Edwin Valero and his mighty gash pounded out a victory over Antonio DeMarco Saturday. No word yet on whether Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez approved of the victory, or would be appointing Valero to a cabinet position.
Tattooing your brain with boxing opinions, it’s the Finito Five!
1. Valero gets gashed, then gashes DeMarco
To many a trained boxing eye, bawdy records and knockout totals are only impressive as the competition they come against. Many times, in order to justify that record, fighters will need to back up that record against opponents highly regarded enough to make everyone take notice. While the Venezuelan lightweight Edwin Valero has compiled an eye-catching 27-0 record with all knockouts, those wins have come against fairly anonymous competition. Well, with his grueling stoppage of the excellent Antonio DeMarco in Monterrey, Mexico, last Saturday, it may be time to sit up and take notice. It wasn’t just the fact that Valero knocked DeMarco out, it was the heart and guts he showed in doing so that has everyone talking. If you saw only the first six rounds of the fight, you might have thought that the Man With Hugo Chavez On His Chest had finally faced a real opponent, and his stock was about to take a huge hit. DeMarco, a much taller fighter, was landing his share of punches while basically keeping Valero at bay. He was not getting knocked out inside of four rounds like most of Valero’s opponents, either. Add to that a massive gash to Valero’s forehead caused by an accidental elbow in round two (apparently, in Mexico, it takes more blood than a battle scene in 300 to stop a fight there) that caused his face to become the proverbial crimson mask. Still, Valero fought through it, and started to put a serious beating on DeMarco after round six, so much so that the Mexican withered under the assault and stopped on his stool after round nine. Of course, the stupid open scoring system the WBC uses announced that DeMarco was behind 98-91 after eight rounds, so that probably helped make his decision to quit that much easier.
Still, at this point, while this single fight is not enough for anyone to gauge whether Valero is the goods or not, we now know he has the heart to get in tough and persevere against a quality opponent. His toughest opponent may be his visa and past health problems, as he still can’t get licensed in the United States bar Texas, and to become truly big, he’ll have get his foot in the door in Las Vegas. Either way, Valero has proven that he’s certainly a boatload of fun to watch, and if he can get on TV more frequently, people will tune in. For DeMarco, however, this wasn’t a good night. While he was able to fend off Valero for the first handful of rounds, his size and reach should have been more effective, and wasn’t. This could have been a big feather in his cap, and he knew it. While Valero is certainly trending up, we’ll have to see if DeMarco can bounce back from this career crossroads. At least when DeMarco does it, most fans will be able to see it. With Valero, we can only hope.
2. But does Hugo Chavez have a left hook like JC Superstar?
Speaking of that Hugo Chavez tattoo on Valero’s chest (which covers practically the whole thing), why hasn’t anybody asked him about it yet? Tyson puts a Mao tattoo on his arm, and then another one of Che Guevara (several boxers have this, too), and the press can’t stop asking him about it. Somehow though, Valero can display his tribute to socialist governance with nary a question? Look, there’s been many a drunken night that ended up with misguided tattoo of some head of state (who the hell is Angela Merkel and why is she on my stomach?), but it would be interesting to at least hear Valero’s reasoning. Even better yet, being that boxing is such a capitalist endeavor in the first place, why don’t Bob Arum and Don King have tattoos of Bill Gates or Warren Buffett on their chests? My only hope is that Valero didn’t ask for Julio Ceasar Chavez on his chest, only to end up with his country’s leader instead. One thing we do know about Hugo Chavez is that no trainer would ever have to tell him to go to his left!
3. Adamek attacks the heavyweight ranks
It has been written in this space before that Thomasz Adamek would serve the boxing public better as a top cruiserweight than another small heavyweight on Planet Klitschko. Regardless of that or anyone else’s wishes, the Pole looks destined to ply his trade with the Big Boys of boxing full time. Showing up at a meaty but natural-looking 220 pounds, Adamek turned in a solid performance against the decent former U.S. Olympian Jason Estrada Saturday, winning a 12-round decision. Disregarding his first heavyweight foray against the over-the-hill Andrew Golota, this was his true debut against someone over 190 pounds. He didn’t disappoint the New Jersey crowd, which had enough Polish people in attendance that they must have been checking visas at the door along with tickets. Although Estrada put on his usual act of being shocked and befuddled at a fight he clearly lost, give Adamek credit; he has good hand speed for a heavy and can throw good combinations to the body, which he did often. He also can take a heavyweight punch, which he displayed when Estrada cracked him in round ten. As good as this performance was, however, all things heavyweight are measured against the Klitschko brothers. Would this showing have been enough to make Vitali or Wladamir take notice? Not yet, and only time will tell if Adamek can change that.
4. Giving fight fans more of what they want
It has been written in this space many times just how TV networks manage to mess with or mess up the fight game, so it’s only fair to praise them when they get things right. After it was thought that Fox Sports Net (U.S.) had left boxing permanently, Bob Arum and Top Rank has brought it back with a vengeance with no less that three new shows a month! The new Top Rank Live series has already given us such excellent fare as Brandon Rios’ superb knockout of Jorge Teron, Vanes Martirosyan and Kassim Ouma’s pitched battle, plus the return of Jorge Arce to the big stage. Add to that upcoming fights featuring Giovani Segura (and his famously disgraced trainer, Javier Capetillo), Victor Ortiz and Mike Jones, and this new series is quickly becoming must-see TV. Every week likely won’t be PPV-level fights, but when Arum has given us crap like Julio Ceasar Chavez Jr.-Troy Rowland on a major PPV undercard (Pacquiao-Cotto) before, maybe that’s not such a bad thing. At least it should be on the level of ESPN’s Friday Night Fights. Speaking of which, a quick kudos to FNF for grabbing the Glen Johnson-Yusaf Mack 175-pound tilt off the cancelled Mosley-Berto scrap heap. No one was sure if Johnson was on the way out or not, but that convincing knockout of the streaking Mack was a good return to form; thanks to quick thinking on the Worldwide Leader’s part, boxing fans were able to see it.
5. The return of Finito!
Thanks to Jorge “Travieso” Arce’s early technical decision win against Angky Ankota on the Top Rank Live show recently, boxing fans got to see a real treat. Of course, given the name of this blog, there’s a bias, but none other than Alonso “Finito” Lopez, son of Hall Of Famer Ricardo “Finito” Lopez was given some screen time in his third pro fight. If anyone blinked thinking they were seeing the old man, they could hardly be blamed; Alonso is the spitting image of his father. It’s amazing that his mother can tell them apart, because the rest of us would have serious trouble. He even fights like his father, albeit a little more raw and a little less accurate, but the slight hop in his movement, hands held mid-high and combination punching are all there. Of course, it helped that his opponent, Sergio Cruz, was determined to make an impression in his professional debut by swinging so wildly he looked like he was playing Jai Halai rather than boxing. Still, Lopez scored a third-round knockout worthy of his dad’s (and this blog’s) name. It’s going to be nearly impossible to go undefeated in 52 fights like his father, but as long as he’s any bit better or more exciting than the underwhelming Julio Caesar Chavez, Jr., it should be fun to watch Alonso’s rise.
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