Podcast: Previewing Fulton-Inoue; recapping Kambosos-Hughes
Plus: Spence-Crawford fight week; Haney update; news of week; ringside memories on anniversary of two significant fights
A note to Fight Freaks Unite readers: I created Fight Freaks Unite in January 2021 and eight months later it also became available for paid subscriptions for additional content — and as a way to help keep this newsletter going and for readers to support independent journalism. If you haven’t upgraded to a paid subscription please consider it. If you have already, I truly appreciate it! Also, consider a gift subscription for the Fight Freak in your life.
We’ve got a hybrid recap/preview podcast for this episode. First, we recapped the one notable card of the weekend, Saturday’s Top Rank/ESPN show headlined by George Kambosos Jr.’s controversial decision over Maxi Hughes in their IBF lightweight title eliminator. Then we previewed the highly anticipated Stephen Fulton-Naoya Inoue junior featherweight title fight that takes place Tuesday in Tokyo (early morning U.S. time). We also covered various news items and looked back on the anniversary of two major fights.
Here’s what we discussed on this episode (in order):
Recap of the highly disputed decision given to Kambosos over Hughes. We get into the scorecards, the fight, the facts about how judges are appointed, what might be next for each guy with a few curse words and rants for good measure.
Recap of lightweight prospect Keyshawn Davis’ rout of Francesco Patera in the co-feature and assessment of Davis’ development.
Preview of one of the best fights of the year on paper, Fulton-Inoue for Fulton’s two 122-pound titles, including thoughts on the match and the hand-wrap controversy that has cropped up in recent days.
Preview of the co-feature, WBO featherweight titlist Robeisy Ramirez’s first defense against Japan’s Satoshi Shimizu.
Spence telling reporters that there will be a coin flip later this week to determine who will walk to the ring last when he faces Crawford on Saturday night.
An update on Devin Haney’s future and an extension of the deadline the WBC gave him because he is in talks to challenge junior welterweight titlist Regis Prograis.
The death of exciting former WBC junior featherweight champion Juan “Kid” Meza, a stalwart of the division in the late 1970s and most of the 1980s.
Announcement that Manny Pacquiao will take part in a junior middleweight exhibition bout against retired Muay Thai and kickboxing star Buakaw Banchamek in Thailand.
Ringside memories on the seventh anniversary of Crawford’s first unification fight, a rout of Viktor Postol to unify the WBO and WBC junior welterweight titles.
Ringside memories on the 15th anniversary of when Antonio Margarito stopped Miguel Cotto in the 11th round to take his welterweight world title in a terrific action fight that became massively tainted because Margarito was caught trying to fight Shane Mosley with loaded hand wraps in his next bout.
Please give it a listen! Also: rate, review, subscribe and enjoy!
We will be bringing you the weekend recap each Monday. Let me know what you think of the podcast by leaving your comments.
Fulton-Inoue photo: Naoki Fukuda
Please upgrade your subscription here: https://danrafael.substack.com/subscribe
Thank you so much for your support of Fight Freaks Unite!
Follow me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/danrafael1/
Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/DanRafael1
Follow me on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DanRafaelBoxing
Navarette said before the Fight "Valdez is a Warrior who fought w/ a Broken Jaw & You're not gonna KO'em w/ 1 punch!" this is a double meaning because Navarette was in trouble against Wilson & was telling Valdez he was in for a War!!