Miguel Cotto is determined to halt Manny Pacquiao’s march towards the history books at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas when he defends his WBO welterweight title against the world’s top pound-for-pound fighter on Saturday night.

Yet Pacquiao is the man with momentum and he could rewrite the history books by becoming the only prize fighter in history to claim seven world titles in seven weight divisions if he defeats Cotto.

Cotto, who has 34 wins (27 KOs) and just one defeat to his name, is beloved by the Puerto Rican nation and as much a symbol of machismo and humility as Pacquiao is in the Philippines.

He faces the man who is regarded as the best pound-for-pound boxer on the planet in the wake of the Filipino’s eight-round demolition of Oscar de la Hoya 11 months ago and the second-round flattening of Britain’s Ricky Hatton in May.

Pacquiao, who has won 49 fights (37 KOs) and lost three, appears unstoppable. What has been startling is Pacquiao’s ability to carry his power up the divisions. Both De La Hoya and Hatton were bigger men, yet De La Hoya at welterweight and Hatton at light-welterweight were dismantled by the speed of the tenacious southpaw.

Cotto is a slow starter, and if he cannot find a way to be the aggressor in a fight, he sits back and counter-punches. He also sets clever traps for opponents and although his handspeed and movement are slower than Pacquiao’s, he will be dangerous in later rounds.

Pacquiao’s trainer Freddie Roach said: “Manny is moving up a weight class but I am very confident in my guy and we are 100 per cent ready for this fight. I feel that he is going to knock Cotto out.”

Cotto is unperturbed. “What they say and what they do does not concern me,” he said. “I’m going home with the belt.”

Pacquiao said: “This is the most important fight of my career. If I win, it will be history for boxing and for the Philippines.”
Sourced via telegraph.co.uk

Popularity: 3% [?]

Women ski jumpers sue for the right to compete in the Vancouver Olympics and stop men from jumping if women can’t.

Unless a Canadian court decides otherwise, the ski jumper with the longest flight on record at Vancouver’s Olympic facility will not attend the winter Games in February.

She is not allowed to compete.

Olympic ski jumping is a men’s-only domain. Since the first winter Games in 1924, men have been swooping down snowy ramps at 55 m.p.h. and springing into flight – human rockets hurtling chin-first, hands thrown behind, and skis angled forward. With nothing but speed and their skis to aid them, they fly the length of a football field or farther – a feat of technical genius disguised in balletic grace.

But women can do it, too – the best often flying as far as men.

With women now included in such formerly all-male Olympic events as boxing, wrestling, bobsleigh, and luge, the last Olympic door closed to women is ski jumping.

But American ski jumper Lindsey Van – who set the record on the 90-meter jump when the Olympic venue opened in Vancouver, British Columbia, last year and is the reigning world champion – hasn’t given up on prying that door open. It’s a logical step for the 24-year-old, who, since age 7, has been soaring over Earth’s mundane limits on what is possible.

She and more than a dozen other women jumpers from Slovenia to Norway hope to legally force the addition of women’s jumping before the Games open Feb. 12. Their lawsuit against the Vancouver Organizing Committee (VANOC) contends that not allowing women to jump for gold is a form of discrimination under Canadian laws that prohibit gender discrimination in government activities.

A Canadian judge, last summer, agreed: It is discrimination.

But her ruling concluded that while VANOC is subject to those antidiscrimination laws, it can’t control the events – that’s the domain of the International Olympic Committee (IOC). The IOC voted in 2006 against including women’s ski jumping in 2010 because it deemed there weren’t enough high-level women to create competition worthy of the Olympics. Because the IOC isn’t bound by Canadian law, the judge ruled, Canada is powerless to change the program.

So the jumpers’ appeal asks Canada to refuse to hold the men’s event unless both genders can compete.

When the appeal is heard Nov. 12 and 13, it will highlight not just women’s battle to wipe out the last vestige of an old-boys-club Olympic culture, but also competing demands on the Olympic ideal:

•Allowing athletes to pursue success on the most visible world stage.

•Broadening the appeal of the Games among Gen-Xers interested in more extreme sports while keeping costs manageable.

“IT’S A TEXTBOOK CASE OF DISCRIMINATION,” says Anita DeFrantz, chair of the IOC’s Women and Sports Commission. “This group of athletes is being told that they’re not good enough, that there aren’t enough women in the top level…. That’s never been an issue before.”

The IOC defends its position as preservation of the Olympic standard, saying the top women jumpers don’t deserve the same gold that is awarded to figure skaters and alpine skiers who have risen to the top of far larger fields.

But the IOC’s recent record of admitting both women’s events (see chart) and disciplines with weak fields – such as bobsleigh and ski cross – suggests the issue is not as clear-cut as either side asserts.

