearns was knocked out in the 14th round by Sugar Ray Leonard in 1981 -- Steward said that was the most painful experience of his life -- and Hearns was on the short end of a three-round fight with Marvin Hagler in 1985 that is considered one of the best bouts in boxing history.
"He brought the very, very best out of me," Hearns once said of Steward.
Hearns wasn't alone.
Steward trained, helped train or managed some of the greatest fighters -- and some kids who just needed to get off the streets -- of the past 40 years out of Kronk and in other facilities across the globe, putting fighters from many countries in red and gold trunks.
Before he fell ill, Steward also trained super-middleweight Adonis Stevenson, shaping the brawler from Longueuil, Que., into a more well-rounded boxer and helping him become a top contender in his weight class.
"Lennox used to say when fighting as an amateur that everyone was afraid of the Kronk guys," Steward once said. "He saw the respect when they saw the colours."
The gym for years was seen as a way to keep kids out of trouble in southwestern Detroit.
"A lot of these kids would be in the streets," Steward once said. "They live for this."
And, Steward lived for it, too.
He loved boxing -- and boxers -- but like the Motor City, the gym he adored fell on hard times.
The city closed the original Kronk Recreation Center -- a hot, sweaty basement gym -- after vandals stole its copper piping in 2006. It was allowed to remain open, but it put Steward in a difficult financial situation and he later rented space at a gym in Dearborn so his young fighters could train.
"With the loss of Emanuel Steward, we have lost a true Detroit icon," Detroit Mayor Dave Bing said. "Emanuel Steward embodied our city's toughness, our competitive spirit, and our determination to always answer the bell.
"We are grateful for Emanuel Steward's many contributions to our city and his impact on generations of young people."
In the early years at Kronk, most of his fighters were black. In recent years, his melting pot of boxers included a Ukrainian heavyweight, an Irish middleweight and scores of young men from Eastern Europe, Latin America and the Middle East.
Steward was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1966. He worked closely with Lewis during his title run, and with current heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko as recently as July when the boxer led 22,000 fans in singing "Happy Birthday," to the beloved trainer.
Klitschko had to trained recently without Steward for his fight against Mariusz Wach next month in Germany
"His spirit is always here," Klitschko said. "I can hear his voice in sparring while doing things, whispering in my ear. As the famous saying goes, 'The show must go on,' and that's exactly the case."
Steward also trained actor Wesley Snipes for his role as a boxer in "Undisputed" and appeared briefly with Lewis in "Ocean's Eleven
Steward worked since 2001 as a boxing analyst for HBO, sharing his rich knowledge of the sport and an adorable personality with a younger generation of fans.
"Manny was a respected colleague who taught us so much not only about the sweet science but also about friendship and loyalty,"
Ukraine is preparing for its parliamentary elections on October 28th. The main question is as old as Ukrainian history: will it be a transparent and fare election by western standards or will the ruling party use questionable methods to win their seats in Parliament?
The main players in this election are the government’s Party of Regions and the United Opposition party, Fatherland (Batkivshchyna). In addition to those, there is UDAR (Ukrainian Democratic Alliance for Reforms), lead by famous Ukrainian boxer, Vitali Klitschko, the Communist Party and about thirty other smaller groups. With Yulia Tymoshenko, former prime minister and the leader of the opposition, in prison, her party is still remarkably strong. Tymoshenko is serving her seven-year term over a gas deal with Russia and abuse of the office – charges that she denies.
The west has continued to criticize the Ukrainian government for imprisoning Tymoshenko, calling her case politically motivated. But the Ukrainian government insists that her case is a legal matter and is about breaking the law—not about politics. Nevertheless, Tymoshenko’s case probably won’t drop off the international radar any time soon, but the elections are taking place this weekend and everyone is focused on trying to make them honest—however much that’s possible within the frame of Ukrainian reality.
The government officially intends to follow the standards necessary for democratic elections. In light of somewhat strained relationship with the US and Europe, Ukraine, still leaning towards European integration, wants to make a good impression. “The most important thing Ukraine can do in the near term to improve relations with the US and EU is to hold elections that meet international standards, and that is what this government is committed to do,” Kostyantyn Gryshchenko, Ukraine’s Minister of Foreign Affairs commented via email to Forbes. “In an extremely competitive election environment, Ukrainians are focused on choosing the parties and candidates who can best represent their interests.”
Read More: Prison, Boxing, and Fair Elections - Forbes
Amateur boxing chief causes uproar by saying all female fighters are either child abuse victims or gay
Hal Adonis was sacked as Boxing USA's president when he said: 'Half of our girls have been molested, half of our girls are gay'
But Boxing USA refused to remove him from its board so International Boxing Association suspended the organisation for three months
It meant all amateur boxing competitions were cancelled and amateur boxing gyms temporarily lost licences
The suspension has now been lifted, 'for the sake of boxers across the U.S.', but Adonis remains banned from amateur boxing for two years
Adonis: 'If kids tell me they haven't been abused, I say, "I don't think you belong in boxing"'
Adonis had been banned from all boxing activities for two years
Read more: Amateur boxing chief causes uproar by saying all female fighters are either child abuse victims or gay | Mail Online
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook
Turns out, AIBA's 90-day suspension of USA Boxing lasted less than 24 hours. But to members of the local boxing community, it felt much longer.
