Bradley-Alexander: Coming Up Short

Photo credit: Carlos Baeza/Thompson Boxing Promotions

Writers don't have venom tongues so much as they venomous ink – if they are disappointed or angry or unhappy, they will let you know by letting the venom ink flow.

So when Timothy Bradley vs. Devon Alexander – a fight with great expectations – turned out to be a woeful clash of styles, writers dug into it with pleasure. Or with displeasure.

Dan Rafael of ESPN.com:

"Talk about a disappointment. Bradley-Alexander, the first unification fight between two undefeated American titleholders in 24 years and only the third ever, was supposed to launch the winner, and maybe even the loser, to stardom, if it had been a great fight. Instead, it was a giant dud.

"The fight, fought before a crowd of 6,247 at the Silverdome, was competitive all the way with several very close, hard-to-score rounds. But the fight was not pleasing to watch. It was messy and never found a flow, and it ended in ugly fashion after yet another head-butt badly rattled Alexander."

Jake Donovan of BoxingScene.com led off with this in his post-fight recap:

"Dead atmosphere. Disappointing action. A major fight that ends on a butt and not a punch.

"Not exactly the ideal return to the big time for a sport desperately in need of a shot in the arm."

Bart Barry of 15rounds.com framed part of his story around his encounter with Bradley at the airport:

"Bradley was exhausted, busted up and bandaged, his left eye swelled shut from accidental collisions with Devon Alexander’s head. He was also the world’s best 140-pound prizefighter – if anyone cared.

"It appeared no one did. And that was fitting a footnote as any to the weekend’s depressed and depressing event, a spectacle billed as “The Super Fight” that filled little more than five percent of Silverdome’s available seats in Pontiac, Mich."

Ouch.

All of these words sting nearly as bad as Alexander's eye must've after that final head butt.

The Big Stage, The Big Screen, The Big Challenge, Two Big Guys

The Big Stage

Inside a large domed football arena this Saturday will be Devon Alexander and Timothy Bradley. So many other writers have weighed in on the economic side of things. But here's a Michigan man, David Mayo of The Grand Rapids Press, discussing what this fight could mean to the state.

Lem Satterfield of AOL Fanhouse, while not from Michigan, says Detroit needs this fight.

The Big Screen

Kieran Mulvaney of ESPN.com looks at a fascinating documentary on modern bare-knuckle boxing.

Murray Greig of the Edmonton Sun has his top 10 boxing movies.

The Big Challenge

Mixed martial artist Nick Diaz wants to try out boxing, says Franklin McNeil of ESPN.com.

Two Big Guys

George Kimball of The Sweet Science kept a secret for a long time – Why did Butterbean get knocked out by Mitchell Rose way back in 1995? Here's the answer...

And Chris Mannix of Sports Illustrated takes a look at Chris Arreola and his new, supposed dedication to training.

What's The World Coming To?

Don't call us nattering nabobs of negativism. There's plenty of good news out there – for just one example, there's Thomas Gerbasi's feature on Kevin Cunningham, trainer to Devon Alexander, on BoxingScene.com.

But blog posts are better made when they're not just roundups, but when there's an overriding theme. And so there's these:

Thomas Hauser of SecondsOut.com has the behind-the-scenes stuff on how the flagship boxing network, HBO, lost the top boxing star, Manny Pacquiao, to Showtime.

John Whisler of the San Antonio Express-News has the story of drama involving a South Texas amateur boxing organization.

Tom Archdeacon of the Dayton Daily News looks into the dangers of Toughman contests, which returned to his city last week.

And Lance Pugmire of the Los Angeles Times says the newly launched World Series of Boxing is already in major financial trouble.

No need to pile on with the poor ticket sales for this Saturday's fight between Timothy Bradley and Devon Alexander...

That's What Sheed Said

There was a report on NPR this week saying that writer Wilfrid Sheed has died, and it took me a second to connect the name to the first boxing book I ever bought. I got Muhammad Ali: A Portrait in Words and Photographs probably a year or so after it came out in 1975, because I remember I used to stretch my teenage budget by shopping for big, glossy books about movies and sports at the discount table, where a lot of good ones eventually landed.

Of course I was drawn to the book by the awesome Neil Leifer photos. Ali looked great. He was cool. So were Frazier and Foreman and Liston. I tore out some of the 9-by-11 photo pages for my wall. I can't say I read the book cover-to-cover. I always figured Sheed was a grizzled sportswriter along with all the other guys I was reading then -- Dick Schaap, Stan Fischler, Ray Fitzgerald at the Boston Globe, Pat Putnam in Sports Ilustrated. The obits say Sheed was a satirical British essayist and novelist. His two biography subjects were Ali and Claire Boothe Luce. But looking back -- I still have my tattered copy of the book -- this is good stuff:

The face has been flattened ever so slightly by the hammers of Mars, and there is some reluctant scar tissue around the eyes. Yet he looks the better for it. Narcissus probably had a dull face without all those ripples on it -- a few rounds with Frazier would have helped him too. Ali's eyes themselves are deadly weapons, black as carbon and jabbing in every direction, from impassive surroundings.

