Boxing Challenge: GGG Stops Murata

    Due to not having watched everything, I will be writing about the Japanese card only in this post and will write about the other events later tonight.

From Saitama, Japan, Gennady Golovkin survived a strong attack from Ryota Murata over the first five rounds and controlled the fight thereafter before stopping the Japanese star in the ninth round.

The victory added the WBA middleweight title to that of the IBF championship that Golovkin already owned and set up a fall third fight against Canelo Alvarez, assuming that Alvarez wins his May fight against WBA light heavyweight king Dmitry Bivol.

Murata gave Golovkin plenty of problems in exchanges over the first five rounds and landed many body shots that Golovkin surely felt, including a third-round punch that appeared to affect Golovkin a bit.

However, Murata's attack slowed just as Golovkin began to get his gears running smoothly which led to Golovkin landing the better punches to both the head and the body in the sixth and seventh rounds, including a right hand in the sixth that sent Murata's mouthpiece flying from his mouth.

Murata appeared to be running on fumes and Golovkin hurt him in the eighth and I thought there was a chance that the fight could end in the corner.

Golovkin stepped up the workrate in the rate and sent Murata retreating around the ring in the ninth with Murata in deep trouble along the ropes for most of the round.

Finally, GGG landed a strong straight right that dropped Murata to his knees with the corner throwing in the towel before Murata could rise.

I had Golovkin leading 78-74  after eight rounds but if you had Murata a point closer I wouldn't quibble.

For Golovkin, he fought well enough to raise the intrigue of some for the third fight against Canelo but he also raised some concerns about his ability to take shots to his body.

If you feel them from Ryota Murata, you certainly will be vulnerable to those from Canelo Alvarez.

Golovkin's style is likely always going to be a problem for Canelo Alvarez like Ken Norton's was for Muhammad Ali.

Golovkin's jab is a power jab, not one to create distance like recent opponents of Canelo like Billy Joe Saunders and Caleb Plant and he has the power that Canelo will have to respect that others have lacked.

Still, it's clear that GGG has lost some speed as Canelo moved into his prime, and Canelo will have to be the clear favorite going into the fight.

Assuming Canelo wins, he would finally have his clear win, and to most that will be enough.

However, keep this in mind- when Canelo defeated Miguel Cotto to win the middleweight title and dodged Golovkin for nearly three years, then-promoter Oscar De La Hoya kept claiming that Canelo "Needed time" to mature to the division before fighting the supposedly bigger (they have the same reach with Golovkin holding three inches in height) Golovkin.

Canelo is the fighter that is larger now and I'm not sure that the size factor will matter an extra than it could have then.

Canelo Alvarez will be remembered as a great fighter but even more than the judging in both fights and especially the first fight and even more than Adelaide Byrd, discerning boxing historians will always remember Alvarez putting GGG off for three years before their first to try to "age him out" and insisting on Golovkin, who thrived on fighting often, fighting less by hanging potential dates that could be ruined by cut eye etc, and after the second fight (I'll place the rematch waiting a year due to Clenbuterol aside), making Golovkin wait another four years for a third fight- that will be the historical cross that Canelo Alvarez will have to bear.

We will never know how Canelo Alvarez would done against a prime Gennady Golovkin because either Alvarez and his various promoters never would allow it to take place.

That's boxing for you.

In the co-feature, exciting WBO flyweight champion Junto Nakatani battered and bruised Ryota Yamauchi for eight rounds before the merciful ending in the eighth round.

The 5'7 southpaw nailed Yamauchi with huge shots in the first two rounds and swelling around the eyes of Yamauchi combined with a broken nose gave the challenger a beaten look even before the fight had reached its halfway point.

I had Nakatani leading 69-64 before the ending.

Nakatani might be the best flyweight in the world but with his height, he could do well with a rise in weight, and should he take advantage of a WBO rule that allows a champion of theirs to move up in weight and immediately become the mandatory challenger, Nakatani could face countryman Kazuto Ioka in what would a huge domestic fight in Japan for Ioka's junior bantamweight title.

Boxing Challenge-This total does not include the Saturday evening bouts.

TRS: 48 Pts (4)

Vince Samano: 44 Pts (1)

Ramon Malpica 40 Pts (2) 

Dwayne Haskins

 Former Ohio State and current Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Dwayne Haskins was killed Saturday morning in Florida on his way to Pittsburgh to continue off-season workouts.

Haskins had abandoned his car on a south Florida highway and was walking along the road when he was hit and killed by a dump truck.

The 24-year-old Haskins was the controversial first-round (15th overall) pick by Washington in 2018 after what is perhaps the greatest passing season in Ohio State history.

