Weekend Boxing Results, June 17

Tyson Fury Scores Easy Second-Round TKO in Vegas Debut

As was expected, the always entertaining Tyson Fury scored an easy win on Saturday night, stopping Tom Schwarz in the second round. Schwarz was overmatched the minute he signed the contract, so it’s not shocking Fury did his best to make the fight entertaining using a wide variety of tactics both in the ring and out.

First, Fury entered the ring dressed as Apollo Creed, then he finished off Schwarz after showing some slick head movement, before singing “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing” to his wife just after the victory. While he did sing “American Pie” with Bob Arum at the post-fight press conference, the Aerosmith classic from “Armageddon” appears to be his go to karaoke hit. We first saw it after he beat Wladimir Klitschko in what was truly a surreal moment.

The new Tyson Fury is being marketed as a loveable, goofy guy who is also a redemption story about recovering from mental illness. That’s great for ESPN, but they are going to have to deal with Fury’s disturbing comments in the past. On Friday’s episode of “Around the Horn”, a tearful Israel Gutierrez spoke of how Fury’s comments about homosexuality made him feel “like I don’t matter. Like my friends don’t matter. Like my partner doesn’t matter.” All the singing in the world isn’t going to help if Fury airs another one of his controversial ideas before one of his fights, which would be a disaster for ESPN.

So Deontay Wilder is up next, right? No, unfortunately he is not. Fury will apparently take another warmup fight before he faces Wilder, likely in October against Kubrat Pulev. That fight will likely happen at Madison Square Garden, while a Wilder fight in February is likely headed to Vegas.

Yunier Dorticos KOs Andrew Tabiti with Huge Right Hand

Andrew “The Beast” Tabiti should have gotten Floyd Mayweather Jr. to make those exhibition fights in Japan a little earlier it seems, as on Saturday night Yunier Dorticos landed a right hand on the button that put Tabiti’s lights out in the 10th round.

What a knockout from Yunier Dorticos #DorticosTabiti #WBSS

pic.twitter.com/K7Ur4LFqAG

— GiveMeSport Boxing (@GMSBoxing) June 15, 2019

The win gave Dorticos, who was likely ahead on the scorecards at the time of the knockout and whose only loss as a professional came when Murat Gassiev knocked him out in the WBSS last year, the IBF title Oleksandr Usyk abandoned when he moved up to heavyweight.

If the “Drake curse” was faltering after the Toronto Raptors’ victory, the internet made sure that Tabiti’s KO loss revived it. It was also a bad look for Floyd Mayweather Sr., who had been both training and hyping Tabiti as something special.

Mairis Breidis KOs Kryzstof Glowacki in Ugly Fight

In the WBSS tournament finals, Dorticos will take on Mairis Briedis, who knocked out Kryzstof Glowacki in his home nation of Latvia, to take home the WBO title. This fight was a disaster from the onset. First of all, the fight was supposed to be for the WBO and WBC titles, but the WBC took their belt off the table when WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman claimed WBSS organizers “failed to maintain the integrity of the bout, and disregarded the WBC rules and regulations.”

This statement was oddly prescient, because the bout’s integrity didn’t hold up very well. Firstly, Briedis elbowed Glowacki in the jaw after getting rabbit punched, which cost him a point but really should have resulted in a disqualification. Then, in the same round Glowacki was dropped twice, with the second knockdown coming well after the bell had rung (but the referee didn’t realize it). Breidis stopped Glowacki in the next round, but it’s hard not to think that a clean almost spinning elbow on the jaw played a significant role in Glowacki continually getting hurt soon after.

It was a mess, but the end result is Briedis takes the WBO title and moves on to face Dorticos for the WBSS Muhammed Ali Trophy.

Jesse Hart Beats Sullivan Barrera in 175-Pound Debut

While after the bout, the narrative that Sullivan Barrera is 37 years old and past his prime was everywhere, it is still incredibly impressive that in his 175 pound debut, Philadelphia’s Jesse Hart joined Andre Ward and Dmitry Bivol as the only men to beat Sullivan Barrera as a professional. Hart, who has only lost to Gilberto Ramirez as a pro himself, dropped Ramirez in the eighth en route to a unanimous 99-90, 97-92, 96-93 decision.

People criticized Hart’s inability to finish Barrera, but Hart claimed the issue was that he hurt his right hand in the seventh round and was fighting one-handed for the rest of the bout. After the fight, he said he wanted one more outing to get used to the weight class before taking on one of the division’s champions. If he’s smart, he’ll stay away from Gilberto Ramirez.

Josh Warrington Tested But Not Beaten by Kid Galahad

In his hometown, Leeds’ Josh Warrington came viciously close to losing his IBF featherweight title to Kid Galahad, and worse, losing the prospect of heading to the USA for a big money unification bout. Galahad’s unique style, often compared to fellow Dominic Ingle protégé Naseem Hamed, frustrated Warrington throughout, as did his incessant holding. However, the stance-switching style and tricky footwork tired Galahad, and by the end of the fight Warrington was coming on strong, to the crowd’s delight.

In the end, Warrington took a split decision, losing 115-113 on one scorecard while winning 116-112, 116-112 on the other two. While most people thought Galahad did enough to warrant a rematch, Warrington’s promoter Frank Warren did not. He compared Galahad’s holding to a “koala bear on a eucalyptus tree” and said he’d be looking to get Warrington a unification bout with Leo Santa Cruz instead.

Moloney Twins Win in Australia

Horrible quit job. Andrew Moloney didn’t even come out of first gear. Experimenting on this dude, he felt one body shot and didn’t want to be there. Why come to fight pic.twitter.com/9mwwbGFtEH

— NBT BOXING (@BoxingNbt) June 15, 2019

Both Jason and Andrew Moloney won in their respective bouts this weekend, but Andrew’s win was hilariously bad. Jason beat Goodluck Mrema via a second-round knockout in a fight that was an obvious mismatch, but not to be outdone, Andrew fought a 15-6 late replacement fighter that quit in the second round. It was crazy; his opponent ate one jab to the body, put his hand up, spit out his mouthpiece and called it a day. A complete waste of everyone’s time.