More than 80 years after men’s ski jumping debuted as one of six original Olympic sports, the International Ski Federation (FIS) – which stages ski events at the Olympics – voted in 2006 to recommend women’s jumping for inclusion in the 2010 Games. The federation endorsed women’s ski cross over ski jumping. Neither sport fully met the IOC criteria for inclusion. The IOC only approved ski cross, which had the required two world championships but less than half as many elite women as ski jumping. Men’s ski jumping doesn’t meet the criteria either, but was grandfathered in. Compounding suspicions of gender discrimination was the fact that FIS president Gian Franco Kasper told National Public Radio in 2005 that jumping was too dangerous for women, that it “seems to be not appropriate for the ladies from a medical point of view.”

But Walter Sieber, a Canadian member of the IOC division that recommended not to include women’s ski jumping in the 2010 Games, denies that the decision had anything to do with gender – pointing to the IOC’s decision this year to include women’s boxing as evidence of the IOC’s true colors.

While he admits that the top women jumpers are very competitive, he maintains that there aren’t enough competitors at that level to warrant an Olympic sport.

The 2009 World Championships results support that view: The women’s field of 36 had a 20-point gap between top competitors and weaker ones, while the men’s field of 50 competitors finished closer together.

THE BOTTOM LINE, claim both those alleging and denying sex discrimination, is the hard fact that the multibillion-dollar Olympic machine is subject to the rising pressure of commercialism.

“What matters to the IOC is: Will the event sell tickets, will it sell TV time, is it popular?” asserts Jacqueline Hansen, a runner who was a member of the lobby that won a place for the women’s marathon in the 1984 Olympics.

Since then, the sway of TV has become so great that Michael Phelps swam at 6 a.m. in Beijing – prime time in the US. TV may well have played into the IOC’s decision to approve women’s ski cross events for the 2010 games. A sort of motocross on snow, the sport is a variation on snowboard cross – an event introduced in the 2006 Torino Games that was a hit with NBC, which paid $1.5 billion for TV rights there and in Beijing.

Olympic officials do consider TV appeal in deciding on sports, confirms Mr. Sieber. In the era of IOC president Juan Antonio Samaranch, in the 1990s, he says, the emphasis was “to have many sports involved,” but the expanding Games became unwieldy for organizers. In the current era, the bar for new events is higher – they must be “good for TV” and “an addition that enhances the program.”

AMERICAN SKI JUMPER JESSICA JEROME, fresh from winning the US Nationals in Lake Placid, N.Y., last month, says she understands the commercial pressures on the IOC: “The Olympics for so long has been what Mom and Dad sit down to watch while the kids are out skateboarding or snowboarding – doing these things that are radical and rebellious.”

But while she acknowledges that X-Games sports will increase viewership and revenue – benefiting all Olympic sports, ski jumping is no less daring. “I think it’s one of the most ex-treme sports … it’s got that dangerous element, but it’s also got that beautiful, elegant thing to it,” she says.

BUT WHILE THE WOMEN jumpers recognize the need to grow the sport, they say they face discrimination at every level – a point supported by a 2009 book by Western European sports scholars, “Sport and Gender Matters in Western Countries.”

“Barred from serious competition for decades because jumping was not deemed appropriate for females, women ski jumpers have not been able to establish the appropriate experience in international level training and competition and to gain the type of ‘technical merit’ required….” concluded a chapter on ski jumping that also notes women were jumping as early as the 1920s.

“Jumping is a very traditional European old-men type of sport. They think that women will take away the extremeness of it,” says Ms. Jerome,

Women jumpers got their first international circuit in 2004, and were allowed to compete at world championships for the first time last year. But in a sport in which the best European men are treated like rock stars and pocket roughly $10,000 per win, the women are only allowed to compete on a secondary circuit that awards winners $500. And, says Ms. Jerome, women are treated very differently. She and her teammates have eaten meals with barn cats jumping on the table and slept above livestock stalls in lodging arranged by competition organizers.

Even after Ms. Van won world championships last year, the US Ski Team – facing an 18 percent budget cut – dropped all funding for women’s jumping, and men’s, too.

THE BRITISH COLUMBIA Court of Appeal must now decide whether VANOC should refuse to hold men’s ski jumping unless women are allowed to compete.

VANOC attorney George McIntosh argued before Judge Lauri Ann Fenlon that as host, VANOC implements, but can’t control, the Olympic program. And while she ultimately found in VANOC’s favor, she put his argument into stark relief when she asked Mr. McIntosh if VANOC would plead the same point if blacks weren’t allowed to compete in the Vancouver Olympics. His answer, after an awkward silence, was yes.

VANOC has encouraged the IOC to include women’s ski jumping, and if that happened, officials say, the Vancouver machine would be able to accommodate the women.

Without that action at the IOC level, however, no one is sure what to expect if the court upholds the women’s appeal.

“It’s unprecedented,” says McIntosh, who half jokes that to enforce such a ruling, “[The VANOC chief] would have to be standing at the top of the jump with a bayonet.”
Sourced via csmonitor.com

Popularity: 23% [?]

Floyd Mayweather Jr. stopped by the New York Jets’ practice facility and came up with a knockout of an idea for his next career move.