Washington's front office and coaching staff were reported to have fought against the selection of Haskins but Haskins's local background won over Washington owner Dan Snyder with Snyder overruling his football people and demanding the selection of Haskins.

Haskins started in only one of his three seasons with Ohio State and beat out Joe Burrow for the starting position in 2018 and it resulted in Burrow's transfer to LSU.

Haskins responded with a season for the record books where he set twenty-eight school records and three Big Ten single-season records, including passing yards, total offensive yards, and touchdown passes.

Haskins's season earned him a trip to New York as a Heisman finalist and he would finish the year with MVP performances in both the Big Ten championship win over Northwestern (499 yards and five touchdowns) and Ohio State's Rose Bowl win over Washington ( 251 yards and three touchdowns).

Haskins was a polarizing prospect entering the 2019 draft as he only played in one season at Ohio State and even those that liked Haskins as a prospect thought that he was going to need at least a season or two of development time to be an NFL starting level quarterback.

Instead, Washington rushed Haskins into the starting lineup, starting seven games as a rookie and opening the season for a month of starts before being benched and then released later in the season.

Haskins cleared waivers and was signed by Pittsburgh after the season, where he spent the 2021 season with the Steelers but did not see action.

Pittsburgh did resign Haskins to a one-year contract for 2022 and he was expected to compete in training camp for the open Steelers starting spot with Mitch Trubisky and Mason Rudolph.

Haskins has to be considered a bust for Washington, although it doesn't take a great football mind to see that Washington did about everything opposite from giving Haskins his best chance to succeed.

Still, Haskins was reported to have been less than diligent in his preparation for games and in practice and spent more time with his friends in the area than anything football related, so it was pretty clear that even if Haskins was to have a good NFL career that his hometown was the worst place for him to play.

So, while there is loads to blame to pass around and plenty of blame for Haskins himself, just as much needs to go to Dan Snyder for insisting on the selection of Haskins considering the potential for distractions.

Dwayne Haskins was still only twenty-four years old and stranger things than Haskins turning his career have happened before in football, so he still had a chance to have a long career in the game as unlikely as it seemed after his release from Washington.

It's always sad to see potential go unfulfilled.

It's even sadder to see it end in this manner.

Cavaliers drop in playing seeding-Lose in Brooklyn

    The Cleveland Cavaliers showed much more heart and spirit in Brooklyn than they did in losing to Orlando Tuesday night but it wasn't enough as the Brooklyn Nets dominated the final quarter and dropped the Cavaliers a spot in the playoff seeding with a 118-107 Nets win.

 Cleveland trailed by as many as seventeen points in the first half but rallied to lead by the end of the third quarter before Brooklyn outscored the Cavaliers by sixteen points in the final quarter.

Darius Garland led Cleveland with 31 points while Lauri Markkanen and the returning Evan Mobley each scored seventeen.

Cleveland will finish the season Sunday afternoon at home against Milwaukee in a game that could determine their position in eighth or ninth place for the play-in series.

Swashbucklers

1) After a very disappointing effort in Orlando, the Cavaliers showed the heart and courage to battle back against a team with superior firepower.

I just have a feeling that had the Cavaliers played like this in Orlando, they would have escaped with a win and helped themselves in the seeding race.

2) Evan Mobley played well in his return with seventeen points, seven rebounds, and three assists and didn't seem to have missed a beat.

If the Cavaliers have any chance of getting out of the play-in series, Mobley is going to have to come up big.

3) Darius Garland charged the basket with abandon with many of his 31 points coming on drives down the middle or along the baseline with one acrobatic score that is sure to be part of the week's highlight packages.

Garland has almost single-handedly kept this team afloat down the stretch-get ready to pay the man, Koby Altman!

4) Even with the lead after three, I didn't feel good about the win because Brooklyn still had Kevin Durant, who took the game over in the final quarter as part of his game-high 36 points.

Cleveland has a talented young team but they still have no answer for a player like Durant in the clutch.

5) Cleveland slipped from seventh to eighth, which means this for now- if the season ended today the Cavaliers would travel to Brooklyn for the 7-8 game.

Entering the evening, it was the other way around.

Cleveland's game against Milwaukee on Sunday will tell the tale. A win and a Brooklyn loss would lift them to seventh.

A win would keep eighth, although a Hawks and Hornets loss would do the same.

The Hawks own the tiebreaker over Cleveland, so a Cleveland loss and an Atlanta win could drop them to ninth place. 

Boxing Challenge

 The boxing weekend looks to be a standout with six key fights in the boxing challenge.

Early Saturday morning from Tokyo will see the biggest fight of the weekend as Gennady Golovkin meets Ryota Murata in a fight that will not only unify Golovkin's IBF title with Murata's WBA championship but even more importantly to Golovkin, a victory means a third fight with Canelo Alvarez in the fall.

The power-punching Golovkin has fought only three times since his controversial decision loss to Canelo in 2018 and hasn't fought at all since a seven-round trouncing of mandatory challenger Kazil Szeremeta in December 2020.

For a fighter that thrived on fighting three and four times a year, GGG has seemed disheartened since his draw and loss to Alvarez, both of which I thought he won but when compared to Murata, Golovkin is fighting a lot as Murata hasn't fought since December 2019 (!) when he stopped Stephen Butler in five rounds.

One can argue that Golovkin has never truly been defeated and Murata has two losses (to Rob Brant and Hassan N'Dam) but the N'Dam defeat was an awful decision and Murata avenged the loss to Brant.

This is a fight with huge ramifications and should help set the big fight schedule for the fall.

The co-feature will also be a championship affair as WBO flyweight kingpin Junto Nakatani defends his title for the second time against Ryota Yamauchi.

Nakatani was very impressive in routing talented Angel Acosta in four rounds and could be on his way to a possible Japanese superfight against either of Japan's two light flyweight champions in Hiroto Kyoguchi (WBA) or Kenshiro Teraji (WBC) with a win.

Yamauchi is only 8-1 and appears to be overmatched in this one.

Later in the evening, two competing cards are on at the same time.

San Antonio, Texas is the site for the long-awaited return of lightweight contender Ryan Garcia after a fifteen-month layoff.

Garcia grabbed the most impressive win of his career last January when he knocked out former title challenger Luke Campbell in four rounds and appeared to be on the verge of bigger fights before various problems forced cancellations several times.

Garcia isn't facing a light touch in his return in Ghana's Emmanuel Tagoe, who hasn't lost since his pro debut but has only fought outside Ghana twice and has never fought anyone close to Garcia's caliber.

Unless Tagoe is more Azumah Nelson than we suspect, this should be a successful return for Garcia.

The co-feature pairs two aging fighters that need a win in Gabe Rosado and Shane Mosley Jr.

Rosado is coming off a one-sided loss to Jaime Munguia at middleweight but will be facing Mosley Jr. at super middleweight.

Mosely Jr. lost a close majority decision to Jason Quigley last May but doesn't have near the resume of Rosado and I'm not sure that he can hold off Rosado if Rosado is a motivated fighter for an opponent that is a cut below his recent rivals.

Showtime and PBC is in Las Vegas for two junior middleweight affairs that will definitely see one winner with a title shot soon and perhaps the other not long after that.

The main event will determine the mandatory contender for the winner of the full four title unification bout next month between Jermell Charlo and Brian Castano.

Towering 6'6 Sebastian Fundora continues his climb up the rankings as he faces hard-punching Erickson Lubin.

Fundora decisioned then-unbeaten Sergio Garcia for the biggest win in his last fight while Lubin has worked his way to the verge of a title with six straight wins since his only loss- a first-round knockout loss in his title shot against Charlo in 2017.

Lubin is the bigger puncher but he still has questions about his chin with the same can be said about Fundora as Lubin will be by far the biggest banger that Fundora has faced.

The co-feature will see former WBC champion Tony Harrison against Sergio Garcia.

Harrison has fought only once since losing his rematch to Jermell Charlo in 2019 and was lucky to pull out a draw against Bryant Perrella in that fight,.

Garcia lost for the first time in his last time out via decision to Sebastian Fundora in what was his first true test in his career.

Harrison has questions about what he has left in his career and Garcia is still looking for a career-defining win to date.

Unification WBA-IBF Middleweight Title 12 Rds 

Gennady Golovkin vs Ryota Murata

R.L: Golovkin Unanimous Decision

TRS: Golovkin KO 10

V.S:  Murata Unanimous Decision

WBO Flyweight Title. 12 Rds

Junto Nakatani vs Ryota Yamauchi

R.L and V.S: Nakatani Unanimous Decision
TRS: Nakatani KO 7

Lightweights.12 Rds

Ryan Garcia vs Emmanuel Tagoe

R.L and V.S: Garcia KO 5

TRS: Garcia KO 9

Super Middleweights 10 Rds

Gabriel Rosado vs Shane Mosley Jr.

R.L and TRS: Rosado Unanimous Decision

V.S: Mosley Unanimous Decision

Junior Middleweights 12 Rds

Erickson Lubin vs Sebastian Fundora

R.L; Lubin Unanimous Decision

TRS: Fundora Unanimous Decision

V.S: Lubin KO 6

Junior Middleweights. 10 Rds

Tony Harrison vs Sergio Garcia

R.L: Harrison KO 9

TRS: Harrison Unanimous Decision

V.S: Garcia Unanimous Decision

Cleaning out the Inbox: Passings

 Recently, the passings of note have slowed, which is always good news!

Goodbye to Grindstone at the age of 29.

The winner of the 1996 Kentucky Derby by a head over Cavonnier, Grindstone was the oldest living Derby winner for less than a month after the death of Go For Gin before his recent passing in Oregon.

Grindstone's off-the-pace rally to nip Cavonnier was his final race, before the Preakness, he was retired with a bone chip in his knee and Grindstone would be the first Derby winner since 1926 to never race again.

Grindstone had won the Louisiana Derby as his only graded stakes win and would be a moderate success at stud siring 2004 Belmont and Travers winner Birdstone.

The mantle of oldest living Derby winner now passes to the 1997 winner Silver Charm.

Goodbye to Tommy Davis at the age of 83.

Davis, a two-time National League batting champion, played for ten different teams but had his biggest success with the Dodgers where he won his batting titles in 1962 and 63, led the league in RBI in 1962, and won two World Series rings in 1963 and 1965.

Davis didn't play in the 1965 Fall Classic after breaking his ankle in May 1965 causing him to miss the remainder of the season and changing his career as it took away much of Davis's speed and some of his power.

Davis would play for nine teams after 1965 and would be a key member of both the Seattle Pilots and Houston Astros in Jim Bouton's Ball Four before being the first designated hitter of note for the Baltimore Orioles from 1973-75.

Davis won the Outstanding Designated Hitter award in 1974 and finished second to Orlando Cepeda in 1973.

Goodbye to Tom Young at the age of 89.

Young won over 500 games in his three career stops (American, Rutgers, and Old Dominion), is the winningest coach in Rutgers history, and is best remembered for coaching the 1975-76 Rutgers Scarlet Knights to an undefeated regular season and a Final Four appearance, the only visit in school history.

Rutgers would lose to Michigan in the Final Four and lose the now-defunct consolation game to UCLA to finish 31-2 but did place three players in the NBA in Phil Sellers, James Bailey, and Eddie Jordan.

Jordan would later hire Young out of retirement to be one of his assistants with the Washington Wizards from 2003 to 2007.

Goodbye to Rocky King at the age of 64.

King was homeless before being hired by Jim Crockett Promotions as a wrestler despite having no experience in the ring.

King progressed quickly and became one of the better "enhancement talents" in the company but never moved out of that level other than a brief and silly stint as "Little Richard Marley" the roadie for the Freebirds composed of Michael Hayes and Jimmy Garvin.

After the Freebirds turned on King, he would return to prelim status before becoming a referee before leaving WCW in 1997.

Goodbye to Gene Shue at the age of 90.

Shue was likely Maryland's best basketball star before the Lefty Driesell era and played ten seasons in the NBA before a long career as a head coach with the Bullets (twice), Clippers (twice, once each in San Diego and Los Angeles), and Philadelphia.

Shue took the Bullets to the 1971 NBA Finals and the 76ers to the 1977 Finals but both teams lost those series and won two Coach of the Year awards-both with the Bullets in two different cities winning in Baltimore in 1968 and Washington in 1982.

Shue's NBA playing career is sometimes forgotten but Shue made five straight All-Star teams as a member of the Detroit Pistons from 1957-to 62.

Shue averaged over 22 points in 1959-60 and in 1956-57, Shue played for the Piston's final season in Fort Wayne Indiana.

Goodbye to Lee Rose at the age of 85.

Rose took two teams to the Final Four in five years and only an arguable bad call cost one of the two a trip to the finals.

Rose took UNC-Charlotte to the 1977 Final Four and lost to eventual national champion Marquette by two points when a long pass with three seconds to saw Jerome Whitehead push Cornbread Maxwell and then laid the ball in just before the buzzer.

Rose moved to Purdue in 1978, won over 20 games in both seasons, and made the NIT Finals in his first season before taking the Boilermakers to the Final Four the following season.
Rose surprisingly left Purdue after the season for South Florida, where he won over 100 games in six seasons but never made the NCAA Tournament. 

Whistles cost Cavaliers in 112-108 loss

     It was a playoff atmosphere in Cleveland Sunday night and it was a rough physical game like you would see in a postseason encounter.

All the ingredients were there for an exciting, closely matched game- except for one- the consistently inconsistent officiating and the Philadelphia 76ers took advantage in a 112-108 win for the visitors from Pennsylvania.

