A bit of a screw-up at TQBR Headquarters yesterday in writing up last night's HBO middleweight main event, so let's keep this brief: Julio Cesar Chavez, Jr., he showed that he CAN box, some. Maybe even pretty well. He dodged punches for the first time ever, countered effectively, fought going backward, and so forth. That was in the first three rounds. In the 4th, Peter Manfredo, Jr. forced Chavez into a back-and-forth brawl, and it was more like the old Chavez -- maybe he can box, but he decided he didn't want to. He emerged from that sizzling round of slugging with a bloody nose, but closed the show the next round. The stoppage was borderline, sure, but for once I can't argue with referee Laurence Cole's call; Manfredo wasn't doing much, and he was getting hit with pretty flush shots.

Manfredo retired after the fight, and in one of the quotes of the year, said he was no longer interested in the sport, basically: "I don't want to promote or be part of boxing. I just wanna (eat) a sandwich." Admittedly, Manfredo was there to make Chavez look pretty, and almost certainly the slow and still-hittable Chavez couldn't do some of the things he did to Manfredo to legitimate middleweight champion Sergio Martinez. But Chavez' career arc, for me, is mimicking that of his popular Mexican rival Saul Alvarez. I started a skeptic of his talent. I was slowly won over by Alvarez. I'm on my way to being won over by Chavez. Chavez is going to be fun no matter what. But if he can fight like he did Saturday, the universe of appetizing match-ups open up for him with fighters previously thought to be in a much higher skill bracket. Here's a good start, a fight that already was appetizing even before Saturday: Should Alvarez get past Kermit Cintron next week, let's see these two Mexican youngsters go at it next.

(I now return to my writing vacation. Don't forget to stop back by during the week and check out what the rest of the staff is up to, though. You have read some of these guys, right? They are GOOD.)
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The situation in New York with Antonio Margarito's license sunk very quickly into catastrophe status over the span of a few days to end the week, and has veered back toward salvageable since. As it stands, Margarito might still get a license for his junior middleweight fight with Miguel Cotto, if a doctor for, for instance, the New York Rangers says his eye -- the object of multiple surgeries -- is satisfactory. The fight is on Dec. 3. Boxing haz a silly.

Some moved to blame the New York State Athletic Commission, and statements from Melvina Lathan that the fight should be fine to go licensing-wise did look a bit incriminating at first, except that was about Margarito's hand wrap scandal. In September -- not long after she made those statements, apparently -- she said she began pestering Top Rank to get the commission some papers, and only got them on Oct. 31. Perhaps Nov. 18 was the earliest they could meet for some reason or the other, but given the proximity to the fight, maybe they could've moved more quickly after getting the papers, and had some better situational awareness overall.

What this should do is convince whatever segment of the boxing world out there that thinks Top Rank knows what it's doing... that it doesn't. Why did they wait so long to get the commission the papers for such a big fight, if the commission was asking for them? They had to know that Margarito's physical condition was such that they would need to take extra care. You can point out that boxers are sometimes licensed at the last minute, but Margarito isn't at all an average boxer, from a licensing standpoint. And by the way, Top Rank -- like all promoters -- does some things very well; maybe it even does more things well more consistently than all of them. But let's face it: No promoter out there has a very high batting average when it comes to knowing what it's doing. This one's a big swing and a whiff for TR.

Maybe the fight will be in New York. Maybe that's what officials are lobbying for in New York. That's where the fight belongs. If it's somewhere else, it will be a monument to the kind of monumental failures boxing is capable of achieving. (Outside the ring, anyway. The card is likely to deliver good action regardless of whether it's in Madison Square Garden or Mississippi. Also, what keeps getting lost in this is whether Margarito should be fighting at all, with his health issue and past cheating. But why should I be any different in neglecting it?)

I'm on the verge of taking a week-long vacation from TQBR, although the rest of the team will still be in business. That means one last chance to clear the deck. There's not much Quick Jabbing with Manny Pacquiao-Juan Manuel Marquez III sucking up all the news energy, and there isn't much Round And Round because most of the fights in the works are on hold as HBO and Showtime transition to new leadership.
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Most big-time prospects are babied, but some demonstrate maturity that demands accelerated development. 19-year-old Bronx junior middleweight Eddie "EBoy" Gomez showed he may be the latter by surgically dispatching Miami's Antonio Infante in five rounds Saturday night on TeleFutura from San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Despite being just a senior in high school Gomez showed a patient and calculating approach in the ring, waiting on Infante to commit himself before countering precisely with his gorgeous left hook. His huge advantage in speed began to show during the cautious opening round, allowing him to box from the outside despite giving up three inches to the rangy Cuban-American.