“I think I could play in the NFL now,” the six-time champion boxer said with a laugh Thursday. “I’m going to talk to the owner.”

A few particularly long tosses had Mayweather jumping around like a little kid back on the sandlot.

“Did you see those passes?” he shouted. “Did you see how far I threw it?”

Rest easy, Mark Sanchez. Your job is safe.

“You always just imagine guys being really big,” Jets coach Rex Ryan said. “Then, you realize that that guy can punch you in the face 20 times before you ever even thought about punching him.”

The Jets invited Mayweather to practice, and he and several members of his entourage were there for the last 15 minutes before he spoke to the team.

“This is my first time coming to an NFL training camp,” he said before adding, “I’ve bet enough money on them.”

With the team huddled around him, Mayweather told the Jets to not let their loss last Sunday at New Orleans get them down.

“They’ve made a couple of good trades, and if Braylon Edwards and Sanchez can get good chemistry,” he said, “they’ve got the potential to make it to the Super Bowl.”

Mayweather took photos with players and threw the football around, including tossing a few passes to running back Thomas Jones.

“He’s real cool to just come out and mingle with us for a little bit,” tight end Dustin Keller said. “He’s definitely a confident man and he loves his money, that’s for sure.”

Mayweather’s last fight, a victory over Mexico’s Juan Manuel Marquez in September that improved him to 40-0, generated 1 million pay-per-view buys. He also didn’t miss a chance to throw a playful jab at Sanchez, whom he followed when Sanchez was the quarterback at Southern California.

“Of course, I told Sanchez, ‘I know you rooted for Marquez,’” Mayweather said with a grin. “He just laughed about it.”

Mayweather also flashed some knowledge of Jets history – and an appreciation for the green and white.

“I know Joe Namath has been that guy for years, and I like their colors,” he said. “They’ve got that ‘Money Mayweather‘ green. They’ve got the best colors in the NFL.”

He was especially excited about meeting Ryan, whose brash and loquacious style is right up Mayweather’s alley.

“Yeah, he’s cool!” Mayweather said. “I like that coach, man. He’s the coolest NFL coach I’ve ever met.”

And that’s even with Ryan taking some shots at his size; Mayweather is 5-foot-7 1/2 and less than 150 pounds.

“It was kind of an interesting deal,” Ryan said. “When you look at him, you’re like, ‘Oh, please. I’ll whip that dude.’ Then, he’s like, bam! And, you wake up missing.”

Mayweather has dabbled in reality television, wrestling and has talked about a potential acting career. He’s excited about all that, but is still unsure what his next move in the ring will be.

“I ain’t even thought about it, but I know football,” he said. “Brett Favre looked extremely good on Monday. His offensive line is unbelievable, man. That guy’s a legend.”

After watching an NFL practice, Mayweather wasn’t sure whether boxing or football was tougher, saying that they’re both “very, very brutal contact sports.”

“I was thinking to myself that he doesn’t get hit very often, so what does he know about contact?” a smiling Ryan said. “It was good to see him out there.”
Sourced via washingtonpost.com

Popularity: 4% [?]

Boxing could take place at Wembley Arena.

Women’s boxing may have been legal in Britain for only 11 years – but on Thursday it could move a major step closer to being part of the 2012 London Olympic Games.

The International Olympic Committee’s 15-man executive board is meeting in Berlin to consider requests from boxing and 16 other sports to incorporate new events.

Rowing, canoeing, cycling and shooting are also looking to introduce more women’s events for 2012 – but boxing is currently the only Olympic discipline in which women are not represented.

The IOC invited requests as part of a systematic review of the Olympic programme, to ensure it remains fresh and appealing.

But any new events must be in place of, rather than in addition to, existing disciplines within that sport.

Men’s boxing would lose around 40 places to accommodate three women’s weight divisions.

Women’s boxing in Britain was first recorded in the 1720s and was a demonstration event at the 1904 Olympics.

In November 1996 the Amateur Boxing Association of England lifted a 116-year ban on women’s boxing. Two years later, Jane Couch was granted a professional licence.

The International Cycling Union are keen to build on the success of the BMX racing at the Beijing Olympics with more freestyle events, while swimming governing body FINA want to introduce 50m sprints.

Modern Pentathlon has already changed its format, to combine the run and the shooting in one final category to shorten the event and create a more exciting finish.

Also on the agenda on Thursday, the IOC’s executive board will decide which two sports to propose for inclusion in an expanded Olympic programme for 2016.

Rugby sevens and golf are reportedly the current front-runners heading into the vote but they face competition from karate, baseball, softball, squash and roller sports.

All seven sports presented their cases to the executive board in June.

Baseball and softball were voted out of the Olympics in 2005, but the IOC failed to reach agreement over potential replacements.

The 15-man executive board will submit their proposals for both the new events in 2012 and the new sports for 2016 to the full IOC session for a final decision on October 9 in Copenhagen.
Sourced via sportinglife.com

Popularity: 21% [?]

