Felix Cora vs. Matt Godfrey

Cora Could Fight For World Title
By Joey Richards
March 29, 2007

GALVESTON — When referee James Warring stepped in to stop Felix Cora’s last fight, 2:52 into the fourth round of a scheduled 12-round bout on May 18, giving Vadim Tokarev the victory, it appeared Cora’s road to a possible world title had taken a detour.

Not only did Tokarev take away Cora’s North American Boxing Federation title in a battle of unbeaten cruiserweights, but he also handed the Galveston resident his first professional loss and sidetracked his world title hopes.

The loss hit Cora hard. The Ball High grad — then ranked No. 10 in both the World Boxing Council and International Boxing Federation — tumbled in the rankings.

He resigned himself to a long, tough road back to contention.

Well, it turns out that road may not be too long after all.

The 26-year-old Cora will fight Matt Godfrey on April 6 at the Mohegan Sun Casino in Uncasville, Conn.

The 12-round bout is the main event on ESPN2’s Friday Night Fights. It will be televised live, starting at 8 p.m. April 6.

Godfrey’s NABA, WBC Continental Americas and WBC United States titles are all on the line, along with the vacant NABF title.

But there is an even bigger prize awaiting the winner. According to Cora’s dad and manager, Felix Cora Sr., the WBC has promised that the winner will become the No. 1 contender in the world and be in line for a shot at the WBC world title.

The younger Cora feels blessed to get a fight of this magnitude so quickly.

“God opened the door for me that I thought would take a while to have open for me ever again,” he said. “I thought I was out of the picture for a while. But, apparently, He looked into it and opened some doors for me.”

Ironically, it could take Tokarev longer to get that title fight than Cora, even though he’s still unbeaten.

Tokarev, ranked No. 11 in the World Boxing Association, No. 12 in the World Boxing Organization and No. 13 in the WBC when he fought Cora, has moved up to No. 5 in the WBC and IBF. He’s scheduled to fight Marco Huck later this year in an IBF eliminator fight. The winner is supposed to get a shot at IBF champ Krzysztof Wlodarczyk.

So Cora could beat Tokarev to the punch, so to speak.

“I’m in the same position I was in before, maybe better, and I give all the credit to God,” Cora said.

Godfrey (14-0, 8 knockouts) will be the highest-ranked professional boxer Cora has fought to date. The Providence, R.I., native is ranked No. 6 in the WBC, No. 9 in the IBF and No. 10 in the WBA.

Cora (18-1-2, 9 KOs) had moved up to No. 12 in the WBC, but dropped to No. 16 in the latest rankings, released Sunday.

Jean Marc Mormeck (33-3, 22 KOs) is the current WBC and WBA champ, after winning a decision over O’Neil Bell on March 17 to claim Bell’s titles.

The elder Cora said that fight opened the door for Godfrey and Cora, who are ranked Nos. 1-2 in the WBC’s NABF rankings.

The 26-year-old Cora is eager to make amends for his loss to Tokarev. He said the defeat was heart wrenching — like losing a girlfriend.

“I know what it feels like to be dumped,” he said. “I was dumped. I know what it feels like to be rejected. Nobody wants to talk to you. Nobody wants to deal with you. You’ve got to wait your chance. You wait for that opportunity again so you can say the right things or do the right things to win her back. I’m taking this fight that way.”

Notes: Cora has cut ties with Florida-based Warriors Boxing, and he’s currently fighting as a free agent, so to speak.

Cora hadn’t fought since May 18, and the elder Cora felt that Warriors wasn’t in a hurry to get his son a bout.

“They just kind of put Felix on the shelf,” he said. “Since our contract would have expired this month, we decided to part ways.”

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Sugar Won’t Lead Train In Manfredo Fight

Sugar Ray Not In Manfredo’s Corner On Fight Night
By Paul Upham

Boxing legend Sugar Ray Leonard clarified on Tuesday that he will not be the lead trainer for Peter Manfredo Jr in his April 7 challenge against WBO super middleweight world champion Joe Calzaghe at Millennium Stadium in Cardiff, Wales.

“I am just a strategist. I am not a trainer,” explained Leonard. “His father (Peter Sr) is the trainer without question.”

50 year-old Leonard, who won six world titles in five weight classes, has been in contact with Manfredo and his father regularly in the lead-up to the Calzaghe fight.