Oh, Holy... Field.

Evander Holyfield loves boxing. And boxing fans loved Evander Holyfield. But there's a reason why the 48-year-old heavyweight – who will enter the Hall of Fame five years after he finally retires, if and when he finally retires – is fighting in a lesser venue against a lesser opponent and would be getting less attention of his fight wasn't coming on an otherwise empty weekend.

Tim Dahlberg of the Associated Press:

The problem is Holyfield hasn't had a good fight in years, unless you count his win over equally ancient Francois Botha last April a good fight. It wasn't, and there's no body of evidence in boxing that the older fighters get, the better they get.

It's the exact opposite, of course, as it is in all sports. But other sports don't involve getting hit repeatedly in the head.

The fighter who helped make the '90s a good time for the heavyweight division might be emboldened in his quest by the knowledge that the cupboard is painfully bare among boxing's big guys. Take away the Klitschko brothers and Britain's David Haye, and there's not a whole lot left in the division.

But Holyfield is never going to get a fight with the Klitschkos or Haye, much less beat them. He's stuck fighting guys like Williams and Brian Nielsen, who is coming out of a nine-year retirement to fight Holyfield in Denmark in March.

Still, he soldiers on, fighting for paydays a fraction of the $35 million he made to fight Tyson the second time around. He's had recent money issues and a payday is a payday, but listen to Holyfield talk and you get the feeling he really does think he can be heavyweight champion again.

The Talk

Not everything is flowery prose and dramatic storytelling and witty turns of phrases. Sometimes the best thing to do is just to get out of the way of the subjects and let them speak. And sometimes writers don't need to write at all, but rather will report, ask questions and let the answers speak for themselves. The above segment with Timothy Bradley and Devon Alexander carried much more power to it than any other minute-long production HBO could've put together.

The beauty of the Internet is that should a writer choose to publish an interview on its own, rather than turning it into an article, it is welcomed because doing so is suited to the short attention span that often comes with reading online. And much like Muhammad Ali saw that television would give him a channel to use his mouth to amplify his stardom, boxers have taken to the Internet to sell their fights.

Writers, of course, are willing to oblige.

In With The New...

It's easy to get caught in nostalgia, to look back at the great fighters and the great fights of decades past. Nostalgia means name value, which is why we still see Hector Camacho and Evander Holyfield and an assortment of long past-their-prime fighters still step in the ring (or why we see Buster Douglas in what might be the worst amateur commercial contest entry ever).

That, and they need money.

We will never be completely out with the old. But we are in with the new.

Thomas Gerbasi of BoxingScene.com talks to prospect Demetrius Andrade and the disappointing 2010 he had just two years after turning pro out of the Olympics:

Still unbeaten as a pro, still on most pundits’ Top Prospects lists, Andrade nonetheless only fought three times last year against pedestrian opposition and ate some backlash from fans and those in the media, including ESPN commentator Teddy Atlas.

Yet the 22-year old from Providence, Rhode Island took everything in stride.

“I just basically keep it moving, keep focused, and I try not to pay too much attention to it,” said Andrade, who chuckled when asked if this is what he signed up for when he became a professional boxer.

“Not at all. I didn’t expect a lot of things outside of boxing to happen. It’s crazy.”

For a taste, just look at Andrade’s social media output. Usually used just as a marketing tool, his webpage and Twitter account provided a glimpse into what he was going through.

Twitter - May 24 - My fight was cancelled last week due to my opponents arrest. My next fight is scheduled for June 18 at Northern Quest Casino in Spokane, WA.

Twitter - June 21 - My June 18 fight at Northern Quest Casino was cancelled, due to my opponents medical condition. Check my tweets for info on my next fight!

Webpage – September 23 - “I want to say to my family, friends, and fans that I've been reading things online regarding my father and myself. I'd like to set the record straight by saying, he's still my dad and he will always be in my corner. It is to my father’s credit that I am, where I am, today. My father is still a key person in my life and will always be.”

Add in a new baby, and it’s kind of amazing that Andrade was able to fight at all, but he did, he kept his “0” and now it’s on to what he hopes will be a better 2011.

There is a new television series centered around boxing called "Lights Out." Michael Woods, writing for ESPN.com, sets the premise of the show: