Ahhh, March Badness. When boxing and MMA mixed cards become the standard (humor me), we will look back on this night and say, "That. That is what the people wanted -- nay! It is what the people demanded."

Do you like overblown commentators describing action that isn't there? Saying it must be that the crowd of MMA fans don't know good boxing? Sure, we all do!

Hey, do you like bad judges? Why am I even asking?! Who doesn't?!

How about terrible, indefensible stoppages from usually-great referees? Oh, well that'd be icing on the cake.

And at the end of the night, do we get to pretend that a once-great fighter needs to get back in the ring with legitimate competition and risk getting seriously damaged? Duh!

Bottom line: If you went into this show as an MMA fan that didn't much care for boxing, your mind did not change. And that's the same for boxing fans that didn't much care for MMA. The idea was nice. But I said when this card became serious that this was nothing more than a Roy Jones showcase where he was booking an unqualified, non-threatening opponent in order to audition for another big fight. And in the end, that's all it was.

Jones (53-5, 39 KO) got his first stoppage win since he wailed on Clinton Woods six and a half years ago when referee Tommy Kimmons stepped in to stop a fairly one-sided fight where Sheika (27-9, 18 KO) wasn't getting hurt. Yeah, Sheika was being hit clean. He was never once deterred or backed down. When Kimmons stopped the fight, Sheika was perplexed. I was, too. But this is what Pensacola wanted. This is what Jones wanted. This is why this fight took place.

No, I'm not saying "the fix" was in. But it was a very early hook pulled on a guy that was defending himself. Frankly, Sheika seemed more than comfortable to find an opening while Jones hot-dogged around the ring at 40 years old with no zip behind his punches.

This was a lot like the Tito Trinidad fight for Roy. He was comfortable because he knew he couldn't lose, so he shimmied, and he did his wiggles and his taunting and his other assorted crowd-pleasing bunch of crap. It's nice. It's cute. It delighted Pensacola, and the fans down there turned out and were electric for a lot of the show (though they loathed BJ Flores' borefest win over Jose Luis Herrera, and they weren't much kinder to the grappling contest between Jeff Monson and Roy Nelson in the MMA main event).

But it doesn't change anything.

It doesn't change that Roy Jones is a 40-year old fighter who looks every bit like a 40-year old fighter. Like I said in the Tito Trinidad fight, and was discussed in the fight thread tonight, it was like watching an old guy without the skills imitate Roy Jones. It's sad. This doofy win over Omar Sheika does not erase Jones' overwhelming loss to Joe Calzaghe last November, when Calzaghe gave Jones the second-worst beating of his entire career, trailing only the beatdown that Glen Johnson gave him.

Nothing new was learned. When Johnson knocked Jones out in 2004, people started saying he should retire. They were right. Five years later, nothing Jones has done -- a second loss to Antonio Tarver, four wins over inferior opponents and the Calzaghe debacle -- has proven those people wrong.

He should retire. He should have retired already. I love Roy Jones. I'm a huge fan. But this is getting downright sad to watch. Hey, if he wants to fight on against guys like Sheika and Prince Badi Ajamu and old, washed-up, blown-up welterweights, all the power in the world to him. Hope he makes a decent living. Hope he doesn't get hurt.

But this is nowhere close to a world-class fighter any longer. Just because he shimmies doesn't mean he's "back." The vintage Roy hasn't been seen since since his win over John Ruiz. He will never be seen again.