“We talk and thank God for technology, there are emails,” he said. “I have seen Peter up close and in person on ‘The Contender’ show and have seen him fight live. I just give my two cents and we go from there.”

While Leonard will be at the Millennium Stadium on fight night, he will not be working in Manfredo’s corner.

“Peter has a very competent team,” he said.

Asked to reveal what knowledge he has been trying to impart on Manfredo, Leonard replied, “It is basically the emotional aspect of the fight. Peter has that, that mental stability. That really is the key factor. Even going a little further, as far as the weight is concerned, the toughest fight for a fighter is making weight and Peter is so comfortable at 168lbs, he is OK.”

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Analysis: Boxing And The Expanding Division

by Tom Donelson
Mar 27, 2007

IOWA CITY, Ia. — For those who have followed my writings for the past few years know that I love the cruiserweights.

With Jean-Marc Mormeck’s defeat of O’Neill Bell last week proved a point that I have made for years. The cruiserweights is one of boxing best and deepest division.

Any fight in this division is an evenly match affair between excellent fighters. This is not a case of mediocrity chasing mediocrity but excellent fighters competing with one another.

Every fighter ranked in the top ten is a championship caliber fighter and unlike other divisions, there isn’t enough championship belts to pass around.

If nothing else, the cruiserweights proves another point that I have been making over the years; that explosion of different and more division is actually good for boxing.

This is one area where most boxing pundits and historians disagree with me. If nothing else, the biggest complaints against boxing is that there are too many divisions. My point is that problem with boxing is not too many division but too many sanctioning bodies.

Take the cruiserweights for example. What boxing has figured out and the pundits or historians have not; athletes are bigger and stronger today than before.

With modern training methods, big money and occasional use of steroids, athletes have grown in stature. What was a heavyweight just a generation ago is now a cruiserweight.

Many of the cruiserweights today are just not strong enough or big enough to compete with the behemoths that populate the heavyweights.

Chris Byrd is considered a small heavyweight at 210 pounds but if he fought in the 60’s, 210 pounds would have been considered a big heavyweight!

So it is only logical that boxing recognize the changes that have occurred and the cruiserweights have shown that a new division can produced excellent fighters and competitive matches as good as any era.

There are two factors to consider. First, boxing draws from entire globe and there are more athletes to draw from. In the division from middleweights and beyond, European fighters are making impact and below the middleweights, Asian and Latin American fighters compete with the best of American fighters.

With the end of the cold war, there are entire classes of fighters that just two decades ago would be fighting amateurs for their communist masters. Now they box for pay. This has added to the depth of boxing worldwide and this can be seen just in the rankings alone.

The second factor is that multiple divisions have allowed for more sensible rise in weights. Boxers are not force to go from lightweight to welterweight in one move but can proceed gradually through the ranks.

A Diego Corrales or Jose Castillo can move from junior lightweight to lightweight to junior welterweight in steps and produce some excellent fights along the way.

And with boxing having the world at their disposals, they can populate any division with excellent fighters and each division has depth to produce great fights.

The cruiserweights are not the only division with depth throughout the top ten. Mormeck and O’Neill Bell would most likely face off in a third match to determine the best but below them are great fighters waiting their turn to face the winner.

Cruiserweights problem is not a lack of depth but a lack of recognition. And this division is proof that boxing does occasionally get things right, like adding division.

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Muhammad Ali, King Again For A Day

Wracked by Parkinson’s, master of the Ali shuffle can merely shuffle, but his stature remains.
By Gordon Marino
March 25, 2007

Americans are like punch drunk fighters when it comes to history. But back in 1974 there was a boxing match that just about everyone in the world either watched or listened to. Many claimed that the fight changed their lives, made them feel as though they could leap tall buildings in a single bound if only they believed in themselves – like Muhammad Ali.

The bout between then-champion George Foreman and Muhammad Ali was tabbed the “Rumble in the Jungle.” It took place in Zaire, and was the subject of both Norman Mailer’s The Fight and Leon Gast’s Oscar-winning documentary, When We Were Kings. At the time of the fight, Ali had already run the trajectory from Cassius Clay the boxing comic, to villainous draft dodger, to cultural hero. The preternaturally powerful Foreman seemed indomitable. After all, he had just doused Ali’s first conqueror, Smokin’ Joe Frazier. Nearly everyone believed that Foreman would easily separate Ali from his senses. Ali, of course, shocked the world and recaptured the heavyweight title with an eighth-round knockout.

