MyBetHistory

Japan’s Takefumi Sakata wins his fights on pressure and punch-volume but at 28 he just might be wearing out a little. Although the scores were wide, the WBA flyweight champion had a tough time against the less-experienced Hiroyuki Hisataka in July. He was cut badly in that fight and Hisataka finished strongly.

At some stage Sakata is not going to be able to win these attrition-type fights, and it is by no means certain that he will get past Denkaosan Kaovichit, of Thailand, in their championship rematch in Hiroshima next Wednesday.

The two fought to a gruelling draw in November 2007, when Sakata was dropped by a right hand in the first round. By the later rounds Sakata had a bloody nose and was cut over both eyes, but he kept the pressure on Denkaosan, and the Thai had a point deducted for holding in the last round, which cost him the fight.

Some Thai world title challengers are exposed at the higher level but others prove to be capable fighters. Although Denkaosan had been stopped by Eric Morel in California in his only previous bout outside of Thailand — a WBA title challenge in 2002 — he had improved with experience. He showed good counter-punching ability, slamming in some heavy rights to the body, and he looked strong and durable.

The first fight boiled down to Sakata’s higher punch-output and Denkaosan’s harder hitting, and the verdict could have gone either way, meaning that the draw was probably a fair result.

Denkaosan has won five fights since then, easy victories over outclassed opponents. He has been 12 rounds a number of times and he likes to fight at a steady pace, whereas Sakata employs a swarming type of style.

In the first fight, Sakata started slowly, suffering the opening-round knockdown and trailing on points on all three judges’ cards after seven rounds. He will want to get off to a much better start this time. If he doesn’t, he will once again find himself needing a late rush to hang onto the title.

Sakata is the younger man by four years but he has had some tough fights and I think it is starting to show. He is a tenacious, gritty fighter who gives his all, and I believe he will dig down deep and grind out a narrow win on sheer hard work and determination — I’m not sure how much longer he can keep doing it, though.

Two well-matched fighters from the Universum stable meet in a 168-pound title bout on Jan. 10 when Russia’s Denis Inkin defends his WBO title against mandatory challenger Karoly Balzsay, a Hungarian southpaw with outstanding amateur credentials.

Balzsay’s fellow-countryman Zsolt Erdei will be appearing in the joint main event when he defends his WBO light-heavy title against Ukrainian southpaw Yuri Barashian. Balzsay and Erdei train together under coach Fritz Sdunek and it would be a tremendous boost for Hungary if each man wins his fight.

Erdei is a clear favourite to beat Barashian but Inkin versus Balzsay is about as close as it gets. Both men are undefeated, and the respect on both sides is obvious, with each camp saying basically the same thing, which is that this is a fight that either boxer can win.

I haven’t see a lot of Balzsay but he did impress me in his KO win over Brazilian Jose Hilton Dos Santos. My notes described Balzsay as “sharp-punching, quick, aggressive”. He hurt Dos Santos in every round before flattening the Brazilian with a big left hand in the fifth.

As an amateur Balzsay boxed for Hungary in the 2000 and 2004 Olympics and was a silver medallist in the European championships, where he defeated Romania’s Lucian Bute. He has been brought along carefully and has been winning almost every round of every fight. In his most recent appearance he knocked out Argentinean Jose Clavero with a right hook in the fifth round. Balzsay is 29, and after 19 wins in a row he is ready to go in with the best fighters in the super middleweight division.

Inkin, 30, is the more experienced professionally, with 34 successive wins. As an amateur he was twice a world military champion while serving in the Russian army, and he beat Britain’s Carl Froch in an international tournament.

Balzsay seems to be the faster fighter and I think he is the bigger hitter, but Inkin is a smart fighter with a solid boxing technique. There was some criticism of the decision when Inkin beat Fulgencio Zuniga to win the vacant WBO title, but from what I saw of this fight — just several selected rounds — Inkin was outboxing the Colombian. Zuniga was very busy but Inkin seemed to land the better-quality punches.

Inkin has fought at a higher level than Balzsay. Apart from the win over Zuniga, he knocked out the tall, rangy veteran Mario Veit in what was a big fight in Germany. Balzsay’s southpaw style could be a factor, but Inkin didn’t seem to have too many problems in a fight of his that I saw when he outscored the competent South African left-hander Peter Mashamaite.

Balzsay could get off to fast start with his quick moves and crisp hitting, but Inkin usually has a sound defence and he is an accurate puncher, and I think that he can begin to time the Hungarian for right hands as the bout goes deeper.

Inkin has been floored a couple of times, against Jamaican Ovill McKenzie and Argentinean Martin Bruer. These seemed in the nature of flash knockdowns, however. I liked Inkin’s consistent, steady fighting when he beat Zuniga, but he faces a more difficult fight against Balzsay due to the Hungarian’s speed and southpaw skills.

