Weekend Schedule - Klitschko-Arreola, Dunne-Poonsawat (free stream), Pascal-Branco (pay stream)

by Brickhaus on Sep 24, 2009 9:30 AM EDT in Fight Schedules Comment 18 comments

Jean Pascal will try to take out Silvio Branco in what should be yet another war. via www.rds.ca

The weekend after a huge megafight that disappointed many in the action department, but was strangely enjoyable as a masterclass, we have a number of fights this weekend that have guaranteed action, but where the skill level might not be, ahem, quite so high.

Thursday, September 24

Versus, 10:00 p.m. Eastern, Luis Ramos Jr. vs. Christian Favela; Charles Huerta vs. Rodrigo Aranda; Karl Dargan vs. Rydell Griffin. I believe this is the end of the Versus Fight Night series, bit I wouldn't swear to it. This iteration put together by GBP has been somewhat of a flop. And if you want to watch Adamek-Cunningham for the 17,000th time, you can tune in at 8 pm.

Friday, September 25

Sky Sports, 4:00 p.m. Eastern, Matthew Macklin vs. Amin Asikainen, Cello Renda vs. Sam Horton. Macklin is getting pretty high in the middleweight rankings after beating on the best that the UK and Ireland have to offer in the weight class. Asikainen has been a top 10 contender and has beaten current beltholder Sebastian Sylvester, and is in Fight Night Round 4, probably to please the all-important Finnish demographic. Either way, this should be a good fight, and should put the winner in a position to fight for a belt at 160 in the not too distant future.

Gofightlive.tv, 8:00 p.m. Eastern ($9.99), Jean Pascal vs, Silvio Branco, Sebastian Demers vs. Jose Spearman, Adonis Stevenson vs. Jermain Mackey. The first of two potentially action-packed major fights to air on GFL this weekend. I'm thrilled to see that this is the kind of fight they're able to get over there now. Branco is the mandatory for the belt that Pascal won from Diaconu. Branco has skills, but he's old and never had a fantastic chin. Pascal, on the other hand, is mostly an athletic freak who doesn't have too much by way of skills, yet makes it look good and exciting while being extremely vulnerable. Pascal hasn't made a bad fight in years, so I don't expect this one to be a borefest. Pretty much all the pre-fight hype you could want for this one is over here, if you can understand French and/or Italian. Winner gets a match with Diaconu.

Saturday, September 26

RTE.ie, 4:30 p.m. Eastern, Bernard Dunne vs. Poonsawat Kratingdaenggym. This is the first defense by all-action Irish fighter of his belt. Dunne-Cordoba from earlier in the year was my fight of the year of this year so far, and there's the opportunity to catch this one by a stream as well. Poonsawat has won his last 14 fights, with 12 of those victories coming by knockout. While it seems like he's been around forever, he's only 28 years old, and has beaten some pretty darn good fighters in the past (Cordoba, Gamez, Somsak). If you're home on a Saturday afternoon, this is must-see TV. Stream it in the background while you're watching college football. THIS FIGHT IS AVAILABLE VIA FREE LEGAL LIVE STREAM AT THE HYPERLINK FOR THIS TEXT. Oh, and if you haven't seen Dunne-Cordoba, the full fight is available to stream on their website here. If the undercard is shown at all, Patrick Hyland will face David Kiilu.

Gofightlive.tv, 9:00 p.m. Eastern ($9.99), David Diaz vs. Jesus Chavez, Jose Hernandez vs. Juan Carlos Martinez. Diaz was last seen a year ago, getting the snot knocked out of him by Manny Pacquiao. Jesus Chavez put up a decent, but not all that competitive, fight against Michael Katsidis. Winner of this fight probably gets one last shot at lightweight glory. If Chavez loses, don't be surprised to see him retire. If Diaz loses, he'll probably toil around as a gatekeeper for a while.

HBO, 10:00 p.m. Eastern, Vitali Klitschko vs. Cristobal Arreola. Bad Left Hook will be providing round by round coverage.

Elsewhere in the world of boxing...