Last Sunday, hundreds of well-heeled fans from all over the globe flocked to the Muhammad Ali Center in Louisville, Ky. The occasion was a fundraising event for the center, featuring a video replay of the Rumble, complete with round-by-round commentary from Ali’s cornerman, Angelo Dundee. Ali, like many of his opponents such as the late Jerry Quarry, the late Jimmy Young, and the late Floyd Patterson, eventually caught the poison of all the punches he absorbed. Years ago, he was diagnosed with Pugilistic Parkinson’s Disease, which in its advanced stages is associated with speech, motor skills problems and dementia.

The man once known as the Louisville Lip can now scarcely talk, and the heavyweight who was known for his tap-dancing feet and the Ali shuffle can now only shuffle. And either the Parkinson’s and/or the medication he takes to alleviate his symptoms have made him so lethargic that he needs to be coached to open his eyes for the countless photographs he poses for with admirers.

But there we were on Sunday to celebrate a man who had become a king through a sport that robbed him of him of his divine physical grace and gift of gab. Sadly enough, it was not uncommon to hear talk about the great boxing champion in the past tense.

There with the boxer widely recognized as the most important athlete of the 20th century was his trainer of two decades, Dundee. They had not seen each other in over a year. The smartly clad 85-year-old Dundee sat next to Ali, put his hand on his back, and whispered to him as though they were between rounds in a big fight.

Later, Dundee effused, “Being with Ali was like riding a comet. He loved people. He was so much fun. And I was so blessed to be with him.” Dundee has spent his life in sport’s hardest game and has a lot of practice at keeping his strong emotions in check. However, when asked to comment publicly on Ali’s greatest ring triumph over Foreman, Dundee found himself over his head.

He gazed at Ali and insisted, “I knew you would win. I felt like you could beat anyone and anything.” Then he started to choke up, made a fist and squeaked out, “Just like I know you will beat Parkinson’s.” But Dundee and everyone else knows that nothing can connect Ali’s brain cells to his body again.

And yet, there was a sunny side atop the underbelly of the Rumble Replay. With all of Ali’s palaver about being the greatest and the prettiest – which he ultimately was – it was easy to get the impression that Ali was a pathological narcissist. However, unlike other luminaries who are so self-absorbed that they cannot get outside of themselves, Ali became directly involved in the lives of a throng of ordinary people whose path he crossed. Some of them came from as far as Australia to be near the man who so amplified their life force.

Former NBA player Winston Bennett was present and like many others he told me Ali was a major inspiration, “Because he got up from every knockdown and was unlike so many athletes he was always doing something to help someone.” Glenn Singleton, an emotionally charged African-American from New Orleans, confided, “It changed my whole life just to see a black man who believed in himself like Ali did, who would stand up for principles and speak his mind no matter what the cost.” He has opened a mini Ali museum in his neighborhood.

Ali’s tremulous hand signed countless autographs. On a number of occasions, he would slowly draw a heart alongside his shaky signature. Way back, Ali sought and eventually received conscientious objector status during the Vietnam War. There were cynics who chuckled at the notion of a non-violent heavyweight champion. But those little hearts that he took the time to scrawl on Sunday were a reflection of the truth. He was man who always tried to lift other people up and never wanted to hurt anyone, not even his ring foes – and if you had an eye for the sweet science you could detect the gentleness of the Champ in the Foreman fight itself.

In the eighth round, Ali lands a combination to Foreman’s head. Foreman begins spinning leaf-like toward the canvas. Ali cocks his right fist. But then, amazingly, he holds back. I can’t think of any other elite boxer who would have held his fire in the heat of this kind of contest. I asked Angelo Dundee about the punch that Ali did not throw. Dundee replied, “That was Muhammad. He knew George was done. And he didn’t want to hit him again.”

That same George could not be present at the Rumble Replay. He called via a teleconference to address the audience. After some gentle patter, Foreman grew serious and made it clear, “I consider Joe Louis the greatest fighter who ever lived, but I consider you the greatest man to ever put on the gloves.” Ali’s eyes were saucer wide.