Miranda, the two talented fighters participated in a media conference call along with promoter Dan Goossen. In the featured bout, the undefeated and No. 2- ranked Ward will fulfill his dream of staging a pro fight in his hometown when he takes a big step up in class to face Miranda, a Colombian knockout artist who has fought top-notch competition throughout his career, on Saturday, May 16 in Oakland, Calif. The 12-round fight for Ward’s North American Boxing Organization (NABO) and North American Boxing Federation (NABF) super middleweight titles will be the featured bout on a special Saturday primetime edition of ShoBox: The New Generation, live on SHOWTIME (9 p.m. ET/PT, delayed on the west coast).

The event will originate from the Oracle Arena in Oakland, and will be promoted by Goossen Tutor Promotions in association with Leonard Productions. The Ward-Miranda bout will be presented in association with Seminole Warriors Boxing. Tickets are on sale NOW, starting at just $25. Doors open at 4:30 p.m. PT. The first non-televised fight is 5 p.m. PT. Fight week (next week) activities in Oakland include an open workout on Tuesday, possibly at the City Center, a final press conference at the City Center and the weigh in at the Plaza at City Center. ALL FIGHT WEEK ACTIVITES ARE OPEN TO THE PUBLIC..

Ward, a highly touted and talented 25-year-old, is 18-0 (12 KOs) and was the only boxer from the United States to capture a gold medal at the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, Greece and remains the last American to win gold. Miranda is 32-3 with 28 knockouts.

DAN GOOSSEN:

“We’re looking at this as Andre’s coming out party, not only in Oakland, but to the world for 168-pound supremacy.

“Let’s face it; he’s taking on a tough nut to make his statement. But that’s what it’s all about. No risk, no reward. That’s the way that Andre has always conquered everything in his life, even leading up to the Gold Medal. I believe he’s going to be the preeminent 168-pounder in the world.”

EDISON MIRANDA:

“I’ve prepared well for this fight. I’ve trained very hard. I know that Andre is going to be a very tough opponent, but I know I am going to walk away victorious after this fight.’’

ANDRE WARD:

“I want to thank my hometown and everybody that is involved and working really hard to put this together.

“I’m preparing like I always do, I’m staying focused like I always am. I’m going to win on May 16 for my hometown fans.”

Is Ward the best fighter you have faced in your career?

MIRANDA: “No, Andre is not the toughest fighter I’ve ever fought. Howard Eastman is.”

How will you beat Andre Ward?

MIRANDA: “I’m going to knock him out in the 10th round.”

Is Edison Miranda the toughest fighter that you’ve faced in your pro career?

WARD: “Absolutely, on paper. I put emphasis on paper. We won’t know until I get in the ring on May 16. I think I’m going to be a lot tougher than he thinks I’m going to be. I don’t have any predictions, but I can guarantee you this: I’m coming into this fight, even though I’m in my hometown, I’m the underdog in my mind. I’m always like that. Gold Medal aside, everything else aside, I’m coming in as the underdog. That’s how I prepared, that’s how my focus is. I’m going to shock a lot of people in this fight”

Could Miranda derail Ward’s momentum?

GOOSSEN: “Look, you’ve got two world class fighters fighting one another, so nothing is ever a foregone conclusion. But, we’ve got a lot of confidence in Andre Ward. Edison Miranda is a tough challenge, but I believe it’s going to bring out the best in Andre Ward. Saturday night, May 16 is when it’s all answered. We can sit here and talk until we’re blue in the face, but it doesn’t matter when that bell rings. We’ve got a lot of confidence in Andre. We believe he is going to win and win in an exciting fashion from the standpoint of showing his prominence in this division, but let’s get to Saturday, May 16.”

With this step up against Miranda, is there is a title shot coming soon?

WARD: “People are going to have opinions about my opponents and how tough they think they are. The bottom line is, we’ve take a steady climb up. I don’t think we’ve regressed anywhere in my career. We haven’t been fighting tomato cans. We’re fighting guys that have had ample time to prepare. They’re coming to win. I understand that each and every fight, guys are going to bring their ‘A’ game because they want that win on their resume.”

“Yeah, this is a step up, but at the same time this is right where we need to be. These are the kind of fights that bring the best out of great, and potentially great, fighters. You have to go through the Edison Mirandas of the division to prove that.”

Have you watched his fights?

WARD: If you’ve seen one of Miranda’s fights, you’ve seen them all. Miranda is going to be Miranda and I’m going to be Andre Ward. At the end of the night, May 16, we’ll see what happens.”

Are you excited to fight in your hometown?

WARD: “This is an event. This is bigger than a fight. This is what my team was talking about when we were trying to figure out when was the right time to fight in Oakland and against what opponent.”

“I think this is absolutely the right time and the right opponent. This is a guy that a lot of people are afraid of based on his tactics that he tries to give outside of the ring and even his style inside the ring. But we’re focused and we’ll do it in my backyard. In terms of excitement, we’re very excited, but I can’t be distracted and put the carpet before the horse. We’ll take care of business and then we’ll enjoy everything else when it’s all said and done.”