There are two other mildly interesting heavyweight bouts on the Klitschko-Arreola undercard. Alexander Ustinov is a former kickboxer promoted by the Klitschkos and really fits their mold - he's huge (6'7", 300), he's Ukranian, he has great power and he's robotic as hell. That said, he's also much slower than either of the Klitschkos. He's taking a massive step up, facing Cedric Boswell, who has a shiny record mostly beating cans. The one time he got a chance against a big name fighter, he was beating Jameel McCline until getting knocked out in the final round. Boswell may be 40, but moves about as well as any heavyweight out there, so it could be an interesting fight, if for no other reason than that Ustinov is laterally challenged. Also, Johnothan Banks faces Javier Mora in what looks like a stay busy fight.
Takalani Ndlovu takes on Kiko Martinez in a featherweight eliminator in a battle of Steve Molitor victims.
Martin Castillo continues his comeback against German Meraz. Between his chin (which was exposed to have degraded against Montiel) and his face (he's always been extremely prone to cuts, and he has scar tissue on both upper eyelids), he's probably done as a top fighter, but on a technical level he's up there with just about anyone ar 115 - 118.
Chop Chop Corley will try to continue his march back to respectibility, facing Harrison Cuello. While Corley had a string where he legitimately lost 5 out of 6, he should be undefeated in his last 5.

0 recs | Comment 18 comments | Share

Story-email Email Printer Print

Comments

Dunne card

RTE usually show a few fights from the card. They would have definitely have shown Andrew Murray’s fight, but he pulled out this week. That was a 12 rounder so they should have a bit of time to fill.

I would say they will probably show the Fury fight to because they are making a biggish deal about it being his first fight in Ireland.

Power vs. Sweeney is a pretty good domestic clash which could provide for some decent action, so they might throw that on to.

by Duan on Sep 24, 2009 9:58 AM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Since there’s nowhere better to say it and it doesn’t warrant its own story, FanPost or even FanShot, someone finally beat Faruq Saleem last night in NH. Thank God.

Bad Left Hook
"Well Howie, I think I'm going to stay outside and outjab him." -- Tex Cobb telling Howard Cosell how he would approach Larry Holmes

by SC on Sep 24, 2009 11:06 AM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Ha!

Lost to a 3-4 fighter. Go figure.

David Rodriguez is next.

Bad Left Hook - The SB Nation boxing blog
"Baseball is played on the field, not on a calculator."

by Brickhaus on Sep 24, 2009 2:15 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Pascal has to maybe fight Diaconu again?

Damn, when is he gonna get in the ring with Cloud or maybe Dawson?

by FunnyBigHat on Sep 24, 2009 2:12 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

He had a contractual rematch clause

And Diaconu stayed at the top of the sanctioning body rankings. Pascal-Diaconu did huge numbers in Montreal and was a great fight, so nobody’s complaining too much. When Pascal inevitably beats Diaconu again (I just don’t see any way Diaconu can beat him, other than an injury or fluke knockout), I suspect either (a) they’ll push him to fight a US fighter on US soil, since he has more of a name here than Bute, to try to get a Dawson fight, (b) they’ll have him fight winnable matches in Montreal, a la what Interbox is doing with Bute (although Pascal isn’t as big of a draw as Bute) or © they’ll have a Bute-Pascal match, which would easily be the biggest fight in Montreal history and for which they could possibly have the fight in Olympic Stadium with 60,000 screaming fans rather than the Bell Centre.

Bad Left Hook - The SB Nation boxing blog
"Baseball is played on the field, not on a calculator."

by Brickhaus on Sep 24, 2009 2:19 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

so a lot depends on bute-andrade i suppose?

by FunnyBigHat on Sep 24, 2009 7:18 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Kinda, but I’m in the camp that sees Andrade as such an underdog in that fight that as much as I’m glad it’s happening and believe it definitely should be, I’m already writing off Andrade. Don’t think Bute will make the same mistakes he did last time, and Bute making mistakes is about the only hope Librado has against a guy that much slicker than he is.