“I send you all my love,” Foreman closed.

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Spinks vs. Taylor, 19 May 2007

Spinks takes over for Mora, will fight for Taylor’s title
By Dan Rafael
March 23, 2007

Unlike Sergio Mora, junior middleweight titlist Cory Spinks has no problem fighting in Memphis, Tenn.

Spinks (36-3, 11 KOs) will challenge middleweight champion Jermain Taylor (26-0-1, 17 KOs) on May 19 on HBO at the FedEx Forum, eagerly accepting the challenge a few days after Mora reneged on a deal for the fight because he was unhappy with the selection of Memphis as the host city.

“Cory is ready to make the most of the opportunity,” Spinks manager and trainer Kevin Cunningham told ESPN.com Thursday night. “We appreciate [promoter] Lou DiBella and Jermain for giving us the opportunity to challenge for Jermain’s title. We’re not going to blow it.”

DiBella wasted little time lining up Spinks after Mora, the winner of the first season of “The Contender” reality show, bailed on the fight.

He quickly reached a verbal agreement with Spinks promoter Don King and is awaiting the contracts.

“We made a deal and I am waiting for it to be signed,” DiBella said. “I’m waiting for the contracts and assuming that I get back something close to what I sent King, then we have a deal.”

Said Cunningham: “It’s on. We haven’t signed the contracts yet, but we have the contracts. We’ve agreed. At least one of the marquee fighters [Taylor] in boxing has the [guts] to fight Cory.”

While the main event figures to produce a tactical battle, the HBO undercard is more geared to producing fireworks.

Middleweight sluggers Kelly Pavlik (30-0, 27 KOs) and Edison Miranda (28-1, 24 KOs) will meet in a much-anticipated title elimination bout in the co-feature. The winner will become the mandatory challenger for the winner of the main event.

Pavlik promoter Bob Arum, Miranda promoters Seminole Warriors Boxing and Main Events all worked with HBO and DiBella to move the fight to the undercard. The bout was originally going to headline its own “Boxing After Dark” card on July 28.

“HBO raised the money they were willing to pay for the fight to compensate us for the gate we would have had and for the international [TV sales],” Arum said. “We’re glad we could work it out.”

Cunningham said Spinks — the son of former heavyweight champ Leon Spinks and nephew of Hall of Fame former heavyweight and light heavyweight champion Michael Spinks — opened training camp on Tuesday in Deerfield Beach, Fla., to get ready for the fight.

“Cory is extremely excited to have this fight,” Cunningham said. “The Spinks family has a history of making history.”

The fight matches the world’s No. 1 middleweight with the former undisputed welterweight champion, who is now recognized by many as the No. 1 junior middleweight. Spinks, coming off a lopsided decision win against mandatory challenger Rodney Jones on Feb. 3, will move from 154 pounds to 160 for the fight.

“Cory looks at this as a fight he has to win,” Cunningham said. “He has to win a fight like this to get respect from the networks and the experts. He feels it’s a fight he has to win. He’s looking at making history and becoming a three-division world champion. This is the opportunity for Cory to get respect and to be looked at as one of the best fighters of his time. If he has to go up in weight to fight a bigger, stronger, heavier guy, he has no problem doing it.”

Said DiBella: “In some ways, I would have preferred the Mora fight. I actually think Spinks is tougher for Jermain. Spinks is a more difficult fight with less reward. Cory is a difficult fighter. He’s an elusive guy. Jermain will have to track him down and impose himself on Cory.”

The match shapes up as a big regional rivalry, which is why DiBella wants to call the fight “The Border Battle.” Taylor, from Little Rock, Ark., and Spinks, from St. Louis, are both proven draws in their hometowns. Both cities are only a few hours by car from Memphis and fans of both fighters figure to flock to Memphis for the fight.

“People from both cities will come to Memphis for the fight. It’s a great regional fight,” DiBella said.

“It will be a huge fight in Memphis, a lot bigger than Taylor fighting Sergio Mora,” Cunningham said.

DiBella said that former welterweight champion Vernon Forrest (38-2, 28 KOs) will also be on the undercard, possibly in a junior middleweight elimination bout against European junior middleweight champ Michele Piccirillo (47-3, 30 KOs) of Italy.