In other fights on the card:

• BJ Flores outpointed Jose Luis Herrera. Boring fight. Col. Bob Sheridan, veteran play-by-play man, explained that the crowd booed because they didn't understand just what a really good boxing fight this was. That's a load. It was a dull fight and Sheridan is the ultimate biased apologist. To Bob's credit, he's capable and enthusiastic, and he was the right guy for the job tonight since he knows the MMA game fairly well, too. But his biases are just absurd.
• As an aside, overall I thought the commentary was solid. Sheridan seriously got on my nerves during the Flores stinker, but other than that he worked well with both Campbell and Petruzelli, and the card never felt third-rate, as it could have with lesser commentators.
• Square Ring "prospect" Kieyon Bussey of Pensacola improved to 6-0 with a six-round decision win over pro opponent Robert LaDuz. The problem is that LaDuz clearly deserved the win and even Sheridan and Nate Campbell weren't buying this load. Prospect Bussey is 34 years old, by the way. Honestly, I'm not sure why Square Ring shoe-horned this fight onto the card in the downtime. To show everyone an example of grotesquely bad judging?
• Jeff Monson outpointed Roy Nelson in the night's MMA main event. Everyone here, Sheridan and Seth Petruzelli thought Nelson won the fight. C'est la vie!
• Din Thomas scored the KO of the night with a stoppage of Gabe Lemley in the best of the night's MMA fights.
  
• Bobby Lashley outpointed Jason Guida in a long, intensely dull heavyweight MMA bout. Lashley is learning on the job and Guida has one notable skill: making other guys look bad.
• Dennis Hallman submitted Danny Ruiz with a rear naked choke in the opening bout of the night.

I think it's impossible to say I'm disappointed with this show. I knew what we were getting. It didn't rock me that Sheridan was biased, that the Jones fight was exactly what anyone with a realistic outlook who has seen Jones in the last five years would expect, or that Sheika simply didn't belong in the ring with Jones after 17 months off and one fight since 2005. The MMA was your standard non-major promotion MMA. The boxing was your standard showcase fights, one for an old man hanging on, one for a guy who talks a nice game about fighting anyone and instead fights guys like Herrera and Matt Hicks.

It was nothing unexpected. It stunk. It was always going to stink.

If only Ken Shamrock had been there to save it...

Pre-fight notes:

• Klitschko-Gomez starts at 6pm ET on ESPN Classic. March Badness starts at 9pm on PPV.
  
• I listed all of Sheika's defeats because I couldn't pick the three most notable, and also to further say, "Hey, this guy's never beaten anyone, and has lost to every good fighter he ever faced besides a majority decision against Glen Johnson." He also lost to Tony Booth, who was 28-44-7 going into the fight.
  
• Herrera's other two losses were also stoppages. So he's 16-5 with 16 wins by knockout and five losses by knockout. He's like Alejandro Berrio II.

via d.yimg.com

The weights are in for tomorrow night's impending March Badness debacle:

Roy Jones Jr. - 173 1/4 ... Omar Sheika 175

Sheika initially came in at 175 1/2 but lost the weight.

BJ Flores 199 1/4 ... Jose Luis Herrera 199 1/4

All the MMA fighters were also on weight. I'm not particularly certain which MMA fights are actually going to be on the show past Lashley-Guida and I'd have to guess Monson-Nelson, but I'm hoping Din Thomas gets on the PPV.

It's a pickin' time of year. I'm currently enjoying the hell out of the start of March Madness and hope everyone else is, too, but there's fights to be decided this weekend as well.

Vitali Klitschko v. Juan Carlos Gomez (ESPN, Heavyweights, 12 rounds - Klitschko's WBC title on the line)

This is the real test of whether or not Vitali is "back," I think. I picked Vitali to beat Peter and though I didn't expect he'd totally overwhelm him, that's what we got. We saw Vitali against a fighter easy for him to hit, a guy that couldn't move, couldn't get inside of his piston-like jab, and just couldn't do anything with the tall, disciplined Klitschko. Sam gave Wlad a hard run a few years ago, but did nothing with Vitali, who may still be a better fighter than Wladimir is.

Gomez (44-1, 35 KO) has waited impatiently and is talking big. These two are familiar with one another from way back. Gomez is not a big hitter, but he's got some pop, he's got style, and he's a really confident guy. Vitali will have to hammer on him pretty hard to get him to go away.

I can't pick against Klitschko, but I'll say this: A Gomez win would not shock me in the least. Vitali's bill of health will never truly be clean ever again. His back problems could haunt him in any given fight.

