Showtime serves legal notice over Ward-Dirrell
by Scott Christ on Sep 6, 2010 11:53 AM EDT
in Boxing News Analysis
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Lem Satterfield of FanHouse reports that Showtime has notified promoters Gary Shaw and Dan Goossen that the fight between Andre Ward and Andre Dirrell must happen by early October, and preferably on the original September 25 date, or a lawsuit could come into play.
Ward and Dirrell, close friends outside of the ring, have not had their promoters settle a negotiation or a venue for their bout. There were rumors that Dirrell was considering not fighting Ward a while back, but he has denied that. Meanwhile, he recently said the fight was postponed, which his promoter Shaw said isn't the case, but Shaw also says that they don't have the fight done, and given that it's September 6 and the original date was September 25, it doesn't take a rocket surgeon to figure out that the fight happening on September 25 is, in the words of Gorilla Monsoon, highly...unlikely.
Ward (22-0, 13 KO) has emerged as one of the top up-and-coming stars in American boxing in the last year, dismantling Mikkel Kessler late in 2009 to kick off the Super Six World Boxing Classic, and dominating Allan Green in June. Dirrell (19-1, 13 KO) is considered by many to be the man in the Super Six who has the tools to defeat him, if anyone does. He rebounded from his first pro loss last year to Carl Froch with a win over Arthur Abraham in March.
Recently, Kessler dropped out of the Super Six with an eye injury, forcing Showtime to go into the tournament's semifinals. Froch and Abraham are set to meet on October 2 in Monaco in one semifinal, with Ward and Dirrell in the other bout. The winners will meet in the finals sometime in the first quarter of 2011, or at least that would be ideal.
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If these two little prima donnas don’t chill out and honor their contracts, their fans, and the tournament, I hope Showtime buries them alive. I hope they know that if they do anything at all serious to damage this tourney, their creds will be zero with matchmakers, boxing fans, and probably even their own promoters, who’ll be finding them a lot harder to promote. Get it on.
Friends fighting each other
Well I dont know how close these guys are, but if they are really close like best friends, this fight might turn out to be like The Williams Sisters in tennis playing each other in a big match. Where neither wants to look to good against the other or do something to show the other one up. Almost like each one is hoping that the other one actually beats them so they wont go home feeling bad about beating their sibling. If its gonna be a fight like that, then I actually hope that the fight doesn’t happen because a fight like that will do more damage to their careers then them not fighting at all imo. I mean why sit through a 12 round fight watching guys pulling their punches and not jumping on their hurt opponent and all of the touching gloves and hugging before and after each round similar to the Pacquaio-Clottey fight…….. I would just rather not see it.
And remember, this wouldn’t be the first time that two boxers have turned down a match between each other because of friendship; Mike Tyson and Riddick Bowe did not fight because of their friendship. Both guys were in the heavyweight division at the same time and were both great fighters that could’ve met in their prime, but both came out and said that they will never fight each other because they were close friends. So it would’nt be the first time that fighters have declined to fight each other becasue of friendship.
well
they kind of were aware they would have to fight each other before entering the tourney, and its very possible to be friends outside the ring before a fight, fight hard and be friends again after. Thats happened infinitely more times than turning down a fight due to friendship, it is a business after all.
Ah, and I don’t know about the Williams sisters. I don’t know if that plays both ways, it always seems that Venus is by far the likelier one to ‘let’ Serena win, as the latter looks by far the worse loser. But Dirrell and Ward entered knowing that only one of them could win, and it could have to be by going through the other. I’m sure that (obviously I guess) the issue is that, in a close fight, the hometown judging will play a big factor and thats why Ward’s camp want it so badly at home and Dirrell’s want it anywhere but. Its not, ‘oh, suddenly I don’t want to fight by best friend’, IMHO
Couldn’t agree more with the touching gloves and hugging in Pacquiao-Clottey…it was all rather bemusing
I hated every minute of training, but I said, ‘’Don’t quit. Suffer now and live the rest of your life as a champion.'’ (Bernard Hopkins)
Yeah I understand that they were aware of the fact that they would eventually have to face each other. My point is if these two guys dont want to fight each other and someone has to force these guys to fight by threatining a lawsuit, if they do decide to fight it wont be a quality fight. It will be a fight that was made for the prevention of a lawsuit. Both guys will be going through the motions flicking soft jabs, clinching and smiling at each other the whole fight.
Thats all Im saying. Im not saying that because guys are friends that they should be given a pass not to fight. Im just saying that maybe boxing can do without this fight if its only going to happen to prevent a lawsuit. Because if it happens it can be a real letdown.
And yeah I agree that Venus being the older sister of the two probaly would feel contrite if she beat her sister in a fashion of another opponent with no kinship to her.
It is pathetic that they can’t get a venue after so many months of planning… and we can’t have Ward have all his fights in his home base…
"Boxing is dirty," said Casamayor. " The day I’m not ready to be a dirty fighter is the day I don’t fight anymore because it will mean that I have no heart for it anymore."
we can’t have Ward have all his fights in his home base
Well then tell someone else to start drawing. The only fight of his three in the tournament that would’ve made any sense not being in Oakland was Kessler.
Bad Left Hook
"To the town of Agua Fria rode a stranger one fine day..."
The real question is how much is Shaw willing to give Goossen in order to have the fight not in Oakland, because any other venue will draw a significantly smaller gate. Sometimes this cost can be offset by a casino bidding for the fight but I bet there aren’t too many takers from Vegas or else this wouldn’t be an issue. So this is literally a pay up or shut up situation for Shaw, since he is the one stalling this process.
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