Like a 15-round fight.
“It was scary,” said Mark Calo-oy, president of the South Texas Amateur Boxing Association.
Scary, because had the suspension not been lifted, it would have effectively shut down all amateur boxing activity nationwide.
Immediately.
No competitions. No clinics. No rhythmic slap of a jumping rope or rat-a-tat-tat of a speed bag.
Had the ban been upheld, many local gyms would have been shuttered until further notice.
Pros could continue their workouts. Cardio boxing would not have been affected. But amateur activity would have ceased, at least officially, because a ban also meant no USA Boxing insurance coverage for its membership.
There are hundreds of boxing gyms all over South Texas. Some are little more than a collection of bags hanging from trees in back yards.
Getting them all to stop would have been next to impossible.
“We'd have had to go on the honor system,” Calo-oy said.
Good luck with that.
More pressing was the matter of Saturday's pro-am boxing card at Freeman Coliseum. The suspension would have forced local promoters “Jesse” James Leija and Mike Battah to pull the plug on the amateur portion of the event.
All 24 bouts.
Not an easy thing to do 48 hours before the first bell.
All of the amateur boxers had sold thousands of dollars worth of tickets. Refunds would have been a nightmare.
“I'm telling everyone to be patient and stay positive,” Battah said Thursday, hours after the suspension was announced. “We're going to work through this.”
Battah had local attorney and boxing manager Michael Miller fire off a letter to USA Boxing, appealing for cooler heads to prevail.
Apparently, Miller wasn't alone. LBC leaders from all over the country got in the ear of USA Boxing president Charles Butler to appeal to AIBA to allow boxing on the grassroots level to continue.
It worked. Butler convinced AIBA president Wu Ching-Kuo to lift the ban.
The action ended one of the ugliest chapters in USA Boxing history. But the organization's future remains cloudy.
Boxing's national governing body has been a mess for a long time. It has gone through roughly one chief executive each year for a decade and been beset by internal squabbles and corruption.
It's been on the ropes in the eyes of AIBA before. Finally boxing's international body put its foot down after then-USA Boxing president Hal Adonis was quoted in the New Yorker earlier this year claiming connections between child abuse and successful boxers.
“When kids call me up,” Adonis said, “I say, ‘Let me ask you an honest question: have your parents ever hit you?' If they say no, I say, ‘I don't think you belong in boxing.'”
The 75-year-old Adonis also said “half of our girls have been molested, half of our girls are gay” and that both made them better boxers.
Yikes. It's hard to justify USA Boxing's 37,000 members being punished for one man's stupidity.
But next time a 90-day ban could be a lot worse.
Read more: Amateur boxing survives wacky 24 hours - San Antonio Express-News
English boxer Ricky Hatton has revealed how close he came to suicide during his three-year break from the sport, as he prepares to relaunch his career with a fight next month.
The 34-year-old, who won world titles at both welterweight and light-welterweight, slipped into depression after a brutal second-round knockout by Filipino superstar Manny Pacquiao in his last fight in May 2009.
He has revealed that, during the worst bouts of the illness, his girlfriend had to take a knife from him to stop him hurting himself.
"I was near to a nervous breakdown; depression, suicidal,'' he told BBC Radio Five Live.
"Most mornings my girlfriend would have to come downstairs and take a knife out of my hand. I had a knife at my wrists, I was in a really bad way, just hysterically crying for no reason.
"I've always liked a little bit of a drink, but my drinking had gone way off the Richter scale. I was having black-outs.
"And even if I was stone-cold sober, I was trying to kill myself. The real lowest point was when my little girl came along, who is one-year-old now.
"(Hatton's son) Campbell had the misfortune to see his dad in such a bad way. I am not going to do it anymore to my kids and I'm not going to put my family though it any more.''
Hatton will return to the ring against Vyacheslav Senchenko of Ukraine at the Manchester Evening News Arena on November 24.
A much-loved figure in Great Britain during the first part of his career, Hatton admitted his defeats at the hands of Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather left him feeling like a "failure''.
"I feel sad because I feel ashamed of myself,'' he said.
"It doesn't matter how many people say, 'Ricky, everyone has problems and you got beaten by Mayweather and Pacquiao, who are the two best fighters of our generation. You did the country proud.'
"That's very kind of people to say, but they don't have to deal with this little fella who sits on my shoulder every day telling me that I'm a failure and I've let my family and my fans down and British sport, British boxing, down.