By the second Gomez was countering effectively and toying with his over-matched foe. Infante came out with more aggression in the 5th but received only a vicious left hook to the jaw for his efforts. Shortly after Gomez caught him with a flush straight right that stumbled Infante. no comments

For the second time in 2011, HBO is airing Julio Cesar Chavez, Jr. and Saul Alvarez in close proximity on the calendar, with the idea that the two presposterously popular young Mexicans will eventually get in the kind of physical proximity that can be confined by a 20-foot ring in what would be one of the biggest-money fights in boxing. This Saturday it's Chavez; next weekend it's Alvarez. The network pulled a similar trick in June, and if all goes according to plan, these will be the last pre-fight fights for the pair.

The opponents -- Peter Manfredo, Jr. and Kermit Cintron, respectively -- are feasible, if not frightening, threats to the prospects of Chavez vs. Alvarez, and they share a history of having fought on NBC in a time when boxing hasn't had much exposure on the big four networks. Manfredo is a step down in competition for Chavez, who got quite the unexpected scare in his last fight against Sebastian Zbik. Manfredo is an earnest middleweight, can box a little and more often than not brings it, but he's also on his last legs. In theory, he'll put up a fun fight against Chavez -- who, at his best, is pretty fun himself -- before likely losing.
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The days after a big boxing match are like a coastal town after a tropical storm, where there's so much debris strewn about that it can take a long while to find everything worth finding and put it in its right place. (In this metaphor, nobody got hurt or ruined economically by the tropical storm. I know this because it's my metaphor. If you think about it, hurricane and tornado and typhoon metaphors are so insensitive, aren't they? We need more happy storm clouds. [via])

The debris in the case of Manny Pacquiao vs. Juan Manuel Marquez III is not only everything we've written here since Saturday, but yet more that we haven't. Things like the ever-evolving stances of all the parties with a stake in what happens next, including Pacquiao, Marquez, Floyd Mayweather, Jr. and their promoters; the continual examination of what went wrong for Pacquiao in his narrow and disputed win; where public opinion is falling on post-Saturday pound-for-pound king-ship; some rather astounding reported numbers about how Pacquiao-Marquez 3 performed at the box office; the latest news about whether Marquez is a cheating foot stomper -- and you'll never guess who said he didn't notice this alleged stompage; plus some other random tidbits.

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Of all the weeks leading up to New Year, this week has the weakest boxing schedule. So if you're planning that winter vacation or have something you've been meaning to do on a Friday or Saturday night, do it now, for God's sake! Because after this, there's really no break. If you go out, you will miss quality boxing and we will shame you in the comments section. Not really. We're very understanding like that.

Not that it's a terrible week. Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. is fighting on HBO, but in a fight that not everyone believes should be on HBO. Wasted talent Joan Guzman is on ESPN Deportes on Friday night, along with underrated junior lightweight Argenis Mendez. There are also a few other cards, the first episode of 24/7 Cotto/Margarito and the replay of Saturday's contentious pay-per-view. Feast your eyes on the delicious awkwardness and confrontation of Margarito and Cotto's “Face Off” and let's get to the fights.
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The Counterpuncher.

He’s not a front runner. He is patient. Watching, calculating. Defense first, elusive tack. He takes what you give him and turns it around. Catch the grenade and toss it back.

Juan Manuel Marquez is certainly among the greatest counterpunchers in the history of the sport. He may even be the best. And those things that are intertwined in his fighter's DNA are also what encapsulates much of his career and how he will go down in boxing lore.

That patience and technical acuity are not only stalwart strengths of Marquez in the ring, but it is those same traits that define the long-smoldering fuse of "Dynamita’s" career.

His trilogy with arch-nemesis, Manny Pacquiao, lays out like his career in microcosm.

Out of the gate, disaster... losing his first fight by disqualification in '93 for a headbutt, glossy unbeaten record never to be -- against Pacquiao down three times, in round 1. Busted nose, staring up at the bright lights, blood pounding in his ears, crowd raucous, thick with cheers and jeers.

A career started 0-1, pulling himself together and rattling off 29 straight victories in the next six years -- getting off the deck and putting on a clinic of counterpunching perfection to battle back the Filipino fury, salvaging a draw from the disaster-strewn first stanza.

After these opening struggles... the perseverance, the second chance.

Those 29 victories upended by a lackluster Freddie Norwood loss on his first big stage -- that hard fought, spectacular draw with Pacquiao undone by an ill advised choice to face unheralded Chris John for short money in the Indonesian jungle.

And then the patience. Biding time, adapting and adjusting, in ring and out. Giving and taking more.

