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Between 1995 and 2004 Japanese fans saw the popular Osamu Sato (27-3-3, 16) make a name for himself fighting at Super Bantamweight and Featherweight. He was fight out of the Kyoei Gym and managed to become one of their stars at the tune of the millennium.
Outside of Japan Sato's name isn't a huge one, but during his pomp he was a must watch fighter with numerous exciting bouts and a really fan friendly style. During his 33 fight career he won the OPBF Super Bantamweight title and the WBA Super Bantamweight title. He also clashed with several notable names, including Willie Jorin, Yoddamrong Sithyodthong, Salim Medjkoune, Yokthai Sithoar and Chris John. Rather than going through Sato's career and achievements today we are here to give you some facts and information on Sato, as bring you 10 facts you probably didn't know about...Osamu Sato 1-Whilst in high school Sato was close friends with Akihiko Nago, who would himself become a professional boxer. Nago was best known for coming up short in 2 world title bouts and for winning the Japanese Super Flyweight title during his 40 bout career. 2-As an amateur Sato went 15-6 (4), not the most amazing of records, though he was said to have won a Kinki High School tournament at Flyweight. 3-In various interviews Sato has revealed that the fighter he admired the most was Katsuya Onizuka. Interestingly both men fought at the Kyoei gym, though Onizuka had retired by the time Sato was a fully fledged member, and it wasn't until quite deep into Sato's career that he really got to know Onizuka, who was working for TBS as a commentator at the time. Rather notably the world title Sato won, the WBA Super Bantamweight title, was also the one that Onizuka had won in 1992 and held until losing it in 1994. The two men would later do commentary together, covering a Koki Kameda fight together. 4-As a professional boxer Sato fought with the nickname of "Hulk" 5-At the time of writing there is a bout of Sato's missing from his boxrec. The bout in question was a bout held in August 1999 against a Filipino fighter, which he won in 5 rounds. This bout is referenced by several Japanese sources and seems to be an odd one to be missing, as it came in the middle of his career. 6-Sato's professional debut came on a show headlined by the then WBC Flyweight champion Yuri Arbachakov, who defeated Chatchai Sasakul. Strangely he was one of 4 Japanese debutants on the show. At the time of his debut he was 18 years old. 7-Rather interestingly Sato's final professional win, a KO win over Dae Kyung Park, came just a day before Sato's 27th birthday! 8-In 2020 Sato was appointed an ambassador for EVERLAST in Japan. Also in 2020 he helped teach table tennis sensation Tomokazu Harimoto some boxing, with Harimoto saying he wanted to incorporate boxing movements into his table tennis performances. 9-Sato shares his name with a Japanese digital artist, photographer and composer. Interestingly the Sato who works in art is pretty well known for his video game work, which included Playstation game "LSD: Dream Emulator", which has a cult following and is widely regarded as one of the strangest Playstation games to ever be released. 10-Since retiring from the sport Sato has gone on to become an actor, and has featured in a number of roles, ranging from movies to dramas. As an actor he has gone by the stage name "Ren Hulk", a play on his old boxing nickname. Among his credits was a role in the 2020 film "Underdog", which is a boxing movie.
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We've all heard of Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, and we've decided to put our spin on things with "Six degrees of separation" looking to connect Asian fighters you may never have assumed were connected! Today we connect multi-time Japanese title challenger fighter Yuichi Kasai to former Korean world champion Min Keun Oh
Just as ground rules, we're not doing the more basic "A beat B who beat C who beat D" type of thing, but instead we want to link fighters in different ways. As a result we will limit A fought B connections, and try to get more varied connections together, as you'll see here! We also know there are often shorter routes to connect fighters, but that's not always the most interesting way to connect them. 1-Former multi-time world title challenger Yuichi Kasai began his professional career on August 12th 1989 with an opening round TKO win over Unchain Kaji at Korakuen Hall. That very same day future American star Shane Mosley picked up a win, over in Puerto Rico, in the World Junior Championships, stopping Mohamas Hassen Ali in the Lightweight division. 2-During his long and successful professional boxing career American star Shane Mosely faced a genuine who's who of who. Reading through his record makes it clear that he faced pretty much anyone who in, or around the his weight classes. Among the many great fighters he faced was Filipino hero Manny Pacquiao, who gave Mosley his 7th professional loss back in 2011. 3-Much, much earlier in his career Manny Pacquiao defeated Mexican fighter Gabriel Mira, stopping Mira in 4 rounds, after using Mira like a human yo-yo. The Mexican showed his guts and determination in the bout, but was dropped repeatedly during the 4 round massacre at the Araneta Coliseum. Interestingly this was Pacquiao's only successful defense of the WBC Flyweight title, with the Filipino icon losing the title on the scales less than 5 months later. 4-Whilst Gabriel Mira was embarrassed by the sensational Pacquiao it is worth being aware of the fact Mira wasn't a bad fighter. In fact he earned his WBC world title fight by out pointing talented Korean Young Soon Jang in 1998 and had previously won the WBC International Super Flyweight title. Another man who held that title was Thai fighter Oleydong Sithsamerchai, who actually made 8 defenses of the belt from 2011 to 2014. 5-At his best Oleydong Sithsamerhcai was a very talented Minimumweight, and he had a solid reign as the WBC Minimumweight champion before losing the title to a young Japanese sensational called Kazuto Ioka. Interestingly Oleydong, also known as Kittipong Jaigrajang, made his debut on September 6th 2002, the very same day that Orlando Salido defeated Carlos Gerena in Texas. A win that would help move Salido on to bigger and better things. 6-Among those bigger and better things for Orlando Salido was a reign as the IBF Featherweight champion, which he won in 2010 with a win over Cristobal Cruz. That was a title previously held by Korean Min Keun Oh. In fact Oh was the inaugural champion winning the belt in 1984 with a KO win against Joko Arter. A few months ago whilst enjoying a binge of random fights we came across a number of bouts featuring long forgotten Japanese based Kenyan Isaiah Ikhoni, who is listed on boxrec as Isaya Ikhoni (14-2, 10). Ikhoni had a short but thrilling career in the early part of the 1980's with some genuine tear ups on the Japanese scene. Although his career never saw him make his way to world title bouts, despite being very close to one when his career finished, he was in some absolutely enthralling bouts, and his 1 round war with Hiroshi Osumi is a must watch for fans who enjoy pure shoot outs. Given how much we enjoyed watching Ikhoni we thought we'd try to shine a light on his career and feature him in one of these weekly fact pieces. Given his style and his thrilling bouts we expected this to be one of the easier facts pieces, though surprisingly the former Japanese Super Featherweight champion isn't the easiest of men to get information about. Despite that, we think we've managed to come up with 5 facts that are worth sharing, and of course we've included the bout with Osumi at the end of this article. 1-As an amateur Ikhoni reportedly fought in more than 100 amateur bouts. Whilst his full record is unknown it's known that he on the 1980 Golden Cup of Kenya, came runner up in the 1980's King's Cup in Thailand and won the President's Cup in 1981, in the Philippines. 2-Ikhoni was the first international boxer to join the Yonekura Gym. The Gym, at the time one of the most prestigious in Japan, re-named him Yonekura Ikhoni, and he would only actually fight as Isaya Ikhoni very later in his professional career. 3-In 1985 the hugely popular Hidekazu Akai was forced to retire due to a bleed on the brain. Following Akai's injury boxers in Japan were required to under-go CT scans, and a number of those scanned showed irregularities including Ikhoni who was pretty forced to retire from boxing in Japan as a result. He originally wanted to fight on but was talked out of it by the chairman of the Yonekura gym, who explained that life was more important than fighting. Following his retirement he worked as a trainer at the Yonekura gym. 4-At the time of his retirement Ikhoni was world ranked and seemed on the verge of a world title fight. He had climbed into the rankings on the back of 8 straight wins, including 5 defenses of the Japanese Super Featherweight title. Those 5 defenses saw him tying second, at the time, for the most defenses of the belt 5-As of 2020 Ikhoni was still involved in boxing, and was helping bring through a new generation of fighters in Kenya, where he played a part in the 2020 National Novices Boxing Championships. When we talk about significant figures in Japanese boxing there are few that are as important in recent Japanese boxing history as former WBC Light Welterweight champion Tsuyoshi Hamada (21-2, 19), one of the very few Japanese fighters to win a world title at 140lbs. As a fighter he was a star, a real hit with fans and a man who has a massive following. His exciting, aggressive style, brutal power and short thrilling fights.
During a career that spanned from 1979 to 1987 he drew massive crowds and TV figures. Following his career in the ring he has remained a popular figure, working for TV and is often regarded as the public face of Teiken Promotions, appearing at press conference for the promotional powerhouse. Even now, in his 60's, he strikes an imposing figure and gives off the vibe of a man you do not ignore. Whilst perhaps not too well known in the west, he is regarded very, very highly by those in Japanese boxing, and with that in mind we thought he was an ideal fighter to feature in this weeks 10 facts you probably didn't know about... series! 1-Hamada was in a huge family, of 21 people living together. Whilst his family unity was huge, he did struggle to get attention and was the youngest of 7 of siblings! 2-Hamada began boxing when he was at elementary school, and was involved in sparring competitions under the watchful eye of his older brother Yuji. Even as a young kid his power was impressive and he is said to hit harder than school kids several years older than himself. 3-As an amateur Hamada racked up an impressive record of 37-6 (28), and won the inter-High School tournament whilst he was in his third year at the Okinawa Fisheries High School in Okinawa. 4-When Hamada turned professional he also got a job at a publishers called "KK Bestsellers", which were also a sponsor for the Teiken Gym. 5-During his 24 fight professional career Hamada fought just 98 professional rounds. This means his fights, on average, went just over 4 rounds. These included 19 rounds in his final 3 bouts, all at world level. Amazingly 16 of his bouts went 5 or fewer rounds, and only 3 of his bouts went beyond the start of round 9! 6-During his career Hamada picked up numerous awards at the Japanese boxing annual awards. They included the KO Award 3 times (1981, 1984 and 1985), the Skill Award twice (1984 and 1985), the Effort Award (1983), the Best Player Award (1986) and the Best Fight Award (1986 for his first bout with Rene Arrdondo). 7-After losing the WBC Light Welterweight title, in his second defense, to Rene Arredondo the plan was for a third bout between Hamada and Arredondo. Those plans were scrapped for two reasons. One of those was that Arredondo had lost the title, with the other reason being that Hamada was himself in bad health, with a knee injury that would have limited his ability to fight at 100%. 8-Hamada regularly used a Japanese cover to Bonnie Tyler's "Holding Out for a Hero", recorded by Yuki Katsuragi and Miki Asakura 9-Whilst it was known that Hamada never drank or smoked during his career, it's said that he still doesn't do either of those activities. His behaviour is said to be model behaviour and something that is, at least partially, expected to rub off on the youngsters coming through the ranks at the Teiken gym. 10-Following his retirement he has been a regular working on TV for both NTV, under their "World Premium Boxing" series, and WOWOW, for their "Excite Match" series of broadcasts. As a commentator he is regarded as being calm and accurate with what he says and being a very insightful analyst. Bonus fact- Hamada is currently the president of a health food company. For today's upset we travel all the way to Puebla in Mexico for a truly surprising result between someone who doesn't spoke about much at all any more and a man who later went on to fight for a world title. The bout was a WBC "Youth" title bout at Super Featherweight, despite the fact the challenger was 30 year old, and saw a really unexpected outcome. Date December 10th 2011 Venue Centro de Expositores, Puebla, Puebla, Mexico Kyohei Tamakoshi (27-7-6, 10) Vs Dante Jardon (19-1, 17) If we mention the name Kyohei Tamakoshi we expect some pretty blank looks from boxing fans. Japanese fans are likely to recognise the name, but those outside of Japan are unlikely to know anything about him. Well other than the fans who saw this bout. He had made his professional in 1999 and had had mixed success on the Japanese domestic scene. He had a few notable domestic wins, such as a victory over Nobuto Ikehara, but had failed to secure wins in bouts for Japanese and OPBF titles, including a loss to Mikihito Seto for the "interim" Japanese Super Bantamweight title just 8 months earlier. Aged 30 by the time he had this fight Tamakoshi was seen as little more than a battle tested veteran. He had 40 bouts to his name and had carved his career at Bantamweight and Super Bantamweight, where he had failed to win any of his title bouts. Although he was no world beater he had proven to be tough, and hadn't been stopped since his 4th professional bout, when he was blasted out by Hideki Yokuda. Despite having 40 bouts to his name he had never previous fought outside of Japan before travelling off to Mexico to take on Dante "Crazy" Jardon. The then 23 year old Jardon was a rising Mexican star. He was the then WBC Youth Super Featherweight champion who had won 18 in a row, following a loss in his second professional bout. He had a staggering 85% KO rate and had beaten the likes of Rene Gonzalez, and Ricky Sismundo and was very much a man tipped for the top. He was aggressive, destructive, heavy handed, exciting and rampaging through regional competition. His previous 4 bouts had lasted a total of 13 rounds and only 2 of his opponents had lasted more than 5 rounds, with only Rene Gonzalez managing to last the distance with him. On paper this was just the next step forward for Jardon and he had all the advantages a fighter could want. He was the younger man, the man in great form, the naturally bigger man, the bigger puncher and the man at home, in a really small ring suited to his style. He seemed to have the deck well and truly stacked in his favour. From the off Jardon took center ring, he was aggressive, coming forward and pressuring Tamakoshi. The Japanese fighter looked focused but was on the back foot and struggling to get any respect from Jardon who looked the boss through the first round, as many had expected. He didn't manage to land too many power shots, but he looked dangerous and like he'd take Tamakoshi out if one of his big over hand right's landed clean. Tamakoshi, to his credit, used his experience to neutralise much of the pressure from Jardon, but didn't land much of note himself, paying more focus on not getting hurt than attacking Jardon in the first round. In the second round we saw a bit more ambition from Tamakoshi, but he was made to pay and Jardon landed some solid bombs on the visitor when Tamakoshi opened up. It seemed we were beginning to see the start of the end as Jardon was finding some very clean head shots on Tamakoshi. Although Tamakoshi had proven his toughness during his career it was still assumed that his toughness wouldn't carry up Super Featherweight, against a puncher like Jardon. Things all changed with about 10 seconds of round 2 left. Things changed in a moment as Tamakoshi landed a long straight right hand out of the blue that dropped Jardon to the seat of his pants. There was only seconds of the round left when Jardon hit the canvas, and he managed to beat the count, getting a minute to recover. Had the shot landed only moments earlier there's a good chance Tamakoshi would have jumped on him and closed the show there and then. Heading into round 3 the big question was whether Jardon had had enough time to clear his head and recover. He started the round aggressively and looked fine but about 35 seconds into the round Tamakoshi landed another huge over hand right which which shook Jardon, who dropped moments later. Again Jardon got up, but this time Tamakoshi had more than 2 minutes to close the show. The visitor smelled blood and went hunting, landing another right and dropped Jardon for a third time. To his credit there was no quit in Jardon, who again got to his feet. He was however up on instinct, rather than awareness and was dropped again. This time the referee had seen enough and waved off the contest. Although not remembered much now a days this was a massive upset for Tamakoshi, who few gave any sort of a chance to. Sadly he failed to really build on it, and when he returned to Japan he ended up picking up 3 rather low key wins whilst getting used to fighting at Super Featherweight. In the years that followed he would have 3 Japanese title bouts at 130lbs, and lose all 3. Despite the set back Jardon bounced back, and just over 2 years later he challenged the then WBC world champion Takashi Miura, losing in 9 rounds to "Bomber Left". From there on his career never really recovered and although he remained in the title mix for a while he wouldn't get a second shot at the top. When it comes to great KO's there are a number of different ways of looking at things. There is the feeling that for a KO to be something special it needs to be at the highest level, and be massively important to the sport at large. We, however, take a different view and feel that the knockout should be judges on it's own merit, irregardless of the quality of the fighters. It is, after all, the KO we're focusing on, not the event, the fighters, or even the fight. With that in mind we want to share one of our favourite KO's from 2019, as we relive the finish! Ho Joon Jung (0-0) Vs Si Woo Lee (0-0) Low level action can be really easy to over-look, and often gets next to no love from fans, especially when it's two low level fighters from the East. As a result this can result in great KO's not being seen by enough fans. We certainly feel that was the case in August 2019 when the debuting pair of Ho Joon Jung and Si Woo Lee faced off at the Yanggu Square in a KBC Rookie of the Year bout. Aged just 15 coming into the bout Jung was a true boxing baby. Whilst we do see a fair few teenagers turning professional in Asia, few turn pro as young as he did and in fairness few were expecting anything of note from him here. Si Woo Lee was a few years older than his teenager foe but he was just as inexperienced as Jung and there was little available about him as well. He was essentially in a 50-50 novice bout, against a teenager. Fighting outdoors in what looked like a local fair or something the two young men touched gloved to begin the fight and slowly tried to figure out the opponent. It wasn't the most exciting of contests early on, though Lee quickly took control of center ring. Jung looked more polished, but for the first minute there was little to think were going to see anything too spectacular. And then the end came, suddenly. About 80 seconds into the bout the two men stood toe to toe. Lee let his shots go whilst Jung's defense allowed him to avoid them. The Jung turned the tables, landed a gorgeous right-left. Lee was out cold and still standing. As his body shut off he fell forward, onto the shoulder of Jung, who stepped back, sending the unconscious Lee face planting the ring. This was genuinely gorgeous, brutal and brilliant. For those who think the quality of the fighters involved in a bout matters to a KO, they are missing out things like this, one of the best KO's in recent years! We've all heard of Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, and we've decided to put our spin on things with "Six degrees of separation" looking to connect Asian fighters you may never have assumed were connected! Today we connect former Korean world champion Soo Hwan Hong to former Japanese fighter Yuichi Kasai.
Just as ground rules, we're not doing the more basic "A beat B who beat C who beat D" type of thing, but instead we want to link fighters in different ways. As a result we will limit A fought B connections, and try to get more varied connections together, as you'll see here! We also know there are often shorter routes to connect fighters, but that's not always the most interesting way to connect them. 1-During his lengthy career Korean warrior Soo Hwan Hong held two world titles. The first of those was the WBA Bantamweight title before later becoming the inaugural WBA Super Bantamweight champion. Another fighter who later held the WBA title at 122lbs was Ryol Li Lee. Interestingly not only did the two men hold the same world title but both won the belt in results that were regarded upsets, with Hong beating Hector Carrasquilla in a legendary bout in Panama and Lee upsetting the brilliant Poonsawat Kratingdaenggym. 2-The talented Ryol Li Lee is one of the more forgotten recent world champions from Japan, only holding his world title for a matter of months before losing it to Akifumi Shimoda. Earlier in his career however he was regarded as a genuine prospect and in May 2006 he defeated Tomo Tanaka in an 8 round bout, in what was Lee's 4th professional contest. On that very same show Valentine Hosokawa made his debut, fighting to a draw with Yoshinori Kanzaki. 3-After drawing on debut Valentine Hosokawa went on to have a genuinely solid career. Whilst his crowing glory was a Japanese national title he also went on to challenge for the OPBF title, losing in a thrilling war with touted Korean Min Wook Kim in 2013. That was when Kim was regarded as the bright new hope of Korean boxing, and the man those in Korea hoped they could build behind. 4-As mentioned Min Wook Kim was a former OPBF champion, in fact he was a former OPBF champion at 140lbs, , with the Korean making 4 defenses of the belt. Another man who once held that title was Takeshi Fuji, who also went on to become one of the first Japanese world champions. 5-We mentioned that Takeshi Fuji was a former world champion, in fact he managed to hold both the WBA and WBC titles at 140lbs back in the 1960's. He was also one of the handful of champions trained by the legendary Eddie Townsend, who was one of the most notable trainers in Japanese boxing history. 6-Prior to becoming a trained Eddie Townsend was himself a talented fighter, though one who never managed to progress to the big time. Another fighter turned trainer, and in fact another man who had more success as a trainer than a fighter, was Yuichi Kasai, who used to be one of the top trainers at the Teiken gym. Japanese Middleweights don't tend to make much of a mark on world level, and even the ones that do tend to do little more than make themselves a footnote in history. One such fight was the heavy handed Teiken hopeful Koji Sato (20-2, 18).
Sato had built a reputation in Japan and Asia from his days as an amateur, where reported very impressive numbers. That reputation had seen Teiken get very excited about him when he decided to turn professional and in 2005 he began a short, but genuinely thrilling, professional career. It was a career that saw him fighting in Las Vegas, have in a world title fight in Germany against Felix Sturm and compete in a sensational 9 round OPBF/JBC title unification bout with Makoto Fuchigami, a bout that everyone should watch! Today we're not here break down the ups and down of Sato's career, but instead take the chance to bring you the latest in our 5 Midweek facts series, as we look at Koji Sato. 1-Koji Sato shares his name with several notable figures. These include a renowned amateur photographer, who lived from 1911 to 1955 and has his photography included in the collections of the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography and the Houston Museum of Fine Arts. Whilst another Koji Sato is an incredibly influential Constitutionalist born in 1937. This Koji Sato has helped reform the Japanese judicial system and has been a massively significant figure in Japanese law, making a massive mark since the 1980's! 2-Unlike many Japanese fighters Sato didn't actually make his professional debut in Japan. Instead he debuted in Las Vegas in April 2005, stopping Francisco Valdez in just 56 seconds. That was one of only two bouts that Sato had outside of his homeland, with the other being his 2009 loss in Germany to the then WBA Middleweight champion Felix Sturm. 3-As a professional Sato faced fighters from 7 countries. These were: Japan (8 times) Korea (6) Indonesia (3) Mexico (2) USA, Australia, Germany (1) 4-Following his retirement from the ring Sato worked for a real estate company, a luxury cruise ship company and a bodyguard for celebrities. 5-Amazingly Sato made a return to boxing in 2019, returning to the amateur ranks at the age of 38. This return came more than 7 years after his final professional bout and more than 14 years after his previous amateur bout. The hope had been for him to qualify for the 2020 Olympics. Sadly for Sato his return was for nought, not because of the Olympic being delayed but because he lost in the 2019 All Japan Championships. We believe, although it's hard to confirm, that that was just his 4th loss to a Japanese opponent in the amateur ranks, where he purportedly went 133-3 (101), won 13 domestic titles and scored a RSC win over Ryota Murata before his ill fated return. Sadly though his full amateur record is unknown with only his domestic records counting towards that record. Still 100 stoppages in the amateurs is rather staggering! Bonus fact - Sato was given the nickname the "Asian Cannon"
Up until Canelo Alvarez’s post-match press conference following his triumph over Billy Joe Saunders, a large part of the world didn’t know much about him. At least, the 30-year-old hadn’t ever spoken English to the media which created an air of mystique around arguably the greatest pound-for-pound fighter to have ever lived. Added to that, Alvarez’s astonishing ability in the ring made him a man that was genuinely feared and never second-guessed.
Then, the day that everyone had hoped for came around after Demetrius Andrade gatecrashed Alvarez’s victorious press conference, enquiring when the two of them could fight. Over the course of the next minute that followed, Alvarez showed a side to him that had never been seen before as he dismissed Andrade’s idea of a fight as nothing short of desperately hopeful. That is of course the gist of what he said but it was the way in which he said it that was so revealing. ​ The decision to speak English when addressing Andrade was also interesting and made one think that the 30-year-old has now reached a point in his career where he is finally comfortable doing so. Fans from outside of Mexico would have learned more about Alvarez during his 60-second dressing down of Andrade than they would have been able to figure out over the whole of his career up until that point. The super-middleweight champion cut an animated figure as he tormented Andrade about his boxing skills, much to the delight of the cackling press in the room. This sudden sarcastic side to Alvarez seemed to galvanise everybody watching on.
Naturally, images of Alvarez gesturing with his hand for Andrade to leave the building won’t be forgotten anytime soon. But if one thinks back to the fight a few hours earlier, there were signs that the Mexican was already beginning to come out of his shell.
Alvarez Plays with His Opponents
It was just after Alvarez had landed a tremendous right uppercut on Saunders' eye during the eighth round that an elevated confidence seemed to kick in. Within seconds the Englishman’s eye had closed and after a quick examination, Alvarez could tell that Saunders had suffered potentially career-ending damage which led him to believe that the fight was all but over. This prompted Alvarez to stand back and begin working the 73,000 strong crowd in Texas, the 30-year-old gestured for them to crank up the noise as he was about to finish the match. Unsurprisingly, the partisan crowd duly obliged and the AT&T Stadium began to shake.
​At the end of the round, Alvarez would inform his corner that Saunders wouldn’t be coming out again to fight in this match. At the time, the Mexican believed that he had broken Saunders cheekbone moments before and after the Englishman's corner gave him the once over, they immediately informed the referee that their man was unable to carry on. Shortly after that Saunders was rushed to a local hospital for emergency surgery. Canelo had made his point in a final and chilling fashion.
Nothing Left to Prove
Indeed, it does feel like the 30-year-old knows that he has finally reached the rarefied atmosphere of the sport. Many of his fans would have felt that was the case even before his fight with Saunders but it appears as if that message took a while longer to hit home for the man born in Guadalajara, Mexico. A look at the state of the super middleweight division as asianboxing.info recaps here, backs that up and shows that Alvarez is almost without peer.
With that said, there is only one belt that Alvarez still needs in order to become the undisputed super-middleweight champion and that is the IBF super-middleweight title that American boxer Caleb Plant holds.
We now know that Alvarez is in a hurry to win that belt despite being involved in an exceptionally taxing training camp in the lead up to the Saunders bout. Incredibly, negotiations have already started with Plant’s team in order to arrange the fight for September 2021.
As Sure as Night Follows Day, Alvarez Will Beat Caleb Plant
It’s not hard to understand why Alvarez and his team are in a rush to finalise a deal with Plant when you take into account the Mexican’s most recent performance. The odds are also stacked in Alvarez’s favour given that the early pricing from the best boxing betting sites has the 30-year-old down at a mere 1/12 to unify the division by beating Plant. These betting sites, chosen by the team of experts at asiabet.org, have reviewed every bookmaker that offers the best boxing odds and lists them on their page. Needless to say, all the bookies are all in agreement that Alvarez has far too much for Plant. Indeed, given that it is a case of when and not if Alvarez becomes the undisputed super-middleweight champion, many will be wondering what life for the 30-year-old will hold after he reaches these dizzy heights. One can only presume that it will be much the same for the boxer who fought. When we talk about the most important people in boxing we tend to talk about the decision makers at the top of the sport, and not the ones a little bit further down the system who are making changes that will be felt by every fight fan. One man who falls in that category is former fighter turned trainer, turned promoter Ichitaro Ishii (21-3-1, 16). With that in mind we decided that this week would focus on bring you 10 facts about Ishii, who seems to be shaking up the sport and thinking outside of the box in ways that we don't really see from promoters. He's also doing so in a way that has helped rebuild Japanese boxing during the torrid times of Covid 19 pandemic.
Ishii is unlikely to be a name Western fans are familiar of, but his impact is something that Western fans who follow Japanese boxing will have been feeling in 2020, 2021 and the coming years. He's also someone we should all be looking at to see what future trends boxing could end up seeing from promoters, as he is genuinely a very forward thinking promoter. 1-Before he took to boxing Ishii was actually into baseball, and it was baseball that he played before taking up boxing in college. Surprisingly it was a PRIDE bout between Rickson Gracie and Nobuhiko Takada that attracted Ishii to combat sports. 2-Despite beginning to box in college Ishii didn't actually have any amateur experience. Instead he made his professional debut at the age of 19 in September 2001. For someone with out any amateur fights his success in the sport, which we'll get on to a little later on, was genuinely impressive. 3-We mentioned that Ishii was 19 when he debuted, it's worth noting that at the time he was a freshman at the prestigious Meiji University, a private university which is regarded as one of the most significant in Japan. Similar in many ways to the Ivy League in the US. Show that even back when he debuted he was an intelligent young man, and that intelligence is now proving vital in his work as a promoter. 4-Ishii's first loss came to Kazuyoshi Kumano in the 2002 East Japan Rookie of the Year, where Ishii lost a razor thin decision to Kumano at Super Featherweight. Although not a big name, or a major success, Kumano is known for later beating the then debuting Keita Obara in 2010. Following Ishii's loss to Kumano he moved up in weight and began to campaign as a Lightweight. 5-Rather notably Ishii was trained by former world champion Royal Kobayashi for his first 20 professional bouts. Sadly the relationship ended after Ishii travelled to train in Thailand and Japan, becoming one of the first Japanese fighters to travel to train. This saw him training at Rudy Hernandez's gym in LA and spending time training in Thailand, training at Veeraphol Sahaprom's gym. 6-In 2008 Ishii unified both the Japanese and OPBF Lightweight titles, beating Hiroshi Nakamori for the Japanese title in March and Randy Suico for the OPBF title. Sadly though his reign with both titles was short, and he had lost both by the time he retired in 2009. He decided to retire immediately after losing to Ryuji Migaki in April 2009. 7-Ishii's career ended when he was just 27, retiring from the ring and moving from an active in ring competitor to a trainer. He had notable success in a trainer role and was the chief trainer for Ryol Li Lee when he won the WBA Super Bantamweight title, in an upset win over Poonsawat Kratingdaenggym in 2010. He was also the trainer for Daiki Kaneko among others. 8-Ishii became the chairman of the Yokohama Hikari Gym following the death of Kazunori Miyakawa. In an interview with the fantastic Daisuke Sugiura, Ishii revealed the death of Mr Miyakawa was the biggest loss of his life. 9-Now-a-days Ishii is best known for being one of the men behind the A-Sign Boxing platform, along with Issei Nakaya of the Hachioji Nakaya gym. The A-Sign service has been one of the big success stories of recent years, and has been at the forefront of why Ishii is such a great promoter. The service has been a hit on YouTube, providing a mix of recorded fights, live streams, interviews, documentaries and chat series. It's through these videos that Ishii, and Nakaya, have helped great a huge following for his shows and helped build a following for fighters featured in his events, including the fast rising Jin Sasaki and the charming Takuya Yamaguchi. Despite being known as a YouTube service now, A-Sign launched as very different service, essentially selling a tape delay PPV service, though it has now evolved into a much, much more accessible and successful service, under crowd funding and sponsorship basis. 10-Going back to Ishii's interview with Daisuke Sugiura, which was done in 2020, Ishii revealed the most painful loss as a promoter was the 2015 bout between Ryo Akaho and Pungluang Sor Singyu. Ishii and Akaho had spent over a year preparing for the world title fight, spending time in the Philippines. Despite being a painful experience it was also regarded as a major learning experience and Ishii has now explained that he is much less emotional as a trainer. For those wanting to read the interviews referenced with Daisuke Sugiura it's a two part interview, and is well worth reading! Part 1: https://news.yahoo.co.jp/byline/sugiuradaisuke/20200904-00196467/ Part 2: https://news.yahoo.co.jp/byline/sugiuradaisuke/20200826-00194925/ |
Thinking Out East
With this site being pretty successful so far we've decided to open up about our own views and start what could be considered effectively an editorial style opinion column dubbed "Thinking Out East" (T.O.E). Archives
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