Over the weekend Eddie Hearn put on the biggest female lead card in British boxing history, with 2 world title fights and an interim world title fight. It was, by far, the most important female card in British boxing history, and a great sign of what could happen in female boxing. It was lead by the fantastic Katie Taylor, who again showed she was class, who was backed up by Terri Harper and Rachel Ball, both of whom won in tough looking bouts.
The show was a start in what appears to be a long game for Hearn to dominate female boxing over the coming years and, on paper, it seems like he has spotted a whole in the market, and is looking to corner it off. Sign up the biggest and best names, and use female boxing as key part of his business. Fans from North Korea, China, and Japan however may well feel that we've seen big pushes behind female boxing before. And we've seen them burn out. In fact we've seen several big pushes in Asia behind female boxing, and in some cases they seemed to be going somewhere before fizzling out without ever making the big break through they needed. A great example was China, who pushed the sport hard in the early part of 00's. They hosted an all-female card in 2004, way ahead of the current wave of female boxing, and their first 3 world champions were all female. The first was Gao Li Jun, in March 2006, followed by Xiyan Zhang a month later and then Wang Ya Nan in 2008. They looked like they were going to be a super power for female boxing. Then nothing. It wasn't until Cai Zongju in 2017 that China had a woman who was seemingly a bankable commodity, with model like looks, a successful style in the ring and solid skills. Her reign never got going and she faded back in the amateur system. North Korea was another country that got in early on, and the national had the aim of dominating the 2008 Olympics with female boxing, before the IOC decided to delay Olympic female boxing. Instead of moping around the North Korean's turned professional and were quickly linking up with the WBC. In fact in 2005 North Korea hosted a world title triple header for 3 WBC female world titles, with all 3 titles being won by North Korean women, on an all-female show. It seemed as if North Korea was going to be a real factor in female boxing thanks to their talent scouts and trainers which had been preparing fighters to prove the nations ability. That quickly petered out and their notable fighters, like Kwang Ok Kim, Eun Soon Choi and Myung Ok Ryu both ended their careers before 2010. Fair enough, you might think, who would want to travel to North Korea to fight? Well they had fighters like Yazmin Rivas, Ana Maria Torres and Alicia Ashley travel to North Korea to face the locals. At that time the options for fighters was thin and it seems that Kim Jong Il was going to do all that was needed to prove how dominant North Korea was. Then nothing. Nothing at all. North Korean female boxing stands out as a footnote. An oddity. A strange, short lived experiment, that lasted a few years, then poof. Vanished. It was over. Of course China and North Korea are hardly boxing power houses. They are oddities. Strange countries who didn't really have male boxing, and they lacked structure. They lacked a true professional boxing foundation. One country that has that is Japan, and they too have tried to open up the female boxing market. Originally the Japan Boxing Commission was against female boxing, and the first females in Japanese boxing weren't recognised by the JBC. Pioneers like Masako Takatsuki in the 1970's had to fight under the auspices of the All Japan Women's Martial Arts Federation, and even in the 1990's Nojima "Sugar" Miyuki couldn't get backed properly as a female boxer. Much like Britain's Jane Couch, who had to battle the BBBof C for a license. The JBC were really slow to get involved, and instead it was the now defunct Japan Women's Boxing Commission (JWBC) who controlled female boxing involving Japanese fighters. The JWBC was founded in 1999 and ran until 2008, when the JBC finally accepted female boxing. When the JBC finally accepted women's boxing it attempted to make up for lost time, and the Japan Professional Boxing Association (JPBA) ended up promoting female boxing shows as an almost annual event under the "G-Legend" banner of shows. This consisted of 6 female only shows from 2008 to 2014, including 2 triple world title shows on Hina Matsuri, or "Doll's Day". It seemed that the JPBA had seen a gap in the market, and something they could build on. Not only that but they were tying it into a day, set aside for "Girl's", like we've seen with New Year's Eve being set aside for a big boxing event. In 2014 the JPBA stopped running their female only shows, with other promoters, like Futur Promotions, reason Promotions, Watanabe Promotions and even Shinsei all promoting female only shows. It seemed clear the push was on for female boxing in Japan. The push behind fighters like Naoko Fujioka, Ayaka Miyao, Tenkai Tsunami, Momo Koseki, Naomi Togashi, Etsuko Tada, Mari Ando, Shindo Go, Naoko Shibata, Kayoko Ebata and others helped Japan to become one of the most important countries for female boxing. That push has continued, don't get us wrong, but it feels very much like it's been tailed back a lot. The new generation, which were supposed to be inspired by the likes of Koseki, Fujioka, Miyao and Tsunamo, haven't really emerged in the numbers Japanese boxing was hoping for. The likes of Eri Matsuda, and Kasumi Saeki are promising, but they seemingly stand alone in the new charge of female fighters. A lot of the veterans are still hanging on but the long term future for female boxing in Japan doesn't look like that that many had hoped for. They have failed to create the new star, the female Joichiro Tatsuyoshi, the enigma to drive a generation. Japanese female boxing is still alive, but it's the women from a decade ago that are still the key players. New wave of talent hasn't come. It's the veterans, still, that are keeping things going. So what does this mean in regards to the UK? Well, maybe it means nothing. It might not matter. But it might, and it might be a sign that just because we're seeing female boxing pushed hard now it might not be pushed for long. 2020 has been the perfect year for female boxing. Promoters have been needing "cheaper" world title fights, and they have been used perfectly by Eddie Hearn in the UK, filling up cards, assuring fans a world title fight, even if some of them have been rather poor bouts. The key however to the success isn't the here and now. The key, as we found out in Japan, is what's next? Hearn is talking about trying to get unified champions across the weight classes in female boxing, which sounds brilliant, even with the caveat it's coming from a man who has said a lot over the years. The reality however is that this generation of fighters needs to inspire the fighters of 6, 8 or 10 years down the line. That's the key to a longer term success of female boxing. Will Hearn continue to pile money in to female boxing, and say it's equal to men boxing when we have fans back in the venues? Will he continue to push it when the world is back to "normal"? Or is this the latest failed experiment? Is the UK set to be the latest country to try female boxing for a few years, then drop out? Katie Taylor, the crown jewel for Eddie Hearn, is 34. She maybe has 3 or 4 years left at the top. Terri Harper, Savannah Marshall and Rachel Ball are all in their 20's, and all 3 are emerging as notable fighters in their own right. The real question however is will they be able to take the mantle from Taylor? Taylor, as a draw, is in a world of her own. When she goes will anyone be able to take the brass ring and run with it? Or will Taylor's eventual retirement leave a hole that can't be filled? Don't get us wrong, what Eddie Hearn is doing for female boxing is setting a great foundation for the future. We just need to hope for several things over the coming years to build on that, or we'll see history repeating. For Hearn to make this a success he needs to make sure match ups are interesting, or as interesting as possible, the best genuinely do need to fight the best, as there is a massive gulf between the best, and the best of the rest. He needs to hope for an influx of talent, inspired by the current generation of fighters, to fill out the holes in a lot of divisions that lack depth. He also can't rush that talent. There's not point in having the fight beat out of every promising fighter years before they mature and develop. For now rushing fighters is fine, but the future needs to allow fighters to develop. Most importantly however he needs to query why other countries never managed to get their female boxing scene's off the ground and keep them there, Japan aside. That may be a lack of interesting match ups, it may be growing purses with fighters increasing their demands, or it maybe that the events simply don't draw the numbers they need to be viable longer term. With female fighters already speaking out about their pay, it may well be that we are only a blink of an eye from female boxing seeing a boost in pay days, though could that be at a cost to the opportunities? It's going to be a very, very fine balancing act over the next few years. Purses will almost certainly have to increase, but that will come at the cost of chances of fighters? Will they lose the ability to get exposure due to increasing pay days? Will days of having multiple female world title bouts on a show in the UK be a short lived thing? Will fans tire of mismatches before that happens? Hearn might have big plans for female boxing. We suspect China and North Korea also had big plans for female boxing. But those plans are not as simple as saying he wants to do something and we could end up with Hearn realising things aren't as easy as he hoped, and dropping his new toy before they come to fruition. Lets, for the hope of female boxing, hope that doesn't happen. At least not until other promoters, globally, begin to pick up the slack. Although we've had pioneers in female boxing dating back decades we dare say this current era of female boxing is merely a transitional one. For those hoping female boxing takes off big time, we need to hope that the next few years gives us great fights, high profile rivalries, memorable occasions, and lasts several years. If it does that it will female boxing to actually transition into the position where the next generation is here, and they will be the ones harvesting the fruit of the effort and labour the current generation give. We need to hope, as sad as this sounds, that the current fighters are willing to be selfless for the future of female boxing.
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When we talk about the greatest Japanese boxers of all time one man who is often over looked from the conversation is Hiroyuki Ebihara, who should make any top 10 of Japanese boxing. The hard hitting southpaw was a major force on the Flyweight scene in the 1960's and faced a genuine who's who. Among those he battled were Fighting Harada, Katsutoshi Aoki, Chartchai Chionoi, Pone Kingpetch, Efren Torres, Speedy Hayase, Horacio Accavallo, Jose Severino and Bernabe Villacampo.
Not only does Ebihara get massively over-looked in conversation about the greatest Japanese fighters of all time but he also seems to get forgotten in general. With that now said, lets look at 10 facts you probably didn't know about... Hiroyuki Ebihara. 1-On December 24th 1960 Ebihara clashed with Fighting Harada in the East Japan Rookie of the Year final. Ebihara was dropped twice and lost to Harada though the two men would go on to become incredibly close friends, and their careers would often inter-twine, despite this being the only bout between the two Japanese greats. 2-In December 1962 Ebihara beat Chartchai Chionoi in what was originally arranged and an OBF title fight. Chionoi missed weight, massively, and was punished by being forced to wear heavier gloves than Ebihara. As a result of Chionoi missising weight the title wasn't actually on the line, though the promoter seemed to try to convince people it was, causing some real issues at the time. 3-Ebihara was one of the champions trained by the legendary Eddie Townsend. The famed trainer stated that Ebihara had the most guts of the fighters he trained. Ebihara was actually the second champion trained by "Eddie". 4-In 1963 Ebihara blasted out Pone Kingpetch inside a round, to become the first world champion from the Kyoei gym. He was followed by the likes of Yoko Gushiken, Katsuya Onizuka Yuri Arbachakov and Koki Kameda, as the gym became one of the most significant in Japanese boxing. 5-Rather interestingly Ebihara was the Japanese world champion to recapture a title, whilst his friend Fighting Harada was the first to become a multi-weight world champion. The title that Ebihara reclaimed was the WBA Flyweight title. 6-Despite being tough as old boots Ebihara suffered a huge number of injuries during his career. Reports out of Japan are that he fractured his left hand 7 times, and also suffered a broken right hand among other injuries. Relating back to Eddie Townsend, the bout with Bernabe Villacampo, the final bout that Ebihara had, saw Ebihara suffer a number of injuries, but Eddie refused to throw in the towel, breaking a rule he had for himself, and explained it was the hardest bout he had seen. 7-Following his retirement Ebihara became a trainer at Kyoei Gym and a commentator for TV Tokyo. 8-Ebihara's daughter died in a traffic accident in 1986 9-In 1991 Ebihara passed away at the age of 51, suffering from liver issues due to heavy drinking. After his death Fighting Harada revealed that he cried at Ebihara's funeral, but didn't cry at that of his own parents. That was how close the two men had become during their lifetimes. 10-The Pokémon known as Hitmonchan in the west is known as "Ebiwalar" in Japan, after Ebihara. Last Friday we saw 22 year old Japanese fighter Junto Nakatani (21-0, 16) announce himself on the world stage with a brilliant performance against Giemel Magramo in Tokyo to claim the WBO Flyweight title. The win took Nakatani from highly regarded young contender to world champion in brilliant fashion and showed that the youngster from the MT Gym really did have all the tools to be a star.