The rest of his career has unfolded much as the middle bout of the Pacquiao saga played out. Stretches of exciting brilliance, but pockmarks of violent setbacks, knockdowns, moments on the brink. Yet unlike his early career -- performances of tedious, technical brilliance, that new willingness to tear away his reserved nature, unleash ferocious attacks like a wild dog bent on survival.

At times it's almost as if Marquez is caught between his early cerebral dissector disposition, and his late career fire-in-the-blood warrior fever vision -- the extreme patience to wait in the wings and bide time watching Pacquiao’s triumphant surge through the welterweight division... and the impetuous grab at greatness in calling out Floyd Mayweather hunkered several divisions above his own.

If that strange dichotomy of character exists now, anyone who has followed Marquez’ career for more than this last chapter or two knows that it was not always the case.

In the old days, Marquez cut a textbook silhouette and possessed a young apprentice's razor focus on performing Svengali trainer extraordinaire Nacho Beristain’s exacting assignments.

Those early bouts built the man that would later have all the skills in the world, but also showed glimpses of the fire that coursed through his blood, unneeded and mostly unused for years at a time.
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Even if you've been a fight fan most of your life, and even if you try to educate yourself when it comes to guys far before your time that you'd never know or care about unless you were a fight fan, you're bound to encounter a few great scraps that you didn't know existed or simply hadn't yet seen.

Footage of primordial bouts has been lost, packed away or forgotten about, and sadly we may never see those gems, and we live with that.

Other classics simply escape our consciousness for one reason or another, though. Fights like Frankie Baltazar Jr. vs. Juan Escobar or even "Caveman" Lee vs. John LoCicero lacked really familiar names, but their tales were recounted unto younger boxing followers by responsible, bloodthirsty folk who watched them 30 or 40 years ago. Jung-Koo Chang vs. Katsuo Tokashiki was perhaps the Somsak Sithchatchawal vs. Mahyar Monshipour of the early 1980s, in that both featured two non-American fighters on foreign soil in excellent lower-weight collisions, though the latter match-up was pushed heavily on the Internet, while the former relied mostly on word of mouth.

Whatever the reason, despite how the Internet has accelerated the evolution of the boxing fan, we cannot be everywhere at once. Time is limited, and fights fly under the radar.

This one, while not quite the slugfest the above mentioned were, flew under mine for too long.
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Here and elsewhere, yesterday and today, some of the more fanatical fans of Manny Pacquaio are flooding the zone with the above video that allegedly shows what a big fat cheater Juan Manuel Marquez was this weekend by stepping on Pacquiao's foot a whopping five times. With that "Walking Dead" theme music, I can only assume that Marquez' alleged cheating is born of UNDEAD EVIL.

Feet stompin' is indeed illegal, if it is done it on purpose.

But anyone who knows the slightest thing about boxing knows that when orthodox fighters face southpaw boxers, they frequently and accidentally step on each others' feet. You needn't look too far for examples. Why... you could EVEN look at Pacquiao doing it to Marquez, if you wanted! This past weekend! Early and often! Like so.


Obviously the person who put that second video together is not the biggest Pacquiao fan, but the video footage doesn't lie. Pacquiao steps on Marquez' feet plenty. That must mean Pacquiao is ALSO a big fat cheater... or, more likely, nobody is.

In neither video do I see anyone appearing to aim at the other's foot, because their eyes aren't on the tootsie target; in both videos, I see the move actually hurting the foot stomper as much as it helps, because the stomper in question finds himself off balance. And even if it was on purpose, it didn't have any impact on the overall fight whatsoever. None. It didn't help Marquez win any rounds, and even Pacquiao trainer Freddie Roach said it made no difference, and is fine by him.

Move on, diehard Pacquiao fans. Defend him if you must, but abandon this particular hair on fire line of attack. Say something about how it was a close fight (it was) but you still think your guy won (which he did, at least on the scorecards). That's perfectly reasonable. Shelve the conspiracy theories. They are getting you nowhere other than laughed at, har har har. no comments

Overlooked in the aftermath of Manny Pacquiao-Juan Manuel Marquez III and all the debates about whether the judges robbed Marquez and whether Pacquiao sucks now is that JUAN MANUEL MARQUEZ GAVE AN INTERVIEW WHERE HE WORE A SOMBRERO OVER HIS NAKED JUNK. That is Mexican manliness personified.

But there are serious things left to debate. Maybe some of them can be debated dispassionately, now that we're days after the card wrapped up on Saturday. They include things like the above questions, but also where each man should be ranked now, what each should do next and whether WBC boss Jose Sulaiman is an asshole.
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