The Road to Science

Next week will be devoted fully to Hatton/Pacquiao, but before we walk into that monster of a fight a few scattered thoughts:



1. Gamboa vs. Rojas was exciting and disappointing in exactly the way one might have expected. Rojas, terrified of Gamboa’s speed and power went into a shell, and with his awkward, jerky movements managed to get through most of the fight. He did this at the cost of reducing his offensive output to nothing and never really taking a chance on winning the fight, even when Gamboa’s insolence left him open to a last desperate heave. Rojas wouldn’t go for it, he wanted to last, but it would have been interesting to see what would have happened.

Gamboa, for his part, was content to methodically and indolently tear Rojas down. He seemed bored in the middle rounds and there was never any sense of jeopardy or inspiration. It was unclear if he wanted to go the rounds and ham it up, or just enjoys the feeling of mastery over an overmatched opponent. When he finally got the stoppage in the tenth round there wasn’t a feeling of real triumph or accomplishment, but more a thing long expected. There was something more there that we didn’t see, Rojas didn’t demand it and Gamboa was unwilling to give it for free. It was that feeling that makes some people so reactionary towards Floyd Mayweather Junior, a feeling that he was hiding something special from us.



Maybe this is part of his maturation as a thinking counterpuncher, a style he would be brilliant with, maybe he just doesn’t have another level, or maybe he will manifest his talents when the situation calls for it. Like a tennis player who sharpens himself in the early rounds, perhaps Gamboa will bring everything he has when the big time arrives. There has been speculation about him fighting Celestino Caballero, the Junior Feather champion. The freakishly tall Panamanian Caballero seems just good enough, and just vulnerable enough that we might finally see Gamboa as a man in full.

2. News has leaked about a potential Juan Manuel Marquez vs. Floyd Mayweather matchup and I'm still working through my thoughts on the possibility. On the one hand seeing two of the top three fighters in the world in the ring together can be nothing but special, and I think I, and moreso the people who have unthinkingly dismissed the fight, are guilty of grave disrespect to Marquez, a ring genius and modern great when we express skepticism. Marquez is a great champion, why couldn’t he beat Mayweather? They would come into the ring no more than a half dozen pounds apart, and if Mayweather is willing to come down to 142 or so why couldn’t it be something special?




I think the answer is obvious; people don’t necessarily want to see Floyd in a great fight, they just want to see him lose. So we want to watch him go into the ring outgunned against our chosen protagonist; for me it’s Mosely or Cotto, for many it used to be Margarito, and now for those of ill-temper and fundamental meanness it has become Paul Williams. For those like me that love him we want to see that level of discomfort and greatness that he has seldom been tested with, that desperate edge that all great fighters have stood at the edge of and come storming back from, or fallen into heroically after long, noble, and grim defiance. And that can only come from a larger man, or one possessing a super power like Manny Pacquiao’s speed. An honest fighter of bravery, technique and passion is simply not seen as that. It could be a great fight, we say, but it’s not our fight. I don’t think it’s fair, but that’s how it is.

I hope Floyd takes a smaller match, say Tim Bradley or Nate Campbell (if only they weren’t both black and therefore unmarketable against Floyd I think it would happen) before he goes for the glory against Pac or Mosley. I can be convinced otherwise, and there is no force that could keep me from watching a Marquez-Floyd fight, but Marquez somehow has his own destiny and I feel it’s more with Manny than Floyd.





3. A couple great KO’s from the little men last weekend. Brian Viloria, a guy with all the tools who just never seemed to put it all together until now.



And Nonito Donaire, the beautiful boxer/puncher who laid Darchinian low with a check hook as sweet as Mayweather’s and who, I think, might very well turn out to be the truth.



4. Going to do a preview of Taylor/Froch and Penalosa/Lopez tomorrow.

I could be right too: Yuriorkis Gamboa

Two men enter, one man leaves. As Oscar exits the stage (please check it out) I will nominate a new soldier of fortune to ascend.



I’m always hesitant to invest myself in prospects, not only because I find it perilous to foresee what a man is made of until they’ve leapt into the crucible, but also because I find the years of step-up fights and mismatches depressing. Still, talent cannot be denied, and Yuriorkis Gamboa is that. He has many things to commend him; the melodious name, the pedigree of the Cuban amateur, and those fast hands. Those hands that look like they are trick photography and seem a combination of Meldrick Taylor and Roy Jones. There are things that can’t be taught, and Gamboa has all of that, a wicked combination of dazzling speed and power that causes one to salivate at the possibilities. Gamboa, a featherweight who one imagines in time will move up to lightweight, flurries in quick bursts as a kind of squids-ink camouflage to better detonate his money left hook and right uppercut.



However, like all those with superpowers his speed and talent also provides his vulnerability. His manifest gifts have given him an insolence and contempt towards his opponents that I find as attractive as the fast hands and statue physique. He walks forward, hands down, darting feet with no more respect than a medieval night confronting a child with a homemade bow and arrow. And he has paid for the overconfidence, suffering several flash knockdowns as he opens up without fear of reprisal and finding the canvas for his trouble. Tito Trinidad was the same way, though more power than speed, and we loved him for it. For his joyful, stalking sense of superiority. Whether Gamboa’s disdain will last as he faces higher quality opposition or if he will use the skills that made him a successful amateur remains to be seen, but at this point his combination of raw brilliance and bonehead aggressiveness intrigue me. He has a real cruel streak in the ring, a sadistic disdain that seems that of a showman who’s dancing partner is not up to the challenge.



Even his looks say that to me, the sculpted body and lounge singer hair. He reminds me of the cabana boys in “Night of the Iguana,” flitting and chirping and knowing something in the language of 48 frames per second that those of us living in a 32 frames world do not. Normally I would think him ripe for a change in trainer, still young enough to marry his physical bravado with the more exacting, scientific style that I find most attractive. But in his case I feel an almost sadistic desire to see just how far exuberance can take him, the beauty and limitlessness of the not-knowing is what’s intoxicating.

Gamboa faces Jose Rojas tonight on Showtime for an interim, “title” only two years into his career. Although I’ve never seen Rojas before it should be interesting as he has fought both Chris John and Celestino Caballero with moderate success. With Gamboa’s electric talent it’s hard to imagine too stern a test, but it’s that creeping suspicion that he’s one mistake from regret or inspiration that has me on his side and watching, and hoping for something special.