By Bart Barry-
Saturday on a “FOX Sports is proud to present PBC Pay-Per-View events” event in Los Angeles welterweight titlists Errol “The Truth” Spence and “Showtime” Shawn Porter will vie for Spence’s number-one Ring rating without jeopardizing Terence Crawford’s number-two pound-for-pound rating in a match between two good guys whose disparity in talent should preclude anything too thrilling from happening. Fans of thrilling talent should look to Saturday’s comain.
Because the most interesting talent on the card is WBC super middleweight titlist David Benavidez, an uncharacteristically ascendant PBC asset. Spence may be the greater talent, and well may not be, but he is not intriguing as Benavidez, not after getting outdone by Benavidez in March.
We probably have seen the best of Spence. While Manny Pacquiao (along with Floyd Mayweather) is the greatest talent ever to fight on a PBC card – a sentence likely to hold up, still, in 2030 – he is far too old to make someone of Spence’s age and size improve. Pacquiao undressed Keith Thurman a few months ago, sure, but does anyone think Thurman will be better for it? Pacquiao wants no part of Spence, either, because of the youngster’s physicality; Pacquiao, way way smarter than we realized in his prime, knows someone big and vigorous as Errol can do a lot of things wrong and still win, and there’s no dissuading him with activity.
There’s dissuading Spence with inactivity, as Mikey Garcia showed us at Cowboys Stadium (we go with birth names, round here) but not with an attack. It’s a reason Porter hasn’t much of a chance Saturday, but we’ll be back to that below.
PBC hasn’t the stable or matchmaking acumen to keep Spence on an upward trajectory. Spence would be improved by a fight with Bud Crawford, who’s small enough to see his craft advantage offset, and an eventual move to 160 via 154, but none of those things will happen in Spence’s prime. Not while Danny Garcia and Keith Thurman and Alfredo Angulo haunt the FOX Sports airwaves.
Which is, in its way, a tragedy. PBC didn’t really know what it had with Spence, but soon as it did, it got cautious as could be, feeding him a b-level vet, a hopeless lad named Ocampo and then a former featherweight. Subsequently Spence has not felt a punch in 28 months. That’s no way to season a prime talent.
Which is why Benavidez is the most interesting man on Saturday’s card. PBC still hasn’t much of an idea what he is or what to do with him. None of us has. Benavidez is loose in the midsection, failed a VADA test a couple years ago, and Dr?ma adorns his coat of arms. But he is a natural, and sneaky-ascendant because he doesn’t look the part.
Our beloved sport’s myriad of hyperbolists begin their marketability prejudging with criteria borrowed from the late Hugh Hefner. Benavidez once was obese, and extra skin is a mortal no-no. In this sense Benavidez is a bit like boxing’s version of golfer John Daly, whose obesity and publicized vices allowed his sport’s hypemen to overlook Daly’s singular athleticism.
Really, who the hell ever mistook a rotund chainsmoker for a great athlete? I suppose I just did.
Next time you see a golf club, or even a heavy stick, try to get it to the place Daly gets his backswing while keeping your feet planted. Never mind maintaining that balance long enough to hit a ball, never ever mind doing it the exact same way at age 53 as you did at 23; just try to get your body in that position – then imagine doing it drunk in front of 50,000 spectators.
Benavidez’s comain foe, Anthony Dirrell, is no one’s idea of an ascendant asset, but he is a veteran prizefighter who is proud and has spent his entire career at the same weightclass. He’s not the better athlete in his family, but he is the better fighter. He will test Benavidez’s will. And that is precisely the test a fighter like Benavidez needs to improve.
Will Showtime Shawn test Errol’s will? A bit, yes. But barring a sprained ankle or Fan Man type of event Porter hasn’t much of a chance. Which is too bad because Porter is a guy to cheer for. He’s joyful, humble, buffoonish, happy, fun. His efforts to play an antagonist generally go nowhere because he likes the guys he makes punches with (when he and Spence “trash-talked” one another before Pacquiao embarrassed Thurman, Porter couldn’t stay in character long enough to get his lines right, and both men came off more endearing than fearsome).
Which is a winding path to writing this: Saturday’s mainevent won’t be very good. Styles make fights – have you heard? – and Spence and Porter have similar styles. And Spence is better at every facet of that style, so much so that we miss how similarly he and Porter are as stylists (too, Porter has been matched much less sympathetically than Spence lately, which makes Porter look like a flailing volume guy while some aspiring aficionados might’ve once mistaken Spence for a power-puncher).
I can forgive myself for admitting a year ago I’d’ve picked Spence to ruin Porter in 10 rounds or fewer. But Spence’s slap-and-tickle contest with Garcia weighs heavily on such predictions now. Porter should look about twice Garcia’s size and girth swimming his way towards Spence, Saturday, and we’re not altogether certain how well Spence fights off his backfoot, are we? But lest we forget, boxing’s clown pauper, AB, dropped Porter flat in the final minutes of their 2015 contest, and one must believe at 147 pounds Spence hits much much harder than About Billions.
I’ll take Spence, UD-12, in a match not even Ray Mancini can call a candidate for fight of the year.
Bart Barry can be reached via Twitter @bartbarry
