Thursday, January 31, 2013

Nonito Donaire vs. Guillermo Rigondeaux April 13 at MSG?


The lastest info I have on this fight happening (and it appears it will go ahead, though not signed as of this writing) points to a thrilled Rigondeaux requesting a "knockout clause" in his contract with Bob Arum as MSG is pegged as the most likely destination for Rigondeaux vs. Donaire on April 13th, 2013 for their unification fight.


Sunday, January 27, 2013

Latest In Guillermo Rigondeaux vs. Nonito Donaire and Golden Boy vs Bob Arum Saga



Nonito Donaire and Golden Boy have just made an aggressive move toward dismantling Guillermo Rigondeaux's chances of landing the biggest fight of his pro-career by offering Donaire and Bob Arum $3 million to secure a fight with Abner Mares. This is unprecedented money for a fight so far down the ladder of weight class.

There's more on this courtesy of Dan Rafael's reporting over at ESPN:

http://espn.go.com/boxing/story/_/id/8883112/golden-boy-offers-nonito-donaire-camps-3-million-abner-mares-fight

Figures they'd throw this kind of money at Donaire just as it was sinking in that I was only a couple months away from savoring the fight I'd most like to see in boxing. Humbug!

Wednesday, January 23, 2013

April 13th in Vegas looking more and more like date for Rigondeaux vs. Donaire



April 13th looking more and more like date for Rigondeaux and Donaire sources close to Rigondeaux's camp have confirmed with me. Some kinks yet, but agreement is there.

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

The Only Way Guillermo Rigondeaux Could Become a Household Name...

"The only way Guillermo Rigondeaux could become a household name is if Fidel Castro came over and co-promoted him with me.

-Bob Arum

Funny how Arum continues to renew Rigondeaux's contract with Top Rank based on statements like these. 

Sunday, January 20, 2013

Rigondeaux vs Donaire March 16th?




According to Dan Rafael over at ESPN, circumstances could push Donaire/Rigo a month and a bit earlier to March 16th:

http://espn.go.com/blog/dan-rafael/post/_/id/2966/bradley-gamboa-fight-in-discussions

Thursday, January 17, 2013

Nonito Donaire vs. Guillermo Rigondeaux April 27th, 2013 Announced


According to a few different websites Bob Arum has formally announced April 27th, 2013 as the date Guillermo Rigondeaux will challenge 2012's Espn Fighter of the Year (most likely in Vegas according to Arum).

Rigondeaux's manager Gary Hyde has confirmed the news via Facebook.

Rigondeaux picked up the torch of Cuba's most important fighter from Felix Savon (who personally passed on his captaincy to Rigo back in 2000 after his retirement), who in turn was the legendary Teofilo Stevenson's successor.

Finally, after all the great fights that never happened between Cubans and the rest of the world on the professional stage, Rigondeaux gets his shot against one of the world's best. My guess is he's licking his chops at the chance to take on a puncher as one of the most deadly, if not the most deadly, counter puncher who ever lived (don't take my word for it, Freddie Roach said the same thing).

Rigondeaux by body shot KO within 6.  

Best of luck to Rigo!

Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Eric Kelly article on SBnation...

The most fun on a profile I've ever had. Fascinating guy.

http://www.sbnation.com/longform/2013/1/15/3866556/eric-kelly-boxing-trainer-wall-street

Guillermo Rigondeaux vs. Nonito Donaire?


Some rumors swirling regarding Guillermo getting a crack at 2012's Fighter of the year Nonito Donaire.

Funny, back in 2007 when I first met Guillermo after Fidel came down on him and branded him a Judas who would "never fight for Cuba again," I wonder if he thought this day would arrive where he'd have a chance, 5 years later, to fight for a world title against one of the top pound-for-pound fighters on earth and prove himself as a professional and potentially have a shot at making the kind of money that can look after his interests the way he couldn't in Cuba.

If he gets his chance and pulls it off, maybe spectacularly (a heavy-handed counter puncher against a puncher trying to expose a weak chin makes the chance of a brilliant bodyshot not all that unlikely), I still wonder if all the fuss associated with him trying to leave will be worth it for him, on his terms.

