Looking Back, Looking Forward

Photo Credit: Tom Casino/Showtime

In this in-between week, there is the before and there is the after.

There are the odes to a November in which the fight came in high quantity and the stories they produced were high quality.

Thomas Hauser of SecondsOut.com recently put forth extended examinations of Manny Pacquiao's one-sided win over Antonio Margarito and Sergio Martinez's one-punch knockout of Paul Williams, which, as they often do, provide new details on these fights and these nights.

The post-fight claims of Martinez's trainer reading instructions to his charge before the fight on how and when the fight would end? Those take form through Hauser's access and observation:

At 10:30, Martinez put on his trunks, moved to the center of the room, and began shadow-boxing in earnest. Sarmiento took a 4-by-6-inch notepad from his pocket and moved to Sergio’s side. The trainer had scripted his instructions for the fight, breaking them down into five points.

“The mistakes of the last fight will not be repeated,” Sarmiento began. “Trabajo de amague y golpe con la mano adelantada haciendo pasos laterales hacia nuestra derecha sin entrar lejos de su distancia o fuera de ella.”

Springs Toledo of The Sweet Science, meanwhile, waxes poetic on Martinez-Williams 2:

Replace the chattering HBO commentators with classical music and the Martinez-Williams replay becomes rather like a ballet, a pas de deux. One pursues, the other is coy. The controlled aggression of Williams complements Martinez’s dazzling virtuosos. The virtuoso disrupts the movement by sliding back and then in at angles, accompanied by hooks that cut the air and passados thrusting high and low.

Those were but two of the standout events of the past month. And while there are no bouts on HBO (not including an HBO Latino bout) or Showtime or a major pay-per-view this weekend, the writing continues no matter what the fighting does.

Doug Fischer of RingTV.com talks to Nonito Donaire about the stature he's had since beating Vic Darchinyan a few years ago and the lack of follow-up on that big win. Cliff Rold of BoxingScene.com looks at Montiel's opponent for the Dec. 4 bout, Wladimir Sidorenko.

Fischer's colleague Michael Rosenthal has a feature on Saul Alvarez, also fighting this weekend.

And here are Bernard Fernandez of the Philadelphia Daily News and Don Steinberg (writing for The Philadelphia Inquirer) on Bernard Hopkins' preparation for his Dec. 18 challenge of light heavyweight champion Jean Pascal.

Hopkins, of course, is never one to shy away from talking. Here's Bernard (Fernandez) capturing the quintessential Bernard (Hopkins):

Unlike narcissistic Baby Boomers hoping to cheat, or delay, the aging process with cosmetic surgery and white lies about their actual year of birth, Hopkins exults in the fact he is his sport's last dinosaur, a die-hard long marked for extinction by those who insist someone that old isn't supposed to still be this good.

"Father Time did come by and knock on my door a couple of times," said Hopkins, a raconteur who is always apt to give an entertaining, half-hour answer to a 10-second question. "He was yelling, 'Hey, Bernard! I know you're in there!' Well, yes, I am. But I'm not opening the door just yet."

The door's not quite shut on boxing in 2010.