Whether the fight will be part of HBO’s broadcast has not been determined, but even if it’s not, HBO likely would air highlights.

Piccirillo claimed a vacant welterweight world title on a highly controversial decision against Spinks in April 2002 in Italy and then lost the belt in his first defense against Spinks when they met in a rematch 11 months later, also in Italy.

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Paulus ‘The Hitman’ Moses Retains Title

The Hitman Retains WBA Title
by The Namibian
Thursday, March 22, 2007

WINDHOEK – Namibian boxer Paulus ‘The Hitman’ Moses retained his World Boxing Association (WBA) Intercontinental Lightweight title against Georgian-born challenger Beka Sadjaia at the Windhoek Country Club Resort.

Moses wasted no time in the 12-round bout as he took on the visiting challenger head-on with his unstoppable punches that landed heavily on Sadjaia’s head.

Moses, who stretched his professional record to 20 fights without a loss, was all over his opponent as he was looking for an early knockout.

Retaining his title is what drove Moses as he came on stronger and stronger with his powerful punches on Sadjaia.

Sadjaia had a running nose for most of the rounds as the determined Moses combined well with his left and right hooks on Sadgaia.

Moses, who won the fight by a unanimous decision in the eighth round beat the rather sloppy opponent in two minutes and 34 seconds.

The bombardment of punches went right up to the eighth round and finally caught the better of Sadgaia.

The brilliant performance of the undefeated WBA Intercontinental Lightweight boxer was witnessed by former President Sam Nujoma, who visibly enjoyed every minute of the fight.

In an earlier title fight, WBA Pan-African Junior Welterweight contender Jason ‘Taks’ Naule was crowned the new champion after beating South African contender Lawrance Ngobeni.

Ngobeni’s experience did not pay off as the lanky Naule came on strongly in the ninth round giving little time to his opponent to breath.

Naule won his first title fight by a unanimous decision and has stretched his record to 11 fights without a single defeat.

Recording the first technical knockout of the evening was super middleweight boxer Willbeforce Shihepo, who wasted no time as he crushed his South African opponent, Emmanuel Gwala.

Shihepo’s well-calculated knockout came in one minute and 34 seconds and he now boasts a record of 14 fights, 10 wins and four losses.

Featherweight Siegfried Kaperu also did his Namibian supporters proud as he went on to claim a victory after a unanimous decision in the six-round bout.

Kaperu now has a record of 14 fights, 11 wins and three losses.

He beat Siyabulela Ziqula from South Africa.

Super middleweight boxer Vikapita Meroro was another marvel to watch as he went on to record his seventh victory against South African opponent Kenneth Masekwane in a four-round bout.

Junior lightweight boxer Junius Amunyela won his fight by a unanimous decision against Victor Khota from South Africa.

Amunyela now boasts a record of seven fights and no loss.

Junior lightweight Jatoorora Tjingaveta beat Peter Malakia in a four-round bout by a unanimous decision and has extended his record to three fights, two wins and one loss.

Flyweight Simon Negodhi drew against Abmerk Shindjuu in their four-round bout while featherweight Mathew Niitembu went down to Albino Felesianu on points in their four-round bout.

The event sanctioned by the Namibia Professional Boxing and Wrestling Control Board was sponsored by Nampower, Total and the Windhoek Country Club Resort.

It was promoted by Nestor Tobias, the brain behind Namibia’s international boxing bonanzas.

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Don King in Front Row for Pope

By DANIELA PETROFF
Wednesday, March 21, 2007

VATICAN CITY — Don King got a front row seat at Pope Benedict XVI’s general audience Wednesday. The usually flamboyant boxing promoter, wearing a blue suit with his preferred high hair style primly flattened for the papal event, gave the pope a green-and-gold boxing belt and a handwritten letter asking for prayers for people ranging from President Bush to the world’s sick and aged.

“I was thrilled to be there. It was a deep spiritual experience,” King told The Associated Press after the two-hour open-air audience in St. Peter’s Square.

In Rome to discuss possible boxing matches in Italy, King had expressed his wish to meet with the pope.

“Faith is the thing that carries us through,” the 75-year-old King said as he walked through St. Peter’s Square, waving Italian and Vatican flags and signing autographs.

Don King Productions spokesman Alan Hopper said the Vatican visit was arranged through a boxer King represents _ Italian super welterweight champion Luca Messi, whose brother Alessandro is a Catholic priest.