When our deepest fantasies collide with reality this is usually what creates the most profound nightmares of our lives. And as Guillermo's silence about the journey to the US illustrates pretty well, he doesn't have all that many people to compare notes with in terms of understanding where he's coming from.

Be fascinating to watch it unfold...


Monday, January 14, 2013

"The One-Eyed King" Drops Tomorrow on SBnation Profiling Eric Kelly


Tomorrow my piece for SBnation drops about Eric Kelly's fascinating allure to the 1% on Wall Street. It's a pretty interesting ride into one of the most interesting people I've met in a long while. Always fun when you can find someone with 1.2 million hits staring at a video that they still come away missing something important from. Kelly goes a long way into filling in exactly what that is over the course of the interview he granted me.

Stay tuned...

Thursday, January 10, 2013

Havana: The Canaries in the Coalmine




While editing Split Decision with a Cuban editor who made it to America via the Cayman Islands at the age of 21, we noticed an extraordinary thing that separated Cuban boxers from American boxers.

When Cubans were victorious in the ring, their immediate instinct was to search and reach out to extend gratitude for anyone they could find who assisted or they felt was responsible for their accomplishment. Felix Savon's last fight when he won his third Olympic gold featured him, as the final bell rang, exhaustedly smiling out to Cubans in the audience yelling though he was out of breath, "Gracias Cuba!"

American fighters, on the hand, over and over basked in their own accomplishment. The gestures of victory all said: look at me. Arms outstretched. Chin high. Posing for history. Occasionally they'd bask in their accomplishment while simultaneously pointing out their humility as a means of compounding their achievement and virtue. It was humbling to make this much money or to have achieved this or that touchstone in their career.

The funny thing about this litmus test dividing Cuban and American boxers was that when we watched all the fights of the top Cuban boxers who defected, they began to adopt the same nature of celebration after their victories as Americans. Rigondeaux and Gamboa, for example, go further than reveling in their victories. They demonstrate contempt. Occasionally they go further than contempt and reveal the bitterness at the heart of their victories: while they want what America can offer them financially, they have both stated publicly on many occasions they'd much rather be fighting before a Cuban audience. Even more curious given how high profile their defections, they claim they remain fighting for Cuba.




Wednesday, January 9, 2013

"The One-Eyed King" Preview


           (One of my favorite scenes I photographed from Havana's Prado, the Cuban Dalai Lama in red)

Eric Kelly, the most celebrated boxing trainer of the 1% in the world right now, caught my attention a couple months ago for his video. I understand he just he just sat down on Good Morning America the other day. Next Tuesday SBnation is publishing an article I wrote on Eric Kelly based on a few visits down at his Church Street Gym in the Financial District of Manhattan. Along with Eric I interviewed several of his clients.

Quite a romance is going on down there and I'm looking forward to this article throwing some light on it.

Tuesday, January 8, 2013

The Salon Treaty


A very interesting, quite fun situation developed after I responded to some hate mail from a former Columbia professor after my Salon article began a shouting match in the comment section.

An enjoyable read about the results of our truce:

http://louisproyect.wordpress.com/2013/01/07/split-decision/

Monday, January 7, 2013

The Art of Spin With Anything CUBA


Funny how when this piece went up on Salon.com:

http://www.salon.com/2012/12/31/the_way_we_left_cuba/

...the editors inserted a headline, attributed falsely to me, saying Cuba was an "Orwellian nightmare." I complained, not before the comment section and some hate mail assailed me as a "right wing, Cuba-bashing opportunist shit," as one person put it. Seemed as if 90% didn't read beyond the headline. Even a metaphor in the piece comparing Havana's current state to a young girl, just sexualized, staring and smiling with rotten teeth at tourists had another person imply I was a pedophile.

So Salon's editor compromised with me on the headline I complained about, though "reluctant to do so," (as the bulk of the article, he argued, would balance it off) and attributed another headline to me, which I didn't write, calling Cuba "by turns beautiful and terrifying."

Seemed that was as close as they'd let the piece get to ambiguity by way of introduction.

Charming times we live in...