Each man, in fact, is facing his stiffest test.

For me, this is, in wagering parlance, a pick ’em fight. I give Inkin a narrow advantage because of his experience but there’s really nothing to choose between these excellent fighters.

It seems to be a recurrent theme in boxing that the heavyweight division is, generally speaking, lacking in excitement, so the U.S. debut of Cuba’s Odlanier Solis will be viewed with interest by fans and industry alike.

A two-time Olympic gold medallist and twice world amateur champion — he stopped Britain’s big-hitting David Haye in the 2001 world championships gold medal bout, after taking an eight count himself — Solis has been boxing in Germany, where he is promoted by Arena Box-Promotion. So far he has been a bit overshadowed by fellow-countryman and stablemate Yuriorkis Gamboa.

Gamboa has come along faster because of his American TV appearances. Now it is Solis’s turn and he boxes on the same show as Gamboa on Friday Night Fights on Jan. 9 in a WBC International title bout against Jamaican veteran Owen Beck.

The 28-year-old Solis has outclassed everyone he has faced in winning 12 consecutive bouts, but there has been a lack of urgency in some of his performances, as if he is a bit too relaxed and laid-back in his approach to the business. For a boxer standing just under 6ft 2ins he has a bulky look at about 250 pounds although I am told that conditioning is not a problem.

With his outstanding amateur background, Solis is obviously ready to start meeting boxers on the fringe of world class. He cruised almost effortlessly to victory in his last fight when stopping Chauncy Welliver in the ninth round, and while Welliver is not highly regarded he is, nevertheless, a big, seasoned southpaw with surprising speed and quick hands, and no one had stopped him before. I wouldn’t say that Solis carried Welliver, but he took his time, opening up with combinations every so often. Although Welliver didn’t go down he was getting knocked around in a one-sided fight and when he wobbled a bit in the ninth it gave the referee a reason for stopping an unequal fight.

I am not sure what to expect from Solis against Beck. This is an important fight for him, and one would think he will be looking to give an exciting performance, but I am starting to think that Solis is set in his ways and will fight at his own pace.

One who knows Solis better than most is the Miami trainer Orlando Cuellar, who worked with the Cuban for his last three fights.

“Solis came to the States after his last fight and there has been a shuffling around of trainers,” Cuellar said from Miami this week, “and I got word that Solis will be working with an amateur trainer that he had in Cuba and who is in the States now.

“How that will work out, I don’t know. All I know is, I haven’t spoken to Solis. I believe that Solis needs professional teaching and guidance, and that’s what I do, and we had three fights together and had a lot of success together, and I believe he looked better in every fight than he did the one before. I was in the process of getting him to sit down on his punches and I was bringing out of that amateur style and getting him to sit in the pocket, block and counter, that type of inside fighting that a pro needs. There’s a big difference in the pros.

“Now, Owen Beck, he’s no pushover. Beck, to me, is right there with the Danny Williams’s of the world — you don’t know what’s going to show up, he can show up and not be competitive, and then you can see him show up in another fight and he’s very competitive, he comes to win, he takes a good shot and gives a good shot, he’s composed, he’s got power, so it’s a very interesting fight for Solis at this point.

“When we worked together, Solis was a very nice guy, respectful, he did everything I asked, and we did great work together. I don’t know what happened, but whatever happened, happened. There are no hard feelings, I wish him all the luck in the world and I’m curious to see January 9th how he’s gonna do.”

I am sure a lot of people are equally curious.

Beck, 32, has shown himself able to knock out people at the lower level, and he well beat the heavy-handed cruiserweight Darnell “Ding a-Ling Man” Wilson, but in the three fights in which he faced sterner opposition as a heavyweight, he lost each time.

I thought that Beck fought well in the early rounds against Ray Austin but he faded down the stretch in losing a split decision, and he was involved in an exciting, highly competitive fight with Monte Barrett right up until he got nailed in the ninth round.

When Beck went in with Nikolai Valuev, however, he looked intimidated and basically collapsed in three rounds. Since then, Beck has won twice by KO in very low-profile bouts.

What I wonder about Beck is how much ambition he has at this point in his career. He has boxed just four times in three years, making him almost a semiretired fighter.

If Beck shows up at his best, he can give Solis a good fight. We won’t know how much ambition Beck has, though, until the bout is in progress.

Beck’s weight was recorded as 262 pounds for his last appearance, 13 months ago. This was a career high and 28 pounds more than Beck weighed in his spirited effort against Barrett in 2005.

If Beck weighs in the 240-pound range it will be an indication that he is coming to win; anything north of 250 will not be a good sign.

