Boxing Challenge: Taylor holds off Prograis, wins WBSS

The best fight of the weekend was also the most important as the junior welterweight division of the World Boxing Super Series concluded with an excellent fight as Josh Taylor added the WBA title to his own IBF championship with a majority decision victory over Regis Prograis in London.
Taylor dominated the middle rounds, survived a badly damaged right eye and a late run by Prograis, who won the final two rounds on my card to make it close, but not enough to catch Taylor, who I scored the winner by a 115-113 score (7-5 in rounds.).
Entering the fight, Prograis was thought to be the bigger puncher, but in the ring, Taylor seemed to be the far larger and more physical fighter and was able to score with both hands effectively landing hooks that pushed Prograis around the ring.
Hopefully some time next year, Taylor's two titles can be unified with the two (WBC and WBO) owned by Jose Ramirez for one champion, although as soon as that's accomplished the Suleman gang at the WBC will declare the winner their "franchise champion" as they did Vasyl Lomachenko recently and took some of the gas away from a Lomachenko vs the winner of December's IBF title fight between Richard Commey and Teofimo Lopez event that would have resulted in a four title champion.
Ramirez will fight mandatory contender Viktor Postol (Postol has a decision loss to Taylor.) in February, so perhaps in the spring or summer, Taylor-Ramirez can be signed.

The undercard saw Dereck Chisora predictably knock out David Price in the fourth round of their heavyweight co-feature.
The third round saw a give and take with both fighters being stunned in the round, but Chisora landed two big rights and then an uppercut to drop Price, who courageously rose but his corner threw in the towel.
Price landed his share and even wobbled Chisora a time or two, but in the end Price's chin just doesn't hold up at a top 20 level and at 36 years of age, someone that cares about Price should step in and suggest that the time has come to step away.

Lee Selby nipped Ricky Burns via unanimous decision in a close but less than thrilling fight.
I figured this would be the case when it was signed and it might have exceeded my expectations a bit.
Selby was the winner on my card 116-112, but the former IBF featherweight champion is going to be outmatched against most top ten lightweights as the aging Burns gave Selby all he wanted and at this stage of his career, the former champion isn't a top ten fighter.

DAZN's other fight was a pretty good scrap on Thursday night as Elwin Soto won a close unanimous decision over Edward Heno of the Philippines to retain his WBO junior flyweight title.
Heno scored a flash knockdown in the third round for the only knockdown of the fight and held a lead after nine rounds before Soto won the final three rounds on my card for a 114-113 win.
A rematch might not be a bad idea.

ESPN plus featured an old-fashioned grudge match entering the fight for the WBO featherweight title that was vacated by Oscar Valdez.
Shakur Stevenson is dating the sister of Joet Gonzalez with the sister estranged from the family and the pre-fight buildup, the pair exchanged plenty of venom that crossed the line of the usual boxing hype.
In the ring, the fight's action might have peaked at the press conferences and the weigh-in as Stevenson put on a performance that may have tabbed him as a future star, but winning in such a dominating fashion in a mundane fight over Gonzalez makes me wonder what the future for Stevenson is.
Stevenson's a terrific boxer and has the ability to outbox almost everyone that he faces, but he didn't turn up the heat against Gonzalez and was content to take his decision and his title home rather than try to finish Gonzalez to put on the type of outing that makes you need to see more of him in the ring.
I had Gonzalez winning only one round with Stevenson winning 119-109 on my scorecard.
The fight that I would love to see is unlikely to happen with Stevenson taking on WBC and PBC promoted Gary Russell in a unification bout that would be huge in the D.C. area with Stevenson fighting out of Alexandria Virginia and Russell living in Capitol Heights Maryland.
A Stevenson-Russell fight would do well at the new MGM casino in the area or even the Verizon Center in Washington, but if the promoters cannot get Errol Spence vs Terence Crawford accomplished, the smaller potatoes of Stevenson-Russell is even less likely,

Bantamweight Joshua Greer won an unpopular unanimous decision over Antonio Nieves in the other main card battle.
Greer was knocked down in the tenth by what could have been a punch behind the head but was ruled a knockdown.
The crowd wasn't thrilled with the scorecards, but I thought they were correct in the close victory as I had Greer a 95-94 winner (6-4 in rounds minus the knockdown).
I'm not sure Greer beats any of the bantamweight champions (The winner of Nonito Donaire-Naoya Inoue will own the WBA and IBF titles, WBC Nordine Ouabaali and WBO Zolani Tete are the current champions), but with Greer being rated 2nd by the IBF and 3rd by the WBO, he could get his chance to try in 2020.

Showtime's three-fight card looked weak on paper but was better than expected.
The first fight, a heavyweight bout between late replacement Frank Sanchez against Jack Mulowayi.
Sanchez replaced Efe Ajagba, dominated by winning every round in a boring fight that wasn't included in the boxing challenge and was better suited for Showtime's ShoBox series instead of their main outlet.

