posted by Large

(Be sure to check out Baggiesboy’s piece on tomorrow’s U.S./Mexico soccer match below this post. I had to bury him due to the breaking Margo situation, but as always he brought his A-game to the pitch. -L)

As I’m sure you guys have read or heard by now, Tony Margarito and his trainer Javier Capetillo both had their licenses revoked by the California State Athletic Commission after a hearing today into the handwraps controversy that emerged prior to Margarito’s fight with Shane Mosley on January 24th.

Our crack commenter Howard in NYC, who I gather doubles in his non-Masian existence as a lawyer, pointed out last week that because Mosley’s trainer, Nazim Richardson, had removed the suspiciously hard pads from Margarito’s dressing room and taken them to Mosley’s, there would be chain of custody issues raised by Margarito’s defense team, and indeed there were.

But apparently, nobody was biting on that line. Margarito’s trainer, Capetillo, also tried to take the entire blame upon himself, saying that he himself was responsible for the hard pieces being inside the fighter’s wraps and that Margarito had no knowledge of the matter whatsoever. As for what he’d done, Capetillo said it was “an innocent mistake.”

Nobody swallowed that, either. A year of license suspensions was voted by the Commission for both men to the tune of 7 yeas and zero nays. Down goes Margo.

Perhaps the most stunning revelation of the day, however, had no influence on the final judgment, though it is certain to lead to mass speculation and perhaps further punitive action against Margarito and Capetillo. During the proceedings, a deputy attorney general for the prosecution, Karen Chapelle, tried to introduce a claim that Margarito had worn similar pads under his gloves for the Cotto fight last July. The Commission refused to hear it, saying that it was irrelevant to the question of what happened at the Staples Center prior to the bout with Mosley.

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posted by Large

Dudes, I realize that football owns the headlines at the moment (although I can’t help but feel myself that the presence of the Arizona Cardinals makes this the Anything But Super Bowl…) but my piece on the Margarito handwraps controversy is up at HBO today. In it, I give Nazim Richardson’s detailed account of what transpired in Margarito’s dressing room before the Mosley fight, an account that clears up a lot of wrong information and rumors that have been floating around on the web about the incident.

I was unable to get any comment from either Margarito’s camp or the California State Athletic Commission. The CSAC will not offer any further comment until the final ruling, and Margarito’s co-managers did not return any of my phone calls. So I only had Nazim’s story to go on. That said, his is a pretty nuanced and damning story that leaves very little wiggle room for interpretation. This piece is pretty much a news story as I wrote it for HBO, so I did very little editorializing, but I think you’ll find that the material speaks for itself. So please check it out, and enjoy the Springsteen concert. I got 4-1 the Boss opens with “Born in the U.S.A.” -L
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Tale of the Taping (hbo.com)
“When I asked Richardson if he thought that Margarito would have gained an edge against Mosley if the pads had been allowed to stand as they were, he laughed. ‘With the kind of condition we had Shane in,’ he said, ‘I figure if Margarito had a stick in his hand he wouldn’t have beaten Shane that night.’

posted by Large

Let the Monday, or in this case, early Sunday morning quarterbacking begin. Plaster of Paris in his gloves? Looking more emaciated at 47 than De La Hoya did? And getting… knocked the fizznuck out??!?!!?! Jesus man, my head is spinning like I just got punched by Shane Mosley a couple hundred times.

Oh wait, that wasn’t me. That was Margarito.

Look, I sensed it, I even bet on it, and oh how I wish I’d had the nads to prognosticate on it because then I could get all “kneel before Zod” on my brothers here at the Mas and feel all righteous and Zodly (Ricky Roe can step up to that mike). As it is, all I can do is count my money and admit that though I certainly felt like Shane had a good chance, I never would have bet a red cent on him getting the stoppage, not in a million years.

In the very first round, I started to wonder, though, because it just didn’t look like a Tony Margs kind of affair. He always starts slow, but even then he’s stalking, moving forward at angles, geometrically trapping his man over and over again and forcing him to fight his way out of trouble.

Here, well, it was immediately apparent that Shane was stronger than Margs, and what’s more, he looked bigger, which was almost as bizarre as Pacquiao looking bigger than Oscar last month. And Shane used that advantage to good effect, stepping into Margo’s lunges rather than away from them and often just manhandling him around the ring. The pattern was established early, Shane letting Margs walk to him, getting off first (and second, and third…), and then smothering his man before he got any chance to work. Lather rinse repeat.

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posted by Large

I’m very surprised that the predominant attitude here at the Mas towards my Margs/Mosley part-one piece was along the lines of, ‘ninja please!” Seems as if the great mass of Masians don’t have much of a sweet tooth on this one, with none other than Ryan, our crack prognosticator on all things Margo, calling for Sugar Shane to get stopped in the ninth.

I certainly understand the sentiment. When trying to envision how a fight might go down, I always find it useful to entertain the possibility that each man might at least equal his finest performance and decide which fighter would prevail in that case. For Margarito, of course, that career performance is a fight we are exceedingly familiar with. And to put it plainly, if Margs pulls another Cotto-type night out of his ass, well, Shane Mosley will not be winning the fight, not if he goes into the ring riding a loaded rhinoceros. I think we all agree on that.

As for Mosley, his best outing was the first De La Hoya fight, I suppose, and that is probably what weighs down his chances in my mind more than anything. While Margarito’s greatest moment in the ring occurred six months ago, Shane’s is eight years gone. He did look mighty good against Cotto, mighty good indeed, but even that is over a year ago. And though he finished his most recent fight in style, it’s true that he had problems with Mayorga. To be fair, though, Mayorga will give you some problems, especially at 47, where he is gigantic. The man is awkward and strong and crazy. I get the sense that mixing it up with the Matador is like playing speed chess with someone who’s brazen but otherwise has no idea what he’s doing. People like that constantly mess with your rhythm because you’re used to your opponents doing things that make sense and these bold fools do everything wrong. It can take you a while to get the feel of that kind of game, and you can even get behind, despite the fact that you’re an infinitely superior player.

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