Boxing Challenge: Nunez wins title

   Eduardo "Sugar" Nunez won the vacant IBF junior lightweight title in Yokohama, Japan, by doing something he had never done- winning a decision.

Nunez had won his previous bouts by knockout, but the rugged Masanori Rikiishi lasted the distance with Nunez and battled him to the end.

Nunez never seemed to seriously hurt Rikiishi, but his consistent attack and hard punches allowed him to dictate the fight despite the occasional counter from the home fighter.

Nunez won by scores of 117-111, 116-112, and 115-113, my score matching the middle score.

The exciting Nunez won the title vacated by Anthony Cacace, who chose a larger purse to fight Josh Warrington rather than Nunez.

A Nunez-Cacace fight would be entertaining, but promoter Eddie Hearn mentioned the possibility of former WBA featherweight champion Raymond Ford as a likely next opponent for Nunez, which would also be intriguing.

Yoshiki Takei dropped Yuttapong Tongdee three times in the first round and was pounding Tongdee along the ropes when the referee ended the fight with barely two minutes elapsed.

Takei retained his WBO bantamweight title with the destructive triumph.

Boxing Challenge

TRS: 81 Pts (2)

Ramon Malpica: 78 Pts (3)

Vince Samano: 32 Pts (0)

Boxing Challenge

    It's a rare mid-week entry in the boxing challenge as two world championships are at stake from Yokohama, Japan, and streamed by DAZN.

In the main event, the vacant IBF junior lightweight title will be filled as Eduardo "Sugar" Ninez meets Masanori Rikiihsi.

Anthony Cacace gave up the title for more lucrative fights against Josh Warrington and Leigh Wood rather than face the dangerous Nunez for a far smaller purse.

All of Nunez's twenty-seven wins have come by knockout, including KOs of former title challengers Oscar Escandon and Miguel Marriaga.

Masanori Rikiihsi's best win was a wild come-from-behind final round knockout of Michael Maganesi in a WBC eliminator.

The co-feature pits WBO bantamweight champion Yoshiki Takei against Yuttapong Tongdee in a battle of unbeatens.

Takei won a close but unanimous decision over Daigo Higa last September in the first defense of the title Takei won from Jason Moloney.

Tongdee is unbeaten in fifteen bouts, but four times beat fighters in their pro debut, and four other wins came over fighters with losing records, so who knows what Tongdee brings to the ring?

Boxing Challenge

Vacant IBF Junior Lightweight Title. 12 Rds

Eduardo Nunez vs Masanori Rikiihsi

Ramon Malpica: Nunez Unanimous Decision
TRS: Nunez KO 8
Vince Samano: Rikiihsi Unanimous Decision

WBO Bantamweight Title. 12 Rds

Yoshiki Takei vs Yuttapong Tongdee 

R.L and TRS: Takei Unanimous Decision
V.S:  Tongdee KO 6 

Boxing Challenge: Taylor upset, Leo keeps title

    The biggest bout of the boxing weekend would see a surprising upset. Ekow Essuman shocked the hometown crowd in Glasgow, Scotland, by winning a unanimous decision over twelve rounds over former undisputed junior welterweight champion Josh Taylor.

Taylor started quickly, banking several early rounds before Essuman turned the tide with an attack that slowed Taylor and never hit the pause button for himself.

Essuman is aggressive but lacks a powerful punch, so he never put Taylor in danger; he simply outworked Taylor and wanted the victory more.

The official scores for Essuman were 116-112, 116-113, and 115-113, with my score at 115-113.

Essuman stated that he wanted bigger fights after the win, while Taylor dropped his third fight in a row, with losses to Teofimo Lopez and Jack Catterall preceding this loss.

Promising heavyweight prospect Moses Itauma destroyed veteran Mike Balogun in two rounds on the Taylor-Essuman undercard.

Itauma dropped Balogun in the first round, and only the guts of Balogun avoided the fight ending in round one.

Itauma knocked down Balogun twice more in round two to end the fight.

Itauma will have to prove he can take a shot, but he looks legitimate as a potential divisional force.

In Japan, Angelo Leo retained his IBF featherweight title via majority decision over former bantamweight champion Tomoki Kameda.

Leo managed to keep Kameda off him just enough to earn the decision in a very good fight.

Scorecards were even at 114-114 and two for Leo, 116-112 and 115-113. I scored it 116-112 for Leo.

On Friday in Doncaster, England, lightweight Maxi Hughes banged out a unanimous decision over Archie Sharp.

Sharp was effective, but spent too much time on the move, and Hughes deserved the nod by scores of 115-113, 116-112, and a crazy 120-108.

Boxing Challenge

TRS: 79 Pts (6) 

Ramon Malpica: 75 Pts (4)

Vince Samano: 32 Pts  (2)

Boxing Challenge

  The boxing challenge is filled with international bouts, with a world championship in one of the weekend fights.

The weekend's biggest name fights in Glasgow, Scotland, as former undisputed junior welterweight champion Josh Taylor moves to the welterweight division against Ekow Essuman.

Taylor's star dimmed after his 2021 win over Jose Ramirez unified all four titles as Taylor began vacating titles, won a very controversial decision over Jack Catterall, and lost the WBO title (the only one he kept) to Teofimo Lopez. and lost a rematch to Catterall in his last fight last May.

Essuman has only one loss, but he's never fought above the European level, and he's thirty-six, so if Taylor doesn't win this one, he could be at the end of the line.

The co-feature will see the best heavyweight prospect, bomber Moses Itauma, take center stage.

Itauma looked devastating in his first-round destruction of Demsey McKean in December, and his opponent, Mike Balogun, was knocked out in two rounds in his only loss against former cruiserweight champion Murat Gassiev, so this could end early.

On Friday, a solid European lightweight fight comes from Doncaster, England, with veterans Maxi Hughes and Archie Sharp facing off in a crossroads battle.

Hughes bounced back from his loss to William Zepeda with a dominant, unanimous decision win over once-beaten Gary Cully in December, while Sharp lost for the first time last July to Ryan Garner in a battle of unbeatens.

The winner will move on to a bigger fight, perhaps even a title eliminator; the loser will slide back to English level status.

The previous three fights can be seen on DAZN, but the only world title bout of the week comes from ProBox as Angelo Leo defends his IBF featherweight title in Osaka, Japan, against Tomoki Kameda.

Leo pulled an upset last August when he won the title with a tenth-round upset of Luis Alberto Lopez, knocking Lopez cold.

Kameda is one of the seemingly ten thousand brothers of the Kameda family and once owned the WBO bantamweight title.

Kameda avenged a previous split decision defeat to Lerato Diamini with a split decision win of his own last August.

Boxing Challenge

Lightweights. 10 Rds 

Maxi Hughes vs Archie Sharp

Ramon Malpica and TRS: Hughes Unanimous Decision

Vince Samano: Sharp Unanimous Decision

Welterweights 10 Rds

Josh Taylor vs Ekow Essuman

R.L and TRS: Taylor Unanimous Decision
V.S.: Essuman Unanimous Decision

Heavyweights 10 Rds

Moses Itauma vs Mike Balogun

R.L: Itauma Unanimous Decision
TRS: Itauma KO 2
V.S.: Balogun Unanimous Decision

IBF Featherweight Title, 12 Rds

Angelo Leo vs Tomoki Kameda

R.L and TRS: Leo Unanimous Decision
V.S: Kameda KO 8

Cleaning out the Inbox: Passings

       Time to pay our respects to some persons of note who have recently left us.

Goodbye to Chet Lemon at the age of 70. 

Lemon played for the Chicago White Sox and Detroit Tigers from 1975 to 1990 in a career that saw him named to three All-Star games and win a World Series with the 1984 Tigers.

Lemon would become noted for his work as a youth coach in Florida after his playing career ended. Several players, including Zack Greinke and Prince Fielder, would make the majors.

Goodbye to Morris The Alligator at 80+

Morris's age was estimated at over eighty after his passing at the Colorado Gator Farm.

Morris starred in several films, including the "classics" Alligator and Alligator 2, but is most remembered for his acting chops in "Happy Gilmore" as the gator who took the hand of Chubbs Peterson, who took Morris's eye in the ensuing melee.

Morris would meet his demise at the hands of Happy Gilmore later in the film.

Goodbye to Nino Benvenuti at the age of 87.

Benvenuti, a former two-time middleweight champion, also held the junior middleweight title and won the gold medal as a welterweight in the 1960 Olympics in Rome.

 Benvenuti won his first sixty-five bouts before losing a split decision in 1966 to Ki-Soo Kim in Kim's home country of South Korea.

 Benvenuti would win, lose, and regain the middleweight title in a three-match set against Emile Griffith with all three bouts held in New York City in 1967-1968.

 Benvenuti successfully defended his title four times before losing it to Carlos Monzon by twelfth-round knockout in November 1970. He retired after Monzon won their rematch by third-round knockout in 1971.

 Benvenuti was inducted into the Boxing Hall of Fame in 1992.

Goodbye to George Wendt at the age of 76.

Wendt's biggest role was as "Norm" on the TV classic "Cheers", who was such a staple of the Boston bar that when he entered, everyone shouted "Norm" in response.

Wendt never won an Emmy for playing Norm Peterson, but was nominated six times for best supporting actor.

Wendt would not have the same success after Cheers, as his self-titled series lasted only a few episodes/ But he never stopped being busy with many character roles and occasional Saturday Night Live appearances, including as part of the Chicago Super Fans and their catchphrase "Da Bears".

Wendt is also the uncle of former SNL and "Ted Lasso" star Jason Sudeikis.

Goodbye to Ruth Buzzi at the age of 88.

Denise Nicarry sent me word of her passing. Buzzi was nominated five times for an Emmy award for her work on "Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In" and won a Golden Globe for her various roles on the variety program, in which Buzzi was the only "featured performer" to appear in every episode of the program's one hundred and forty.

Buzzi's portrayal of the spinster "Gladys Ormphby", complete with hairnet, consistently scared the preschool TRS to death, which is even odder from a comic character!