I doubt, though, that Solis’s camp has slipped up in making this match. There is too much at stake for things to go wrong. Even allowing for Solis’s tendency to be unhurried in his method I would be surprised if he doesn’t win this fight in about six rounds.

What on earth is all the fuss about? Nikolai Valuev was unimpressive, no argument, and Evander Holyfield showed that at 46 he is still a fighter to be taken seriously, but the decision in Saturday’s heavyweight title fight in Zurich was hardly one of the worst of all time.

This could have been scored for either fighter. It so happened that Valuev got the majority decision. One point on one judge’s card was all that kept this from being a draw. It was that close. The 116-112 score in favour of Valuev by the Italian judge seemed too wide, but I had no quarrel with 115-114 in favour of Valuev by Swedish judge Mikael Hook or the 114-114 score by Guillermo Perez, from Panama. I actually had Valuev winning, 115-113.

The fuss about the scoring, I believe, comes in large part from the TV commentary that had Holyfield winning practically every round.

Then we had the Swiss fans getting right behind Holyfield and cheering every time the great old warrior landed a punch or made an aggressive thrust.

Holyfield got off to such a terrific start, it was easy to get into a pro-Holyfield scoring pattern. I thought there was no question that Holyfield swept the first three rounds. Suddenly there loomed the possibility that we might be seeing an historic upset unfold.

I muted the sound on the PPV commentary around about the fifth round, just low enough that I could still get a sense of the crowd’s involvement. I was starting to veer away from the way that commentators Nick Charles and Al Bernstein (who were operating, I believe, from a studio in the U.S., watching on TV, and not at ringside) were seeing the fight. I didn’t want to risk being influenced.

Here’s what I was seeing, rightly or wrongly. I was seeing Valuev moving in slowly but looking like the man who wanted to engage. Holyfield was moving smoothly around the ring, this way and that, impressively athletic for a fighter of his age.

I saw Valuev plugging away with left jabs, initially mainly to the body. Excuse me, but I thought a jab was still a scoring punch? I saw Holyfield fighting — that is actually throwing punches — for very brief moments in each round after the third. He landed some nice shots, and there isn’t any doubt that, overall, he connected with a greater number of eye-catching punches than did the huge Russian.

Valuev, though, was pegging away with the left jab. So, as I was seeing it, a judge had a problem because a case could be made for either man winning in a number of these rounds.

From experience, controversies always occur when a TV commentary is strongly in favour of one man. I’m not saying that everyone simply goes with the commentary, it is just the way it is.

Let’s look at the rematch between Lennox Lewis and Holyfield in Las Vegas, for instance. It was a hard-fought bout with some closely contested rounds. Lewis got the unanimous decision, and people in the U.S. who watched on HBO had no problem with that — the HBO team had Lewis a clear winner. Canadians got the commentary supplied by Bob Sheridan, who for many years has been at the microphone for international broadcasts. Sheridan had Holyfield a convincing winner, and people in Canada who talked to me about the fight were convinced that Lewis had been given a gift by the judges.

Valuev’s performance was dreadful, the worst I have ever seen him, but I give Holyfield some credit for that. Holyfield was moving so much, changing direction so deftly, it was hard to time him for punches. Also, Holyfield is capable of being dangerous. He can still hit hard. I could see why Valuev would want to be careful.

There is another thing about Valuev. Because he is so big, I believe that his trainers, from the start, have stressed the importance of balance, of boxing in a measured way so that he doesn’t throw the sort of punches that will have him looking clumsy and floundering. Valuev is at his best against a slower heavyweight who will stand in front of him — he looked very good against Sergei Liakhovich 10 months ago, for instance.

Why didn’t Holyfield throw more punches than he did, to make sure of winning the rounds? As he said afterwards, it isn’t that easy when you’re actually in the ring with Valuev. It isn’t just that Valuev is so big, as Holyfield, explained, but the way he positions his body. I think that what he meant is that Valuev is usually just far enough away from an opponent to make them tend to lunge when they come to him, which allows the big man to hit them on the way in and step away from counters. Holyfield obviously would have liked to have hit Valuev more often than he did, but I believe he wanted to get it exactly right, to be able to close the gap and score without running into anything. He did this very well, much better than I thought he would, but, to me, he didn’t do it quite well enough.

Valuev cut it awfully fine, but he did seem to be getting the jab and the right hand on target a bit better in the second half of the fight and he seemed to win some of the later rounds quite clearly. Certainly Valuev had the look of a man who believed he was in control of the fight, and I loved the respect he showed towards Holyfield at the end, even bowing to him to acknowledge that he had been in the ring with a legend.

Holyfield, of course, was all class in defeat. Yes, he thought he won, but his view is: The judges see it the way they see it.

