Source: Rick Reeno, Boxing Scene
-- WBC middleweight champion Sergio Martinez told BoxingScene.com that he doesn't blame Bob Arum, CEO of Top Rank, for refusing his catch-weight proposal for a Manny Pacquiao fight. Martinez was willing to fight Pacquiao at 155-pounds, which Arum rejected. Pacquiao holds the WBC title at 154-pounds, but he plans to return to the welterweight division in his next fight.
"I don't blame Bob Arum because he already had his taste with Kelly Pavlik, so I don't blame him," Martinez told BoxingScene.com.
Martinez will continue to push for fights with Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr.
"I want to be the number one [pound-for-pound fighter], and to be the number one, you have to fight with the number one and the number two," Martinez said.
Martinez's promoter, Lou DiBella, has an alternative target - WBA 154-pound champion Miguel Cotto. Martinez would go down to 155 to face Cotto, which allows the Puerto Rican champion to keep his title regardless of the outcome.
"We'll fight him at 155 and then he'll still have [Julio Cesar] Chavez fight. If he wins he has two titles and if he loses he still has his belt. We think he's one of the few guys who's enough of a warrior to accept the challenge," DiBella said.
Source: The Sweet Science
ATLANTIC CITY --- With a single punch, a devastating left hook, Sergio Gabriel Martinez retained his world middleweight title, separated arch-rival Paul Williams from his senses, and may well have ended Manny Pacquiao’s stranglehold on Fighter of the Year honors.
A year after dropping a majority decision to Williams in a fight many thought he won, Martinez left no doubt about the rematch, knocking the taller man stone cold just 1:10 into the second round of Saturday night’s card at Boardwalk Hall.
Many had expected the rematch to unfold as cautiously as had its predecessor, but after a frenetic first round (we gave Martinez a slight edge) the two picked up the pace in the second – for as long as it lasted. A minute into the round they threw simultaneous lefts, and suddenly only one man was standing.
“The difference was that I attacked in the second,” said Martinez. “I thought if I applied the pressure he might make a mistake.”
Mistake? A southpaw, Williams carelessly threw a long, looping, roundhouse punch – one that never arrived. Before it got within six inches of its intended target, Martinez had stepped inside it and turning his head to the side, driven home a left of his own that had his full weight behind it.
Referee Earl Morton counted, although he needn’t have bothered. Before Williams even woke up, Martinez was being paraded around the ring in a gold crown that looked as if it had been appropriated from the local Burger King franchise.
“I knew it was going to be a tough fight,” said a rueful Williams. “I got caught with a punch.”
Even happier than Martinez may have been promoter Lou DiBella, whose fortunes may also have turned with the punch. Forced by HBO into a rematch neither he or Martinez particularly wanted, both promoter and boxer will now likely find themselves in the drivers seat.
“Pacquiao, Mayweather, and Martinez are the three best fighters in the world,” said DiBella, who was probably also correct in noting that the ferocity of Saturday night’s kayo isn’t exactly going to bring prospective opponents swarming to his door.
On the other hand, the emphatic nature of his victory is likely to put Martinez at the head table at the 2011 Boxing Writers Dinner. Pacquiao hasn’t had a bad 2010, but in Joshua Clottey and Antonio Margarito, he beat a couple of guys he was supposed to beat. Martinez, on the other hand, was a big underdog when he beat Kelly Pavlik to win the 160-pound title, and then topped that here Saturday night by punishing the Punisher. If he’s not the Fighter of the Year right now, he’s the leader in the clubhouse.
Source: AFP,
ATLANTIC CITY, USA - Argentina's Sergio Martinez knocked out American Paul Williams with one explosive second-round punch Saturday to retain his World Boxing Council middleweight world title.
The left hook caught Williams on the jaw and sent the American toppling face-first to the canvas 1:10 of the second round.
As Martinez began to celebrate, doctors entered the ring to tend to Williams, who was able to get to his feet after several minutes.
Martinez, who improved to 46-2-2 with 25 knockouts, avenged a defeat to Williams last December, when the American won their action-packed encounter by a 12-round majority decision. Both fighters went down in the first round of that fight.
Martinez rebounded from that defeat to capture his title last April with a unanimous 12-round decision over another American, Kelly Pavlik.
Williams, who had said he felt like Martinez "stole" a crown that should be his, fell to 39-2 with 27 knockouts.
