Eric Armit's World View by Eric Armit Mar 5th 2008

In this day of instant communications, and in our sport in particular, you would like to think that on medical matters the National and local Boards or Commissions would talk to each other, have reasonably similar high safety standards and would honour each others medical suspensions. Forget it! War seems to have broken out between Mexico and the United States on this very matter. We have recently had both Tommy Morrison and Oscar Larios fighting in Mexico whilst under suspension in some States in the USA, and these suspensions have not been routine 30 or 60 day suspensions, but potentially life threatening matters. Morrison's case is an example of both of the above problems. He was banned after testing positive for HIV before a bout in 1996. However, after a break of almost eleven years he has received a licence to fight from a few States, but remains banned in others - and this is a country where they claim to honour each others suspensions. So there is no consistency, even within the USA, and the local authorities in Mexico, despite a reported appeal from the Association of Boxing Commission, allowed him to fight. As for Larios, his is a more clear cut case as the Nevada Commission had placed him under indefinite medical suspension when their doctors found he had a subdural haematoma. Despite this Larios fought in a show in Mexico last month. In both cases either the fighter is fit to fight - and if so then he should be able to get the suspension lifted - or he is not, and if he is not fit, then he should not be able to flit across borders and find somewhere with lower standards where he can risk his life, and in the case of someone who is HIV positive, endanger that of others. But why should we be surprised? We have a WBA champion in Edwin Valero banned in the USA but okay to fight in Japan, France, Panama, Venezuela, Argentina etc., the Zambian I reported who has a brain tumour, and a licence, and I recently read of a fighter scheduled to fight in Dubai, who to my understanding has dangerously defective eyesight. It is obvious that the word safety does not translate too well. The former WBO light-middleweight Harry Simon won a decision recently. This was not in the ring but in the courts. He was cleared of drunken driving and obstructing the course of justice in charges relating to an incident in 2006. Simon won't be doing any driving for a while as he is serving a ridiculously short sentence of two year in Walvis Bay Prison after being found guilty of culpable homicide for his involvement in a car crash in 2002 in Namibia which resulted in the death of three Belgian tourists (Absolutely disgusting - Ed.). Rolando Navarette is another former world champion in the news for the wrong reasons. The Filipino appeared at a local hospital in General Santos City with a stab wound in his neck. Rolando pulled out his intravenous drip and walked out of the hospital the following day as he had no money to pay for his medical treatment. Rolando, now 51, won the WBC super-featherweight title in 1981 with a fifth round kayo of Cornelius Boza-Edwards, but lost it to Rafael Limon in his second defence nine months later. He had over 70 fights. He was known as “The Bad Boy from Dadiangas” and is still living up to that as this was the third occasion on which he has been hospitalised with stab wounds. There is no better statistician in boxing than Bob Yalen. His review for last year shows that the IBF, WBA, WBC and WBO staged 152 “world” title fights with the WBA leading the way with 43. The busiest division was the light-flyweights with 14 title fights, but the heavyweights, bantamweights and strawweights were in bottom place with just seven each. Twenty three different countries staged title fights and the United States hogged most with 56, Germany second with 17, Japan third with 15 and then the United Kingdom with 14. Of those title fights 73 went the full distance (5 draws) and 79 ended inside the distance with more than half of those ending in rounds 7, 8.9 and 10, so if you are considering betting on rounds be aware. Every year Bob produces the most detailed breakdown covering every aspect of these title fights. He originally qualified as a Nuclear Engineer, then worked as part of the ABC boxing team and is now Events Co-ordinator at the Mohegan Sun casino. He has to be the No 1 boxing statistician in the world. What a farce these “interim” titles have become. On March 29 Adrian Diaconu fights Chris Henry for the interim WBC light-heavyweight title and on April 12 Chad Dawson defends the WBC light-heavyweight title against Glen Johnson. It appears that you now need an interim champion whilst the champion trains. I previously wrote that it had got to a point where a champion was frightened to stop to tie his boot lace on the way to the ring for a title defence because when he looks up he will probably find a couple up there fighting for the interim title. Stupid ideas make the sport look stupid. Now here's another. On February 23 in Superior, Wisconsin, Zach Walters beat Carl Daniels on a seventh round retirement. This fight was billed as for the WBC African Boxing Union light-heavyweight title. I understand that Walters, now a US citizen, was born in Madagascar, and therefore seems to qualify, although the “Jungle Boy” nickname might need a bit of PC adjustment. However, Daniels, the 37-year-old former WBA light-middleweight champion was born in St Louis, and his tie-back to Africa would seem to be that being black his ancestors must have been African - and therefore he qualifies. Well if we believe the anthropologists my ancestors came out of Africa and therefore I qualify even if I might struggle to provide a family tree that goes back that far. If you take this to its ridiculous conclusion then there are American fighters who should be able to qualify to fight for the British title, German title, French title, Italian title, Polish title - well you get the idea. Apart from that, there are few enough opportunities for African-based boxers to fight for major titles without the WBC hiving them off to the United States. So there you are Jose, another source of income a WBC European title for fighters of European descent to show that there is no racial prejudice being practiced here. British fighters have shown little interest in the EU titles, but they can pave the way for a shot at the full title. However, right now some of the title fights are below standard. A typical example was France's Jimmy Colas second round stoppage of Spaniard Miguel Angel Pena in Martigues on February 15. Haitian-born Colas regained the EU light-middleweight title and now has a 23-4 record, but veteran Pena had won only two of his last eight and it pains me, as a technical advisor to the EBU on ratings, to say that in the December EU ratings he was not in the top 20 and yet in January, after 7 months of inactivity, he appeared as the “official challenger”. Two of Hungary's top fighters scored easy wins in poor matches on a show in Budapest on February 19. IBO light-middleweight champion Attila “The Viper” Kovacs halted Janos Petrovics in four rounds of a non-title fight and super-middleweight Jozsef Nagy stopped novice Istvan Petroczki in one. Kovacs has 22 wins in 23 starts and is unbeaten in his last 20.This was his first fight since beating Robert Frazier in May. Nagy is 18-1 and was returning after a loss to Carl Froch foe Denis Inkin. Colombian welterweight Richard Gutierrez took his record to 24-1 (1 no contest) with a wide points verdict over Nicaraguan Jose Varela in Fort Lauderdale on February 22. The tough, brawling 29-year-olds only loss was to Joshua Clottey in July 2006. Varela dropped to 23-3. In another February 22 bout Vernon “Iceman” Paris failed to impress as he had to go eight rounds to outpoint experienced 38-year-old Kenyan Nasser Athumani at light-welterweight. The 20-year-old Paris has 18 wins and a no contest and was expected to end this one early. Athumani, a pro since 1994, had lost his last two inside the distance but those were against world rated Tim Bradley and Jose Urango. Another former top amateur appeared on the show and scored a points win. Willie Nelson, a 6'3” 20-year-old welterweight went to 7 wins as he decisioned Robert Jones. I am not sure of the reason for it, but the WBA have introduced 11-round title fights. As a person who has acted as a fight supervisor that really upsets me. I am pretty good at my ten times and twelve times tables but always struggled with 11 x 11 so trying to check scores over eleven rounds with everyone waiting for the scorecards would cost me what little hair I have. Anyway enough of my problems. In Mar de Ajo on February 23 Argentinian Rodolfo Martinez won the vacant WBA Fedlatin welterweight title with en eleven rounds points verdict over Marcelo Miranda. The 26-year-old Martinez has a 27-1-1 (1 no contest) record and is unbeaten in his last 24. Hot Puerto Rican prospect Juan Manuel Lopez marched on with a third round stoppage of fellow-Islander Jonathan Oquendo in Caguas on February 23. The WBO Latino super-bantamweight title was on the line as 24-year-old southpaw Juanma made it 21 wins, 19 inside the distance. In another bout super-featherweight hope Roman “Rocky” Martinez made it 18 wins and a draw as he halted Jose Cruz in three for the WBO Intercontinental super-featherweight title. South Seas heavyweights tend to flatter to deceive - David Tua being the exception. It remains to be seen which way Solomon Haumona will go. The New Zealand born big man halted Tommy Connelly in three rounds in Sydney on February 27 to go to 14 inside the distance wins in a row. At 32 he is hardly a “prospect” but he can punch so it could be a short but exciting run.

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