Admittedly Magramo didn't look great in the bout, though much of that was due to Nakatani neutralising him at range and proving himself to be surprisingly dominant on the inside, the range where Magramo was supposed to fare better. It was a performance that proved how talented the youngster was, and how good he can be. He shut down a legitimate contender, who had given Muhammad Waseem hell just a few years ago, the same Waseem that came close to stopping Moruti Mthalane, and launched himself into the mix for some great bouts over the coming years. For this weeks Five For we're going to look at 5 potential bouts for Junto Nakatani 1-Angel Acosta (21-2, 21) The first bout on this list is the most logical one, by far, and that's a defense of the WBO title between Nakatani and mandatory challenger Angel Acosta. It was known that Acosta was waiting in the wings for the winner of Nakatani Vs Magramo and he's first in line for a shot. On paper this is a really tough first defense for Nakatani, he's not being babied into a reign. Acosta is a dangerous, heavy handed, fighter who is known to Japanese audiences for his 2017 bout against Kosei Tanaka. Despite losing to Tanaka we saw Acosta's career continue to go forward and he quickly won the WBO Light Flyweight title before losing it in controversial fashion to Elwin Soto in 2019, and the deciding to move up. He's a legitimately dangerous contender and would be a baptism of fire for Nakatani, however Nakatani is the much bigger man and we suspect his size would be a huge advantage against Acosta. This is one we suspect we can really look forward to in the new year. 2-Julio Cesar Martinez (17-1-0-1, 13) Lets be honest we all want unification bouts, and a contest between the WBO champion, Nakatani, and WBC champion, Julio Cesar Martinez, is a great match up and ticks a lot of boxes. Firstly and foremost it's a unification bout between two young champions, secondly it's between men who's styles should gel, and we should get a war on the inside, where Nakatani is surprisingly effective. Perhaps most importantly however it would give Nakatani the chance to fight on foreign soil, something he spoke about following his recent title win. Martinez has been making a name for himself with fans in the US, with 2 of his last 3 bouts being in US, and Nakatani has links in the US himself. Given that the bout shouldn't be a tricky one to make. It's one that makes sense, promises amazing action, would unify 2 titles and make the winner a genuine star on both sides of the Pacific. It's also a pretty damn close 50-50 match up, and a genuine argument could be made for either man to be the favourite. 3-Sho Kimura (19-3-2, 12) Unlike some countries Japanese fighters do tend to fight world title fights against each other quite regularly, and for Nakatani that might be a great idea for next year. With that in mind we'd love to see the champion defending his title against former champion Sho Kimura, in what would be a potential war for the ages. Kimura, who turns 32 later this month, is known to be a tough, durable warrior and his bout with Kosei Tanaka in 2018 was a truly tremendous contest. He's aged a bit since then, and his 2019 bout with Carlos Canizales was certainly a damaging battle. For Nakatani a win over Kimura would legitimise is reign, and potentially earn him comparisons to Tanaka, who could be a 4 weight champion by the time Nakatani fights again. A win for Kimura would see him becoming a 2-time champion and getting one more run. For us, as fans, this would be an amazing war! 4-Sunny Edwards (15-0, 4) One thing Nakatani will want to do is improve his international profile. One wat to do that would be to face unbeaten Englishman Sunny Edwards, the brother of former WBC Flyweight champion Charlie Edwards. Sunny is highly ranked with the WBO and is the sort of out spoken and brash fighter who would instantly generate attention for a bout with Nakatani through social media. This bout could take place in Japan, with the backing of G+ and NTV or could see Nakatani travel over to England and attempt to follow in the footsteps of Naoya Inoue, the only Japanese fighter so far to win a world title bout in Europe. A bout between these two would get attention on both sides of the globe and would be a great chance to help build Nakatani's profile in Europe. It would also help the 22 year old show the difference between European class and world class at 112lbs. 5-Artem Dalakian (20-0, 14) We looked at one potential unification bout so we'll end this with another as a bout between Nakatani and WBA champion Artem Dalakian is also very interesting, though could be a hard one to make. For Nakatani we don't imagine he has any issues facing anyone in the division though don't think he, or any, top fighter will be rushing to Ukraine for a bout with Dalakian. Likewise we don't see Dalakian fighting on away soil unless there is a solid size purse for him. With that in mind we would love to see this bout on neutral soil, and Dalakian has fought in the US before. So maybe, just maybe, we could have this intriguing match up in the US! Dalakian is an awkward, tricky fighter who can be a thorn in the side of anyone in the division, but can also stink out the joint and his competition since winning the title, against Brian Viloria, has been disappointing. To say the least. Maybe if Dalakian was facign a top fighter he would have the ambition to show what he could do, and if Nakatani could get a fight in the US we'd expect him to look to impress. This would be a really interesting bout in terms of styles, and it would be one of the few times Dalakian would be up against someone with a better jab than himself. If a promoter is looking to put together a relatively cheap world title unification bout this would be ideal, and could fill out a good card. It's unlikely, but it is one we really would love to see. Note - We haven't mentioned Moruti Mthalane as he has a bout set for December against Jayson Mama though the winner of that bout would also make for a very good opponent for Nakatani, as would Ryota Yamauchi. One thing about boxing being such a global sport is the misconceptions that fight fans around the world have of other regions and countries. Sometimes this is based on a one off example, that people use to assume is always the case, other times it's based on a lie repeated so often that it becomes accepted as truth to an audience who don't feel the urge to check for themselves. Whatever the reason, we all make have our own wrong views on things, and in many cases people just haven't take the effort to correct us. In fact in a lot of cases the misconceptions might be repeated by those who perhaps should know better, and should know to correct us. With that in mind we want to expose 5 misconceptions of Japanese boxing today, with these conceptions often being parroted by fans. 1- The fans are super quiet We'll start with one of the big ones, and one of the most parroted misconceptions about Japanese boxing, and that's the idea that Japanese fans are "quiet" and that the atmosphere of Japanese fights is poor. This is something that has really been repeated ad