PAULIE’S MAD AS HELL
Pittsburgh, PA– Paulie “Magic Man” Malignaggi (26-3, 5 KOs) shoots off his mouth like he shoots jabs – fast, constantly, and often without much to back it up. But, Saturday night in Houston, many believe that he earned to right to vociferously complain by outboxing local favorite Juan “Baby Bull” Diaz (35-2, 17 KOs). Texas udge Gale Van Hoy’s lopsided 118-110 scorecard reinforced Malignaggi’s paranoia, along with an HBO Boxing After Dark crew that unanimously seemed to favor the New Yorker.
SCORING A CONTROVERSIAL FIGHT
The underdog outsider used his size, speed and movement to clearly win round one, and he often performed at his best throughout the bout. However, after Diaz dominated the second and Malignaggi took the third, my scorecard had Diaz sweeping the net six (though a few frames could have gone either way) by landing the bigger power punches. The Magic Man touched Diaz a lot, but the Texan’s commitment to his punches gave his much greater effect, as he landed the contest’s most significant blows with many flush head and body shots.
WHAT DID YOUR SCORECARD READ?
The Brooklyn veteran outboxed Diaz in the 10th and 11th, before the aggressive younger man landed several big shots to earn the 12th and a 116-112 nod on my scorecard. Therefore, I have no quarrel with judges Raul Caiz, Sr.’s or David Sutherland’s scores of 115-113 or 116-112 for Diaz; a poll of bloggers Sunday had a clear favoring Malignaggi, though. (I wonder whether there is an HBO influence there, since the BAD crew seemed to be watching a different fight than me.)
YOU CAN’T BE RIGHT, ‘CAUSE THAT WOULD MEAN I’M WRONG
For those of you licking your chops to issue your scathing blogs at me, consider: My card, scored each round before I knew HBO scorer Harold Lederman’s, (whose card is Exhibit A for Malignaggi supporters), agreed precisely with his, with the exception of only three rounds – the sixth, eighth and ninth. Here are the stats for those rounds, according to CompuBox:
Total Punches Power Punches
Sixth: 20-18 Malignaggi 16-9 Diaz
Eighth: 16-14 Diaz 9-5 Diaz
Ninth: 16-15 Malignaggi 8-3 Diaz
LAURENCE COLE – AT IT AGAIN
More than the scoring, I was troubled by referee Laurence Cole’s apparent disregard of the rules – again – by twice appearing to illegally ask others where Diaz’ cuts came from. Moreover, for Diaz’ second cut, he could be overheard asking Van Hoy whether he saw an elbow before ruling it an accidental head butt, implying that he ruled a butt where he saw none, another violation of the rules. Cole got himself into trouble three years ago by advising Juan Manuel Marquez, after a cut, that he was well ahead on points if he wanted to quit and take a decision. With his dad, Dickie Cole, at the head of Texas boxing, Laurence seems to operate with impunity; fortunately in this case, his errors did not affect the bout’s outcome. That didn’t save him from the Magic Man’s wrath, which for that matter included the Texas Commission, Van Hoy, Caiz, Golden Boy Promotions, the media, HBO, agents, the city of Houston, the guy in the third row… well, you get the point.
Brian Gorman