Is fighting in Oakland an advantage?

WARD: “Fighting in your backyard could either be a gift of a curse. I’ve never been one to get caught up in the lights, camera, action and that whole deal. I don’t really get caught up in the hoopla before the fight. I’m just a steady kind of person. I’m steady and I’m consistent in terms of the way I approach each fight. Whether I’m fighting in the Olympics or I’m fighting at Tachi Palace, it doesn’t matter. I have a job to do.”

“I’ve been preparing for nights like this since I was nine years old. I can’t let fighting in my hometown detour me in terms of my focus. Trust me, there’s going to be a lot of energy in the building. I think a lot of people in Oakland are excited about this and I’m going to deliver on May 16.”

Does Miranda’s tactics bother you?

WARD: “I don’t fear anything in that ring. Miranda is going to be Miranda inside and outside that ring and, I’m going to be Andre Ward. At the end of the night we’ll see who is standing and who’s talking the loudest.”

“In terms of his tactics, I’ve said it before, Miranda is a bully and I don’t like when people try to bully people. He’s going to find out that I’m a whole lot tougher and a whole lot nastier inside that ring than he’s anticipating. It’s going to be a different type of fight than he’s anticipating. I’ve been on that canvas and I’ve gotten back up and come back to win. Whatever he wants to bring, bring it, and I’m going to be ready on May 16.”

How has your difficult (situation with your mother) impacted you as a fighter?

MIRANDA: “No, it hasn’t affected me at all, my past with my mother. What I can say is that anytime that I had a loss in the ring it made me more determined to win my next fight. That’s exactly what I’m going to do on May 16.”

Asked to address his weight issues since he fought at 176 pounds in March and has to fight at 168 pounds against Ward?

MIRANDA: “I’m at 168 right now. I have no problem right now. I’m eating fine and normally, so it won’t be an issue.”

Do you have anything to prove in this fight?

WARD: “To me, this fight is totally about respect. It’s about respect from the media, respect from the entire 168-pound division and just respect in general. There’s always something to prove with each fight. The stakes are higher, absolutely.”

“I know a lot of people don’t think I’m going to win this fight. I think a lot of people get caught up in the whole Miranda hoopla. They get caught up in his punching power and stuff like that. But, I’m not buying it. I respect him for his strengths in the ring, but we’re coming to win. We’re coming to do our job each and every fight. This fight is about respect, and this fight is about proving that I not only belong but that I have aspirations to be the best in this division.

What can this fight do for you if it turns out the way you want it to?

WARD: “This fight is everything. This is going to be a major leap forward or a major leap backward. It’s going to put the winner in title contention and, I know for myself, it’s going to put me in a mandatory spot (for a title challenge). So this is a must win. It goes without saying that we have to win this fight.”

Did you see the (Carl) Froch- (Jermain) Taylor fight (April 25 on SHOWTIME)?

WARD: “I thought it was a good fight. You’ve got to give Froch respect for coming over here and putting his title on the line. He’s 30 years old so he understands that he doesn’t have much time and his window of opportunity is pretty short. I’m sure that had a lot to do with him coming over here (from England).”

“I expected a little more from Jermain Taylor. I don’t understand what’s going on with his conditioning. It was unfortunate the way he went out. I would have liked to see him hold on and get that belt back. He wasn’t able to hold on, but, once again, you’ve got to respect Carl Froch for what he did in that fight. His determination pulled it out for him.”

When asked if he had any words about Froch possibly being his next opponent:

WARD: “I’m locked in on this fight. I’m eating, sleeping and drinking the guy that’s in front of me. When it’s over, we can talk about that. But I’ve really had few to no talks about what lies next for me.”

WARD’S closing comments:

“I can’t wait to see what comes out of me May 16. It’s my time and that’s just the bottom line. As far as Oakland is concerned, let’s do something positive. Let’s buy our tickets, let’s come out and let’s show that good guys do finish first, not last.”

GOOSSEN:

“This is the future of our sport and what better people to go out there and represent us than athletes that we can look up to.”

Are you in touch with your mother now?

MIRANDA:

“I do talk to my mother; I’ve always talked to her. The question isn’t about my mother or my father, the matter at hand is Andre Ward. I can talk about my mother or my father after the fight, but right now the only thing on my mind is Andre Ward.”

Do you respect Andre Ward?

MIRANDA: “I have respect for Andre outside of the ring as a man. But inside the ring, I don’t have respect for him. In fact, I don’t have respect for any other fighters inside the ring. If I had to say I respected somebody, it would be Bernard Hopkins. He’s been such an example for me. I really can say that he’s the only boxer that I have respect for.

GOOSSEN Closing Comments:

“Andre gets into town Sunday. Monday, Miranda comes in. We’re going to have an open workout on Tuesday, I believe, at the City Center. We’ll have the final press conference on Thursday in the City Center and we’ll have the weigh in on Friday at the Plaza at City Center. We’re doing everything open to the public. We’re going to go out there and put on a great show for Oakland and all of the Bay Area.”
Sourced via eastsideboxing.com

Popularity: 5% [?]

Filipino southpaw Manny Pacquiao flattened Ricky Hatton in the second round, taking a historic victory with a devastating left to the chin that hospitalised the Englishman.

Pacquiao equalled a boxing milestone with a title in a sixth career weight class by slamming a powerful left-hand blow into Hatton’s chin to buckle the Englishman’s knees and send him down to the canvas on his back unconscious.

“It was a hard punch. It was a solid punch,” Pacquiao said. “I hit him on the chin and I didn’t think he would get up.”

Referee Kenny Bayless knelt over the unmoving Hatton and halted the fight after two minutes and 59 seconds of the second round, giving the Filipino star a victory and the International Boxing Organization junior welterweight title.

“Everybody is surprised. Me too. I didn’t expect this would be so easy,” Pacquiao said. “But I have worked hard in training camp. Nothing personal. I was just doing my job.”

Hatton awoke and walked from the ring to the locker room but was taken to a nearby hospital as a precaution.

“It was a hard loss but I’m OK,” Hatton said. “I didn’t really see the punch coming, but it was a great shot. I know I will be OK.”

Pacquiao, widely considered the world pound-for-pound champion, won his 10th fight in a row, improving to 49-3 with two drawn with his 37th early stoppage coming on a spectacular punch for the ages.

“That was the best knockout punch I’ve ever seen,” Pacquiao trainer Freddie Roach said. “It was the perfect shot. That rarely happens.”

The Philippines hero secured his place among boxing’s top legends, adding the junior welterweight crown to past world titles at lightweight, super featherweight, junior featherweight, featherweight and flyweight.

“It means people will put me on the list of boxing’s all-time greatest fighters,” Pacquiao said.

Pacquiao was coming off a victory last December over Oscar de la Hoya that cemented his place as boxing’s “pound-for-pound” champion, even though a newly unretired Floyd Mayweather Jnr might one day make him prove the point again.

“This was as big for me as the De la Hoya fight,” Pacquiao said.

Hatton fell to 45-2, losing at junior welterweight for the first time in his career and prompting his trainer, Floyd Mayweather Snr, to say Hatton should hang up his gloves.

“I would suggest he retire,” Mayweather Snr said. “At the end of the day it’s his decision.”

Hatton’s only prior loss came in December of 2007 when he was stopped in the 10th round by Mayweather in a welterweight bout for the pound-for-pound title in the same ring where he was hammered again by the Asian superstar.

“He tried twice. He failed twice,” Mayweather Snr said. “He lost to my son and to lose to someone below that, it’s time to leave the ring. He made a good profit. Sometimes you have to go when your prime is still there.”

Pacquiao knocked Hatton down twice in an electrifying first round, the first time with a left to the chin 30 seconds into the fight and the next with a combination near the end of the round.

In round two, Hatton caught Pacquiao with a left to the head but Pacquiao answered by pressing the attack, cornering Hatton before settling matters with a devastating punch in the center of the ring just ahead of the bell.

“This was no surprise,” Pacquiao trainer Freddie Roach said. “Hatton pops his hand before he throws a punch. He’s a sucker for the right hook and that’s what we worked on the whole camp. He fights the same way over and over.”
Millions of Filipinos danced in the streets and President Gloria Arroyo announced a national holiday as the impoverished nation celebrated Pacquiao’s emphatic win.

Motorists waving the national flag drove through major cities tooting their horns and shouting out of the windows after Pacquiao’s knock-out of the Briton.

The Philippines’ usually jammed highways had been deserted before a delayed broadcast of the Las Vegas fight was screened on free television, and police said even criminals took the day off.

“We wish Manny would fight every day so we will have no problems in security,” said national police spokesman Senior Superintendent Nicanor Bartolome.

Only one crime was reported in Manila, a gun-ridden metropolis of 12 million, by Sunday morning. Police also rushed a fan to hospital after he suffered a heart attack while watching the bout on television.

Troops fighting Muslim militants on Jolo island watched the fight, while Arroyo took time out from an official visit to Egypt to declare a national holiday to welcome Pacquiao home.

“President Gloria Arroyo joins the entire nation in gratitude of God for the spectacular victory of our Manny Pacquiao,” her spokesman Cerge Remonde told Filipino radio by telephone.

“Manny Pacquiao showed the world the best in the Filipino … We found it incredulous that it was that fast. We were really ecstatic. There was whooping in the delegation.”

At least 10,000 people watched a free live screening in Pacquiao’s dirt-poor home city of General Santos, while in Manila’s depressed Tondo area another 2,000 people packed an airless gym to watch the fight.

Tempers flared among the capacity Tondo crowd, including shirtless men, when a technical hitch briefly interrupted the feed but the fans roared Pacquiao’s name and raised their fists when Hatton fell unconscious to the canvas.

