Joseph Agbeko retained his IBF bantamweight title with an upset of top ten pound-for-pounder Vic Darchinyan in Sunrise, Florida. (via www.boxnews.com.ua)

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It wasn't the Fight of the Year candidate it had potential to be, but after 12 mean, ugly and spirited rounds of brawling, IBF bantamweight titlist Joseph Agbeko retained with a tight unanimous decision over top ten pound-for-pounder Vic Darchinyan on Showtime from Sunrise, Florida.

Agbeko (27-1, 22 KO) won on scores of 116-111, 114-113 and 114-113 in a fight that featured multiple headbutts, low blows, elbows, shoves and trips. There was little technique on display whatsoever and it seemed like Darchinyan had reverted back into his pure "destroyer mode." Agbeko never seemed dented by Darchinyan, whose power just may not travel up to 118 pounds, but also acquits Agbeko as one tough son of a gun. There is no denying that Agbeko took Darchinyan out of his game, or perhaps that Darchinyan simply wasn't "feeling it" tonight. He came in at 127 pounds for the fight, with Agbeko at 121.

By the end of the night, Darchinyan was a bloody mess from punches and illegal shots. I had Agbeko winning 114-113 on the strength of a 12th round that Darchinyan simply didn't fight. He could have won this fight. He lost early, came back, rallied, and found his way into the bout. He had a chance to win. He didn't do it.

Darchinyan (32-2-1, 26 KO) is back to the drawing board after this one. He doesn't lose a lot; he lost to a good, rough fighter that stood up to him and could take his shots, and picked at him enough with sneaky lead rights to score points. He hurt Darchinyan far more than Darchinyan even bothered him with punches, and if Agbeko had a better left hook to throw in, he might well have stopped Darchinyan the way Nonito Donaire did.

It was definitely a disappointing night for the Armenian, but Vic will be back because he'll fight anyone. For Agbeko, I hope this means another big fight. Hell, I wouldn't even mind a rematch if neither of them can find something more lucrative, and given the shape of the bantamweight division and even 115 and 122, there just might not be much there.

On the undercard, Anges Adjaho tried to flop his way into referee help, but instead was counted out against Antonio DeMarco. The fight started very slowly before developing into a pretty fun throw-down.

We'll have more tomorrow, and we want to end the night's coverage by saying it one more time: Rest in peace, Arturo.

Tonight's round-by-round of Agbeko-Darchinyan is dedicated to the memory of Arturo Gatti. May you rest in peace, "Thunder."

"No matter how many times they remake King Kong, the ending is always the same. It's beauty that kills beast. Who's more beautiful in the ring than I am?" -- Vic Darchinyan

"Vic is always talking about his power and about how he's this and that, but I've watched a couple of his fights and never saw that power. I'm going to let him do whatever he wants to do in this fight because I can do whatever he does better than him." -- Joseph Agbeko

Joseph Agbeko and Vic Darchinyan were both under the 118-pound bantamweight limit at the weigh-in for Saturday's title fight in Florida.

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The weights are in from Sunrise, Florida, for tomorrow night's big Showtime fight card. Main eventers Joseph Agbeko and Vic Darchinyan both came in under their 118-pound limit, with Darchinyan at 117.5 and Agbeko at 116.5.

The televised undercard feature at lightweight has Antonio DeMarco at 134.5, with Anges Adjaho at 135 on the nose. The only other reported weight from what is really a pretty stacked card has cruiserweights Steve Cunningham and Wayne Brathwaite well under the 200-pound limit. Cunningham tipped the scales at 195, with Brathwaite a half-pound lighter.

Those three fights could've made a nice (if affordable) pay-per-view show, really, no lesser than any of Top Rank's Latin Fury shows. I'm not complaining, really, I just wish Cunningham-Brathwaite were also being televised, but what can you do?

We'll be here tomorrow at 9 ET for round-by-round coverage of the card, so join us and chime in!

HT: Rick Reeno & Jake Donovan

It's been a while, but finally there's another major fight to get down some proper picks. For those of you with casually interested boxing friends like I have, or those that you've made into boxing fans like I have, or even the skeptics who went, "That's it?" when you invited them over for some big fight, this is one to recommend.

Joseph Agbeko v. Vic Darchinyan (Saturday, Showtime, 9 ET - 12 Rounds - Agbeko's IBF bantamweight title on the line)

This is one of those fights that has Fight of the Year Contender stamped all over its violent face. Vic Darchinyan (32-1-1, 26 KO) would probably leap into my pound-for-pound top five were he to dominate Joseph Agbeko in this fight. It'd be a third weight class where he's won a title belt, and he cleaned out 115 pounds to the point where there was legitimately no reason to stay any longer. He's been phenomenal in his last three fights, the best he's ever looked, dominating Dmitri Kirilov, Cristian Mijares and Jorge Arce. All three of them were completely out of their depth against the re-focused "Raging Bull."

"Bull," meet "King Kong" Agbeko. Born in Ghana and now living in the Bronx, Agbeko is a double-tough customer with good power (26-1, 22 KO), tons of guts, and an ability to win a war, which he'll probably have to do against Darchinyan. In terms of pure boxing skills, Darchinyan is his superior, an underrated technician who pulls it out to gain control of a fight. Darchinyan mixing his old amateur form with the "crab-style" power game he's known for has made him one of the best fighters in the sport today. Agbeko will need to out-bomb him to win, I believe.

And there's the rub: If this turns into a firefight, all bets are off. We have seen Vic Darchinyan knocked silly by Nonito Donaire at 112 pounds. Yes, it was one of the most perfectly timed punches you'll ever see, but he was in freaking Dreamland. Agbeko has the sort of power that can dent Vic's chin if he gets to it, and he's not going to stop trying to get to it.

We didn't do a picks thread for Ortiz-Maidana, but if we had, I would've told you that was a 50-50 fight to me on paper. Like that one, this has a favorite, but it's a toss-up bout in my view. Darchinyan deserves to be in that favorited role. But Agbeko is an excellent opponent and the type of guy it's hard to bet against. He won't have much real size advantage and he doesn't figure to be the most daunting opponent of Vic's career. That has turned out to be Donaire, obviously, and many felt that Mijares would totally dominate Vic, too. He didn't. Darchinyan is not the same fighter he was when he lost to Donaire.

I expect a war, I expect fireworks, and I expect some mean-spirited fighting. This is gonna be a good one. Darchinyan TKO-11

Non-Official Pick: Give me Antonio DeMarco in a heck of a good undercard scrap over Anges Adjaho.

Shawn Hawk will try going tribal on "Too Smooth" Matt Godfrey.

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Friday, July 10

Sky Sports, 5 p.m. Eastern, Lee Haskins v Ross Burkinshaw

ESPN2, 10:00 p.m. eastern, Matt Godfrey vs. Shawn Hawk; Shaun George vs. Chris Henry.  Two very solid fights on the same FNF card, although I have to say I find the George vs. Henry undercard to be more compelling.  George and Henry are both on the fringes of the light heavyweight top 10.  For those of you who like watching classic fights, Holyfield-Bowe I and II will be leading into the show.

Saturday, July 11

ZDF, 4:00 p.m. eastern, Felix Sturm vs. Khoren Gevor; Sebastian Zbik vs. Domenico Spada.  I'd venture that Gevor is the best fighter Sturn has faced since de la Hoya, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if Gevor wins, completely sinking any Pavlik-Sturm talks.  Zbik-Spada is an eliminator to become one of Pavlik's mandatories. 

Showtime, 9:00 p.m. eastern, Vic Darchinyan vs. Joseph "King Kong" Agbeko, Antonio DeMarco vs. Agnes Adjaho.  We'll be providing round by round coverage of this fight that, on paper, looks like a FOTY candidate. 