My impression was that Holyfield was just glad to have shown the critics that he can still hold his own at the top level and that he isn’t what the game would call a “shot” fighter. He isn’t what he was, of course, not by a long chalk, but he can still fight, he is smart and tough, and his physical conditioning is almost phenomenal. Not many heavyweights in the ring today would have an easy night with Holyfield.

Although the fight was in Zurich, it was a German-promoted show. Despite the neutral judges, there are inevitably cries of “another German hometown decision”.

Well, fighters such as Felix Sturm, Axel Schulz, Marco Antonio Barrera, Lennox Lewis, Jose Armando Santa Cruz and Fres Oquendo — some of many — might have strong words about the judging in U.S. jurisdictions.

Many visiting boxers over the years have won decisions in Germany over local favourites or German-promoted house fighters: Harold Johnson, Archie Moore, Dick Richardson, Jersey Joe Walcott, Henry Cooper, Vivian Harris, Jose Antonio Rivera, John “Cowboy” McCormack, Michael Sprott, Cristian Sanavia, Paolo Vidoz, Frederic Klose, Rudy Markussen, Anselmo Moreno, Oleg Maskaev — I’d better stop, it’s getting boring.

The thing is, disputed decisions and refereeing controversies happen everywhere although it helps to be the fighter on home ground.

I hope I don’t sound as if I’m knocking Nick Charles and Al Bernstein, gentlemen who have been watching boxing for many years. Maybe they were completely right about Valuev-Holyfield and I was completely wrong. We see it the way we see it, and it is one of the intriguing things about boxing that two people can watch the same fight and see it differently.

For me, the worst decision of the weekend was the draw in the women’s flyweight title fight between New York’s Eileen Olszewski and German-promoted Nadia Raoui on the Zurich show. It seemed to me that Raoui had won that one quite clearly.

Valuev’s win over Holyfield will go down as one of the most controversial verdicts in heavyweight history, along with such disputed decisions as the ones rendered in Louis-Walcott I, Patterson-Ellis, Ali-Young, Spinks-Holmes II, Lewis-Holyfield I and maybe Foreman-Schulz and Briggs-Foreman (and Bugner-Cooper in the U.K., of course).

And yet, sorry, I can’t go with the tide of condemnation over the Valuev-Holyfield scoring. The decision was debatable, that’s for sure, but in this minority view it was no robbery.

One of the most shocking miscarriages of justice in boxing history is likely to be put right in Mexico on Saturday when Humberto Soto meets Francisco Lorenzo in a rematch for the vacant WBC 130-pound title.

Soto’s disqualification loss against Lorenzo in Las Vegas in June still resonates within the boxing community.

The decision by referee Joe Cortez that night will never be forgotten by those who saw it.

Lorenzo, battered and bloodied, totally out of the fight, was awarded the “win” because Soto hit him with a glancing blow to the top of the head as the veteran from the Dominican Republic was on the canvas.

If Cortez had simply waved the finish, no one would have said a word. When Soto threw the last punch, the fight was over, for crying out loud. Yet Cortez called for a time out and conferred with Nevada state athletic commission officials at ringside and Lorenzo, realising he had a chance to get a favourable result via the back door, went into a swooning routine, acting as if he had had been hit on the head by a baseball bat.

Unfortunately, Soto did take aim at a downed opponent, but as Emanuel Steward pointed out in the HBO commentary, Lorenzo had been bobbing up and down like a cork in the sea and it was not unreasonable to assume that Soto, in the heat of the moment, wasn’t sure if his opponent was all the way down — or whether he was about to spring back up again, jack-in-the-box style.

That night I actually felt sickened by boxing. I know I wasn’t alone. Emanuel Steward almost trembled with indignation in his HBO comments.

Over in Britain, the outspoken pundit Steve Bunce apparently was almost apoplectic with anger in the TV studio.

Soto’s disqualification was aberrant and abhorrent. (Oddly, on Dec. 6 in Las Vegas, Juan Manuel Lopez seemed to hit Sergio Medina with a severe shot when his opponent was down but referee Cortez let it go — fair enough, because Medina was not going to last much longer, but a little inconsistent, one might say.)

Now, by order of the WBC — which refused to recognise the DQ — Soto and Lorenzo meet again.

There seems to be no way that Lorenzo can win. A stocky, muscular fighter, he has had success outhustling and outworking opponents — including an upset win over Nate Campbell — but Soto is too big, too strong, too young, too powerful and too good for the 37-year-old Lorenzo, as he demonstrated in the first meeting.

Lorenzo isn’t going to be able to outpoint Soto and he cannot outpunch him, and there is about as much chance of Soto getting disqualified this time as there is of me being hit on the head by a falling star.

This fight is all about matters being put right, as they were when Roy Jones Jr. obliterated Montell Griffin in their rematch.