Across town, a well-heeled crowd of 200 including politicians and celebrities watched at a cafe in Manila’s upscale The Fort district.
“We knew he would win but not this fast,” R.J. Ledesma, editor of men’s lifestyle magazine “Manual,” told AFP.

Pacquiao’s International Boxing Organisation junior welterweight title means he has equalled the record of world crowns in different divisions, and is considered the world’s best pound-for-pound fighter.

The victory also offers a welcome moment of celebration for the Philippines, often a victim of natural disasters, political upheaval and corruption and whose already struggling economy has been hit hard by the global slowdown

- Unbeaten Floyd Mayweather will end a 17-month retirement on July 18 against Juan Manuel Marquez.
Sourced via theage.com.au

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Manny Pacquiao can no longer be identified as a boxer. Lethal weapon, maybe. Or destroyer missile. Whatever the definition, he is unquestionably the sport’s top gun.

What he did to Ricky Hatton on Saturday night, in a boxing ring at the MGM Grand Garden, before a crowd of 16,262 and millions more all over the world watching on pay-per-view, was mostly mayhem. The man from Manchester was manhandled.

British fans who swoop down on this city every time Hatton fights — which is three times since December 2007 — serenaded him into the ring as usual, with the now-annoying version of “Winter Wonderland” that begins: “There’s only one Ricky Hatton.”

They were right. He was the only one who ended up on his back in the middle of the ring.

The fight summary is one paragraph. Pacquiao knocked Hatton down twice in the first round, dominated the second and caught Hatton with a vicious left hook as the round ticked down. Hatton’s eyes rolled back and his body fell, like a sack of potatoes, flat on his back. Referee Kenny Bayless knelt over him for several seconds, then waved his hands, with one second left in the round, to signify that the fight was over.

The aftermath was a bit scary. Hatton didn’t move right away, and soon there were many people with concerned looks on their faces, kneeling and hovering. Hatton may have been on his back longer than he was on his feet during the fight.

Eventually, they brought his stool to the middle of the ring and got him on it, and a few minutes later he left the ring under his own power, waving feebly to a crowd of Brit fans who may have been driven to drink by the result. Of course, any result would have driven them to drink.

Pacquiao, the Filipino powerhouse whose record went to 49-3-2 (with 37 knockouts), weighed in Friday at 138 pounds and went to 148 by fight time. Hatton, now 45-2-0 (with 32 knockouts), weighed in at the limit of 140 and gained 12 pounds by fight time.

A measure of how dominant Pacquiao has become is that this victory marked his fourth different weight-class win in the last 14 months. His previous conquest, of boxing legend Oscar De La Hoya at 147 pounds, sent De La Hoya into retirement. Hatton is only 30, two months older than Pacquiao, but may be pondering a similar path. The pubs of Manchester are a lot safer than Pacquiao’s left hand.

Pacquiao’s trainer, Freddie Roach, now the pound-for-pound best corner man in his sport, pretty much called the shot again, just as he had against De La Hoya on Dec. 6. He said Pacquiao would knock Hatton out in the third round. Pacquiao apparently had earlier dinner reservations.

“This fight was no surprise to me,” Roach said.

The star trainer always seems to have a secret strategy, and he revealed afterward that, for this one, he had watched hours of film of Hatton — “I knew him better than my own fighter,” he said — and realized that Hatton was wide open for the right hook.

“Hatton pumps his fist before he throws,” Roach said. “We also knew he’d be looking for the left,” Pacquiao’s main weapon.

The first knockdown in the first round came via a right, the second with a left. Hatton had actually survived somewhat better in the second, despite Pacquiao’s quickly evident superior hand speed, foot speed and punching power. But the left that finished him started at about 7 o’clock, landed on Hatton’s face at about 12 noon and made the likely obvious result official.

Hatton didn’t attend the post-match news conference, because he was taken to Valley Hospital. Before he left, he said, “It was a hard lot, but I’m OK. I really didn’t see the punch coming, but it was a good shot.”

Pacquiao, ever the diplomat, said, “I’m surprised the fight was so easy. I worked hard in training camp and he was open for the right all night. It was nothing personal. I was just doing my job.”

Bob Arum, whose Top Rank Promotions handles Pacquiao, called his boxer “a monster” afterward, and started making noises about Pacquiao’s becoming boxing’s “all-time great.”

Two things to consider there. As a promoter, Arum is wired for hyperbole. But also, he is no newcomer to this and began his career promoting no less than Muhammad Ali.

The only thing that might stop Pacquiao now is his desire to become a prominent government official someday soon in his beloved Philippines. There is even talk of the presidency someday.

Were that to happen now, it would make Pacquiao the answer to the trivia question: Which country has a president even more popular than Barack Obama?

For Hatton, a nice guy and tough competitor who is also beloved in his country, there may not be a lot of return trips upcoming.

Which, of course, will send the beer distributors of Las Vegas into deep depression.

