A Few Thoughts on Bert Sugar, Magdaleno-Beltran, Garcia-Morales, Kirkland-Molina

By Ryan Maquiñana
Norcalboxing.net

First of all, my condolences to the family of the legendary Bert Sugar. The stories about him were true; he was a great guy.  I hope he will be given the media tribute he deserves.

In terms of the rest of the weekend, for those who saw Diego Magdaleno scrape himself off the canvas to stop Fernando Beltran on "ShoBox: The New Generation" on Friday, we spoke on the phone at length after the fight. His team was adamant on facing IBF junior lightweight champ Juan Carlos Salgado next. Here's my article on our discussion for BoxingScene.com: http://www.boxingscene.com/team-magdaleno-ready-we-want-juan-carlos-salgado--50988 

As far as Saturday night's HBO card, for the record, I don't always get 'em right, but I picked Danny Garcia to defeat Erik Morales by decision as evidenced by my prediction on Ring Magazine's website earlier in the week. Here's the link: http://ringtv.craveonline.com/blog/172027-who-wins-morales-garcia-the-experts-decide?start=1 


Also, in terms of the controversy surrounding James Kirkland's disqualification win over Carlos Molina because the latter's cornerman stepped in the ring before the 10th round concluded, I think there's a time and place to apply the letter of the law, but also situations where the spirit of the law should suffice.

In other words, if Molina was having trouble beating the count after the knockdown and received any kind of boost by his cornerman's premature entrance, then so be it. But neither was the case.

For one, Molina was already on his feet, and two, the round was technically over already, so Kirkland would not have had a chance to immediately capitalize on it anyway. Oh yeah, there's a third point, although irrelevant in the end--Molina was up on two of the judges' cards.  (And yes, Molina was getting away with excessive holding, but that's a separate subject of debate.)

Thus, I think veteran referee Jon Schorle would have been better served in this instance to let this one slide in retrospect.

And if you think we should show zero tolerance for a gray area to exist and be as inflexible as possible, then Floyd Mayweather should be 41-1 based on what happened six years ago against Zab Judah.  For those who don't remember, Uncle Roger charged the ring in the middle of the round (below, photo courtesy AP) after Judah hit his nephew low, but referee Richard Steele--and the police--allowed clearer heads to prevail.

What do you think, fight fans?  Should Mayweather be painted with the same brush as Team Molina?  If Floyd and Uncle Roger don't get disqualified, then why should Carlos? 

P.S. Who else but Gale Van Hoy would have Kirkland, the house fighter, ahead by a point in a matchup Molina was winning so clearly that Kirkland's own trainer Ann Wolfe TOLD Molina as much after the bout? If Osvaldo Rivero was in my Hall of Shame last week, then surely this week it's Van Hoy, who I wouldn't trust to tell me what time it was, much less who rightfully won a world title fight.

Boxing correspondent Ryan Maquiñana is a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America and Ring Magazine’s Ratings Panel. E-mail him at rmaquinana@gmail.com, check out his blog at Norcalboxing.net, or follow him on Twitter: @RMaq28.

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