The only question, for me, is how Soto will get the win.

I am not at all sure we will see another four-round beatdown. Soto brought a lot of intensity into the ring that night in Las Vegas. He was absolutely “on”. It wasn’t the same Soto in his next fight, when he laboured against fellow-Mexican Gamaliel Diaz. He got the stoppage win but he was a bit lacklustre. Maybe he was still feeling the mental letdown of the win-that-wasn’t.

If Soto’s performance on Saturday is similar to the one he gave against Diaz, I think that Lorenzo might linger a bit longer than most people think.

Lorenzo knows what is coming. He will be doing a lot of moving, a lot of ducking and diving. I think that he will be hoping that he can keep away from Soto, bother him with an occasional slapdash flurry and somehow sneak out a win.

I do believe, though, that Soto will be more motivated for this fight than he was for the one with Diaz.

This is payback time for Soto. My guess is that he will have rekindled the flame that he showed in Las Vegas. I think that Lorenzo is going to be overwhelmed once again, but this time with the better fighter not having victory snatched away from him by an officiating atrocity. I believe that Lorenzo, with survival on his mind, will last longer than four rounds this time, but probably not too much longer. I think that Soto will stop him in six to nine rounds, with six the number that seems likeliest.

One of the most durable fighters in boxing meets a hard-hitting younger fighter in Belgium on Saturday when rock-chinned former welter champion Carlos Baldomir faces “Sugar” Jackson Osei Bonsu, who was born in Ghana but lives in Antwerp.

The 12-rounder is a WBC title eliminator, so, at the age of 37, Baldomir is within one fight of challenging once more for a world championship.

Although Baldomir, is the underdog, he has a great chance to win, even though he is boxing in his opponent’s adopted homeland.

Bonsu, 27, can certainly punch but he is a raw fighter who tends to throw wide hooks and swings. Baldomir is much more experienced against a higher level of opposition, and he is back in his natural welterweight division after an unsuccessful attempt to win the 154-pound title against Vernon Forrest, who was much too fast and athletic for him.

In his last fight, Baldomir had a surprisingly difficult time against strong but limited Luciano Perez but he battled his way to a close decision win. Although he has been inactive for 13 months he has apparently stayed in the gym, sparring with his Argentinean protégé Luis Carlos Abregu.

This fight is in the nature of a last grab at glory for Baldomir so you know he will be coming into the ring in top-notch condition and ready for 12 hard rounds.

Bonsu has been more active than Baldomir, but he comes into this fight after a couple of highly disappointing performances.

First, Bonsu’s long run of wins came to an end when he was well beaten by the veteran Rafal Jackiewicz in Poland, a defeat that cost him his European title. Bonsu was knocked down in that fight, which was surprising as the Polish boxer has never been considered a very hard hitter.

Then, in his last fight, Bonsu barely eked out a win over a southpaw Romanian trial horse named Gheorge Danut, who wobbled him with a left hand in the third round.

Bonsu, in fact, may have peaked and could even be past his best. His chin has looked questionable for some time. He was stopped in the first of his two losses, when he collapsed from exhaustion. Since then Bonsu has been exciting but erratic. He was knocked down three times in his win over French journeyman Fabrice Colombel in the first of two meetings, and Bonsu was rocked badly by Russia’s Maxim Nesterenko and knocked down by Nordine Mouchi, a French fighter of North African descent, in the first of two fights.

From what I have seen of Bonsu, he is a wild puncher who wins most of his fights on sheer hitting power. If he is unable to land a big shot early, Bonsu gets his victories either by outlasting opponents in back-and-forth shootouts or making them think defensively and outpointing them.

Saturday’s fight is a last chance for Bonsu as well as for Baldomir. If he loses, Bonsu will be written off as just the latest in a long line of heavy hitters who were exposed when stepping up in class.

Baldomir is the better, more seasoned, much tougher fighter but Bonsu is a decade younger and fighting at home. Neither has looked good in his last two fights — a loss followed by an unimpressive win in each instance.

Strangely enough, although Bonsu is the banger in the fight, I think he is the one most at risk of being stopped. His chin is highly suspect, and while Baldomir isn’t a seriously hard hitter he is crisp and accurate with the right hand and the Ghanaian can often be a wide-open target.

So, an either-way fight, but my feeling is that Bonsu, with the crowd behind him and his back to the wall, can win this on youth and energy, simply by throwing more punches than Baldomir. If Baldomir wins it will be considered an upset, but, for me, only a mild one.

Boxing fans in Japan have seen a lot of exciting title fights this year, from local-rivalry clashes to world title bouts, and they are likely to witness another good one on Saturday when the veteran Filipino, Randy Suico, defends his Orient and Pacific lightweight title against Japan’s Ichitaro Ishii.

Each man is known for being aggressive and crowd-pleasing. Suico is taller and more experienced. He has fought at a much higher level, including a world title defeat against Juan Diaz in Las Vegas.

Ishii, a few years the younger man at 26, has lost only once in the last six years, when he was befuddled and outsmarted by the crafty southpaw Kengo Nagashima. A good left-hooker, Ishii had a career-best win in March when he knocked out Hiroshi Nakamori in two rounds to become the Japanese champion.

Suico has never lost at the Oriental level. His three defeats were all on the road — two in the U.S., one in South Africa. He is a strong, busy fighter who hits heavily, and he has excellent stamina. Suico is perfectly at home in Japan, where he has boxed several times, and he has a Japanese mentor in the knowledgeable Joe Koizumi.

In breaking down this contest, I reviewed Suico’s last fight, a draw with Nihito Arakawa, and I thought that the Filipino looked particularly slow and hittable. Suico’s physical strength and pressure earned him the draw, but Arakawa, a clever southpaw, outboxed him in the early rounds and went toe-to-toe with him in the last two rounds, when each man threw a lot of punches.

It could be that Arakawa’s shifty, southpaw stance was “wrong” for Suico, just as Nagashima’s slick, southpaw style bedevilled Ishii. On Saturday, Suico and Ishii each faces a boxer after his own heart — someone who will stand and fight.

This should be a terrific, all-action fight. When I first started to analyse it I was going to go for Suico, but I have the slightest of suspicions that he could be at the stage of his career where a Japanese fighter might finally be able to beat him. Ishii is the fresher fighter, he seems to be the quicker of the two men and he appears to have the chin that can stand up to Suico’s heavy hits. Pulling the trigger on a pick, I am going to take Ishii to edge out a narrow points victory.

The final show in Telefutura’s Solo Boxeo series takes place in Denver on Friday, when undefeated local favourite Mike Alvarado meets durable Mexican veteran Miguel Angel Huerta in a 10-round junior welter bout.

It has been a great ride for boxing fans on Telefutura, with a lot of excellent bouts, including such championship fights as Jesus Chavez vs Sirimongkol and Martin Castillo vs Alexander Munoz.

My understanding is that the Azteca America network will be throwing its hat into the ring with a strong boxing presence in 2009, but Friday nights won’t be quite the same without Telefutura and commentators Bernardo Osuna and Ricardo Celis, who came to be almost like friends of the family even for non-Spanish-speakers.

The Telefutura series should end on a high note because Alvarado is a crowd-pleasing boxer-puncher who usually takes the fight right to his opponents, while Huerta has probably never been in a bad fight.

Alvarado, 28, has been developing nicely on Telefutura but just seems to have found a new level in recent bouts, with stoppage wins over Michel Rosales, Cesar Bazan and Manuel Garnica in his last three fights. He was just too strong and too insistent for his opponents in these fights, and his punching was crisp and accurate. Alvarado isn’t just a slugger. He jabs his way in, and I think that his increased use of the jab has helped him become a better fighter. If Alvarado has a man in trouble, he will keep right on him. In each of his last three bouts, the other man seemed broken down mentally as much as physically.

Huerta, 30, is an excellent test for Alvarado. He is an experienced professional who can box and fight, and he still has ambition, with four wins in his last six bouts, one of his losses being the very disputed decision defeat he suffered against Almazbek Raiymkulov.

Huerta has been in the ring with a lot of good fighters, with notable wins over Rolando Reyes and Darling Jimenez, and although stopped by Julio Diaz — his only stoppage defeat in the last seven years — he knocked down the former world champion in the first round. I think that Huerta’s nose was broken in that fight, and with one eye starting to close it was decided to pull him out with two rounds remaining.

The fight that Huerta is most remembered for, though, is his 12-round war with Raiymkulov on the Versus network when he seemed to have outfought the bigger puncher. When Huerta dropped Raiymkulov in the 11th round it seemed to seal the deal, but it was not to be. Two judges had Raiymkulov winning by just one point — the crowd agreed with the 116-111 score in Huerta’s favour.

Although outfoxed by crafty veteran Javier Jauregui in March, Huerta came back with a widely scored decision win over Juan Ramon Cruz. After fighting as a lightweight his whole career, Huerta has decided his best weight now is 140 pounds, and of course he faces a very tough debut in this weight division against Alvarado.

I am expecting a good, tough, action-filled fight. Alvarado must be considered the stronger fighter, he is at home and he has career momentum. Huerta is a good, busy fighter who switches from the orthodox to the southpaw style during his fights. I think he will be throwing lots of punches, and he will not easily be beaten.