King was seated in the front row of a special section on the steps of St. Peter’s Basilica. He was able to hand the pope the gift and the letter as Benedict drove slowly by in an open jeep at the end of the audience.

King, who spent four years in prison for manslaughter, had hoped for a personal meeting with Benedict. Very few nonchurch people, however, receive private time with the pope during his Wednesday audiences.

Before arriving in Rome, King toured Messi’s hometown, Bergamo. During the visit to the northern Italian city, King began a fundraising campaign to restore the city’s church of St. Mary Major, which includes frescoed paintings on the walls of a pre-existing church buried underneath.

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Austin Displeased With Beatdown

Austin Displeased With Performance
By Joe Maxse
Monday, March 19, 2007

As Ray Austin saw it, it was just one of those things.

That’s how the Cleveland heavyweight assessed his second-round knockout loss to International Boxing Federation champ Wladimir Klitschko in Mannheim, Germany, on March 10.

“I’m definitely upset with my performance,” said Austin, who met with reporters last week. “On a better day, I could have done better. You take a step up, this is what happens to you.”

About the only good steps Austin (24-4-4, 16 KOs) took were the ones getting into the ring. Once inside, his lack of effort was embarrassing, to say the least.

Attempting to become the first local heavyweight to win a major world title, you could understand the loss if some firepower went with it. Intimidation was not a factor, said Austin.

“I wasn’t intimidated at all,” said Austin, who matched Klitschko in height and weight. “I came there to do a job and unfortunately it didn’t happen.”

Austin, 36, said he was unhappy “from day one” with new trainer Stacey McKinley, who was hand-picked by promoter Don King to work his corner. Austin said he preferred to have longtime Cleveland friend Romeo Conner in his corner.

“This is what they were paying me to have and I had to roll with it,” said Austin, whose purse was $1 million. “They wanted me to box and attack in the later rounds. I wanted to be more aggressive.”

Klitschko ended matters when he connected with a series of left hooks that put Austin on the canvas. According to Austin, it was the first punch that did all the damage.

“I only remember getting hit with one hook,” Austin said. “We were expecting the right hand from beginning to end. We thought we had the speed department handled, but he was tremendously speedy.”

Klitschko (48-3, 43 KOs) told the German press that Austin’s “lack of speed and coordination didn’t allow him to be a real threat.”

Austin said it was “back to the drawing board,” with his next bout in Cleveland on a June show promoted by King. However, a spokesman at King’s offices in Florida said a Cleveland show was not in the works.

Deal making:

A match close to being finalized has middleweight contenders Kelly Pavlik and Edison Miranda squaring off on July 28. Promoters and HBO are looking into both Quicken Loans Arena and Cleveland State’s Wolstein Center as possible sites, with Florida also in the running.

Youngstown’s Pavlik (30-0, 27 KOs) and Colombia’s Miranda (28-1, 24 KOs) would be about big punching, with the winner getting a title shot against Jermain Taylor in the fall.

Around the ring:

The Ohio Athletic Commission will hold its monthly meeting on Wednesday at the Bureau of Worker’s Compensation, 4800 E. 131 St., in Garfield Heights at 10 a.m. It is open to the public. . . . Juan Manuel Marquez (47-3-1, 35 KOs) decisioned WBC super featherweight champ Marco Antonio Barrera (63-5, 42 KOs) on Saturday night in Las Vegas. Scores were 118-109 and two by 116-111. HBO has already penciled in a rematch for Sept. 16. . . . The Cleveland Golden Gloves amateur boxing tournament will be held April 13-14 at the Erieview Galleria, with the finals at Cleveland Browns Stadium on April 21. Go to clevelandamateurgg.com or call 216-662-7445 for information.

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Mormeck Wins Against Bell

Mormeck Wins Back Cruiserweight Title
17 March 2007

Frenchman Jean-Marc Mormeck regained his WBA/WBC cruiserweight titles from O’Neil Bell in Saturday’s rematch. Just over a year on from their explosive first fight, Mormeck won out on points in a very good fight at the Levallois-Perret, France, Saturday night.

The difference on was Mormeck was able to weather Bell’s late surge to finish the fight and win a close, unanimous decision in front of a raucous sellout crowd of 4,000 at the Palais des Sports Marcel Cerdan.