The co-feature stole the night as junior welterweight Robert Easter bested Adrian Granados in a tough fight that was almost ruined by poor judging with Easter's unanimous decision coming via scoring that seemed to have the scorecards filled out in advance.
Easter 's taller style seemed to fir the attacking style of Granados, but Easter stood and engaged Granados and gave the fans an enjoyable fight to watch.
I had Easter ahead 97-93, but I could see Granados being closer on the cards if you are the type of judge that likes aggressive fighters that lands a large volume of punches.
One judge had the fight like I did at 97-93 and another's 98-92 seemed a bit wide, but tolerable, but the 100-90 score for Easter was a pathetic joke as Granados easily won between two and three rounds and maybe even four.
Easter's debut at junior welterweight in an entertaining bout took some of the dreck off of his previous fight, a too bad to be described draw with Rances Barthelemy and Granados showed his effectiveness at 140 after being knocked out for the first time in his career at welterweight by Danny Garcia.
Both fighters came out of this one looking better than when they entered, but I'm not sure either have a road to a title in the division with two champions holding two titles apiece and neither are promoted by PBC in Josh Taylor and Jose Ramirez.

The main event had junior middleweight contender Erickson Lubin against late replacement Nathaniel Gallimore and Lubin, he of the big punch and questionable chin, went the distance and looked good in winning a unanimous decision over Gallimore.
I had Lubin a 99-91 victor and even though he didn't stop Gallimore or even knock him to the floor for a spectacular showing, Lubin might have gotten more out of a solid ten rounds than he would have of an early-round knockout.
Lubin looks likely to be headed towards the winner of the WBC title rematch between Tony Harrison and Jermell Charlo, which should Charlo win his title back would be a rematch for Charlo and Lubin.
Their first ended in a first-round, one-punch knockout by Charlo.

In the boxing challenge, I added twelve points to Ramon Malpica's ten with the difference in points being Shakur Stevenson winning via decision and a bonus point for picking the round of Dereck Chisora's KO of David Price.
My lead stands at 261-225

Boxing Challenge: Stevenson draws with Jack, Russell tops Diaz

Sorry, this is late, but the PC is having issues that I think are related to the latest Windows update.
Hopefully, I have smoothed those out and will have no future issues, but it did cause me to lose the entire column on the Cavaliers game three thrashing of the Celtics.
Fingers crossed that this is not an issue that continues!

Kudos to Showtime for the three fight weekend from three cities, two countries, and two platforms.
I'll have more on Showtime below.

Adonis Stevenson looked to be the fearsome champion of old for six rounds and was far ahead on my card to retain his WBC light heavyweight title in Toronto.
When the bell rang to begin round seven, everything changed for the reluctant one and he would win just one more round against the challenge of Badou Jack.
That round was enough to salvage a 114-114 draw on my card and saved his title on the judges' scorecards as Stevenson kept his championship with a majority draw.
Two judges saw it as I did with another scoring 115-113 for Jack.
It was a good enough fight, but nothing that I have to see again soon.
Stevenson was badly staggered by Jack in the 12th round, looked every one of his forty years of age and might be the sports most vulnerable champion as contenders elbow their promoters for a shot at the aging Haitian expatriate.
Jack would love a second shot, I'm sure, but the WBC allowed this fight as long as the winner agreed to fight Oleksandr Gvozdyk next.
Stevenson's track record shows that he is likely to put that fight off as long as possible and the WBC has given him more breaks than any fighter that I can remember in years, so I'm not sure that fight happens next, but it should as the WBC should order that fight or mandate that Stevenson vacate the title.
Badou Jack now owns two draws in his two biggest fights ( He drew with James DeGale in a super middleweight unification contest in 2017) and really can only blame himself.
Jack gives away far too many early rounds and makes a late charge to get back into the fight only to be at the mercy of the judges in hairline fights.
It's easy to say that Jack needs to start faster, but perhaps he simply cannot.

Meanwhile, in beautiful Oxon Hill, Maryland (and I really need to hit one of these cards sometime), Gary Russell made one of his yearly appearances and for six rounds was in a dogfight with mandatory contender Joseph Diaz.
The problem with that was that title fights are twelve rounds and Russell kicked the fight into a gear that Diaz wasn't capable of keeping up with over the second half of the fight to win a unanimous decision to keep his WBC featherweight strap.
Diaz did exactly what Badou Jack in the half of the fight-he simply didn't throw enough punches to keep Russell honest and for some reason after investing lots of bodywork in the first half of the bout didn't follow up over the second half.
I thought this is how this fight would play out and as someone that has always thought the world of Gary Russell the fighter and yet next to nothing of Gary Russell's management, I hope to see Russell back in the ring before the end of the year and against good competition too.
Gary Russell deserves better, he simply needs to step up and fight for it- outside the ring as well as inside.

