It doesn’t take that great a
leap of faith to believe that in a year, maybe a year-and-a-half, Paulie Malignaggi
will become the face of boxing.
The WBA welterweight champion
has always been a glib, accessible, entertaining interview, as well as a
skilled, if a little underpowered, boxer.
But Malignaggi is on the verge
of reaching superstar status as an announcer. He’s been doing analysis for
Showtime’s boxing broadcasts and he’s demonstrated the kind of ability that,
combined with experience, could soon make him the best in the business.
He’s thoughtful, insightful
and well-spoken, quick to notice trends and able to explain them in a manner
the audience understands. Broadcasting a fight, particularly in a three-man
booth, is no easy task, and Malignaggi has come off in his rookie year like a
10-year veteran.
That’s why it has been so
strange these last two months to see Malignaggi come so unglued in his public
appearances while he’s promoted his title defense on Saturday at the Barclays
Center in Brooklyn, N.Y., against Adrien Broner.
Malignaggi has always talked
trash before a fight, but until he signed to face Broner, it’s always been
light-hearted and good-natured.
But as he’s trained for
Broner, it’s almost as if he’s been overcome by some unseen force. He’s matched
Broner insult for disgusting insult, demeaning women, treating them as sex
objects and showing disdain for the sport that has made him rich.
He’s lost the cool that helped
make him so popular in the first place.
At a kickoff news conference
in Las Vegas on May 4, Broner called a woman he said was named Jessica while he
was on the dais. He said she was Malignaggi’s ex-girlfriend.
On Thursday, Broner brought
the woman to the Barclay’s Center for the final news conference.
When he took the dais,
Malignaggi spoke directly to the woman in the audience and asked her what his
mother’s name was. Stories had been published saying she’d dated Malignaggi for
six or seven months.
When she didn’t know his
mother’s name, Malignaggi used it as proof that they weren’t close and hadn’t
dated.
“Let’s put this thing behind
me now,” Malignaggi said. “This is somebody I slept with. Athletes sleep with a
lot of women. It’s 2013. It’s what we do. All right?”
His response came off crass,
crude and far too Broner-like. It probably didn’t win him many new fans and
might have cost him some of his existing ones.
Malignaggi and Broner both
came off disgusting, and the stench of it rubbed off on Golden Boy, Showtime
and the Barclays Center.
At least Golden Boy CEO
Richard Schaefer pleaded before the news conference for the fighters to act
civilly and to keep their comments about boxing, though he didn’t act to stop
it when it quickly got raunchy. It was a two-bit soap opera, not a professional
sports media event, yet Showtime Sports’ social media account gleefully tweeted
a video link to the news conference, calling it “a fun one.”
Yeah, it was a hoot all right.
Boxing not only should be
better than this, it has to be better. This horrible two-month act just played
on all the negative stereotypes that exist about fighters.
From a boxing standpoint, the
question is whether all of Broner’s talk has caused Malignaggi to come unhinged
and lose concentration on what he needs to do.
Malignaggi, who is 32-4 with
seven knockouts and has won world titles at super lightweight and welterweight,
needs to worry about outboxing Broner and neutralizing his power, and not about
one-upping him with one-liners at a news conference.
His four losses came to Miguel
Cotto in 2006; Ricky Hatton in 2008; Juan Diaz in 2009 in a fight that
Malignaggi appeared to win going away; and Amir Khan in 2010.
Particularly in the Cotto,
Hatton and Khan fights, he was beaten by men who were considerably larger and
who were able to impose their size and strength on him.
They could hurt him but he
didn’t have the kind of power to do the same.
Broner is tremendously
skilled, but the hype train that is pushing him is far greater than his
accomplishments in the ring. It’s why it wouldn’t be a shock if Malignaggi were
to score the upset.
The combination of an
underrated fighter along with one who might be looking past a guy he clearly
doesn’t respect might make Broner vulnerable to the upset.
“He has good speed and good
timing, but his power is overrated,” Malignaggi said. “A lot of what he does is
overrated.”
Golden Boy is clearly grooming
Broner to be its next superstar, though Schaefer has plenty of respect for
Malignaggi.
He found the wide odds
favoring Broner preposterous and, win or lose, expects Malignaggi to come up
with an elite performance.
“Throughout his career, Paulie
has been one of those guys who’s been able to rise to the occasion,” Schaefer
said. “The bigger the challenge, the better the performance he puts in.”
The Broner fight could be
Malignaggi’s last big chance. If he loses, he’s not going to be a popular
opponent because he’s a slick boxer with the ability to make guys look bad.
That’s not the kind of guy managers want to put their rising stars in against.
So Malignaggi has much at
stake in the ring on Saturday.
Win or lose, though, he still
has the talent – in front of the microphone – to become the face of boxing.
Hopefully, his antics in the,
ahem, promotion of the Broner fight won’t ruin an otherwise promising career. (Source)