The winner of this one likely faces 40-year old Oleg Maskave, though Vitali wants to take an optional fight between the two mandatories. I still think he's right to want that and to feel he deserves it. He just better not get totally ahead of himself. Klitschko UD-12

Roy Jones Jr. v. Omar Sheika (PPV, Light Heavyweights, 12 Rounds)

Roy's 40. Anything can happen when a guy's 40, and Sheika hits harder than Joe Calzaghe, who beat Roy up last November worse than anyone besides Glen Johnson ever has.

But Roy is not going to lose to Sheika, who hasn't fought since September 2007, and that is his only fight since September 2005. Sheika is a pawn in Roy's B.S. game, where he loses big to someone good and F's off back to the C-show circuit to grab some wins, hoping to fool people into thinking he'll ever be Roy Jones again. He will wipe the mat with Sheika, who is nothing more than a speed bump. Talent is talent and neither of these guys are near their best at this point. 70% of Jones is a lot better than 75% of Omar Sheika, if Sheika even has that left. This is a payday for Omar and a chance to knock out a legend if he can find that punch. Jones TKO-10

BJ Flores v. Jose Luis Herrera (PPV, Cruiserweights, 10 Rounds)

Flores will leave his schedule of ducking out of big fights and fighting fat amateurs to take a chance against Herrera, who has ended all 16 of his victories by way of knockout, and has been knocked out in every one of his five losses. Herrera is live here. Flores isn't a very big puncher, although he's not feather-fisted, either. BJ doesn't care about making an attractive fight either; recall the way he completely and easily avoided Darnell Wilson on ESPN2. I hope Herrera knocks him out. I really do. Flores UD-10

If you missed it, the MMA portion of Roy Jones Jr.'s upcoming March Badness show took a major hit when Ken Shamrock tested positive for steroids to beat a 400-pound man that had no business in the same ring as him.

Now in need of a replacement to fight former WWE star Bobby Lashley, Dave Meltzer reports that Lashley has approved two possible opponents: former heavyweight boxing champion Hasim Rahman and MMA legend Don Frye. Jones' Square Ring promotions offered up both to Lashley, and he accepted a fight with either, which shows some real guts. Lashley was a champion college wrestler, but his MMA inexperience is huge.

Square Ring reportedly prefers to use Rahman, perhaps because it would put boxing against MMA on the boxing/MMA show. They're trying to work out a deal right now.

Rahman, 36, last fought in December when he was picked apart and beaten down by Wladimir Klitschko. He was a replacement opponent there, subbing for the injured Alexander Povetkin.

Frye is 43 years old and hasn't been a top fighter in years, but he's got a ton of experience and is every bit as dangerous an opponent as Shamrock was, probably. They're both well past their primes, but at least Frye hasn't become a total schmuck.

Shamrock, for the record, is saying over the counter supplements caused a false positive. For three steroids, mind you.

The main event is Jones against Omar Sheika, of course. And BJ Flores is on the card, facing Colombian Jose Luis Herrera (16-5, 16 KO, all five losses by KO).

Even though Bloody Elbow's Brent Brookhouse is no longer in for covering the MMA fights on the show, I'll still be ordering this pile and doing a live, round-by-round on the 21st. I'm going to try to find an MMA dude that's ordering to do those fights since I'm not educated enough to do them. Any volunteers? Anyone ordering? Bueller? Bueller?

Roy Jones Jr. did an interview with Mike Harris at Sherdog.com recently, and had this to say about his upcoming "March Badness" pay-per-view:

“So to cure the stigma that we don’t like MMA or that we’re against it, to prove my point, I’m going to start promoting them too,” Jones said. “And they have a huge fan base too. They love fighting. Boxing. Ultimate fighting. It’s all still fighting.”

Jones said he does not understand the boxing-versus-MMA mentality.

“Why do people keep trying to pull us apart?” he asked. “Why not come together and make for an even bigger situation and make it better for both sports? MMA has something that boxing doesn’t have, which boxing needs to acknowledge.”