Alvarado, though, has the bit between his teeth and is moving forward confidently in his career. I think his is going to be too much of an offensive powerhouse for Huerta and I think he is going to wear down the sturdy veteran, either outpointing him or possibly getting a stoppage win in about nine rounds.

Argentina’s Luis Carlos Abregu was a bit exposed, I thought, in his win over David Estrada on ShoBox. The unbeaten welterweight looks good when he’s on top but he clearly isn't the big hitter his record indicates and I fear that he doesn’t like pressure.

Estrada was coming on strongly at the end but ran out of time in the 10-rounder. Abregu was hitting with sufficient authority in the early rounds to keep Estrada contained.

When Estrada started to get into the fight it became a gruelling ordeal for Abregu. In the last two rounds he back-pedalled his way to the finishing line, a bit like Oscar De La Hoya against Felix Trinidad although in Abregu’s case he had built up a big enough lead in the early rounds to get the win. I didn’t think there was all that much in it, though, and the two wide scores in favour of Abregu surprised me.

On the same show, Travis Kauffman took advantage of the situation and let his hands go to hammer the slow and overweight Malachy Farrell in three rounds. The unbeaten heavyweight from Reading, PA, had a target in front of him, and he went out and hit it. I thought that Kauffman showed good combinations and hand speed, although really it was hard shard to miss the lumbering Farrell. I have to admit I thought Farrell was going to be competitive and even a bit dangerous, but the preview was written before I knew that he would weigh in at a whopping 281 1/2 pounds.

Farrelle did manage to score a flash knockdown, though, when he caught Kauffman with a left hook. Otherwise it was Farrell who was doing almost all the catching.

The mega event last Saturday was Manny Pacquiao slapping around Oscar De La Hoya in Las Vegas but the best fight by far was in Britain, where Nottingham local favourite Carl Froch pounded out a unanimous decision win over Montreal’s Jean Pascal to capture the vacant WBC super middleweight title.

This meeting of unbeaten fighters lived up to all expectations expectations. Froch was a worthy winner with scores of 118-110, 117-111 and 116-112, but Pascal was brave and durable. We knew going into the fight that Froch could take a terrific shot, but Pascal was considered a bit suspect in the chin department. Now we know better. Pascal took the sort of punches that would surely have finished off most 168-pounders but always came back fighting — and he did so to the bitter end.

At times it seemed they took turns to land big shots. “Phenomenal exchanges!” exclaimed British ITV network commentator John Rawling. “Absolutely breathtaking stuff,” was the opinion of ringside pundit Barry McGuigan.

The commentary might have been a bit over the top in comparing the first three rounds to Hagler-Hearns, but it was undeniably exciting stuff.

The fighters each threw wild and off-balance punches at times, and each showed a certain disregard for defence, but they were putting so much into their shots and fighting with such intensity that it seems like carping to criticise technical imperfections.

This was a real fight, a throwback type of contest, between gutsy professionals who gave their all. It was a shame it wasn’t shown on American TV: I was able to get hold of a tape of the Canadian Super Channel coverage.

Pascal showed that he isn’t some flashy Roy Jones wannabe but a real fighter. He was willing to go at Froch and take his chances, risking getting hit so that he could land his own punches. I thought it was anyone’s fight for five rounds, but then Froch pulled ahead. He steadied himself and showed a stylish left jab and good judgement of distance as he stepped away from Pascal’s attempted haymakers and caught the Haitian-born Montrealer with counters.

Froch’s punching, especially with the right hand, was powerful, but with his left hand dangling by his waist he was always in danger of getting caught by Pascal’s right hands, which kept the suspense at a high level.

Pascal blinked through a swollen and battered right eye and you could tell that he was feeling the weight of the British boxer’s punches, but although he seemed to wilt a few times he gathered himself and rallied. Froch was a bit savvier, a bit more mature, had the better jab and was the tougher man, but I thought that Pascal enhanced his reputation even though he lost and I think that he will have learned a great deal from this fight.

A lot of Canadians have fought in Britain over the years, with varying results. The 1950s light-heavyweight contender Yvon Durelle, who almost knocked out Archie Moore, couldn’t win a fight in the U.K. and he had four of them. He was disqualified twice — once against a New Yorker, Artie Towne — but his ruggedness and fighting spirit was much praised when he got knocked out by Trinidad’s Yolande Pompey, who also challenged Archie Moore. George Chuvalo won and lost in Britain. Earl Walls took part in what was considered one of the most exciting heavyweight fights seen in Britain in years when he lost to the Jamaican Lloyd Barnett in 1949, a contest that had six knockdowns and numerous swings of fortune. I was ringside at the Royal Albert Hall when a young welterweight from Montreal named Marshall Butler gave a classy boxing exhibition to outpoint an up-and-coming John H. Stracey, who went on to become world champion.