Bad Left Hook
"Well Howie, I think I'm going to stay outside and outjab him." -- Tex Cobb telling Howard Cosell how he would approach Larry Holmes

by SC on Sep 24, 2009 8:51 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Dunne fight NOT available for those outside Ireland

Unfortunately, the Dunne-Poon fight will NOT be available on the RTE website for those without an Irish IP address (i.e. anyone living outside of the island of Ireland). RTE is the national broadcaster, hence paid for by Irish tax payers, hence not available to those who don’t pay those taxes. And oddly enough, it’s very difficult to find a free Irish IP address – so you won’t be able to do a switch just to see the fight.

Anyway, I’m sure there will be someone doing another stream. If you google “watching RTE from outside Ireland” you should find a bunch of alternatives (there are plenty of Irish abroad who’ve found ways around it with slingboxes and the like).

Should be an excellent fight.. If the fight goes Dunne’s way it won’t be as action packed as his last (he’ll try to go the 12 while boxing on his bike), but Poon’s a little pitbull and Dunne doesn’t mind a fight either so it could go off at anytime. I’ll be close to ringside for this, really looking forward to it.

by MCM on Sep 24, 2009 3:33 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Weird — Dunne-Cordoba was available overseas for a lot of people. I couldn’t quite get the stream to work on my Mac, but it kept trying to work. It was a technical issue with me but people on BLH in the States did watch it. I hope Dunne makes his way onto a big card in the States sometime just so more people can see him. He’s a fuckin’ hoot.

Bad Left Hook
"Well Howie, I think I'm going to stay outside and outjab him." -- Tex Cobb telling Howard Cosell how he would approach Larry Holmes

by SC on Sep 24, 2009 3:55 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

I had no problem picking up the RTE stream from New York yesterday.

Bad Left Hook - The SB Nation boxing blog
"Baseball is played on the field, not on a calculator."

by Brickhaus on Sep 24, 2009 5:48 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Used to be able to pick up the ARD stream as well

Not sure if you can out of Germany anymore though. Reason they stopped was because they licensed the fights to Setanta, but Setanta no longer exists.

Bad Left Hook - The SB Nation boxing blog
"Baseball is played on the field, not on a calculator."

by Brickhaus on Sep 24, 2009 5:49 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

That is weird

Any time I’ve tried to watch RTE abroad I’ve been blocked. I’ve heard of the same thing you describe though – it works for a minute or so, then cuts out. But like you said, it was a technical issue for you.

Dunne definetly has the ability to go down well across the Atlantic. Have him fight against Vazquez or a decent name on Paddy’s Day, put Duddy-Lee on the undercard, and laugh all the way to the bank…

by MCM on Sep 24, 2009 4:00 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Yeah a card with Dunne, Duddy and Lee — even in separate fights — could do awesome in New York or Boston near St. Patrick’s Day.

Bad Left Hook
"Well Howie, I think I'm going to stay outside and outjab him." -- Tex Cobb telling Howard Cosell how he would approach Larry Holmes

by SC on Sep 24, 2009 4:07 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

some of my friends who are living abroad were watching the Cordoba fight on the RTE website definitely.

by Duan on Sep 24, 2009 4:28 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

brick

you’re insane if you don’t have JMM-Baby Bull as the FOTY

The Dude Abides

by battle axe of doom on Sep 24, 2009 6:16 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Have you seen Dunne-Cordoba? It’s a by God war and very arguably even better than JMM-Diaz.

Bad Left Hook
"Well Howie, I think I'm going to stay outside and outjab him." -- Tex Cobb telling Howard Cosell how he would approach Larry Holmes

by SC on Sep 24, 2009 7:11 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

i think so. wasn’t THAT impressed by it, in fact i voted against it in the fight of the month poll. too many one-sided rounds for my blood. might have to check it out again since both you and brick are backing it up and to be frank don’t remember it too much except that dunne got a dramatic KO

The Dude Abides

by battle axe of doom on Sep 24, 2009 7:20 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs