I'll be writing about the Showtime and DAZN cards in the next post in order to concentrate on Devin Haney's road victory over George Kambosos to unify all four championships in the lightweight division and hopefully stuff the WBC "franchise" championship into the trash for causing this mess to begin to with.
Haney's easy unanimous decision win by scores of 118-110 and 1160-112 (X2) (my score was 117-111 for Haney) may not have been the most aesthetically pleasing triumph in history for those watching and sitting through what has an excellent case for the worst pre-fight broadcast in boxing television history from ESPN but Haney's win was exactly what was needed to win against Kambosos and to do so by such control that the expected to be raucous Australian crowd was silenced for most of the bout.
Haney's offense was as basic as one could imagine but the Haney jab and one-two combination combined with just enough movement to avoid any punches were able to confound Kambosos, who rarely found his target and didn't resemble the tiger that invaded New York City to upset Teofimo Lopez last fall.
Kambosos wasn't nearly aggressive enough to trouble Haney as his wild right hand seldom hit the mark and even though Kambosos would land only one less power punch than Haney landed, the Haney jab was more than enough to carry the day and win a decision without dispute from even the most fervent Kambosos supporter.
Haney is contractually obligated to give Kambosos a rematch in the fall and again in Australia but few seem excited about a second bout considering this one wasn't either exciting or competitive.
Still, there is an obligation and Kambosos will almost surely activate that clause as he's unlikely to ever receive better terms down the road with another sizable paycheck and again fighting at home but he had both of those in this fight, and other than the paycheck those advantages didn't help him very much at all.
Haney established himself as a star with a great performance on the biggest stage of his career and should he defeat Kambosos in their rematch, Haney will hold the cards in the division with all four titles and with his move to Top Rank before the Kambosos match, Haney will have several big fights that would be relatively easy to make.
First on the list would have to be multiple division champion Vasyl Lomachenko, who would have been the person in the ring with Kambosos with both sides agreeing to a deal before Lomachenko stayed in his home country of Ukraine to defend against the recent invasion by Russia.
Assuming Lomachenko's issues in his native land will eventually be settled, Lomachenko would likely receive the first chance under the circumstances with the only question being whether or not Lomachenko would take a tuneup fight first or move straight to Haney.
The conqueror of Lomachenko and the surprising loser to Kambosos, Teofimo Lopez, has been rumored to be moving north to the junior welterweight division even before his win over Lomachenko and had he not lost to Kambosos, a pairing of the unified lightweight champion (disregarding the franchise issues) against the then unified junior welterweight kingpin Josh Taylor (Taylor has since been stripped of the WBA title for refusing to fight their mandatory challenger, the unbeaten, untested, and unknown Dominican Alberto Puello for a small purse after few were interested in bidding for the fight via purse bid) would have been very attractive before the luster was removed by Lopez's defeat.
Could Lopez be tempted to stay at lightweight for a full four title attempt against Haney, who Lopez had taunted via social media and tagged him with the term "Email champion" that only would go away after Haney's win this weekend?
The WBA still has a minor title in the division and despite the title meaning little, the fighter holding it certainly does with Gervonta Davis as the beltholder.
Davis has been criticized for his relatively weak competition and there are questions about when Davis's contract with Mayweather Promotions expires with some reports stating that it ended last week with Davis's knockout of Rolando Romero and yet others reporting that Davis has one year remaining on his contract.
Mayweather refuses to do business with Bob Arum and Top Rank, so a Haney-Davis fight would seem to be a long shot with the best hope coming from the WBA deciding that the time is right to end their lightweight mess and order Haney vs Davis and hope for the best- Don't hold your breath waiting for that to occur.
Ryan Garcia would be another big fight and his association with Golden Boy wouldn't be a hindrance to challenging Haney as Golden Boy has worked with Top Rank on several occasions.
And one other possibility with Top Rank eventually could be WBC and WBO junior lightweight champion Shakur Stevenson, should Haney hold off his challengers and Stevenson rises after his goal of unifying the junior lightweight division.
I'm not sure that I would pick Haney against all of those fighters but I'm not sure I'd wager against him either and after this win, Haney now owns the best resume' of the young stars in the division.
Devin Haney is the Email champ no more.
In the other two boxing challenge affairs from Melbourne, Jason Moloney stopped Aston Palicte in the third round of a ten rounder between two former world title challengers in a crossroads fight.
Moloney knocked Palicte down and quickly finished him off with seconds remaining in the round.
Moloney will likely hang around in the lower half of the top ten and likely appear in a title eliminator soon, while Palicte looked weaker in his new weight division and might be better suited to return to junior bantamweight.
Lucas Browne shocked Junior Fa with a first-round knockout in their ten rounder and juiced-up what appeared to be a fading career.
Browne had been stopped by Paul Gallen and David Allen in his previous four bouts and looked to be overmatched against Fa, who entered the fight with only one loss, a distance fight with former WBO champion Joseph Parker and had never shown signs of a weak chin.
Browne landed a huge right hand to drop Fa, who never was able to get his legs back under him after rising and Browne finished him off with a right hand that could have been close to being to the back of the head of Fa.
It wasn't an obvious foul but there may be enough evidence there to support a rematch that would likely give both fighters a solid purse perhaps on the Haney-Kambosos rematch card.
I'll be back with the review of the Showtime/PBC card and a world title explosively changing hands from Wales on DAZN.
Boxing Challenge
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