Now Pascal has given the sort of performance that will long be remembered by the British fans who saw it, and I think his name will rank with the very best in the long Canadian connection with British boxing. This was Froch’s night, though. He has waited a long time for a night like this, and he seized his chance, magnificently.

RINGSIDE REPORT: So many people got it so wrong. What some thought would be a mismatch turned out to be a mismatch in reverse when Manny Pacquiao pasted Oscar De La Hoya for eight rounds in the so-called Dream Match in Las Vegas on Saturday.

Far from being the weaker, smaller man, Pacquiao looked much stronger and also much harder-hitting than De La Hoya.

What surprised me, most of all, at ringside, was how little steam there seemed to be on De La Hoya’s punches. Pacquiao was the puncher in the fight and no mistake. Right from the start he was hurting De La Hoya.

When De La Hoya was retired by his corner after eight rounds it was eerily reminiscent of the way the Golden Boy obliged Julio Cesar Chavez to surrender a decade ago — also after eight rounds. The difference was that Chavez was semi-competitive and even made a desperate rally. De La Hoya showed nothing. As Angelo Dundee put it when we chatted at McCarran airport after the fight: “The kid came up empty.”

Empty just about sums it up, but Pacquiao obviously had a lot to do with De La Hoya’s wretched showing. His upper-body movement and quick moves had the older fighter looking perplexed. The speed and power of Pacquiao’s punches actually seemed to shock De La Hoya, who looked old, slow and painfully vulnerable.

It was as if this was a pale impostor of the De La Hoya who just 19 months earlier had fought Floyd Mayweather Jr. — the world’s No 1 at the time — to a close, split decision. De La Hoya didn’t even show the form he did when he outpointed Steve Forbes in May.

Pacquiao punched with excellent technique from his southpaw stance, sharp and accurate, and he was superior in every department and in fact was made to look a bit of a bully, such was the one-sided nature of the affair.

A 2-1 on favourite at the MGM Grand sports book before the line was taken down, De La Hoya looked as if he didn’t belong in the same ring as Pacquiao.

Boxing is indeed a strange business. Fighters who are generally expected to win or at least to be competitive, sometimes, in the parlance of the game, don’t show up. We saw it when Steve Molitor melted down against Celestino Caballero, and now with De La Hoya.

Pacquiao was tremendous, let’s make that clear, and his trainer, Freddie Roach, put together a strategy that was simple yet stunningly effective, but De La Hoya was almost like a man mesmerised.

To me, De La Hoya looked uneasy and lacking in confidence from the start, whereas Pacquiao looked loose and relaxed and also very self-assured.

It was as if Pacquiao knew he was going to win and De La Hoya knew he was going to lose.

The body language of fighters can tell you a great deal.

Even before the off, I was having misgivings about De La Hoya’s chances. Word circulated at ringside that De La Hoya had come in at an astonishingly light 147 pounds on HBO’s fight-night scale — 1 1/2 pounds lighter than Pacquiao. This set the alarm bells ringing. A ringside neighbour who had action on De La Hoya immediately started laying off all his online bets. A laptop computer can be a godsend in moments such as this.

The pre-fight vibe, it seemed to me, was good for Pacquiao, bad for De La Hoya. In the second round, I said to the people seated next to me: “This fight is over.” The gentleman on my left, covering for Vanity Fair (now that’s a publication not often on hand at the fights) said: “I’m going to put that in my story.” I guess I’ll have to pick up a copy of Vanity Fair to see if I do in fact get mentioned in the upscale publication although I suspect I will end up on the cutting-room floor, so to speak.

The pundits who picked De La Hoya (oops, that would include me) were mildly chided by Pacquiao’s promoter, Bob Arum, in post-fight comments. I’m always surprised when winners react this way. It was like Bernard Hopkins gazing down reprovingly at press row after the win over Kelly Pavlik. If the majority of the reporters are picking against a fighter, it makes his victory all the more meaningful, surely?

These picks are nothing personal. It is just an opinion being expressed. My own opinion was that Pacquiao would put up a tremendous fight but come up short. Oh well, I was right about the “tremendous fight” part — I never made this a blowout-type win for Oscar although some good judges did.

Pacquiao is now, as Arum put it, “the king of boxing”. He looks formidably strong as a junior welter (a muscled 142 pounds at the official, day-before weigh-in) , and projected fights with Ricky Hatton or Floyd Mayweather Jr — said to be “unretired” — are potential blockbusters for the new year.

It is fights of this magnitude that will keep boxing very much alive even in these troubled economic times.

Note: I was writing a big-fight package on deadline for Boxing Monthly on Sunday night but I plan to take a look at some of the other weekend fights and hope to post a few reports later today (Monday).