Left-Hook Lounge: Is Donaire Done?, Is Andrade Ready?, and Is Mikey Garcia Ready for the P4P list?

11/11/2013 Vivek Wallace

donaire44 Hannali R. (Reseda, CA): I thought Nonito Donaire proved that he still belongs at the top of the sport with his victory over Darchinyan. How did you rate his performance? And what do you think about Rigondeaux’s bizarre request to stage a rematch in Miami?

Vivek W. (ESB): To be quite frank, I see this purely the opposite of anyone who feels this effort either “places him” or “keeps him” at the top of the sport. What I saw in Donaire was a talent who appeared totally unsure of himself, and very limited – in terms of self confidence. I’m a long time proponent of pure fundamental skills, and although I’d stop short of calling Donaire a “hype job”, when I think of the accolades received that labeled him “Fighter of the Year” and beyond, I’d be the first to say he never really had the level of talent to support such claims. Donaire’s speed and power alone made him a phenom. Beyond those two attributes, he has very little left in the tool kit and we were reminded of this again, last Saturday night.

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Nonito Donaire is Bailed out by his Power in Texas

11/11/201311/10/2013 George Goddiess

donaire9 In boxing six years can be an eternity for the arc of a career and the landscape of different levels of class. Six years and fourteen pounds ago Nonito Donaire was not the pound for pound fighter he is today but a real unknown. His abilities and progress as a fighter had not shown anything indicating what was to come for the sensational fighter has ultimately become. He was heading into his first world title bout all the down at flyweight against an emerging star in Vic Darchinyan.

A very cocky Darchinyan was making his seventh defense of his International Boxing Federation championship and had been on an impressive run knocking out all in his path minus one exception. That exception was Glenn Donaire, the older brother of Nonito, who lost a technical decision after an accidental foul resulted in a broken jaw. Heading into this fight it did not appear that Nonito was going to bring anything into this fight that was going to stop the blossoming Darchinyan from continuing his drive toward the larger stardom of boxing as he was hyped to be capable of.

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Nonito Donaire proves his mettle in stopping Vic Darchinyan…again

11/10/201311/10/2013 Joseph Herron

donaire8 Although four division world champion Nonito Donaire had tasted defeat for the first time in twelve years when last seen in the ring, the Filipino Flash remained one of boxing’s premier fighters and an HBO attraction going into Saturday night‘s Featherweight grudge match with longtime nemesis Vic Darchinyan.

Since the disappointing loss to two time Olympic gold medal winner and Super Bantamweight Champion Guillermo Rigondeaux on April 13th, 2013, Nonito welcomed his first born son, Jarel Donaire, into this world and reconciled with his father, trainer, and mentor, Nonito Donaire Sr.

With the time away from the squared circle, the 30 year old fighter felt genuinely excited about the sport once again, and wanted to use the return bout with “The Raging Bull” as a gauge in which to measure his current level of boxing proficiency.

While most fight fans and boxing writers may not be able to determine his stature among the elite of boxing with last night’s performance, Nonito’s heart, grit, and physical durability was off the charts inspirational. Despite being a heavy favorite leading into the long awaited rematch, the Armenian born fighter gave Donaire Jr. everything he could handle in the squared circle.

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Donaire’s Left Hook: Save The Best For Last!

11/10/201311/10/2013 Alon Calinao Dy

donaire3 Nonito “The Filipino Flash” Donaire came out victorious tonight against Vic “The Raging Bull” Darchinyan at the American Bank Center in Corpus Christi, Texas.

Many observers said that Darchinyan was leading on the score cards until the stoppage and Robert Garcia, Donaire’s trainer, encouraged his prodigy to throw some combinations. In the 9th round, the Filipino fighter listened to the advice from his corner and he hurt and caught Darchinyan with his deadly left hooks, which sent every boxer he faced, to go down. When Darchinyan went down and couldn’t recover anymore to a fast flurry of punches from Donaire, referee Laurence Cole halted the fight to save the defenseless boxer.

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Garcia stops Martinez; Donaire TKOs Darchinyan in 9th; Andrade beats Martirosyan

11/10/201311/09/2013 Rob Smith

donaire1 As expected, Mikey Garcia (33-0, 28 KO’s) stopped WBO super featherweight champion Roman “Rocky” Martinez (27-2-2, 16 KO’s) in the 8th round on Saturday night at the American Bank Center, in Corpus Christi, Texas, USA. Garcia knocked Martinez down with a big left hook to the body in the 8th round. Martinez wanted to get up but he was too hurt to rise to his feet. The fight was then halted by referee Lawrence Cole 0:56 of the round.

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Nonito Donaire (32-2, 21 KO’s) looked like a shell of himself in having to go life and death to stop a way past his best Vic Darchinyan (39-6-1, 28 KO’s). Donaire caught Darchinyan with a left hand in the 9th to put him down. Donaire then loaded up with a series of single shots agaisnt a badly hurt Darchinhyan until referee Lawrence Cole stepped in and stopped the bout with Darchinyan still on his feet. The official time of the stoppage was 2:06.

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Nonito Donaire vs. Vic Darchinyan II: Revisionist historian

11/09/201311/09/2013 Joseph Herron

_MG_9679 On July 7th, 2007, a scarcely known Filipino fighter named Nonito Donaire challenged the consensus regarded “Lord of the Flies”, Vic Darchinyan, for his IBF 112 pound title, and defeated the heavily favored champion with one swift left hook in the fifth round of their scheduled twelve round contest.

Today, it’s hard not to recognize the ripple effect of that impactful punch. Both fighters ended up going in two different directions professionally as a result of that significant blow to the chin of the formerly undefeated and highly regarded champion.

Since that fateful day, Nonito Donaire has gone on to compete in many lucrative bouts on the biggest stage of boxing, picking up three more division world titles and becoming one of the more highly regarded fighters in the entire sport.

In contrast, the “Raging Bull” from Armenia has garnered a respectable record of 11-4-1 with six knock-outs since the initial bout with the “Filipino Flash”, but has fallen short of most initial observations as one of the most feared pound for pound punchers in the entire sport, circa 2007.

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Photos – Weigh-in: Garcia-Martinez, Donaire-Darchinyan, Martirosyan-Andrade

11/09/201311/08/2013 Steve Lopez

Boxing returns to the south this weekend in Corpus Christi, TX for another fall Top Rank tripleheader showdown on HBO Boxing After Dark.

Headlining the card is the WBO Super Featherweight title fight between Mikey Garcia and Roman “Rocky” Martinez. After losing his Featherweight title at the scales earlier this year, Garcia makes a move to the Super Featherweight division to challenge Martinez in another Mexico VS. Puerto Rico clash.

Co-headling the card is a rematch between Nonito Donaire and Vic Darchinyan. In 2007, Donaire derailed the Darchinyan express with a vicious left hook to end their first encounter via KO win for Donaire. Six years in the making, Darchinyan gets his chance at redemption. Having never fought at Featherweight, it will be interesting to see how Darchinyan’s chin holds up at the new weight. A heavy puncher himself, Darchinyan is oozing with confidence by ensuring a victory for himself and Armenia.

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Robert Garcia: “Darchinyan Really Hates Nonito Donaire”

08/01/201411/08/2013 Vitali Shaposhnikov

Team Donaire are not taking Vic Darchinyan lightly, assuming that the bad blood between the two fighters makes Vic more dangerous than ever before. Nonito Donaire’s trainer Robert Garcia believes that finally getting the rematch that Darchinyan had wanted so badly for all these years, is likely to push Vic to new higher limits in preparing for this fight.

“He really hates Nonito. We got to be very well prepared and very careful for a dangerous fight. Darchinyan could be a very dangerous opponent because he has nothing to lose. And I’m sure he trained like nothing before, because he wants this rematch so bad. Now that he’s got it, he’s going to do anything possible to win the fight,” said Robert Garcia in a recent interview with Hustle Boss.

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Donaire vs. Darchinyan 2 & Garcia vs. Martinez: A bridge to nowhere

11/08/2013 Chris Carlson

Normally when two elite fighters are co-featured on a card together you can expect the winners (favorites) to be matched up in a (super) fight of sorts at some point in the near future.

It’s a formula that’s been used to build or as Bob Arum would say “marinate”, certain fights that have been labeled by the fans as must see fights.

Usually the promoters put each fighter in a showcase type fight for future highlight replays that will be used as fuel to stoke the fire of a talked about fight.

Some fights never come to fruition due to the inner political issues of the business of boxing.

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Donaire/Darchinyan Interview Transcript

11/07/201311/06/2013 Top Rank

We have a terrific card coming up this Saturday at the American Bank Center in Corpus Christi, Texas, which will be televised Live on HBO® beginning at 9:30 p.m. ET/PT. The telecast will open up with the two top-rated contenders — both undefeated — in the junior middleweight division fighting for the vacant WBO title and coincidentally they are both former U.S. Olympians – Vanes “The Nightmare” Martirosyan taking on Demetrius “Boo Boo” Andrade; that will be followed by Nonito and Vic in their rematch; and the telecast will conclude with Roman “Rocky” Martinez defending his WBO junior lightweight title against former WBO featherweight champion, the undefeated Mikey Garcia. Robert Garcia will have his hands full Saturday night as he will be working the corners for both Donaire and Garcia.

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