For those out of the loop, Jones' Square Ring Promotions will be putting on a pay-per-view show on March 21 from Pensacola, Fla., which will mix MMA and boxing for the first time on a "major" show.

On the boxing side, 40-year old Jones (52-5, 38 KO) will look to get back in the win column following a horribly one-sided loss to Joe Calzaghe in their bomb of a November pay-per-view, which had a lot of money behind it but was promoted terribly and featured an undercard that was even worse. He'll face 32-year old Omar Sheika (27-8, 18 KO), who hasn't fought since September 2007 and has lost both of his last two notable fights (Jeff Lacy and Markus Beyer).

Also, recently signed Square Ring cruiserweight contender B.J. Flores (22-0, 14 KO) will supposedly be in action, but we'll see if he has the guff to take on a legitimate opponent or if he'll just protect his IBF ranking and fight some schmoe, as he did on January 23, when he fought as a 207-pound heavyweight against 261-pound Matt "Hurricane" Hicks.

The MMA side is a little more interesting. Seth Petruzelli, the man who knocked out Kimbo Slice and then questionably dressed as him for Halloween, will take on former WEC light heavyweight (205 lbs.) champion Doug Marshall. In a heavyweight bout, noted troublemaking punk rocker bleehhh!!! Jeff Monson will fight Roy Nelson, and in the big interest-generating hail mary, former forgettable WWE star Bobby Lashley will be fighting.

I sort of want to think Roy is doing this for some sense of unity, but really I'd bet the farm that he's doing this to hopefully piggyback on the popularity of mixed martial arts -- or more accurately the popularity of UFC, which more people are starting to realize but few have yet to grasp -- and sell some PPVs in a crap fight against an opponent that hasn't fought in 17 months. Jones-Sheika is for Jones an attempt at a sure bet that he can win another one, let the Calzaghe loss get washed over, and land another money fight later this year. That's all it is.

And by including MMA, he's hoping to convince more people than loonies like me to pay for this card. If boxing and MMA are going to unify the fanbases (and it's unlikely to see any more of a crossover than it already has), it won't be because of fights like Jones-Sheika or Nelson-Monson.

Bad Left Hook and Bloody Elbow will be teaming up to cover "March Badness," as I'll handle the boxing portion of the show and BE's Brent Brookhouse will be doing the MMA portion. It should be an interesting night. But I guess at least in terms of the SB Nation combat blogs, Roy's unity mission is a success already.

When HBO Sports said that they would be cutting back on the number of boxing pay-per-views, which had to be at least somewhat influenced by a brutal American economy and the massive flops of Calzaghe-Jones (November) and Pavlik-Hopkins (October), I took it with a grain of salt. Or an economy sized box of Morton's kosher salt. Whichever.

I'm sure most did. We've heard that line before, but then here it comes, pay-per-view after pay-per-view. HBO even planned to put a fight between Shane Mosley and Zab Judah on PPV last May, which was bizarre. Mosley has never been a PPV draw besides his fights with Oscar de la Hoya, and has never drawn much period as the A-side of a fight. Great fighter? Yes. Money in the bank? No. And Judah has been teetering on professional opponent for a while now.

Luckily Judah fought a shower door for free and the PPV was scrapped, which led to Mosley facing Ricardo Mayorga -- another fight HBO had slotted for pay-per-view before putting Pavlik-Hopkins on instead -- and Judah facing Joshua Clottey on Boxing After Dark.

The sheer volume of pay-per-views and the lack of quality coming out of them for the price demanded ($44.95 to $54.95 for a top shelf main event, not in HD) has been a complaint for years.

HBO, to their credit, has no PPV scheduled unless they wind up as the producers and distributors of the May 2 Hatton-Pacquiao fight, which is likely. But that doesn't mean boxing as a whole isn't gearing up to fire off a series of five, count 'em, five pay-per-view shows in February and March.

What are we looking at here?

Today, for instance, a viewer with iNDemand pay-per-view might choose to order Ruslan Chagaev's heavyweight title defense against little-known, lightly-regarded Carl Davis Drumond. "Why would anyone pay to see that?" you might ask. Good question. For $24.95, it's a "bargain" (coughcough), and here in the lean sporting months there's little to watch sports-wise at two o'clock in the afternoon eastern. So maybe you're up for Chagaev-Drumond!

Hey, I'm not, but whatever floats your boat.

Is Bad Left Hook Gonna Cover It?: Not unless I stumble upon a stack of cash sometime between now and 1pm.

On February 21, Bob Arum's Top Rank brings us a double main event, two-site pay-per-view extravaganza live from both Youngstown, Ohio, and Madison Square Garden in New York City. Youngstown's Kelly Pavlik defends the middleweight championship of the world against Marco Antonio Rubio, and in the hallowed halls of the Garden, Miguel Cotto main events against Brit welter Michael Jennings. Both are rebound fights; let's not get it twisted. But there's also a useful undercard, with John Duddy facing off against Matt Vanda and Anthony Peterson matching up with two-time title challenger Edner Cherry.

What's that? Four watchable fights? Get out of here, Bob. That's not how boxing pay-per-view works.

$39.95 figures to be the going rate for the Pavlik and Cotto Show, and it sounds like a keeper.

Is Bad Left Hook Gonna Cover It?: Signed, sealed, delivered -- we'll be here for this bad boy.

Then we come to March 14, and another overseas show headed to American television sets by the wonder of point and click ordering. Offensive phenom Amir Khan will battle faded veteran Marco Antonio Barrera in a fight that could bring out the sleeping warrior in the Mexican legend, and could spell doom for the chinny Brit, whose "top prospect" tag was getting shaky enough before Breidis Prescott knocked his block off.

This one, though, is pretty much good news all around. Khan-Barrera could be a heck of a good fight, plus with Nicky Cook defending his 130-pound title against Roman Martinez and cruiserweight Enzo Maccarinelli facing ...well, Ola Afolabi, there's another actual undercard going on. Afolabi is a substitue for Argentina's Victor Ramirez, and not a very good one, either.

Also, this is likely to be another $24.95 card given the timeslot (American afternoon) and the fact that there's not a single American draw on the show, which might sound insulting to Barrera who still has his fans, but this ain't the Barrera of years ago and everyone knows it.

Is Bad Left Hook Gonna Cover It?: We're in it to win it.

March 21. Roy Jones. Omar Sheika. MMA on the undercard. Pensacola, Florida, are you ready?

Questions to ponder:

1. Will Jones and Square Ring try to pay Michael Buffer to be there?

2. Can Sheika, who turns 32 in February and hasn't fought since September 2007, muster up enough sock to knock Jones out and finish Roy's career?

3. If Jones wins, will he talk about how he wants to fight Antonio Tarver again? Remember, Tarver is a near lock bet to lose to Chad Dawson for the second time on March 14.

4. If Jones wins, will he try to call out Hopkins again?

5. If Jones wins, will he try to lure Calzaghe out of retirement, feeling that boxing fans simply must see the two legends square off in another exciting contest?

6. If Jones dominates, how many minutes (yes, minutes) will it take for the first article to pop up online that Jones looks "better than ever" at 40 years of age?

Is Bad Left Hook Gonna Cover It?: My utter mocking of this card and total non-belief in the idea that people have to mix boxing and MMA on the same card might lead you to think we're not coming within ten feet of this stinker. But chances are we're gonna do it. I'll cover Jones-Sheika and whatever other boxing fight(s?) are on the card, and if they actually do the MMA portion (color me skeptical, by the way), my good friend Brent Brookhouse of Bloody Elbow will be handling those fights, because even though I'm an MMA fan, my knowledge of the game is rudimentary in comparison, and when you've got the better option, hey, do it.

On March 28, Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. headlines his umpteenth "Latin Fury" card, which Mexican fans keep buying in enough numbers that Arum keeps happily shoving them into the marketplace, despite the fact that he all but flat-out admits, "Hey, for someone people buy this junk, so I'm gonna keep peddlin' it!"