The afternoon fight from Leeds, England saw Josh Warrington surprise Lee Selby with a split decision win to take Selby's IBF featherweight title and attempt to place himself in the bigger picture at 126 pounds.
Selby was never able to accomplish that throughout his title reign, so we'll have to see if Warrington can pull that off, but on this night, Warrington should have won a unanimous decision as the 115-113 Selby card was ridiculous.
Warrington has one of suffocating styles that smothers others (like that?) but is never going to bother anyone with his pop (6 KO's in his 27 wins) and against the elite of the division I would be dubious of his chances, but one thing is clear-If Warrington gets that shot against the top names- they better be ready to fend him off for twelve rounds.

A few words on Showtime, if you please ( An nod to Gordon Solie there) and their growing dominance in televising boxing.
Putting aside their connection with Al Haymon's PBC, which is often more than tentative about putting their best against the best), Showtime consistently is making solid fights, if not fights that make the world stop on a dime and have made themselves the network that I have always hoped to see in televised boxing.

Showtime is making bouts happen more than any other network and keeping boxing fans active and eyes on their product that not only helps the sport but the network as well.
Not every bout has to have championship connotations and I would like to see some fighters against better competition (most notably the Charlo's), but it's tough to argue against an active network that brings boxing to fans multiple times a month in at least interesting fights.

Showtime also offers the fairest broadcast set in the fight game as well and I was struck by this watching the Gary Russell-Joseph Diaz bout last night.
The easy way to cover this was to shower Russell, a Showtime/PBC fighter, with praise while discussing Diaz, a Golden Boy Promotions, and non-Showtime fighter, with some distance as Showtime would not gain anything from a Diaz victory.
Instead, their three-man crew of Mauro Ranallo, Al Bernstein, and Paulie Malignaggi called it straight, gave both fighters their due with what happened in the ring with no consideration for their connections outside of the ring.
This would be a layup to say that is the way all events should be called, but it isn't the case.
ESPN is somewhat of an offender with Timothy Bradley, who is quite friendly with many of Top Rank's stars outside the ring, and Mark Kriegel, who is from a writing background and calls fights with a wish for a storyline and not what is actually happening in the ring.
The opposite of what Showtime does with their commentators is HBO, who has the solid Jim Lampley, but employs Max Kellerman and Roy Jones (and occasionally Andre Ward), who enter the fight with a narrative, rarely deviate from said narrative and definitely choose a side more often than not.

I've been critical on occasion of Mauro Ranallo for often generating artificial excitement when it is not needed, but I think it's his legitimate if somewhat misguided enthusiasm for the sport that causes this and I cannot knock that.
Al Bernstein has been a favorite of mine for years and even though I wasn't always a fan of Paulie Malignaggi in the ring as a fighter, I think as a commentator, Malignaggi brings up points from the fighters perspective that aren't always about his career as is often the case with the aforementioned Roy Jones.
Showtime's announcers are the fairest in the game and from the viewer's standpoint, that's all boxing fans can ask for from the new leader in boxing television.

In the boxing challenge, I scored two points to Ramon Malpica's one.
I added two points from Gary Russell's win with Ramon scoring one.
No points were scored from the Stevenson-Jack draw and both of us selected Lee Selby to defeat Josh Warrington.
I now lead the challenge 90-71.

Boxing Challenge:Horn stops Corcoran

Photo Credit: Getty Images

The Boxing Challenge continued from Australia as Jeff Horn defended his WBO welterweight title with an eleventh round stoppage of unheralded Gary Corcoran of England.
Horn was way ahead on my card and the win not only retained his title, but likely earned him a healthy purse in his next fight and the right and the right to try to take out one of the best fighters in the world in Terence Crawford.

In other weekend fights that I hadn't seen of last writing.

The upset of the weekend saw journeyman Caleb Truax upset IBF super middleweight champion James DeGale via majority decision in London.
DeGale dominated the first two rounds and looked like he thought he would blow through Truax early and gassed himself out.
I had Truax a 115-113 winner.

Lee Selby retained his IBF featherweight title on that card via a unanimous decision over Eduardo Ramirez in a workmanlike victory.
I scored Selby a 117-111 winner.
Selby will face mandatory countryman Josh Warrington in his next defense.

On the Salido-Roman undercard, Rene Alvarado scored a minor upset with a narrow split decision over Denis Shafikov.
I scored the fight a draw at 95-95.

Boxing Challenge points to:

Ramon Malpica:2 pts, 1 each for wins for Jeff Horn and Rene Alvarado
TRS: 4 pts, 2 pts for Jeff Horn win/KO and 2 pts for Lee Selby win/decision

Current Standings192-173