Boxing Blog – TSS Tidbits

Can anyone tell us who are Juan Urango and Herman Ngoudjo?

Two questions: Who is Juan Urango? And what’s a Herman Ngoudjo? The point of this weekend’s exercise is threefold: First, to acquire for Ricky Hatton a title he can live with; second, to grease the skids for a fight between Hatton and Jose Luis Castillo; and third, to facilitate a makeover of Hatton’s American image by eradicating the residual stench of his HBO debut against Luis Collazo in Boston last year.

Assuming all of the above to be the case, it figures that both Hatton and Castillo should have a relatively easy time of it at the Paris Saturday night. While both opponents are relatively anonymous in the eyes of most big-time boxing watchers, you’ve got to assume that neither Hatton’s people nor HBO want to repeat last May’s experience, in which they vastly underrated both Collazo and Ricky’s capacity for going up an extra seven pounds in weight, and have done their homework this time.

I actually wish I’d thought to ask the locals about Urango when I was down at the Seminole Hard Rock weekend before last, because the Colombian has been more or less a house fighter there since taking up residency in the US two and a half years ago. A look at his record suggests that while he’s undefeated, he hasn’t beaten much, and that includes the immortal Naoufel Ben Rabah, whom he outpointed to acquire the IBF 140-pound title he’s getting paid to pass along to Hatton. The most interesting thing about Urango seems to be the multinational character of his opposition: Counting Hatton, in his last ten fights he will have boxed against opponents from nine different countries. (Two Russians and one each from England, Tunisia, the USA, Costa Rica, Mexico, Greece, Ghana, and Spain.) Hatton should win whenever he wants, say the fifth or sixth.

Peter/Toney weigh-in results from Hollywood, Florida

HOLLYWOOD, Fla.—Turns out the former middleweight champion known as ‘Lights Out’ wasn’t even the only weight-challenged James Toney fighting on Don King’s Saturday night card at the Seminole Hard Rock.

A day after James (Lights Out) Toney tipped the scales at 234 (a pound more than he won for his first encounter with Samuel Peter, “but this time he’s skinny,� insists trainer Freddie Roach), James Obede Toney of Ghana weighed in at 159 for his undercard bout against former IBF junior middle champ Roman Karmazin on the Toney-Peter undercard.

James Obede Toney didn’t even have Tae Bo guru Billy Blanks going for him, but it might be noted that just eleven months ago, the Ghanaian boxer was a 185-pound cruiserweight when he fought Mickey Stackhouse in South Carolina.

After Toney and Peter weighed in on Thursday, by the way, Jose Rivera’s trainer John Scully (who used to spar with Toney years ago) accompanied the heavyweight James to dinner at the hotel coffee shop.

“I was impressed,� said Scully. “James had salad, a small piece of broiled chicken, and some vegetables – and this was after the weigh-in. You’d never have seen the old Toney eating that way.�

Friday night’s undercard weigh-in was highlighted by the performers in the only world title bout on the card. Jose Rivera scaled in at 153, while his challenger – and fellow New Englander – Travis Simms was incrementally heavier at 153¾.

Florida referees Jorge Alonso (Toney-Peter) and Tommy Kimmons (Rivera-Simms) will be working Saturday night’s Showtime bouts. Interestingly, although the Toney-Peter rematch is a non-title fight, an international panel of judges will oversee that bout, while a trio of Floridians will work the Rivera-Simms WBA title contest.

Peter Trematerra of Florida will be joined by John Keane (England) and Danny Van De Wiele (Belgium) in judging the heavyweight eliminator, while for the Rivera-Simms 154-pound title fight it will be Trematerra, Billy Ray, and Rocky Young.

Rivera and Simms have had a nodding acquaintanceship since their amateur days a dozen years ago. Although both competed in the Golden Gloves at Holyoke on multiple occasions, Simms boxed at 156, Rivera at 139, so they never met.

Although one might have supposed from the trash-talking press releases that have been flying across the internet over the past month that Rivera and Simms shared some bad blood in the past, Scully says that it’s really him that has the history with Simms.

“I almost got into it with him and his brother (identical twin Tarvis Simms) at Foxwoods back in ’96,� said Scully. “It didn’t quite become a physical altercation, but that was only because they called the Tribal Police in to break it up.�

Scully, in any case, has been enthusiastic in debunking several myths included in the ‘official’ biography Simms’ publicists had been circulating.

“He claimed he’d won the Holyoke Golden Gloves ten times, when he’d really won it twice,� said Scully. “And he claimed he was an “alternate� for the 1996 Olympic team, which he wasn’t.�

Don’t know whether this should be taken as an omen or not, but following Friday night’s weigh-in Simms and his posse were joined in the Hard Rock coffee shop by Luis Collazo, the former WBA welterweight champion who was, you might recall, the last man to defeat Rivera.

Promising New England jr. middleweight killed in car crash

Enrique Palau had fought seven times since turning pro 13 months ago, and had won all of them. Trained by Sean Fitzgerald, the promising 27-year-old Worcester (Mass.) junior middleweight had recently been working as a sparring partner for WBA champion Jose Rivera while pursuing his own career.

Although Palau boxed from an orthodox stance, he had joined lefties Derrick Whitley and amateur Dan O’Connor in helping prepare his hometown mentor Rivera for his January 6 Florida defense against fellow New Englander Travis Simms.

“Palau,� Rivera trainer John Scully told me a few weeks ago, “is so ambidextrous that he probably ought to be fighting southpaw himself.�

As a young teenager Palau won multiple New England Junior Olympic titles, but his progress was interrupted at the age of 17 when he was convicted on an armed robbery charge. He spent nearly five years as a guest of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Following his release he won the 2004 New England Golden Gloves 152-pound title in Lowell, and competed in that year’s Gloves nationals in Kansas City.

He made his pro debut in November of 2005, stopping LeShawn Wiliams at the Dorchester Armory.

None of his first four opponents got out of the first round.

He appeared to have turned his life around, and seemed to feel that his earlier struggles had been a blessing in disguise, in that he was allowed to embark upon his professional career with a maturity he would have lacked as a teenager.

“Now I’m in my prime,� he told a Worcester Telegram & Gazette sportswriter. “I’m strong and I think now is the time. And I don’t think it could have come at a better time, really.�

We’d last seen him when we worked the telecast of Rich Cappiello’s Mike Oliver-Adam Carrera show at the Mohegan Sun on October 28. Palau stopped John Gottschling in two that night’s undercard, and just last Friday night he’d won again, outpointing Massachusetts veteran Hollister Elliott on Hank Tuohy’s card at the Park Plaza Castle in Boston.

The telecast of that bout will be shown via tape-delay on NESN, but Palau won’t be around to watch it. He was killed early Wednesday morning in Worcester when a car in which he was riding with a lady friend, 25 year-old Amanda Snaras, ran a stop sign and crashed headlong into a stone wall.

Enrique Palau left two young children, aged 4 and 1. Ms. Snaras, who was married, also had two children.