Darius Garland led the Cavaliers with 23 points with Caris LeVert adding 19 to lead Cleveland, who fell 2.5 games behind Chicago for the sixth spot in the Eastern Conference and watched idle Atlanta cut their lead to 1.5 games for seventh in the conference.

Cleveland will visit Orlando on Tuesday to start the final week of the season.

Swashbucklings

1) The Cavaliers had plenty of reason to question the officiating and J.B. Bickerstaff claimed his team was robbed by the officiating in the post-game press conference.

Bickerstaff may be right but that's not going to stop the inevitable fine that I'm sure will be levied by the league, the only question will be the amount.

2) The biggest play in question was a late drive by Darius Garland that saw him fouled by Joel Embiid and a no call that resulted in the Sixers up two and the ball with less than a minute remaining.

It's not unfair to ask for some consistency in the officiating- you made that call all night and with the game in the balance, the whistles were put away and that is defined by an abbreviation that starts with B and ends with S.

3) Joel Embiid and James Harden shot 32 free throws in the game.

The entire Cavalier team shot 31-As the home team!

Usually, one could understand the home team shooting a few more free throws but two players on the visitors?

4) Cleveland did receive a nice night from Caris LeVert, who hit seven of fourteen from the floor.

LeVert's play has been erratic since arriving from Indiana and the Cavaliers will need to hope that he can play well in the playoffs.

5) Joel Embiid finished with 44 points and 17 rebounds and while the officials had a little to do with those numbers, the absence of Jarrett Allen was likely the largest factor.

Embiid is a terrific player and possibly the league's MVP but these were the optimum circumstances for such a great night.

Cavaliers knock Knicks 119-101

  The Cleveland Cavaliers entered Madison Square Garden in desperate need of a victory to solidify their chances of finishing seventh in the Eastern Conference in the first of two weekend games.

They left town with a big win over the New York Knicks by a 119-101 score that held their place in the standings with only four games to go in the season.

Darius Garland (24 points, 13 assists) and Moses Brown (16 points, 13 rebounds) each posted double-doubles with seven Cavaliers scoring in double figures.

Cleveland hosts Philadelphia tonight in Cleveland before the final week and the last three games of the season.

Swashbucklings

1)  The Cavaliers scored the first five points of the game and never trailed during the game but even more than control of the game was the team managing to put an awful game against Atlanta behind them quickly.

With a battered and to a degree inexperienced in a playoff chase, it did show some maturity in how the situation was handled with a fast start and strong effort.

2) The Knicks had been eliminated from playoff contention earlier in the week and they were playing without Julius Randle, so one could say they had little to play for.

However, Cleveland putting the Knicks down early and not allowing the Knicks to feel like they could hang around and steal a game that would mean little to them but a lot to Cleveland was a key factor in the attitude of both teams.

3) Darius Garland was as expected the best player on the floor with his double-double but Garland nailed five three-pointers.

Garland's shooting still has a little room to potentially improve but if he could do that and that's not a guarantee he will be able to do so, Garland might be the type of point guard that you can build teams around.

This Cavalier team seems to have been built around not having one star that is above the team in stature but like it or not, Darius Garland could throw a wrench into that plan.

4) Another surprising performance from Moses Brown with a 16/13 in thirty minutes of play makes me really believe that Brown may have a place on this team next season.

Brown hit seven of ten shots and although he is a more traditional big man as far as his offensive game goes, Brown has the type of energy that can play well off the bench.

Brown will need to expand his shooting range even a little bit and he needs lots of practice time as a rim protector but I can see him as the big man that spells Jarrett Allen next season.

5) The Cavaliers' win moved them to a two-game lead with four to play over Atlanta for the seventh spot (Atlanta leapfrogged Brooklyn after the Hawks defeated them yesterday) and just as importantly a three-game lead over Brooklyn and Charlotte.

That's important because Cleveland would really like to be seventh or at worst eighth.

That spot places them in a position to have to win only one game to advance out of the play-in level and either one or both would be in Cleveland.

Falling to ninth or tenth would force Cleveland to win two games and at least one (ninth) or two (tenth) on the road.

Cleveland hopes to have Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen in the lineup for the play-in series but the path will be easier if they can hold on and stay in the seventh slot.

Conversely, the Cavaliers are two games behind Chicago for the sixth spot which would avoid this scenario.

Cleveland's four games remaining are Philadelphia at home, road games at Orlando and Brooklyn before wrapping up next Sunday at home against Milwaukee.

Chicago will have a three-game homestand against Milwaukee, Boston, and Charlotte before ending the season at Minnesota.

Atlanta finishes with a road trip to Toronto followed by a home game against Washington before their final two games on the road at Miami and Houston.