Sourced via latimes.com

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LAS VEGAS – Ricky Hatton and Floyd Mayweather Sr. are an odd couple. A British brawler who is noted for pub crawling when he’s not training for a fight is paired with a flamboyant trainer who likes to talk trash about the opponent or the opposing trainer.

It is a union that Hatton hopes will transform him into the kind of boxer/brawler who can subdue Manny Pacquiao (48-3-2, 36 KOs), the No. 1 pound-for-pound king, when the two meet in a 12-round junior welterweight match at the MGM Grand Garden Arena Saturday night on HBO Pay-Per-View.

Hatton and Mayweather’s styles are as different as their dress. At the final press conference on Wednesday, Mayweather showed up in a brown, three-piece, pinstripe suit with a yellow shirt and tie and matching yellow alligator shoes. Hatton wore a floppy black hat, black T-shirt, sweatpants and sneakers.

“I’m not sure he could pull this off,” Mayweather said regarding Hatton trying to wear his ensemble.

But Mayweather has no doubt that Hatton (45-1, 32 KOs) can pull off what he has been teaching him at the Las Vegas gym where they have been working the last two months in preparation for Pacquiao, who won at three different weight classes last year (130, 135 and 147) and beat Oscar De La Hoya, Hatton’s promoter, in his last fight on Dec. 8.

This is the second fight that Hatton and Mayweather have worked together. Mayweather helped train Hatton for his match against Brooklyn junior welterweight Paulie Malignaggi last November. Hatton, a bullish brawler, showed flashes of defensive skill and head movement that he hadn’t displayed in recent years in winning the match on an 11th-round TKO.

Hatton, 30, said he needed every minute of the seven weeks he spent with Mayweather to get used to the trainer’s methods.

“To be perfectly honest with you, for the first two or three weeks of those seven weeks, I couldn’t understand a word Floyd was saying,” Hatton said.

Hatton said that Mayweather, whose English isn’t easy on the ear, isn’t trying to remake him, only enhancing what he developed in a career that includes winning the undisputed junior welterweight title from Kostya Tszyu in 2005 and winning a welterweight title in a narrow decision over Brooklyn’s Luis Collazo in 2006.

“Everybody seems to think because I’ve been working with Floyd Mayweather Sr. that I’m all of the sudden going to turn into a master boxer,” Hatton said. “And I don’t think that’s what I’m getting at. I think the old Ricky has to be ultimately the one that is going to win this fight but he’s a lot more polished in other areas now.”

There is a school of thought in boxing that you can’t change a boxer’s style after he’s been fighting a certain way for a long time. Typically as soon as a boxer takes a good shot, he reverts back to what he has always relied upon to be successful. Hatton dismisses it.

“I didn’t resort back to the old Ricky Hatton against Malignaggi,” Hatton said. “If I’m going to resort back to the old Ricky Hatton, Manny Pacquiao has got as much chance as me because he likes to fight just like me.

“I’m boxing a little bit more now. I out-boxed a boxer last time against Malignaggi. And I think although Manny surely could box in his last fight, he did it against not much, I feel. And I say that with the greatest respect for my promoter and friend, Oscar.”

Mayweather said that Hatton can win the fight being the “old Ricky Hatton.”

“If he reverts back to himself, I think he can beat Manny (even) if he didn’t have me in his corner,” Mayweather said. “So, if he reverts back to what he did before it’s gonna be good enough.”

Sourced via nydailynews.com

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Boxing SA suspended Jarred Lovett for 12 months after he was found guilty of bringing boxing into disrepute, while also suing Sowetan and this writer for R250000.

A letter from lawyers acting on behalf of Boxing SA was received last Thursday. They are demanding an apology for an article written and published on March 19.

The story was about Boxing SA’s sanctioning committee, which overruled Dr Peter Chadderton, who had said that he suspended Tyson Sixhakuma after he had dislocated a shoulder in the finals of the Baby Champs.

Sixhakuma fought almost three weeks after his order and dislocated his shoulder again, forcing his fight to be stopped.

Chadderton said he recommended that Sixhakuma go for an operation, and that he would not be able to fight until then. He was also required to produce a letter from the physician who conducted the operation.

The lawyers said the article cited Boxing SA as being “corrupt, insensitive or inconsiderate” .

Back to Lovett, who was charged with conducting himself in a disgraceful manner by attacking organisers and participants at an amateur boxing tournament without provocation, insulting them and allegedly calling them “kaffirs”.

His hearing took place last Thursday at Nasrec. Bongani Khumalo was the presiding officer, Loyiso Mtya, director of operations, was the prosecutor while Imran Khan, director of Champions Inn Boxing Academy, was the complainant.

Lovett was represented by his manager Brian Mitchell.

The incident happened at Booysens Boxing Club last month.

Lovett admitted misbehaving but denied claims of racism.

“I am no racist. My best friend, an orphan, David Rajuli, lives with me. I support him,” he said.

But Khan insisted Lovett insulted him and pushed him around.

“But I’m happy we found an amiable solution. We accepted his apology and the 12-month suspension,” he said.
Sourced via sowetan.co.za

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