There's Your Karma, Ripe As Peaches

The Missing Link Retains WBA Heavyweight Title

Boxing is far and away my favorite sport, so I tuned in to HBO on Saturday night with a fair amount of drunken enthusiasm to watch Nikolai Valuev, history’s largest heavyweight champion, in his American debut against lowly Monte Barrett.

Valuev, who is now controlled by Don King, was looking to legitimize his reign by beating a relatively known fighter in Chicago while keeping his chase for Rocky Marciano's undefeated record in tact.

• Side note: It is absolutely disgusting to me that Valuev is 4 fights away from Marciano's record having padded his own with bums and tomato cans at every step of the way. Keep in mind that Valuev has fought no one - not even Wladimir Klitsccko or Calvin Brock. The last heavyweight to come close to Marciano was Larry Holmes, who went 48-0 before losing to Michael Spinks in 1985. Twenty of the fights in that streak were title defenses against the likes of Muhammed Ali, Ernie Shavers, and Gerry Cooney - you know, real fighters. But let's get back on topic...
  

Monte "Two Gunz" Barrett, who hadn't fought in 14 months and also stood nine inches shorter and 106 pounds lighter than Valuev, was the perfect schmuck for this campaign and it showed straight away.

I know HBO said this was boxing and with Jim Lampley, the braindead Larry Merchant, and Michael Buffer in place, it certainly looked like it should have been boxing. But what we were treated to wasn't boxing; it was some type of David & Goliath battle between the Missing Link and an able-bodied but sluggish man from the 21st century.

The best thing I can liken it to is Westley's wrestling match with Fezzik (Andre the Giant) in The Princess Bride, except, in the end, Barrett wasn't able to jump on Valuev's back and disable him with a sleeper hold.

Things started well enough, as Barrett rocked Valuev with a looping overhand right that caused the champ's legs to buckle. But Two Gunz most effective shot proved to be his last, as he immediately retreated into this ridiculous strategy of throwing sloppy right hands and holding on for dear life. And while he tried to actually fight the Russian for about a minute in the fourth round, the match was all Valuev. What's sad is Valuev wasn't doing anything remarkable... he looked belabored to actually lift his hands up to fight but showed that it's not too hard to beat a man down when your bunches, by default, land in the middle of your opponent's noggin.

By the 8th round, things were a mess, as Barrett got dropped to the canvas for the first time with a short right. It happened again - twice actually - in the 11th when Valuev put all of his might into another right and then again later on with a solid left.

Sadly, that was all she wrote.

I was hoping that Valuev would rise to the occasion in this fight even though his opponent had never managed to rise to the occasional in any major bout but this wasn't even close.

There are currently four heavyweight titleholders running around and this one might be the most limited of the bunch (and of all time).

With a repetoire consisting solely of stamina, I imagine you could go back in time, kidnap Cro-Magnon man, and even after you took away his club, he'd be just as good. 

What a colossal waste of time this turned out to be. Had I known we were about to be treated to 11 rounds of sloppy, painfully unskilled fighting, I would have flipped over to ESPN for a couple episodes of "The Contender."

Posted at October 9, 2006 11:08 AM

Comments (7): The Missing Link Retains WBA Heavyweight Title

Katy	October 9, 2006 12:32 PM
	Jesus. "Missing link" might be putting it lightly.

Gianni	October 9, 2006 2:37 PM
	Boxing has gone so far downhill. The Kronk is at risk of closing, there are no up and comers, the heavyweight division is being dominated by Encino Man. Where's the talent anymore? I wanna think the sport can bounce back but it's not looking good right now.

Shawne	October 9, 2006 11:06 PM
	and now all you get is UFC. Ive tried to get in to that for the last couple years but its just as ugly as todays heavyweight boxing. Hopefully the sweet science can get on that comeback. There's no shortage of talent out there.. we just need the right dudes to train em.

Matt Geiger	October 9, 2006 11:20 PM
	At least we know he can use Geico...

Toxic	October 10, 2006 9:32 AM
	Totally given up on boxing, too much of a farce now, epitomised by the likes of that thing.

TJ Martin	October 10, 2006 11:38 PM
	Jack Dempsey, Joe Lewis, Rocky Marciano, Muhammed Ali, Sonny Liston, Joe Frazier, George Foreman, Leon Spinks, Larry Holmes, Mike Tyson, Buster Douglas, Evander Holyfield, Riddick Bowe, Lennox Lewis, Roy Jones Jr................. Nikolai Fucking Valuev? How the hell does this happen?!?! How does a sport fall this fast!!

Nathan Arrington	October 14, 2006 8:16 PM
	I watched the replay on HBO last Tuesday. I really can't believe this was a title fight for ANY belt. Sad what's become of the weight class.

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