Mormeck (33-3, 22 KOs), from Point-a-Pitre, Guadalupe, France, now residing in Rosny-sous-Bois, had been the first French fighter to become a unified world champion, and he said he felt tremendous pressure attempting to regain the titles in his home country.

“I felt the whole country of France on my shoulders going into this fight,” Mormeck said, “but it helped me. I was fighting for them tonight. We were in it together. I couldn’t let them down.”

Saturday’s match resembled the first fight in many ways as Mormeck built an early lead by staying busy and landing power shots. While he faded at Madison Square Garden in what became a “Fight of the Year” (and “Round of the Year”) nominee that took place on Jan. 7, 2006, Mormeck was able to box his way to a win in the later rounds when Bell asserted himself most strongly.

Bell had commented at the weigh in on Friday that Mormeck looked like he had trained harder for the rematch by the looks of his physique, and Mormeck came out aggressively from the opening bell.

Bell tried to establish his jab and often followed with one-two combinations while Mormeck—just as he had done in the first fight—landed power shots, including four tremendous right hands in the opening stanza.

Mormeck added an uppercut, some left hooks and body shots in the second round. Bell tried to answer but Mormeck landed the harder shots.

Bell landed an uppercut of his own in the third round before Mormeck fell to the canvas at 2:15 into the round from a low blow. When the action resumed after a one minute break, Mormeck showered a vicious assault on Bell that, ironically, may be best remembered for the fact that Bell didn’t go down.

The non-stop action continued in round four as Bell attempted to counter Mormeck’s power shots, but the Frenchman seemed unwilling to lose exchanges in the early going of this seesaw battle.

The brisk pace slowed a bit in the beginning of the fifth round before the staggering blows returned. Seeking ways to break Mormeck down, Bell even acted like he was hurt near the end of the round to only try to gain an advantage by exploding with combinations.

Bell had his best round of the fight in the sixth. The referee warned Mormeck for punching in the back of the head at 1:40 into the round. Bell then deployed a rope-a-dope strategy in an attempt to get Mormeck to exhaust his seemingly boundless energy.

The tactic worked wonders for Bell, who appeared to have Mormeck on the verge of a knockdown before the bell sounded ending the round.

Bell tried to keep his momentum rolling into the seventh, and a referee’s warning to Mormeck for hitting behind the head seemed to encourage him. Bell used more rope-a-dope before returning to the center of the ring for more brawling.

Bell responded to a belt-line shot in the eighth round with a delayed-response pratfall, apparently mocking Mormeck’s low-blow fall to the canvas in the third round.

Mormeck sensed or learned from the open scoring announcements spoken in French on the public address system that he had built a sizeable lead going into the ninth round.

Bell knocked a fading Mormeck out in the 10th round in their first fight, and Mormeck made a deft decision to box more and conserve energy for the championship rounds.

Mormeck lowered his punch output and displayed boxing skills in the closing rounds while Bell wanted to continue brawling to pick up some desperately needed rounds from the judges.

In the end, Bell’s rally came a few rounds too late. All three judges scored the fight for Mormeck by scores of 116-112 and 115-113, twice.

Bell (26-2-1, 24 KOs), from Jamaica now fighting out of Atlanta, did not agree with the decision.

“Mormeck is a monster in the ring,” Bell said. “I spared him the knockout this time but I think I did enough to win.

“I am disappointed by this decision. I thought I won every round. I am appalled by the judges. He never hurt me.

“I’ve been off for 14 months and my promoter Warriors Boxing needs to answer for that.”

Bell prowled the dressing room hallways looking for Mormeck after the fight, and he stormed into the post-fight press conference with his anger festering while he waited for the Frenchman to arrive.

After Mormeck commented on the fight, he responded to a reporter’s question by saying, “I don’t like O’Neil Bell.” Before the translator could say, “but I do have tremendous respect for him as a fighter,” Bell rushed toward Mormeck and a brief melee broke out that promoter Don King would later characterize as “deplorable after such a great match took place.”

The victor was understandingly more positive in his comments.

“Bell was in good shape,” Mormeck said. “He always has surprises for me and tonight was no different. He was still standing after 12 rounds.

“I do not respect him as a person but I do have tremendous respect for him as a fighter.”

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