Mainevents.com, 10:00 p.m. eastern ($9.99), Tomasz Adamek vs. Bobby Gunn, Henry Crawford vs. Dennis "The Momma's Boy" Douglin, Piotr Wilczewski vs. Curtis Stevens.   Main Events has really gone downhill as a promoter.  At this point, it's pretty much just Adamek.  They're trying to turn Crawford into a prospect, but he's still facing semi-bums 22 fights into his pro career, although Douglin has an awesome nickname.  Wilczewski is also undefeated, but Stevens is a HUGE step up for him. 

ESPN Deportes, TV Azteca, 10:00 p.m. Eastern, Cristobal Cruz vs. Jorge Solis; Eric Ortiz vs. Julio Miranda.  Cruz is an entertaining fighter who became a beltholder and is much better than his record indicates.  Still, Solis, who beat Cruz via wide decision in 2003, has to be the favorite in this one.  Despite being a no-name fight at the time, Pacquiao's victory over Solis could still end up being a pretty solid win.  Ortiz vs. Miranda is a flyweight eliminator. 

Elsewhere in the world:

• In one of the all-time annoying television decisions, there's a real solid cruiserweight eliminator on the Darchinyan-Agbeko undercard, but it won't be televised.  U.S.S. Steve Cunningham will square off against "Big Truck" Wayne Braithwaite.  Cunningham should have risen to prominence after his fight of the year candidate against Tomasz Adamek, but Don King continues his mismanagement, and he's off TV.  It's pretty sad that less than a year after Adamek-Cunningham, neither one can make it onto television.  Romanov-Angulo was originally on the undercard as well, but that fight was moved to the beginning of August.  It was just a waste to have too many good fights on the same card when half of them weren't being televised. 
• Selcuk Aydin and his little tiny T-rex arms will try to beat slugger Sugar Jackson Bonsu.  As I've mentioned before, it's pretty sad that this is a big fight in the welterweight division.  Just not much depth at all in the weight class.
• Philip N'dou faces Lovemore N'Dou in a battle of N'Dous that Scott is pumped about.  Phillip was retired for about 5 years after getting beat down by Floyd Mayweather, so we'll see how rusty he is.  If he's anywhere close to what he used to be, he should blow out Lovemore, but Lovemore will at least make the fight exciting and try to bang.
• A number of big fights will be in Japan next Wednesday.  Elio Rojas takes a crack at Takahiro Aoh's featherweight title.  Hozumi Hasegawa will face off against solid contender Nestor Rocha in attempting his 10th title defense.  Roman Gonzalez will tace off against Katsunari Takayama, who has a win over former titlist Isaac Bustos and close losses to titlists Eagle Kyowa and Yutaka Niida.
• Choi Tseveenpurev has his first fight since his big upset of Derry Matthews over a year ago.  Since then, not only has he lost all his momentum, but Matthews has lost again so his win doesn't even look as good as it did at the time.  He'll be facing Alfred Tetteh. 
• Billy Dib is back in action tomorrow.  I think they put him in Fight Night Round 4 just so people could have the satisfaction of beating the crap out of him.  As bad as his fight against Luevano was, he's still only 23, and I have seen him in some more entertaining fights (in a defensive entertainment kind of way), so he may be back at some point.

No chance of a rematch between Nonito Donaire and Vic Darchinyan happening any time soon, says Darchinyan promoter Gary Shaw. And he's got a lot of reasons.

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Michael Marley spoke with Gary Shaw this weekend, and Shaw tried to set the record straight on a potential rematch between Nonito Donaire and his man, Vic Darchinyan. You will recall that Donaire scored one of the decade's most scintillating knockouts when he stopped Darchinyan on a left hook in 2007, the only loss in Vic's career.

But despite the idea that many of us have had that Shaw may be holding a grudge against Donaire for leaving him, or that he simply didn't want to make the fight again, Gary says that's not the case.

"Vic is just moving up in weight from 112 to 115 and then to 118 and eventually to 122 pounds," Shaw said. "Vic is doing this the way Manny Pacquiao did it. I have no problem making such a rematch but who will buy it, who will pay the freight?