"I feel a failure and it doesn't matter how many people say, 'Don't be too hard on yourself.' That's how I feel and that's how I'm coming back. I feel I've got to redeem myself.''
Read more: English boxer Ricky Hatton reveals he was close to committing suicide after losing to Manny Pacquiao | News-com.au
Golden Boy Promotions CEO and former 10-time boxing world champion Oscar De La Hoya's Twitter account has once again fueled speculation he will return to the ring. Now, in fairness, this is likely just a promoter hyping his own guy, Golden Boy Promotions' new golden boy Saul "Canelo" Alvarez, who competes at 154 pounds.
Oscar hasn't fought in nearly four years, and he looked terrible in his last fight.
But De La Hoya has entertained a return to the ring in the recent past.
It was reported just this past August that the "Golden Boy" entertained the idea of returning to the ring to headline his company's inaugural boxing card at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
De La Hoya would've faced then WBA middleweight champion Felix Sturm in a rematch of their highly controversial 2004 bout, which Oscar won, though many observers felt he lost.
At 39, the former six-division champion indicated his body was no longer able to handle the strenuous training required to be successful in the ring.
He last fought in 2008, losing a lopsided bout against Manny Pacquiao, and soon retired from in-ring competition. He instead focused his attention on promoting fights, making Golden Boy one of the biggest companies in the industry.
Golden Boy is home to many top fighters, including Alvarez, Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Adrien Broner, and recently engineered boxing's successful return to Brooklyn at the Barclays Center.
The company has recently indicated they intend to make regular appearances at the new arena, and while their debut was highly successful, it would be nothing compared to a potential return of the "Golden Boy."
While this is all just rumor and speculation, and likely not to happen, it would certainly be a huge event and would put Brooklyn on the map in terms of hosting big-time boxing.
Even at his advanced age (in boxing terms), and having not fought in a significant amount of time, De La Hoya is still one of boxing's biggest names. He was one of the few fighters in recent years to transcend boxing and draw in many fans who otherwise wouldn't have followed the sport.
His return, no matter what you may think of it, would certainly be a huge event. And it would be huge for boxing in Brooklyn.
Boxing: Oscar De La Hoya Tweet Reignites Comeback Rumors | Bleacher Report
Hamid Rahimi, Afghan-born boxer, has defeated Tanzania's Saed Mbelwa in Kabul's Fight 4 Peace.
Rahimi's seven-round victory drew a raucous crowd who paid up to $100 per ticket for the country's first organised professional men's boxing match on Tuesday.
Rahimi's victory comes in a year of sporting triumphs for Afghanistan.
In August, Rohullah Nikpa won the nation's second-ever Olympic medal at the London 2012 games.
Nikpa's bronze came four years after he secured Afghanistan's first-ever Olympic medal at the Beijing games.
Earlier in October, the nation's highly successful first-ever football premier league came to a close, with organisers promising bigger and better next year.
The heavyweight fight between former All Black Sonny Bill Williams and South African veteran Francois Botha has been postponed until next year.
The bout was scheduled to take place in Brisbane on November 24, but Williams' chest injury suffered playing Japanese club rugby last weekend has forced the delay.
The fight's promoters said in Johannesburg overnight an exact date for the rescheduled bout would be worked out after they meet Australian TV broadcasters.
"We wish Williams a speedy recovery and hope that he is able to return to training soon," said Thinus Strydom of World Sport Promotions.
Earlier on Wednesday, Williams announced on Twitter he had undergone successful surgery on his pectoral injury in Sydney.
"Just spoke to the doctor operation went well, Thanks for the support I've truly been blessed," tweeted Williams.
The 27-year-old revealed the news a day after arriving from Japan, where he picked up the injury playing for the Panasonic Wild Knights.
Williams smashed his shoulder into the turf after making a tackle in Panasonic's 23-20 win over Kintetsu Liners.
With Japanese rugby on a five-week break, the New Zealand heavyweight champion initially flew to Sydney to prepare for his bout against 44-year-old Botha.
But it was rumoured that the dual rugby league and union international was also poised to formally sign a contract to return to rugby league with the Sydney Roosters.
Instead, Williams went straight to the NRL club's headquarters at Moore Park to undergo scans on an injury that could threaten or at least delay his high-profile switch back to the code after walking out on the Bulldogs in 2008.
Reports on Tuesday night suggested Williams was set to be out of action for at least two months.
The injury puts in jeopardy his return to the Wild Knights, where he is contracted until the end of January.
His Panasonic club told Reuters on Wednesday they were discussing a rehabilitation schedule for Williams but were not sure when he would return to Japan.
"It's not been decided where and what kind of rehab programme he will undergo," team manager Seigo Ikeda said.
"We want to work out those details quickly obviously."
While his mooted deal with the Roosters might still eventuate, the untimely injury has the potential to further complicate negotiations that have been bubbling away for months.
In July, Williams said he would quit the All Blacks to fulfil a handshake agreement made several years ago to return to rugby league in the NRL in 2013.
Boxing: Sonny Bill fight postponed - Sport - NZ Herald News
Former boxing world champion Evander Holyfield has filed a lawsuit to prevent the upcoming auction of some of his boxing memorabilia, including an Olympic bronze medal and the gloves he wore to fight Mike Tyson.
Holyfield, who filed his lawsuit in Los Angeles, is seeking an order blocking the sale of 20 of about 450 items set for auction on Nov. 30 by Julien's Auctions.
The lawsuit claims that Holyfield must 'consent to the auction of all the items', adding that holding back those items from sale would "not suffer anything other than a dip in income," Fox News reports.
"If, on the other hand, Holyfield is forced to sell those few items of personal property that have the very most sentimental value to him as he looks back over his career, and which he wants to pass down to future generations of his family, the hardship is overwhelming and irreparable," the lawsuit states.
According to the report, Julien's Auctions President and CEO Darren Julien said that his company had obtained an approval from Holyfield to list the items for sale in the auction earlier this year.
He also said that his company had worked for months to organize a world-class auction of Holyfield's memorabilia and other items that had to be hastily collected when the former boxer had to vacate his Georgia home.
It comes after it was earlier reported that Holyfield was flat broke despite banking 350 million pounds, half of it from his 57 fights, in his 28-year career.
Holyfield files lawsuit against auction house to prevent sale of 'boxing memorabilia'
Amir Khan on Tuesday stood in a large hallway inside the Sports Arena, where on Dec. 15 the former super lightweight champion from England will try to get his career back on track when he takes on Carlos Molina of Norwalk in the main event (on Showtime).
Khan had to know every reporter he spoke with was going to want to know why he left trainer Freddie Roach to train with Virgil Hunter, Andre Ward's trainer.
He respectfully explained.
"I think the main reason for changing trainers was because I wasn't maybe getting the focus I needed, maybe I wasn't getting the time I needed," said Khan, who most recently was stopped in the fourth round by Danny Garcia in a title-unification bout in July.
Roach is one of the world's most sought-after trainers. Among his star pupils is Manny Pacquiao, who helped make Roach the rich and famous trainer he is today.
Another is Julio Cesar Chavez Jr.
"Don't get me wrong, Freddie Roach is one of the best trainers out there," Khan said. "I just want to be No. 1 when I'm training. I wanted someone to spend time with me, build that bond. It's not all about going into the gym and seeing a trainer and then leaving and you don't see him again.
"It's seeing the trainer, then he comes and sees video, watches the videotape of a boxing fight, explains things about what went wrong and you have that bond.
"That's what I want. That's why I think being with Virgil is such a big difference in my boxing career."
Read more: Boxing: Amir Khan is confident he can revive career - Whittier Daily News Boxing: Amir Khan is confident he can revive career - Whittier Daily News
Floyd Mayweather Jr. and 50 Cent's friendship and short-lived business partnership is apparently over, as the boxer took to his Twitter account on Friday night to rip the rapper, calling him "a male boxing groupie."
The rapper, whose real name is Curtis Jackson, started the war of words on the micro blogging site when he repeatedly posted that undefeated boxing prospect Yuriorkis Gamboa, who is not under 50 Cent's SMS Promotions banner, wants to challenge Mayweather, the New York Post reported.
"GAMBOA WANTS TO FIGHT FLOYD," 50 tweeted.
"I will put up a extra 20 million for the winner. He don't like it that Floyd pulled out. #SMSAUDIO"
"You should have know [sic] not to go against me punk," he added.
Mayweather responded by tweeting that SMS stood for "Snakes Maneuver Slick," "Sisters Managing Sports" or "Similar Mayweather Show."
The two were longtime friends and sometimes training partners as 50 dabbled in boxing.
In the spring, 50 Cent got his promoter's license in New York and the two were going to promote fights under the banner of The Money Team.
"TMT IS OVER the money team is no longer a team," 50 Cent tweeted on Thursday.
"So it SMS promotions that's it thats all.SMSaudio ...I move the fighters to SMSpromotion cause the other half of the money team .Didnt put up there $MONEY$.SMSaudio," he wrote
50 Cent is a male boxing groupie, says Floyd Mayweather Jr.
Former IBF super-middleweight champion Lucian Bute has declared he is ready to face Carl Froch in a rematch for the title. Bute recently defeated Denis Grachev in Montreal on Saturday in a rematch, and now the Romanian-Canadian fighter is eyeing Froch to avenge his Nottingham defeat of earlier this year.
“Ever since I lost I wanted a rematch,” said Bute after he defeated Grachev. “I'll be happy to get back in the ring with him.”
