Comments on: Tuesday headlines: Referees gone wild

By: D. Capitated

D. Capitated — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 04:33:28 +0000

Kelly Pavlik can never be a crossover star to the 18-34 demographic. Even though he’s got the prototype in-ring style, to say he comes off as meek and mild outside the ring would be an understatement. He doesn’t have the posterboy appeal Oscar does. He doesn’t have the anti-hero arrogance Floyd does. He doesn’t have the drink a pint and play darts with you at the local pub appeal that Hatton does. He’s just a quiet, soft spoken dude, and unlike a Chuck Liddell figure, he doesn’t have a bad ass look to him. He’s just a lanky white guy who mashes faces.

Are we talking about the Kelly Pavlik that’s known for getting into fights at nightclubs and beat up a cop?

By: 45 Huddle

45 Huddle — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 21:35:16 +0000

Akihiro Gono is fighting for the UFC in November. At least according to MMAJunkie. that is a good pickup for that division.

By: Justin Bullock

Justin Bullock — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 19:16:14 +0000

It looked to me like Shields was landing some pretty hard shots while he had Charuto mounted. While Charuto was deflecting a good amount of the punches, he did get tagged with a few that looked like the hurt him. But even if they didn’t, you can’t just lay there and cover up while somebody is raining down punches.

And Gaijin, I agree with you about the Kid fight. Very upsetting.

By: The Gaijin

The Gaijin — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 17:45:31 +0000

Finally say the KID fight…that was a disgrace.

Even KID looked like he was embarassed at the blatant favoritism of the refs. I half expected him to go to the middle of the ring and lay in guard after that stand-up.

WHAT A FUCKIN’ JOKE.

By: Zack

Zack — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 16:16:54 +0000

It’s just getting so old where you had MMA fights with a guy on top throwing weak shots that are being blocked, then the fight is stopped. The sport needs more Matua, Nelmark, and Quarry’s, IMO.

By: LR

LR — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 15:48:41 +0000

Make the argument all you want, the shots were fairly weak. You could tell that Shields was looking for a stoppage while on top. Shields said for the most part that Charuto was blocking some, and he said he missed a few as well which was evident in the side angle shot on Showtime during the fight. Charuto was immediately sitting up shaking his head right after the stoppage. If it was so horrendous, he’d be laying on the mat completely out of it.

By: Fightlinker.com

Fightlinker.com — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 14:29:38 +0000

Looks like i’m gonna have to make a shields-charuto video so you guys can see how insane that really was.

By: KennyP

KennyP — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 14:09:37 +0000

Jordan,

I agree with you about Pavlik’s personality. But, being a native Youngstowner, I can say that he has engaged a latent fanbase and built excitement that hasn’t been seen since Mancini. (Anyone who could sell 4,000+ tickets for a Versus card, at boxing prices, in the poorest city in the nation IIRC, has to be resonating.) Heck, I have cared more about Pavlik’s recent fights than anything on PPV lately, including Oscar-Floyd. With a win (or even an impressive loss), Pavlik could legitimately create a fight market that has fallen latent. It might not be the 18-34 demo. But as Mancini proved, there is an untapped market for a soft-spoken, blue-collar, Midwestern action fighter…who is also white. And Arum (and Durkin and Loew) have been really smart and deliberate in building a fighter methodically and intelligently, while not sapping his active style in favor of point-fighting.

By: LR

LR — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 13:47:51 +0000

Also, HERO’s seemed to have a good amount of early stoppages. Fabio took some huge hooks to the face, but looked fairly still alive when he was taking some shots on the ground. Calvancanti vs Ribeiro almost seemed like an early stoppage as well.

I will say this, Melvin Manhoef is always exciting to watch, I always want to see a Manhoef vs. Cyborg II.

By: LR

LR — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 12:34:02 +0000

Shields was throwing baby shots at Charuto on the ground. Some of the camera angles made it look as if Charuto was more annoyed by the shots than actually hurt, looked like Yamasaki was giving him a chance to get up, too bad he just gave up.