infinitum since the early 1990's, when the Japanese fans were quiet for the Mike Tyson Vs Buster Douglas bout at the Tokyo Dome. Interestingly watching the Japanese version of the fight, rather the HBO broadcast, does make it clear the crowd were noisier than they seemed. They weren't raucous but they weren't particularly silent either, at least not in the way the HBO coverage of the fight made out, and they often roared and appreciation at big shots being landed, particularly in round 8, when Tyson was rocked before coming back and dropping Douglas. It should also be noted however that this wasn't a typical fight for Japan. This was more of a status fight, much like many fights featuring Floyd Mayweather later in his career. It was an event that appealed as much to business men, as boxing fans. It was also not a bout where they had a dog in the fight. Now we'll accept the Japanese fans aren't the loudest out there, but for a bout they are behind, and a bout where they have a connection with the fighters they are incredibly loud. For example take this 2019 Japanese Middleweight title bout between Kazuto Takesako and Shuji Kato, where they are loud, cheering, applauding, as early as the first minute. They appreciate intense action, big shots, determination and clean punching. When they see that they respond with their noise. Yes British and Polish fans are louder, but don't live with the misconception that Japanese fans don't make noise. They do. At least they did before the sport returned with mandatory masks, and rules on them to not cheer due to Covid19. Yes there is a sense of respect shown in some events, but the fans happily lose their shit when they have a reason to! 2-Everyone Fights on New Year's Eve / Loads of fights on NYE This is one of the most interesting misconceptions as it's not just fans but also the media that make it, and repeat it. And it's one we actually understand, to some extent. However it is very wrong to assume every big fighter in Japan fights on New Year's Eve. What is true is that many top fighters in the country fight in the last part of the year, but they are usually spread out through November and December, and it's rare, especially now, to get more than 1 card on New Year's Eve. The idea that fighters like Naoya Inoue, Kenshiro Teraji and Ryota Murata fight on New Year's Eve are very much misconception. None of that trio have ever fought on New Year's Eve. Though all three men have fought in late December. The only TV channel that currently does boxing on December 31st is TBS, and if you want to be technical its affiliates. Fuji TV, who have deals with Inoue, Murata, Kenshiro and others, show RIZIN on New Year's Eve. As a result the only fighters who currently fight on New Year's Eve, at least at the highest level, are TBS fighters, such as Kazuto Ioka and Kosei Tanaka. Part of the reason for this mistake is that Fuji TV have held an end of year show in December, thought not on New Year's Eve, the last few years. And in the past TV Tokyo used to hold them, usually headlined by Takashi Uchiyama. TV Tokyo however have dropped boxing in recent years, leaving TBS, and affiliates, as the only show in town on New Year's Eve. If you want to check back you can see this quite clearly. Since 2017 there has only been 1 card a year on New Year's Eve shown to a Japanese audience, including the 2018 card from Macao headlined by Kazuto Ioka Vs Donnie Nietes 3-Japanese champions don't want to travel We often hear that Japanese champions want to stay at home, and keep titles hostage . Whilst financially it can, for a number of fighters, make sense for them to do that it typically isn't true, and many top Japanese fighters are open to travelling. In fact we've seen Naoya Inoue do it a number of times recently, and we also saw fighters like Toshiki Nishioka, Takashi Miura, Kohei Kono, Ryota Murata, Sho Kimura, Tomoki Kameda and Masayuki Ito travel as champions in just the last few years. That's along with the fact fighters like Shinsuke Yamanaka, Takashi Uchiyama and Hozumi Hasegawa all wanted to fight abroad in world title fights in the last decade or so. That's almost all the notable names of the last decade, barring currently active fighters. The problem is often the fact that financially it makes more sense to fight in Japan, especially at the lower weights. There aren't many countries that can draw a TV figure and gate for a fight in the lower weights, and many discussions for fights in the US for top Japanese fighters just end up failing for whatever reason. We often see Japanese fighters openly discuss wanting to fight in the US, particularly Vegas. Unfortunately it takes two to tango, and it's not that common that the US, or Europe, have a big enough draw at Minimumweight, Light Flyweight, Super Flyweight or Bantamweight to have the Western promoters want to pay for a top Japanese fighter to come over. Just to add to this is the fact that in the last few days we've seen recently crowned WBO Flyweight champion Junto Nakatani state that he wants to fight abroad. The Japanese fighters want to travel. They want to improve their international standing and profile. Similarly we see the same thing with some Japanese musicians, notably Hyde, from L'arc en Ciel, who explained why he wanted to break America in a fantastic video with Chris Broad from Abroad in Japan, which can be seen here if you're interested in Japanese rock music. 4-No one knows who these guys are
One thing we hear from Western fans is that "no one knows who that even is", as if being known in the West is all that it comes down to. Japan is the 11th most populated country in the world. If a fighter is known by just 10% of Japan, then they are known by around 12,000,000 people, that's more than the entire population of Belgium, or Greece or the Czechia, or similar to the entire population of Denmark and Finland added together. That's a huge number of people just "knowing" who you are. Fair enough, the easy response to that is that "nobody watches them guys", but with big bouts often being on free TV the viewing figures for Japanese fighters often end up being multiples of what fighters getting in the US. A bout that has good viewing figures in the US draws between 1-2 million on TV, for many big bouts in Japan, a country around 1/3 the population of the US, that figure would be seen as massively disappointing. The reality is that the top fighters in Japan are seen by more people than the top fighters in the US. Sure they are Japanese fans watching them and not American, or European fans, but their fan bases are still large. And thankfully in the last few years we have started to see more and more Western fans show an interesting in the fighters from the Land of the Rising sun. We've seen promoters show a growing interest as well. Now we just need TV companies to begin to show more interest, and start picking up more Japanese shows, to help increase fighters profiles in the West. One thing that some fans, probably not those reading this in fairness, need to realise is that the fighters have a lot of fans following their top guys in the East, even if you maybe haven't seen them yet. 5-Japanese judging is fair One of the most common comments about Japanese judging is that they are the fairest out there. Technically that might be true, but in reality it's hard to know for sure. The key reason this is a misconception however is the fact most fans aren't aware that the judging for most world title bouts in Japan is due the judges rarely being from Japan. In fact most world title fights have no Japanese judges involved. In the 1990's Japan had a spate of awful judging decisions favouring their fighters, this was particularly notable in Nagoya and Osaka. There used to be a joke that when a champion was defending his title in Nagoya he started 3 rounds up at the first bell. Suggesting that they only needed to win 4 of 12 rounds to win a fight. Japanese fans are very fair, mostly positive, and mostly open minded. They are happy to slam on their fighters if they feel something isn't fair and just. We saw it notable with Koki Kameda bouts. As a result the reputation they had been getting for dodgy decisions hurt them, and harmed the view of the Japan Boxing Commission (JBC). Now a days the reputation for judging in Japan is very, very different. Part of that is the fairness aspect of Japanese boxing, but a bigger part is the fact that the country rarely uses it's judges for the biggest bouts, unless the bout features two Japanese fighters. As a result judges are typically all from neutral countries. There is no hiding behind the judges, that may or may not know the fighter and their team, because the judges are imported and completely neutral. They are there to score the bout, not pull favour for the promoter, fighter or TV company. They aren't there to bail out a fighter after a bad performance. As we write this Naoya Inoue has only had Japanese judges work 1 of his title bouts, that was his 2016 clash with Kohei Kono. Likewise Kosei Tanaka has only had a Japanese judge in 1 of his world title bouts, against Ryoichi Taguchi, even his bout with Sho Kimura had 3 neutral judges. Kazuto Ioka is the same, with a Japanese judge only working his bout with Akira Yaegashi back in 2012. Whilst Japanese judging might be fair, the judging of their biggest bouts is essentially outsourced for fairness. The world title bouts, the biggest bouts, have imported judges. Maybe world boxing would be better served by doing something similar, importing officials with no local ties. No reason to favour someone, and no accusations of bias. It would certainly help clean up judging in regions like the UK, Texas and Nevada, where accusations of bias, whether they are substantiated or not, have persisted in recent years. This past Friday we saw a young fighter score a win that has genuinely put him on the boxing map, and made him talk of the town in Japan. That was a win scored by Junto Nakatani (21-0, 16), who looked like a star he beat up, broke down, and stopped Filipino Giemel Magramo (24-2, 20) and claimed the vacant WBO Flyweight title. The bout was seen as a genuinely tough match up on paper, but Nakatani made it look easy and made Magramo look third rate, not something we had been expecting.
Having had a chance to go back and rewatch the fight again a few days later we've decided to talk about our take aways from the bout, and the performances of the two men. As well as touching, just slightly, on the future of the fighters involved. 1-It's fucking great to have world title bouts back in Japan! Lets start this with a really, really obvious one. It is damn good to see a world title bout back in Japan after such a long wait. Other than a female title fight, in September between Mika Iwakawa and Nanae Suzuki, we've not seen any top level action in Japan this year! That's not just since boxing came back in the summer, but at all in 2020! So let us just say this was an amazing event. Especially after what had happened just a few days earlier with Hiroto Kyoguchi. Whether anyone wanted to admit it or not this was a really important event, and we can't help but thing Japanese boxing needed a big win. 2-Magramo had no plan B So on to the actual fight. We had seen Magramo a few times prior to this bout and he had always seemed like a solid puncher with a boxer-puncher style. Here he looked absolutely clueless with no Plan B, and in fairness we're not even sure he had a Plan A! His game plan seemed to be based around getting close to Nakatani, but even when he got there he never seemed sure of what to do. It sure didn't help that Nakatani managed to hold his own up close, and landed the more solid, hurtful and clean shots, but we're still confused what Magramo and his team were thinking. We already knew Nakatani was good in a toe-to-toe war, he had broken down Seigo Yuri Akui in an inside war, a result that looks even better now, but surely there was some sort of logic and intelligence to Magramo's gameplan. What ever that idea was never seemed to show it's self. 3-Nakatani is still improving and has been moved perfectly We've followed Junto Nakatani with some interest since he was in the Rookie of the Year in 2016, where he beat Masamichi Yabuki in the All Japan Final. Since then we've seen him grow, and grow, and grow. He's only had one genuinely close fight and that 3 and a half years ago, against Yuma Kudo. Since then he has matured, developed and become one of the best Flyweight, and best young, fighters on the planet and scored some very solid wins. He's broken down Seigo Yuri Akui, for the Japanese Youth title, battered Dexter Alimento, dominated Shun Kosaka, broken down Naoki Mochizuki, schooled Milan Melindo and now whooped Giemel Magramo. It was easy to get excited about Nakatani early in his career but credit to his team, Teiken and MT Gym for developing him well, and taking progressive steps forward with his career. He's moved Japanese Rookie of the Year, to Japanese Youth title, to Japanese title, to facing a former world champion to winning a world title. Every step of the way has been logical, it has been a step forward and it has made sense. Now he's a world champion we don't expect him to be having "developmental defenses". He's a champion and we expect MT Gym and Teiken will be looking to have him face world class opponents. Yes he's a young champion, but he's been developed properly. 4-Nobuto Ikehara deserves more opportunities One thing we seen our selves really focusing on in this series has been the officials and we need to say that a Japanese referee has, once again, done everything to deserve praise! From what we could find this was seemingly Nobuto Ikehara's first world title fight as a referee and the world title contender did a really good job on the big stage. Like we typically see from Japanese referees he let them fight out of clinches, for the most part, didn't involve himself too much, despite needing to force some breaks, and let them fight when they had an arm free up close. He didn't get on either fighters case, and called it straight down the middle with no issues in telling either man to stop bending the rules. We have praised Japanese referees a lot in this series and once again we need to hold our hats up and say Ikehara did a great job. We do need to note that was a former fighter, fighting in a world title fight during his career, and is still a young referee however he acquitted himself really well here, was clear, and didn't ever look phased by the occasion. Aged 44 we suspect he's going to be a very good official, for a very long time 5-The future is incredibly bright for Nakatani At just 22 years old, and already looking like a star in the making we can't help but feel like Nakatani has the boxing world at his finger tips right now. He's done and said the right things, comes across as a very personable young man, and seems to want to be the new face of boxing on NTV. If he can get the trust and belief of the channel, and get their full backing he may end up being their replacement for the now retired pairing of Shinsuke Yamanaka and Hozumi Hasegawa. It's clear NTV want to get back into the boxing game, but haven't had a fighter who can carry a show. We dare say Nakatani is that guy, and he's done it organically. He's built his name and reputation properly, he's very fun to watch, he's still got strong links to local fans whilst also openly talking about wanting to fight on foreign soil, and building his international profile. He's learned bits of English, spent time in the US and has connections on both sides of the Pacific. He might not ooze the destructive power of Naoya Inoue, or have the charisma of a Joichiro Tatsuyoshi, but make no mistake he has everything needed to be a star, and one of the biggest faces in Japanese boxing over the next decade. We suspect NTV know this, and if he manages 2 or 3 title defenses next year, expect to see NTV building shows around him very soon. This past Saturday in Bang Phun we saw two former world champions clash in what turned out to be one of the most entertaining bouts of the entire weekend. The bout saw former IBF Flyweight champion Amnat Ruenroeng (21-4, 6) clash with former 2-time WBO Bantamweight champion Pungluang Sor Singyu (54-9, 36) in what was a battle of veterans. Despite coming in at a combined age of 71, the two gave us more action than men significantly younger. Not only that but they also had styles that gelled, making for a genuinely fun to watch back and forth, with both men having moments in a bout that swung back and forth.
Although we suspect most would have over-looked this bout, and not cared much for it going in, especially given the fact Amnat was the wrong side of 40, it was worth caring about, watching and rewatching. Something we did earlier today to help with our five take aways from the bout. 1-Styles are important in match making One of our biggest gripes from this weekend has been matchmaking, which was a particularly big complaint about the contests in the US, with the Devin Haney Vs Yuriorkis Gamboa bout being a particularly dull match up where styles didn't gel. Here we saw the styles of the two men click instantly, and it was a fans dream. The men were relatively even in ability, but their styles were totally different. Pungluang was the aggressor, the man pressing the action, coming forward and looking to make a fight whilst Amnat was the counter puncher, using slick tricks, timing and movement to make Pungluang pay. The game plan from both was clear. For Pungluang it was to grind down his foe, and take him deep, tire him out and go for a big finish. For Amnat it was to be calm, land the eye catching blows and run up the early lead, then soak up the heat late on if he needed to. The matchmaker fucking nailed it here and so much credit goes to them for getting it right. Matchmaking isn't easy, but the folk behind this bout deserve a round of applause. 2-Amnat might be dirty, but he doesn't like it back We've known for years that Amnat is a sneaky, crafty, intelligent fighter who bends the rules as far as he can without getting points taken. In many ways he's like Bernard Hopkins, knowing that there's a lot of leeway within the rules to, be a dirty sneaky SOB. One thing that was really interesting here was how disgusted he looked when Pungluang used some dirty tactics himself. Amnat didn't like it at all. There's no real take away here, other than that we found it humorous when Pungluang gave him a taste of the medicine he had dished out several times during his career. If he fights again we do wonder whether an opponent will perhaps go dirty against him. 3-Despite being 40 Amnat can still go! Now we need to pre-face this and state we don't think Amnat should be getting a world title fight any time soon, but even at the age of 40 he can still go. His performance against Srisaket Sor Rungvisai earlier this year may well have said more about Amnat than it did about Srisaket. The sneaky veteran is still sneaky, quick, sharp, knows hoe to move around the ring, can look after himself defensively and has brilliant timing. There's not much on his shots, but he is still a fantastic boxer and a handful for many out there. At least over the shorter distances. We suspect he'll struggle more in 10 and 12 round bouts, but over 6 and 8 rounds he's a banana skin for good to very good fighters. His performance against Srisaket, and now Pungluang, shows just how good of a boxer he is, and in some ways it's a shame he developed a reputation for bending and breaking rules, when, on the back of recent performances, he really didn't need to. 4-Pungluang Sor Singyu is our type of fighter We'll admit we prefer aggressive fighters to defensive ones. It's our natural preference and something that isn't likely to change. With that in mind we need to admit that we bloody love watching Pungluang Sor Singyu. Win or lose he comes to fight. He puts his on the wall and fights. He might not be the best, the most skilled, the hardest hitting, the quickest or the smartest, but he's the sort of fighter we can watch and enjoy any day of the week. Not only that but he also seems to genuinely enjoy being in the ring. We see him smiling, and smirking through a fight, and whether he's on top or not he's the sort of man we love to watch. The sport needs more Pungluang Sor Singyu's. The sport would be so much better with more Punglung Sor Singyu's! 5-Amnat sure didn't look like he had an injury! Going into this bout it was originally advertised as being for a WBC regional Featherweight title until the week of the fight, where the WBC title was removed from the contest and instead we ended up with the bout being fought at 131lbs. The reason reported was that Amnat had injured his wrist and requested the heavier weight as a result. Whilst he was clearly some extra weight around his waist it didn't seem like he was carrying any sort of injury into this at all and he let shots fly with both hands. Maybe he was playing a dirty game in the long run with the feigned injury. Regardless there is talk about a rematch in the future at 126lbs, and you know what, after this bout we'd bloody love it! Injury or not he looked great, Pungluang looked great, they made for a fantastic fight, and it was so nice we want to see it twice...well we already have but you get the point! 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 long term Japanese world champions Takashi Uchiyama and Momo Koseki.
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-Japanese Super Featherweight Takashi Uchiyama is best known for his lengthy run as the WBA Super Featherweight champion, which saw him holding the title for more than 6 years. Before winning the WBA belt he won the OPBF Super Featherweight, which he defended 5 times before vacating it. His title win came against Nedal Hussein in 2007, with Uchiyama stopping Hussein in round 8. 2-With almost 50 bouts to his name Nedal Hussein was fighter who was very busy during his 10 year career. His career ran from 1997 to 2007 and saw him face a bit of a who's and fight for various titles, winning the Commonwealth Super Bantamweight title, fighting twice for world titles and twice for OPBF titles. His opponents not only included Uchiyama but also Hiroyuki Enoki, Scott Harrison, Oscar Larios and Filipino icon Manny Pacquiao, who took a TKO win over Hussein in 2000. 3-During his legendary career Manny Pacquiao has been one of the faces of the sport and has won a huge collection of titles. These have included regional, international and world titles as he become one of the most legendary fighters in the sport's history. One of his many world titles was the IBF Super Bantamweight title, which he won in his US debut against Lehlo Ledwaba. That win put him on the boxing map in the west, and was also his second world title. Another man who later won that very same title was Panama's Celestino Caballero, who won the belt in 2008 whilst unifying it with the WBA title that he had previously held. 4-The freakishly long and rangy Celestino Caballero was a nightmare to go up against, standing at almost 6' and fighting at Super Bantamweight and Featherweight during his career. He was a true road warrior, fighting in Panama, USA, Venezuela, Colombia, Thailand, Canada, Mexico Argentina and Japan. Not only was he well travelled but he also proved to be a thorn in the side of Asian fighters, notching wins over Satoshi Hosono, Daud Yordan and Somsak Sithchatchawal. 5-Somsak Sithchatchawal is best known for his legendary bout with Mahyar Monshipour, which saw him claim the WBA Super Bantamweight title. Sadly he lost that belt to Caballero in 2006 and began a slow decline that saw him ending his career with a 60-4-3 (43) record. His final bout came on January 6th 2010 when he lost to to Fernando Otic in Koh Tao. On the same card fans also saw female fighter Krikanok Islandmuaythai, in what was reportedly her professional debut. 6-Whilst not a particularly successful fighter Krikanok Islandmuaythai did fight a relative who's who of the female scene during her short, but surprisingly notable, career. She fought a number of world title challenger and several world champions. She also had a world title fight of her own, in what was her 6th bout. That ended in a loss to the dominant Momo Koseki, who recorded her 6th defenses of the WBC Aromweight title thanks to a 5th round TKO of the Thai. The Japanese Middleweight title is one of the most over-looked domestic titles from the Land of the Rising Sun but it's also a very interesting on and has had it's share of not just Japanese born champions but also fighters born outside of the country. One of those was 2-time Japanese Middleweight champion Steven Smith (18-11, 14), who was better known in Japan as Flasher Ishibashi.
Whilst not too well remembered now Smith was an exciting glass cannon and only 5 of his 29 career bouts went the distance. He was must watch, win or lose, and today we bring you 5 Midweek facts about Steven "Flasher Ishibashi" Smith. 1-Smith is from a large American family, from which he is the eldest of 7 siblings. 2-Smith's amateur record was reported 7-1 (6), with the fighter learning to box at an air force base in California. It was whilst he was in the air force that he also visited Japan, spending time at the Yokota Air Base. 3-Rather notably Smith didn't adopt the "Flasher Ishibashi" moniker until he had had more than 10 bouts, with the first under his adopted fighting name being his bout with Hideo Kanazawa in 1973. The Ishibashi name came from the Ishibashi gym that he fought out of. 4-Smith's first reign as the Japanese Middleweight champion ended despite him losing in a non-title bout to Ryu Sorimachi, the then Japanese Welterweight champion. This was due to the JBC rules that stated losing a bout held within the weight class limits would cause a fighter to be stripped. Due to this situation Smith has the 26th and 27th recognised reigns of the title. 5-Although an American born fighter who spent much of his career in the US Smith was a really well travelled fighter. He had 16 bouts in Japan, one in South Korea, one in Australia, one in France, one in South Africa and 9 in the USA. Whilst he's not alone in fighting in 4 continents, Asia, Oceania, Europe, North America and Africa, he's certainly in a rather small percentage of fighters to have done that Among the many bouts we saw over the weekend one of the most notable was a bout between 20 year old Thai Flyweight Thananchai Charunphak (11-1, 9) and veteran Pigmy Kokietgym (61-14-2, 25), with Pigmy being stopped in 4 rounds by his much younger foe. The bout wasn't the most exciting, but it was the next step forward for the talented youngster who is progressing really well and being matched with notable names in Thailand's as he continues to develop and build his name.
Having watched the bout live, and now rewatched it we've decided to share our take aways from the contest. 1-Pigmy came with hunger In some countries we see the under-dog come to survive, this was the case with Yuriorkis Gamboa when he took on Devin Haney over the weekend and together they stunk out the joint. In Thailand however the veterans enter the ring with the intention of beating up the youngsters. This made the bout actually quite compelling, with Pigmy coming forward through out, pressuring and trying to drag Thananchai into a fight. It was all effort from Pigmy, but relatively wasted effort and although he came forward, and did have a hunger for victory, he didn't look capable of really pulling the trigger on a consistent basis and more and it's clear father time has caught up with him. 2-Pigmy should retire Ok so Pigmy did come with hunger, but it's the other issues that are the problem. We mentioned he didn't look like he could pull the trigger when he wanted and that father time had caught up with him. That's not really a surprise. The 29 year old has been a professional for 21 years, he's had 77 bouts, and over 400 professional rounds. He's had a damaging, punishing and hard career and has lost 5 of his last 6, including 3 by stoppage. Given his style, and age, we really would advise him to retire. He's not "shot to shit" but he's certainly taking damage and when a young fighter puts their foot on the gas, as Thananchai did here, they can hurt him. Credit to him for still being hungry and full of fire, but it's probably time he hung them up. Given his experience we suspect he'd be a decent trainer and certainly should remain in the sport, but not take punishment at the hands of these youngsters. 3-Thananchai is a really classy operator We don't really see many Thai's boxing on the back foot, using their feet to control the ring, and boxing behind a stiff, rigid jab. Thananchai however does all of that. When he's on the back foot he establishes range well, moves very nicely around the ring and neutralises aggression well, something we also saw him do against Kompayak Porpramook. His jab is a really good weapon, and unlike some with great jabs he can also throw some great shots on the inside. The way he finished this bout was spectacular, with a brutal body shot, and his first knockdown came from a fantastic combination. We really think he has the potential to go a long way, and wins against formers contenders and champions are doing him the world of good at this stage. 4-All Thai bouts are fun For many years we saw a lot of Thai prospects and hopefuls beating up on over-matched foreign opponents there to pick up a pay check and a loss, and to pad a fighters record. It served little purpose in the long term and saw a lot of prospects getting heavily padded records with no substance. Some fighters were good enough to come the lack of actual developmental fights, whilst many others fell by the way side, coming up short at the top level. Over the last year or so we've seen more and more all-Thai bouts and they have seen the prospects and hopefuls being forced to answer questions, often in fun bouts. The last generation if Thai's may technically have been a bit limited, but their aggressive mentality makes them fun to watch and the new generation of more polished fighters are getting a chance to shine when facing the older, aggressive guys. We'll probably say this a lot in this series, but those really gel, and make for some really fan friendly contests. 5-The ring looked huge! On thing we've began paying attention to during this series is the venue, the ring and the officials. This time the really eye catching thing was the size of the ring, which looked huge compared to the fighters. Fair enough the two guys were Flyweights, but with that in mind they seemed to have a lot of room to move around in. This suited the movement and boxing style of Thananchai but really did seem to dwarf the two men. We've seen Heavyweights fighting recently in smaller rings. This was particularly notable when WP used a higher camera angle, and shows so much of the ring being empty. Maybe, just maybe, a slightly smaller ring guys? Sometimes when we do these 10 fact pieces they can takes weeks, if not months, to put together 10 interesting fact, and sometimes the facts we use are less interesting than maybe they should be. We sometimes get a little desperate for facts 9 or 10. Today however we cover a 4-time world title challenger who was genuinely one of the easiest and most compelling fighters we could ever talk about. Someone who is a genuine inspiration and some one we are very glad we decided to do. That is Hiroyuki Sakamoto.
Fans of the sport have likely seen Sakamoto's amazing bout with Takanori Hatakeyama, a real classic from 2000. They may well have seen his shoot out with Gilberto Serrano and his losses to Stevie Johnston and Cesar Bazan, but many won't know much at all about Sakamoto. With that said, here are 10 facts you probably didn't know about... Hiroyuki Sakamoto 1- Sakamoto's parents divorced at a young age and he and his younger brother were left in the care of his relatives. Sadly the relatives were abusive, to the extent that his brother collapsed from malnutrition and the two would end up in care. 2- Sakamoto graduated from the Komatsubara High School, a school that several other boxers have gone to. These include Shingo Yamaguchi, Yosuke Nishijima and Yuichi Hosono. 3- Like many fighters Sakamoto was inspired to take up boxing after watching it on TV as a child. 4- Sakamoto is a fan of classic music, as a result he often used classic music as his entrance music, with Dvorak 's Symphony No. 9 in E minor, "From the New World", the fourth movement, being one of the most often used. 5- Sakamoto was known as the "Japanese Duran" and the "Heisei KO King" 6- Despite being a popular fighter, with a great back story, Sakamoto was regarded as being a quiet person outside of the ring. He was meek and often came across as shy, the complete opposite to his style in the ring. In an interview in 2018 he explained that he choose to talk with his fists. Things have changed since his days as a fighter and he has regularly spoken at children's homes trying to break the chain of negativity. 7- Sakamoto's retirement ceremony took place on November 17th 2007 at Korakuen Hall. 8- In 2010 Sakamoto opened up the SRS boxing gym. The name is an abbreviation of "Skyhigh RingS", rather using his own name he used the name of something that was hoping to inspire children. 9- In 2000 Sakamoto set up the Kokoro Aozora Fund, which was set up to help support children in Japanese care homes. The charity was later recognised for it's activity, receiving the "HEROs SPORTSMANSHIP for THE FUTURE" award in 2017. 10- Despite never winning a world title Sakamoto has remained a popular figure in Japan and is the subject of several books, and has authored some himself. These are available on the Japanese Amazon. Sadly however none appear to have English translations. |
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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