"If someone called from the Philippines and said, hey, we’ve got $2 million for Darchinyan, we’d go there in a heartbeat. Vic and I love the Philippines and the great boxing fans in that country. But I don’t see that happening, do you?

"If (Showtime boxing boss) Ken Hershman called with that kind of an offer, if he said he’d pay us $2.3 million, then we’d fight Donaire again also. Donaire is with Top Rank and yet I have never had a phone call from either Todd duBoef or from Bob Arum about a rematch. And HBO shows no interest in this particular fight, either."

Is there less money in Donaire-Darchinyan II than there is in Darchinyan against Joseph Agbeko? Given Showtime's wonderful support of Darchinyan, it would seem to me that they'd probably be all on board for a Darchinyan revenge storyline.

Shaw said the accusations that he is holding some kind of personal grudge against Donaire, who used to be under his wing, are false.

"My job for Vic, for any fighter, is to get the most money along with most exposure. What has Donaire been doing since he beat Vic? Not much, really. Top Rank gets more exposure and publicity for the Russian kid (7-0 middleweight Matt Korobov) than they do for Donaire.

"Vic has Joseph Agbeko July 11 on Showtime," Shaw said. "We have to get past that after we already got past Cristian Mijares and Jorge Arce. Then we can go to 122 and look at Israel Vazquez."

I'm not trying to be a stickler, but apparently he hasn't heard the news that Vazquez won't be fighting at 122 pounds anymore. That's not going to happen.

Where he's absolutely, 100% right is this: Donaire left Shaw in order to get more and better fights made. With Top Rank, he hasn't really done that yet. He's lost a ton of steam from what should have been a star-making performance against Darchinyan, where he not only knocked Vic out but dominated the entire fight. Darchinyan was outclassed that night. Would it happen again? I don't know. Vic has learned from that fight and become a much more well-rounded fighter, and is currently among the best in the sport.

He's also right in that right now, I can't see where it would happen. Darchinyan's stopping off next at 118. If successful, he might try 122. He might even go higher than that. Donaire is right now stepping up to 115 pounds to fight a guy that was at his best at 108. They're not on the same path right now, and I've abandoned hopes of seeing their rematch for the time being simply because it doesn't add up. Gary Shaw gets tons of flak, but it's not like he isn't making some sense here. The fight isn't going to happen for any number of reasons.

I also found one other quote interesting, regarding Darchinyan-Agbeko:

I asked Shaw what sense the Darchi-Agbeko title bout made in Ft. Lauderdale.

"None, it should’ve been in LA where we could get a lot of Armenians to come out for Vic. But that was Don King’s call. I don’t understand it."

There you have it. Don King: Weird.

Toshiaki Nishioka went to hostile territory in Mexico and beat Jhonny Gonzalez by TKO in three rounds. (via www.ring-japan.com)

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WBC 122-pound titlist Toshiaki Nishioka recovered from a first round knockdown to crush Jhonny Gonzalez in the third, and Rafael Marquez returned to the ring after 14 months out of action with a three-round stoppage of Jose Francisco Mendoza in Monterrey.

Nishioka (34-4-3, 21 KO) was fighting outside of Japan for the first time in five bouts. The hostile territory and good opponent proved no great task, and the early stoppage of Gonzalez (40-7, 34 KO) could make him an attractive opponent for a lot of guys at 122. The alphabet strap doesn't hurt, either.

The return of Marquez (38-5, 34 KO) is probably even bigger news for most fight fans, as it could well set up a fight with Juan Manuel Lopez or a fourth bout with Israel Vazquez later this year.

In the UK, Tyson Fury stayed unbeaten with a second round TKO of Scott Belshaw, and Darren Barker beat Darren McDermott (TKO-4) in the middleweight main event.

Witter-Alexander to be paired with Agbeko-Darchinyan

The 140-pound title bout between Junior Witter and Devon Alexander will take place in Florida and be televised on Showtime as part of the July 11 show main evented by Joseph Agbeko and Vic Darchinyan. It's a really nice grab for the show and for Showtime.