RINGSIDE
movers who move more than they ‘stick.’ And I don’t care for low-volume plodding pressure fighters. We don’t need a 168-pound version of Haney-Ramirez.” But that’s what we got. Another example of one boxer refusing to engage with the other being unable – or perhaps unwilling – to do anything about it. Only this time, the guy who stank it out was a lowly “B-side” and thus received no favors from the official judges, who handed in tallies of 115-113, 116-112 and 119-109 for the Mexican superstar. Alvarez – who was content to stalk Scull, occasionally aiming right hands to the Cuban’s body – regained the IBF strap. So, he will enter his September 12 superfight with Terence Crawford as the undisputed super middleweight champ but maybe not as the odds or media favorite. Midway through the fight, I posted: “OK, Canelo landed a few nice body shots in Round 6, but halfway through this fight I can see why Terence Crawford wants to fight him. If Canelo doesn’t get upset tonight and the planned September showdown happens, I’m changing my pick to Bud. Canelo’s in quicksand.” Once again, the “Boxing X” community was not happy: Veteran scribe Dan Rafael: “Per @ CompuBox: By throwing a combined 445 punches over 12 rounds, Canelo (152 punches) and Scull (293 punches) set a new record for fewest punches thrown in a 12-round [bout, according to] CompuBox’s 40-year history of more than 15k bouts tracked. Old record: 459 (Parker-Wilder). “Canelo’s 152 thrown punches were the 2nd fewest in a 12-round fight in CompuBox’s 40-year history and 15k+ fights tracked. And he still won easily against a track star.” Scull is partly to blame for the low- volume snooze fest, but elite fighters should know how to break down and eventually clip skittish stick-and-movers. (See Naoya Inoue’s 11th-round TKO of Paul Butler for a recent example.) At this point in his career, Canelo can only pull the trigger on one punch at a
Canelo seemed just as disgusted as the fans watching.
time vs. a runner. Added Abramowitz on X: “I don’t think this was a good version of Canelo by any means, but this was embarrassing by Scull. Even if you believe that Scull was doing well in the fight, the way he fought those last two rounds was just embarrassing. I’ve seen so many truly awful performances this weekend. “Thankfully, Bud is a complete fighter, an elite veteran who has too much pride and confidence to do anything resembling Haney or Scull… so we’ll probably get a proper fight on Sept. 12 in Las Vegas, but there’s no denying that Canelo looked flat in Riyadh.” And there’s no denying that The Monster was absolutely electrifying on May 4 at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. Inoue and Cardenas – as well as Rafael Espinoza and Edward Vazquez in the co-feature to the ESPN broadcast – gave fans everything missing from the May 2 and 3 main events. They took risks. They took punches. They got hurt. They raged back. Inoue was decked hard in Round 2, but the undisputed junior featherweight champ got up and resumed his seek- and-destroy mission against a dangerous and defiant Cardenas, who earned a legion of fans with his bold stand against the Japanese superstar. Inoue dropped Cardenas in Round 7 and
forced referee Thomas Taylor to save the San Antonio native in the eighth. Espinoza battered gutsy Vazquez to a seventh-round stoppage in defense of his WBO featherweight title. The 6-foot-1 Mexican threw 520 punches (landing 40%, according to CompuBox), more than the combined total punches thrown in each of the Haney-Ramirez, Garcia-Romero and Alvarez-Scull bouts. “Boxing X” was unanimous in declaring that these co-mains “saved the weekend.” Ring Magazine columnist Steve Kim: “A text I got from Larry Merchant earlier: ‘OMG, a real fight.’ “I got others from casual fans who were amazed by #InoueCardenas.” Kim had considered not attending the Top Rank show when Inoue’s little- known opponent was announced, but he ultimately decided to go. A choice he’s glad he made. “You go to a fight, and you just never know what you might witness,” Kim posted to X. “Tonight is one of those nights I won’t forget. They are fewer and far between nowadays, and you appreciate them more at this point.”
14 RINGMAGAZINE.COM
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