Chavez will face an untested guy with a fluffed up record that no one's ever heard of, and on the undercard Fernando Montiel will face Eric Morel. I actually like Morel for the upset in that fight.

Is Bad Left Hook Gonna Cover It?: I have never and will never pay for a show Chavez Jr. main events. I can say that with full confidence, because he will never be good enough to main event a show truly worth buying. I don't begrudge him his financial success as the go-to "Latin Fury" guy, nor do I have any intense dislike of him. But I wouldn't pay to see Edner Cherry main event, either. If Chavez ever fights anyone worth a crap, it's the same career.

BoxingScene.com got word that Roy Jones, Jr., is in talks to headline an independently-produced pay-per-view event on March 21, against journeyman Omar Sheika.

What a...I don't know what the word I want would be. Rest assured this is absolutely no different than Jones' lame PPV fights against Prince Badi Ajamu and Anthony Hanshaw, and is simply a way for Jones to rack up a win against a guy who likely can't beat him no matter how faded he gets, which in turn positions Jones to tack on a W, stay out of the spotlight a little while staying active, and land a fight against another name guy in due time.

In short, I hate it, because it's just a ploy.

Sheika (27-8, 18 KO) is just a regular pug that keeps fighting on because that's what he does for a living. He's always been willing to fight just about anyone, and I like the guy as a fighter because of that. He'd come looking to put Roy on the canvas and finish his career. He's that sort of fighter. So in that regard, at least Roy's fighting a guy with hunger and a pulse if this goes through.

But he's just not good enough. Roy's natural skills, even depleted as he's just hit 40 (happy belated birthday, Roy!), are too much for a guy like Sheika to cope with. Sheika first lost to tomato can Tony Booth (28-44-7 entering that fight) back in 1998, but that was a fluke. His other losses have come to Joe Calzaghe, Thomas Tate, Eric Lucas, Scott Pemberton (twice), Jeff Lacy and Markus Beyer. He did beat Glen Johnson just before his 2000 fight with Calzaghe, but like most of Johnson's losses, it was debatable.

My reaction to this news is probably as predictable as Lake Michigan being cold this time of year, but even though I'm shouting down a well with this one, it deserves to be said. Anyone that pays to see Jones-Sheika (and I might be one of them) will almost certainly get the sham it looks like on paper.

Roy Jones, Jr., told the Pensacola News Journal that he wants to fight again on March 21, hopefully in his hometown (Pensacola, naturally). He also says if he can't find a deal at the Pensacola Civic Center (he won't), he'll look to fight in Biloxi, Miss. (far more likely)

Jones, who turns 40 tomorrow (happy birthday, Roy!), last fought in November, and was taken apart at the seams by Joe Calzaghe on one of the world's worst-ever pay-per-view events.

Jones has not once indicated any desire to hang up the gloves since that loss, which I put only behind the TKO loss to Glen Johnson as the worst beating of his career. He's also contacted Lou DiBella about making a fight with Jermain Taylor, but that's as far as that rumor has gone.

Prior to the Calzaghe and Trinidad fights of 2008, the latter being more an exhibition than a prize fight, it's sort of easy to already forget that Jones was fighting once a year on low-budget pay-per-views against the likes of Prince Badi Ajamu and Anthony Hanshaw. More likely than not, should he press ahead with a March return, he's looking at that sort of B- or C-list opponent again.

I'm sure there are plenty of guys that would love to take a shot at the weathered former P4P king right now. To add his scalp still means a little bit, particularly to a fighter in need of a boost. I don't think Roy will have trouble finding an opponent. I do think he'll have a lot of trouble finding a name opponent that is going to agree to his pay demands.

He's not box office, he's not a top fighter, and he's just plain over the hill. I'd rather Roy leave a fight too soon than a fight too late, and every time he goes out there now he's risking the latter. Still, best of luck to him.