Buzzi would star in the Saturday morning kids show by the Krofft brothers, The Lost Saucer, with co-star Jim Nabors, and would spend the remainder of her long career with guest roles and voice acting jobs in animated projects.

Goodbye to Will Hutchins at the age of 94.

Hutchins was the star of the western series, Sugarfoot, from 1957-1961 as a young lawyer named Tom Brewster who was given the nickname of "Sugarfoot" as someone who wasn't tough enough to reside in the Wild West.

Hutchins would star in the sitcom "Blondie" in 1968 as "Dagwood Bumstead" but Blondie would last only one season and he then transitioned to co-starring and supporting roles, and that is where I would see him and remember him best.

Hutchins would co-star in two Elvis Presley films, "Spinout" as police officer Tracy Richards, who fell in love with Deborah Walley, who played Elvis's female drummer in the film, and "Clambake" where Hutchins character water ski instructor Tom Wilson switches lives with Elvis's oil tycoon son Scott Hayward and we all learn a valuable lesson about wishing for lives opposite our own and quite a few music tunes as well!

Cleaning out the Inbox

    The inbox cleaning starts with WTOP reporting that affiliated baseball could be returning soon, perhaps as soon as the 2026 season, to Frederick, Maryland, and Harry Grove Stadium.

Frederick lost their High A team after the great minor league implosion of 2021, despite leading the Carolina League in attendance for years.

MLB insisted that Frederick would not retain their team due to its stadium amenities or lack thereof, but I've been to worse stadiums that retained their teams (Lynchburg, VA).

Recent renovations to Harry Grove Stadium have apparently pleased the powers that decide these things and have given the thumbs up for a return to affiliated baseball.

The article doesn't mention any rumored teams that would move to Frederick, but if I had to place a wager on the likely franchise, I'd bet on either the Aberdeen Ironbirds (High A Baltimore) or the Wilmington Blue Rocks (High A Washington).

The Athletic writes of the ownership and support of Leeds United (English Football) by NBA player Larry Nance Jr., who calls himself the "Tallest Leeds United fan in the world".

Nance bought a small share in the team from their owners, the San Francisco 49ers, and travels to as many games as possible after the NBA season.

Nance looks at his ownership as a fan more than an owner and discusses how he doesn't have or want any pull in personnel decisions.

Nance currently plays for the Atlanta Hawks, and while on the sidelines, injured, during the Hawks' two play-in playoff games, he wore two different Leeds jerseys.

The Ringer has some thoughts on the streaming service Max changing its name to HBO Max.

The name change is very important since Warner Bros. changed the name to Max from HBO Max originally.

Like the Haslem's brain-dead idea to change the Cleveland Browns uniforms only to return them to their original design as soon as they could, Warner Brothers is the latest to learn that you can freshen things without screwing up what people like and remember about your product.

The change becomes official this summer.

The James Webb telescope recently saved images of auroras from the planet Jupiter, which are described as "Hundreds of times brighter than the Northern Lights seen on Earth".

This occurs as Jupiter (like Earth's version) receives high-energy particles that the sun ejects from solar storms, but Jupiter's are even brighter due to the planet capturing particles that are ejected into space from volcanoes on its moon Io. 

Boxing Challenge: Allen avenges defeat, KO's Fisher

      Often in boxing, when an underdog is deprived of a deserved victory, they don't do as well in the rematch.

Dave Allen changed that narrative with a brutal fifth-round knockout of Johnny Fisher in London.

Fisher won their first fight in Saudi Arabia, a fight which most gave the nod to Allen, by split decision, and was expected to handle Allen at home in England. 

Fisher did well for a while, using the jab and fighting off the attacking Allen but you had the feeling that eventually Allen was going to have his chance to take Fisher out.

Allen dropped Fisher in the fifth round in the first fight but couldn't finish the job, which allowed Fisher to take the fight to the judges.

This time, the fifth round would be the end of the fight as Allen knocked down a fading Fisher, who showed heart in rising but the fight could have been ended with Fisher on shaky legs.

Allen didn't allow Fisher to wiggle off the hook this time as he slammed a left hook to Fisher, sending him face first to the floor as his corner tossed the towel of surrender in mid-flight.

For Allen, the win will help a trialhorse receive a few more solid paydays at the British level and he should be quite competitive at that level.

For Fisher, it likely finishes him as a potential world-class prospect and resigns him to a career at the British level.

In Comnerce, California, top junior middleweight contender Serhii Bohachuk hammered out a unanimous decision over Mykal Fox.

Bohachuk is currently the number one contender in the WBC and will meet the winner of the Sebastian Fundora-Tim Tszyu rematch and the experience in fighting the 6'3 Fox would come in handy against the 6'6 Fundora, if Fundora wins the Tszyu rematch.

Judges scores were 98-92 times two and 97-93 as I've been unable to watch as of this writing.

Boxing Challenge

TRS: 73 Pts (1)

Ramon Malpica: 71 Pts (1)

Vince Samano: 30 Pts (0)