Bute was an unbeaten fighter until he faced Briton Carl Froch earlier this year in May. It was Bute’s first title defence outside his hometown, and he was humiliated by the Briton in the ring. Froch knocked out Bute in the fifth round to win his title, leaving the Canadian fighter helpless in the ring. Bute was unable to defend his title outside his hometown, as many suspected but he thinks he is now ready to face his nemesis in a rematch.
Bute defeated Denis via unanimous decision to claim the North American Boxing Federation light heavyweight title. Judges scored the fight as 115-113 116-112 118-110 in Bute’s favour.
“In the fifth he got me with a good right, but I wasn't in difficulty. Against Froch, when I was up against the ropes I didn't react, but this time I reacted right away each time and made him pay. I didn't just stand there,” said Bute while comparing his performance against Denis to that against Froch.
While Bute believes he deserves a rematch against Froch, the latter has shown no green signals towards it. Froch is currently scheduled to take on Yusaf Mack in Sheffield on November 17.
Last week, Froch asserted that he is looking forward to make history by taking on the most ferocious fighters of the division. Unfortunately, the Briton did not come up any names but he sounded excited to be the champion.
Chances are that Bute might get a rematch against Froch earlier next year. If he is lucky, Froch might just agree to fight him in his hometown Montreal. If not, then Bute will once again have to be under pressure since Nottingham has a huge fan base of Froch.
Thirty years ago this month, South Korean boxer Kim Duk-Koo entered a Las Vegas ring for a world championship bout that would end with his death, trigger at least one suicide and change the sport forever.
For a generation of South Koreans, millions of whom watched live on television, the fight between Kim and world lightweight champion, Ray "Boom Boom" Mancini, remains a powerful memory.
Now a new book and accompanying documentary that coincide with the 30th anniversary hope to shed fresh light on the bout, its tragic aftermath and the impact it had on the lives and families of its two protagonists.
For Kim, then 23 and fighting for the first time in the United States, the glitz of Caesar's Palace with its celebrity audience including the likes of Frank Sinatra, was a different universe from his impoverished upbringing in Korea.
"I remember when we landed in Las Vegas for the fight," his trainer, Kim Yoon-Gu, now 56, recalled.
"The city was all lit up at night. It was like landing on a garden of flowers in the desert. We'd never seen anything like it," he told AFP at the boxing gym he runs in Seoul.
US boxing commentators had pretty much written Kim Duk-Koo off before the November 13, 1982 clash with Mancini, a powerful 21-year-old from Youngstown, Ohio making his second defence of the world title.
But Kim was confident. Before leaving Seoul he had a carpenter rig up a mock coffin which he said he would use to bring back Mancini after the fight.
Unimpressed with such bravado, his trainer stomped it to pieces which he then hid under the ring in Kim's training camp.
The fight when it came was a particularly brutal one.
For 13 rounds, the two men went toe-to-toe in a slugging match that left both with badly swollen faces and struggling to see through bruised, puffed-up eyes.
At the end of the 13th, Kim Yoon-Gu tried to lift his fighter, telling him Mancini was exhausted and exhorting him to put in one last effort to finish him off.
"He clenched his teeth, nodded and said 'Yes, I'll do that'. And that was it. That was the last thing he ever said," Kim said.
At the beginning of the 14th, Mancini connected with a straight right that snapped Kim's head back and sent him crashing to the canvas.
The Korean managed to haul himself up by the ropes to beat the count, but referee Richard Green stepped in to stop the fight.
Kim Yoon-Gu had been tending to his corner and missed the actual knockout blow, but when he saw Kim on the ground, he knew at once that the fight was over.
"He was obviously hurt, but at that time we had no idea it was so serious," he said.
Back in his corner, Kim collapsed and was taken from the ring on a stretcher to hospital where he was diagnosed with a blood clot on the brain and underwent emergency surgery.
He lapsed into a coma from which he never recovered and four days later he died.
On the flight back to South Korea, a traumatised Kim Yoon-Gu locked himself in the toilet and "cried and cried until we landed.
"I thought about quitting the sport entirely. In the end, I decided to stick with it, but it was a very, very difficult time," he said at his gym where photos and posters of Kim Duk-Koo adorn the walls.
The consequences of the Kim-Mancini bout were far-reaching and tragic in their own right.
Four months after her son's death, Kim's distraught mother killed herself by drinking a bottle of pesticide.
Four months after that, referee Richard Green also took his own life, although there was no indication that his suicide was linked to the outcome of the fight for which he was never held in any way responsible.
Mancini, a devout Catholic, endured a prolonged period of depression and, although he fought again, was never the same boxer.
"In all the obvious ways, he was haunted," American sportswriter Mark Kriegel, author of a new biography of Mancini titled "The Good Son," told AFP in a telephone interview.
"He also got over it. The complications for Ray have more to do with the fact that the rest of the world didn't get over it and continued using that fight as a kind of reference point for his life," Kriegel said.
Kriegel's book, and an accompanying documentary of the same name, climax with an emotional reunion in June last year between Mancini and Kim's family.
Kim's fiancee, Lee Young-Mee, had been pregnant at the time of the 1982 title fight and seven months later gave birth to a son, Kim Jiwan, now 29.
While being interviewed by Kriegel for the book, Jiwan had suggested a trip to the United States to meet with Mancini.
"As full of duty and obligation as Ray was, he wasn't going to turn down a request from the son of the man who, without intention, died at his hands," Kriegel said.
At the meeting in Mancini's home, Jiwan admitted to the "hatred" he once felt for the boxer, before absolving him of any blame.
"I think it was not your fault," he said.
The Kim-Mancini bout proved to be a watershed in boxing, triggering a series of major changes to the sport.
Championship bouts were reduced from 15 to 12 rounds, the standing eight-count was introduced and the medical tests required of boxers before a fight were overhauled.
Boxing: The tragic title fight that changed boxing - Channel NewsAsia
At one stage in its history, just winning was enough to keep a boxer moving toward the top and in the hunt for significant, big-money bouts.
That is no longer the case, however, as the proliferation of cable channels and the growth of other sports has marginalized boxing the last several decades.
That's why, 50 years ago, a guy like Moreno would have been a star of the highest order. He's a highly skilled boxer who not only wins the vast majority of his bouts, but he wins them in one-sided fashion.
But winning in and of itself isn’t enough anymore. It's also how one wins that matters. Style points count.
And so Moreno, who on Saturday will meet Mares in a Showtime-televised card from Staples Center in Los Angeles for the WBC super bantamweight title, has a difficult challenge ahead of him.
The best way for Moreno to win simply would be for him to use his boxing skills to keep Mares on the end of his jab, neutralize Mares' aggression and turn it into a dull fight.
But with a bout opposite his on HBO that night, and with the impatience of the audience, that blueprint isn't a recipe for stardom these days.
"Fight fans in this day and age like to see more toe-to-toe action and they want to see some blood," Golden Boy CEO Richard Schaefer said. "The fans are demanding action."
Moreno was impressive in his last outing, a ninth-round stoppage of David De La Mora in April. But he's hardly what one would consider a blood-and-guts fighter and takes a decidedly more tactical approach to his job.
He's 33-1-1, but he only has 12 knockouts and has never been in anything approaching a Fight of the Year candidate. Judging by his words at a Los Angeles workout on Monday, he's not planning to change what is working.
"My style is what it is," Moreno said. "I'm an elusive fighter, the kind of fighter that hits and doesn't get hit. My style is one that makes you watch at all times. I've fought the same way since I was younger. I learned that lesson when I was fighting in the streets when you need to stay smart all the time and not just brawl."
The professional boxing ring on national television isn't the street, though. In the ring, he’s an entertainer. If he's able to sell the fan base on a hit-but-not-get-hit style, all the better for him.
That is a difficult task though, particularly for someone who doesn't speak English.
Mares has no such issues. He's one of the rising stars in the sport with wins over the likes of Vic Darchinyan, Joseph Agbeko and Yohnny Perez, among others.
He's also among the most exciting fighters in the game. He's not a huge puncher by any means, but he's willing to stand in the pocket and trade in the mould of so many of the great super bantamweights of the past.
"I am shocked, to be honest with you, that Abner Mares is not in everybody's pound-for-pound Top 10," Schaefer said. "He's one of the most underrated guys in boxing. Look at what he's done in the last two years alone. He's faced anyone and everyone and won. He beat a guy with the awkward style like Vic Darchinyan and a banger like Joseph Agbeko and everything in between.
"He's the total package, in my opinion. He has the ability to adjust to different styles and, no matter who he's fighting, he's always in exciting fights."
Mares is going to have to find Moreno, a southpaw who will give him angles and movement. He turns 27 at the end of the month, though, and believes he's just coming into his own.
An engaging, affable sort out of the ring, Mares is plain nasty inside of it. Much of his work in camp has been dedicated to finding ways to get Moreno to fight.
"You can expect a more mature, focused and ready Abner than you ever have seen before," he said. "… This will be a very good fight, a very tough one that will bring out the best in me and the best in both of us. This is the kind of fight the fans want, a pretty even fight you could say, between two world champions going at it from the opening bell."
The key is whether they go at it. It's the only way, win or lose, Moreno has a chance to increase his profile.
Mares has already established himself as an all-out fighter, so he'll be fine no matter how the bout plays out.
But a victory that brings out the catcalls from the crowd won't be much of a win at all for Moreno.
Boxing - Moreno style not winning any fans - Yahoo! Eurosport UK
Carmen Basilio, the welterweight and middleweight boxing champion of the 1950s who fought two brutal bouts with Sugar Ray Robinson, winning his middleweight title and then losing it to him, died Wednesday in Rochester, N.Y. Basilio, who lived in Irondequoit, a suburb of Rochester, was 85.
His death was announced by the International Boxing Hall of Fame in Canastota, N.Y., where Basilio was born. He was among its first class of inductees in 1990.
They called him the Upstate Onion Farmer — his Italian immigrant father worked the onion fields near Syracuse, N.Y. — but from the time he was a youngster, Basilio wanted nothing more than to be a pro boxer. He became a champion with an unrelenting style of attack, willing to take punishment as well as dish it out.
“There was no one with more determination than Carmen,” his trainer Angelo Dundee, one of boxing’s most renowned cornermen, was once quoted by The Boston Globe as saying.
In September 1957, Basilio, holding the welterweight championship, stepped up a weight class when he challenged Robinson for his middleweight title before a crowd of 38,000 at Yankee Stadium.
Basilio had resented Robinson ever since their brief encounter four years earlier in midtown Manhattan.
“He pulled up with his entourage with his big Cadillac,” Basilio recalled in an interview with the Cyber Boxing Zone website. “I was walking past, so I decided to go over and introduce myself. I said: ‘Hi, Ray, I just fought Billy Graham the week before, the No. 1 welterweight. I’m Carmen Basilio.’ He gave me the brushoff, and I felt about an inch high.”
Basilio won the middleweight title in a split decision over Robinson, who, pound for pound, was generally considered the best boxer in history. Robinson almost floored Basilio with a left hook near the end of the 13th round, and he delivered a right hand to the body near the close of the 14th round that left Basilio reeling. But Basilio, displaying his customary grit, pressed forward in the 15th round, punching away steadily.
Basilio’s craggy face was a mess when he met with reporters in the locker-room. He had a heavy gauze bandage protecting a cut along the outer edge of his left eyebrow, and his eyes were slits from large welts on his cheek bones. He was rubbing a chunk of ice in a towel across his bruised lips.
“I figured my aggressiveness gave me the edge,” he said.
Basilio was required to give up his welterweight title when he won the middleweight crown, but he was awarded the Hickok Belt as the top professional athlete of 1957.
He lost the middleweight title to Robinson at Chicago Stadium in March 1958 in another split decision after fighting with his left eye virtually closed from the seventh round on, a victim of Robinson’s right hook. Basilio rallied with left hooks to the body in the 9th and 10th rounds, but it was not enough to keep Robinson from winning the middleweight championship for a fifth time.
Carmen Basilio was born on April 2, 1927, in Canastota, N.Y., about 25 miles east of Syracuse, and was one of 10 children. His father was “a fight nut,” as he recalled, and bought his sons boxing gloves. Basilio boxed in the Marine Corps during World War II, then made his pro debut in 1948.
His first title fight came in 1953 when he scored a second-round knock-down of the welterweight champion Kid Gavilan, but lost a 15-round decision.
He won the welterweight championship in June 1955 with a 12th-round knockout of Tony DeMarco, then stopped DeMarco again in Round 12 of a rematch. He lost the crown on a decision to Johnny Saxton in March 1956, then regained it and defended it against Saxton, knocking him out each time.
After his second match with Robinson, he fought only occasionally and made three unsuccessful bids to win a middleweight title again, losing twice on knockouts to Gene Fullmer and on a decision to Paul Pender in 1961, his last fight.
He had a career record of 56 wins (27 by knockout), 16 losses and seven draws.
The International Boxing Hall of Fame was built in part as a tribute to Basilio and his nephew Billy Backus, who held the welterweight title in the early 1970s. The Hall contains bronze busts of Basilio and of Backus, who is not an inductee.
After retiring from boxing, Basilio, a high-school dropout, taught physical education at Le Moyne College in Syracuse. He also worked in public relations for the Genesee Brewing Co. Basilio’s wife, Josie, traced his decline in health to heart-bypass surgery in 1992, The Associated Press reported. A magnetic resonance imaging scan revealed no brain damage from his prizefighting days, she said.
In May 2009, Canastota High School, where he was once a member of the boxing team, presented him with a diploma in recognition of his achievements.
Basilio is survived by his wife, four children and many grandchildren and great-grandchildren, according to The Rochester Democrat and Chronicle.
Basilio had no regrets despite all the tattooing his face and body took.
“I don’t enjoy getting hurt, waking up with a puffed eye and pain, stiff all over,” he told Sports Illustrated as he neared the end of his career. “But you have to take the bitter with the sweet. The sweet is when guys recognize you on the street, say, ‘Hello, champ,’ know who you are. It will always be sweet for me.”
Rau’shee Warren has no regrets. He waited through a decade in amateur boxing and a U.S.-record three Olympics to fight for a gold medal, only to lose his first fights in Athens, Beijing and London.
Although he has finally accepted he’ll never get that gold, Warren is hoping for even more lucrative rewards as a professional fighter.
"I just want to get started," Warren said while relaxing in the empty arena where he’ll fight Puerto Rico’s Luis Rivera in his pro debut. "It’s been a long time coming, and I’ve got goals I want to reach. It’s grind time now."
Warren is among five fighters from the least successful U.S. men’s boxing team in Olympic history who will make their debuts together at the Fantasy Springs Resort Casino outside Palm Springs, Calif., on a card headlined by Gary Russell Jr., a 2008 Olympic team member and promising pro.
Warren, Terrell Gausha, Marcus Browne, Errol Spence Jr. and Dominic Breazeale all intend to prove they’ve got futures beyond those dismal Olympics, where they became the first American team to win no medals.
"It was definitely a disappointment for everybody, but we can’t go back and change anything," said Gausha, who dramatically stopped his first London opponent. "I really don’t have any complaints about amateur boxing. I had a lot of success, and I got to see the world. I feel like I left everything in the ring for USA Boxing, and now I’m ready for what comes next."
Despite the collective London flop, the cachet of these five fighters’ Olympic pedigree still attracted famed manager Al Haymon. The mastermind behind Floyd Mayweather Jr.’s rise signed the quintet and put them on Showtime for their debuts, beginning the process of bolstering their pro records.
"I was definitely flattered when I heard from (Haymon), but I didn’t want to jump into anything," said Browne, who plans to fight as a light heavyweight after debuting at 180 pounds Friday. "I got excited when I heard we were all going to have our debuts on the same night. It’s great to keep that teamwork and togetherness for a little longer."
Browne is dedicating his first fight to his fellow natives of Staten Island, where he said he rode out Superstorm Sandy last week by retreating from his own house to relatives’ homes "in the projects, because they’re bigger."
"I’m just hoping I can give people a little good news if I win," Browne said. "It’s been rough, but I’ve had to focus on taking care of my business. There’s always going to be distractions as a fighter. You’ve got to be a professional, because that’s what it’s about now."
The Olympics were a disappointment for every American man, but all five fighters on the desert show are grateful for the opportunities they created. Gausha got to meet President Barack Obama, while Spence still can’t get over the fact people regularly recognize him on the streets in his native Dallas.
Breazeale took up boxing just 4½ years ago, but the former Northern Colorado quarterback with a wife and two kids rose quickly in the amateur sport. The Southern California native figures the only way to erase the sting of his loss in his Olympic debut is to fight early and often as a pro: He wants to be 10-0 by next summer, fighting every month.
"It still lingers with me a bit, because I wanted to do so much," said Breazeale, who wears Team USA gear while he works out in the empty events center. "I really wanted to get past that first day, get all the jitterbugs out, and go from there. It’s probably going to hurt forever, but now I want that feeling reversed."
They’re all heavily favored in their pro debuts, but they all realize their performances over the next two years will determine how far they can rise as prizefighters — and how quickly they’ll get the chance to fulfill their professional dreams.
Warren has been training with fellow Cincinnati native Adrien Broner for years, and he’s hoping to follow in the footsteps of his friend — as well as Andre Ward, Russell and the other pros who were his teammates over the last decade.
"I feel like I’m not in a hurry," Warren said. "I’ve got time to accomplish my goals. I just want to get out to a good start. I’ve been getting ready for this for a long time."
5 US Olympic boxers making pro debuts together - BostonHerald-com
Being the Mensa-level brain surgeon I am, I deduced that ticket sales to see a nine-bout card, topped by Philadelphia's Danny Garcia defending his junior welterweight crowns against Mexico's Erik Morales, weren't flying off the shelves or, in this case, out Ticketmaster's doors.
And then I moved on to other matters.
I interviewed Danny Jacobs about three times, took a couple of videos of him for NYFightBlog, queried him about growing up in a rough part of town, Brownsville, which he told me some folks there called "Little Iraq" when it resembled that war-torn Middle Eastern country. Jacobs told me he saw a family member get shot right in front of him -- and survive, thank goodness -- when he was a little boy, and he told me about his tussle with a tumor that attached itself to his spine and tried to steal his life.
I talked to Paulie Malignaggi about how amped he was to fight so close to where he grew up, in Bensonhurst, where he said he went from being a little dark-haired punks to become a welterweight champion.
I concentrated on stories like those, and of other Brooklynites fighting on the card, which was promoted by Golden Boy, the first of what is said will be a regular slate of fights to run for three years.
And I hoped, to be quite honest with you, that those rumors about cruddy ticket sales were false, or that if they weren't, that there would be a late surge and the joint would be, if not packed, then reasonably jammed with fight fans. I hoped not because I'm a shill for the promoter or arena, but because if boxing succeeds at the Barclays, it will benefit me, as I live in Park Slope, located a neighborhood over from the arena. I can walk to bouts here, and that's good -- for my wallet, for climate-change reasons and more. And also because boxing doing well benefits all of us who dig boxing. Because if boxing at the new arena does well, then that means this new platform for fighters will stick around and there will be more gigs for fighters.
Read More: Give boxing time to take root again in Brooklyn - ESPN