Martinez, stung by the decision in his first fight with Williams, had said coming in that he didn't intend to let the judges decide the rematch.
"I didn't want the judges to rob me this time," he said.
Added Martinez promoter Lou DiBella: "He said, 'I'm going to knock him out. The fight is not going to go seven rounds, I'm going to knock him out.'
"I was worried like a maniac and he said, 'No, I'm knocking him out. Relax.'"
Martinez delivered a series of crisp blows in the opening round and Williams never saw the knockout punch coming in the second.
"I started to attack, and when I did, we knew he was going to make a mistake, because he always makes mistakes," Martinez said. "He left me a lot of room to come in and hit him."
Said Williams: "I just got caught with a punch. He got me with a clean shot."
Martinez, who earned slightly more than one million dollars for his evening's work, said he wants to fight two or three more times before hanging up his gloves.
He mentioned as possible candidates Filipino hero Manny Pacquiao and American Floyd Mayweather -- the man Pacquiao displaced as pound-for-pound king.
But most fight fans still hope those two will eventually meet, and DiBella didn't seem to think a Pacquiao or Mayweather bout was likely for Martinez.
"If you're Pacquiao, would you go near him? You think Mayweather will fight him?" DiBella said. "We're going to have a problem making the next fight because that's how good he is."
Source: AP,
NEW YORK — Becoming a star in boxing at 35 isn't easy. The conventional blueprint dictates starting young, often as early as 18, to develop name recognition.
Perhaps that's why most would be hard-pressed to identify the current middleweight king.
Meet Sergio Gabriel Martinez, a charismatic fighter from Argentina with a face that belongs in Giorgio Armani ads — when it hasn't been punched lately. He's well-spoken and respectful, with an easygoing attitude.
But one of the best fighters in the world has only plied his trade in the United States a handful of times, including a bloody destruction of Kelly Pavlik this year to lay claim to the 160-pound throne. So despite an all-action style that has given boxing some of its best recent fights, Martinez remains something of a mystery to all but the most ardent fans.
"Just look at him," promoter Lou DiBella often says. "He should be a movie star!"
Martinez is hoping for a breakthrough performance Saturday night against Paul Williams at Atlantic City's Boardwalk Hall in a fight that will be televised live on HBO.
It's a rematch of their meeting last December, when both hit the deck in the first round and traded blows the rest of the way in a candidate for Fight of the Year. Williams, a three-time champion, ended up winning a controversial mixed decision.
That fight was held in the smaller ballroom just off the boardwalk. This one is moving to the main arena, a sign that the world is starting to realize Martinez.
"You have, in my mind, two guys in Paul and Sergio who can scream out loud they're as good as the top two fighters in the world, because they're not given the opportunity to prove they're not," DiBella said, referring to superstars like MannyPacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr., who have been reluctant to move step into the ring with Williams and Martinez.
"Really, what this is a battle for is to decide temporarily who is third," DiBella said, "and if they're ever given the opportunity, the chance to establish they're pound-for-pound the best fighters in the world."
Martinez came to boxing relatively late at age 22, and likes to say he's a young 35. The first time he fought outside of his country, he was starched in seven round by former welterweight champion Antonio Margarito.
He quickly returned to Argentina and won before eventually moving to Spain and the junior middleweight division. He kept fighting in small arenas across Europe until he hooked up with respected manager Sampson Lewkowicz. Along with DiBella's help, they ventured to American two years ago and shot to the top of the boxing ladder.
Even though Mayweather has fought at 154 pounds, and Pacquiao just claimed a title in the division, DiBella realizes that there's almost no shot that either of them winds up in the ring with Martinez, who has fought so much of his career at junior middleweight.
That's one of the reasons he's back in the ring with Williams, and why the discussion Wednesday turned to the potential for a trilogy regardless of what happens in their rematch.
"I will fight only important fights, and definitely Paul Williams will be important in the future," Martinez said through a translator. "So I will fight him any time he wants."
Williams said he's willing to fight anybody, regardless of the place and time, though his promoter Dan Goossen was quick to put the brakes on discussing anything beyond this weekend. He remembers the brutal fight of less than a year ago.
"We've read a lot of stories the last few months about the fans, media, everyone wanted to see the biggest and best fights that could be made," Goossen said. "No argument this is one of those fights."
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