The Lightweight Odyssey: All Roads Lead Around or Away From Johnston

By Phillip Przybylo

March 17, 2000: Stevie Johnston dominates Julio Alvarez and sends him packing inside of two rounds in front of 8,000 hometown fans. Johnston for the majority of the last year has been regarded as the best lightweight of the world. His decimation of the competent contender further confirms the fact that this man is one of the shining stars of the sport and may be among the top five pound-for-pound in the world.

January 2002: With no upcoming fight of note and no title, Stevie Johnston is floundering near the borders of obscurity.

The man known as "Little But Bad" is flawlessly fluent when he gets into a groove inside the ring. Outside the ring, the direction of the 5'5" wonder's career has been marred with anything but a flawless course. From the top of the lightweight mountain, Stevie Johnston has descended to also-ran status on a lot of "lightweight contenders" lists within a year and a half.

The situation brings up the adage, "Oh, how the mighty have fallen" to mind. Or better yet, it begs the question: how exactly did the mighty fall?

Grocery List of Reasons

First, it was the fighters who hurt Stevie, but not in the way one would think. Whether it was the empty promises of other titleholders or notable contenders who did not really want a piece of the man, especially after he lost his belt, Johnston could never find the right fight to garner the mainstream publicity he deserved. The disrespect of sanctioning bodies displayed by their monthly ratings has also played a factor. The ratings have stalled a great career while not forcing so-called champions to fight the best. Even his very own promoter, Top Rank, has not had a great track record in guiding and protecting their fighter.

The small in stature Johnston is back in grade school again. This time, instead of the big bad bullies slapping a "kick me" sign on his back, a large "duck me" sign has replaced it. As any lightweight worth his salt knows, in order to be successful, one must do one thing: avoid the "Little But Bad" one.

Weight Not The Only Thing 135 lb'ers Are Light In

Not everyone is a guilty party, and this is no conspiracy by any means. Sugar Shane Mosley was in top form while Johnston held the WBC version of the lightweight title twice. I believe it was Pedro Fernandez who reported that the Mosley camp went so far as to offer Stevie a mid-six figure payday. Unfortunately, Johnston had just come off the biggest win of his career over Cesar Bazan, and Mosley was in now-or-never mode. It was just a case of bad timing. The fight never came off in 1999 as Mosley had to move up in weight. Just because Mosley has the heart of a champion, that does not mean others may be lacking a little in that department.

August 20, 1999: Paul Spadafora wins the IBF trinket by out-pointing and outright dominating Israel Cardona. In the television interview proceeding the fight, Spadafora talks of unifying the lightweight championship. Johnston's name pops up, and Spaddy pretty much agrees that he will have to go through him. Within mere seconds, Spadafora backs down and talks about getting in a couple of easy defenses before anything. The words "Stevie Johnston" are never seriously uttered by the Pittsburgh Kid again.

When Johnston chose to fight Jose Luis Castillo, he did not have to. He probably would have avoided him if he had known the number of prime years of his boxing career it would cost. In June of 2000, Johnston and Castillo squared off for Stevie's WBC championship in Bell Gardens, CA, USA. In a telecast for ABC (likely the #1 network at the time), both men engaged in an ugly battle. Castillo was even deducted a point for holding and hitting. The point did not matter as an extreme injustice was done. Given his cleaner punching, this scribe had the fight scored 7-4-1 in favor of the champion and was thinking to be generous to the challenger. The judges had it by scores of 114-114 and 116-111 (!) and 115-113 in favor of Castillo. It may have been the ugly nature of the bout, or it may have been the fact that Oscar De la Hoya and Shane Mosley fought about seven hours later, but there was no outrage from the media.

Castillo returned the favor and took on Stevie three months later. It was the same ugly fight with Castillo doing his best rendition of an octopus, usually tangling up one of Stevie's arms while inside. Johnston was definitely more vibrant this time around, though. He not only landed cleaner punches, but had more effective punches than his last time out. When the scorecards were announced, Johnston held his title once again. Ten minutes later, an error in adding the cards up had been discovered, and a majority draw was the new verdict. Once again, this scribe had Johnston winning 7-5 in rounds. Once again, there was no outrage by the media for a man who was never highly publicized to begin with. For a second time, Stevie himself thought he had won the fight. Rather than face the most skilled opponent of his career who wanted to fight for a third time, Castillo has since elected to fight other men, a couple of them not of the greatest ability.

Someone like Juan Lazcano has opted not to face Johnston even once. With him and Johnston numbers two and one, respectively, in the WBC ratings for months, it would have made sense for Lazcano to face-off with "Little But Bad." He would surely earn his title shot that way. Instead, his team has lobbied with the WBC for their shot, which brings us to the easiest targets in the game.

WBC, IBF Get It Wrong

It is hard to believe that Angel Manfredy has been awarded another title shot, but he is the mandatory challenger for Paul Spadafora's IBF title. One cannot blame Angel for playing by the rules and winning a title eliminator. But did he deserve to be there in the first place? Every title shot he ever received he lost big time. In fact, in the most decisive bout of his career when some placed him as the favorite, he was dominated by Stevie for twelve action-packed rounds in August of 1999. How he held superiority over Johnston in the ratings is not too fathomable.

The IBF does not have anything on the WBC, though. Stevie has played by their rules. He won the NABF title years back and earned his title shot. He beat Jean-Baptitse Mendy in the champion's home country to win the lightweight title. He defended it three times before losing to Bazan. He then came back to win the rematch in magnificent fashion and defended four more times before Castillo. He had no problems taking on WBC rated contenders and tough "off" fights in two illustrious title reigns. After drawing with their champion (Castillo), he appropriately held the number contender spot in their ratings. All he wanted was a title shot. On the Top Rank website after his knockout of Brad Jensen several months ago, he was quoted as saying, "This is just another steppingstone trying to get back and get another shot at Castillo. They can't bump me from No. 1. That's all that counts. As long as they leave me No. 1, I'm satisfied until I do get the shot."

WBC's Lightweight ratings for December 2001 comes out and you need only guess what happens. Juan Lazcano magically moves ahead of Johnston based on...his better idle time. Here are the facts:

-Johnston is a two-time WBC champion who has fought and beaten some of the very best the division has to offer
-Juan Lazcano's fights of note are a bogus decision victory over Jesse James Leija and a spectacular win over a 36 year old John Molina.
-Lazcano's last fight was a knockout victory against the co-star of the opening sentence of this article, Julio Alvarez. As a reminder, Alvarez also got crushed against Johnston. This happened on September 1, 2001.
-Stevie Johnston scored a knockout victory of his own against the not so great Brad Jensen. This happened on September 23, 2001.
-Johnston was ranked ahead of Lazcano in the following months' ratings in October and November of 2001.
-Johnston and Lazcano have switched positions in the WBC ratings since December.

What happened? The WBC being persuaded by Main Events when they presented their case to institute Lazcano as #1 at the WBC convention is what happened. The WBC is either implying 1) "We have been blinded for months and admit we were wrong for the past year in place Johnston in the top spot" or 2) "We are more blind than statement number one indicates and are easily persuaded."

Unfortunately, no one from Top Rank was to be found at the convention of one of the most "respected" sanctioning bodies. Thus, no one was there to protect Stevie's best interests. Keep in mind that this is the same promotional team that paired him up with a stinker like Aldo Rios in a semi-main event of a Pay Per View event. Nobody looks good against Castillo, either, and that is exactly who Top Rank paired him up with on a nationally televised broadcast.

The Outlook

While the past has had its share of up's and down's, the future does show some signs of hope for the Denver native. For one, even if he is an also-ran on a "lightweight contenders" list, he is still there on the minds of the boxing media after having one televised bout in sixteen months. He is still on the minds (and probably among the fears) of many of the top fighters out there as well. No less than superstar Floyd Mayweather, Jr. had this to say, "The top lightweights, who we got? Lazcano, Manfredy, Diaz...for God's sake, I'll beat 'em all up. Stevie Johnston's better than all of 'em... (as quoted by Fiona Manning of MaxBoxing.com) " Of course, the confident champion would finish off by saying he would essentially whup Johnston, but that is beside the point.

Speaking of whom, Johnston's best hope of achieving recognition by the public would be a bout with Mayweather. One should not put it past Top Rank (who promotes both men) to finally get something right and set up a match-up within the next year. I may be the only person in the world that believes this (and I may take a serious blow to my credibility), but I think Stevie Johnston is one of the few fighters that can beat the "Pretty Boy." Stylistically, if Johnston were in a groove, I do not think Floyd would be able to come up with a solution to Stevie's onslaught.

Lastly, Johnston has hope for redemption and returning to March of 2000. Top Rank also promotes Castillo. If Top Rank cannot convince Castillo to fight Johnston and he elects to fight Lazcano, Johnston is next in line.

Just as it was mentioned before, these are just signs of hope. It is up to the fighters themselves to want to prove they are the best. And Stevie Johnston is the best lightweight in the world. The world just does not know it yet.

Double P's Power Punches

-Light Heavyweight champion Roy Jones Jr.'s long awaited debut album, "Round One," is scheduled to be released on February 26. According to his promotion's press release, his debut single, "That Was Then," "...rocketed to the No. 2 spot on Billboard's Hot Rap radio-airplay chart in its very first week of release." The single that was presented on HBO, "Y'all Must Have Forgot," was panned by some boxing writers, of all people. But I know I will be lining up to get the album, though. Better yet for you readers, convince a friend to buy it and see if it's any good first. Also of note: watch out for Roy as he'll dominate another "#1" contender in Glen Kelly on February 2 in Miami.

-It might be time for me to hang up the ol' pen and notebook as I called the Mickey Ward-James Leija battle a surefire classic, which I thought was a pretty safe prediction. I was wrong, again. The solid five-round fight was just getting good when it was stopped. For the record, I had Ward up 48-47. I also thought that Ward had taken less punishment than in other fights and would have pulled off a successful late rally. Remember, I picked Leija to win, so, I'm pretty much objective with this opinion. The momentum was going to switch 3-4 times before the fight was over, but it looked like Ward was actually going to pull it off. Therefore, I believe Lester Bedford's (a representative of Leija) letter (that was actually posted on this very website) is a near embarrasment to himself and to Leija, sprinkled with many gaps in logic throughout. If there is any victim here, it is Ward and only Ward.

-Final point: Get out there and read something. I highly recommend Randy Roberts' Papa Jack: Jack Johnson and the Era of White Hopes. If you can find the book at your local discount store, it'll be all the better. It is up on Amazon.com, too. The best book on Jack Johnson, period. Nothing but new knowledge to gain from this classic book, I tell ya. It flows well and is very well researched.