SPORTS RUMORS- A little bit of everything. Hockey, boxing, wrestling and stream of consciousness rambling.
by Michael

Starting Friday night with Shobox on Showtime, they have the semi finals of their Super Middle weight tourney, tune in and see four young and hungry fighters in a division that is fun to watch, at 168 lbs, these guys throw like welter weights but hit like heavyweights, I see lots of action and probably more than on knock down in each fight.

This Saturday we have dueling fight shows on HBO and Showtime. Showtime has the rubber-match between lightweights (130 lbs.) Diego "Chico" Corrales and Joel "El Cepillo" Casamayor, their first two fights were all action affairs with each taking a win. I expect nothing less of this, Corrales and Casamayor do not like each other, hate is not to strong a word for the feelings these two have for each other, Casamayor in general hates everyone anyway, so it's no surprise he hates Corrales, why shouldn't he, Diego "Chico" Corrales from Sacramento, Ca. is everyone's favorite type of fighter, a true warrior willing to go toe to toe with anyone anywhere, even after doing two years for spousal abuse everyone still loves him, because Diego Corrales is truly a nice guy, he made a mistake as a kid and he has been forgiven. Casamayor on the other hand seems to just be a whining prick, he likes no one and no one likes him, he tells his sad story of fleeing Cuba after he was given the gift of a bicycle from Castro for winning the 1992 Gold Medal. Anyway, their first fight ended in a 6th stoppage for Casamayor who had Corrales down twice before the doctors stopped it due to cuts Corrales had sustained throughout the fight, the rematch ended in a split decision for Corrales, who again was down in the tenth before pulling out the slim victory. Though Casamayor is a very slick boxer, he tends to stay on the inside and slug when he really has no need to, he did it in the previous two fights with Corrales, as well as with JL Castillo and Popo Freitas, Casamayor has the pop to trade with Corrales, but I think he is better off trying to out box the bigger stronger fighter, but pride or plain meaness won't allow for that, I see Corrales ending this with a big left hook, Corrales by KO in the 9th round.

The opener on Showtime is another action fight, this one contested at flyweight Vic Darchinian vs. Glenn Donaire , this should be a barnburner, with Darchinia already calling out Jorge Arce, even before he has won this fight, Darchinia seems to be looking past Donaire, always a dangerous thing to do with any fighter.

On the supposed "Home Of Boxing" HBO, the circus coming to town in the form of 7 foot 325 lbs "Russian Giant" Nikolai Valuev versus Monte "Two Gunz" Barrett, good name Barrett, 'cause that's what it is going to take for you to even come close to winning this fight - TWO GUNS, two very big guns. Now, America finally gets to see if the latest Don King discovery can fight, we have seen fighters this size before, and mostly they are freak shows, all size no talent, but we'll see if Valuev can throw more than one punch at a time and if he can move with any kind of grace or fluidity, if he can, he might be dangerous to anyone in the heavyweight division, anyone that is, not named Wladimir Klitschko. If Valuev proves he can fight and can KO a true heavyweight contender than I fear Klitschko will be the only one who will be able to stop him, Klitschko has the size at 6'6" and skill to beat anyone in the glamour division right now, including Valuev.

In support of the Valuev - Barrett massacre is Tomasz Adamek vs. Paul Briggs light-heavies (175 lbs) both are punching machines, this should be a good action fight from two not very well known fighters. Enjoy it while it lasts.

Well, Sunday is just around the corner and my Buccaneers are staring down the barrel of 0 & 4, this is not good, but maybe all is not lost. With Chris Simms out for probably the season and maybe forever as a Buccaneer, we get to see the future in Bruce Gradkowski, a sixth round pick from Toledo, he looked good in the preseason, but that was against teams number 2 and mostly number 3 defenses, luckily we are facing New Orleans, who after that Monday night against Atlanta have come back down to earth and are as mediocre as always. Hopefully "Chuckie" Gruden has come up with a plan to win, word is he is not scaling back the playbook which is good, give Gradkowski the tools
and lets see what he can do.

Good luck to the Mets they are going to need it, 2/3rds of the starting rotation down even before the first pitch of the post season, not a good sign.

A's - Padres World Series

Hockey season opens this week, who cares?

I do, got my "Center Ice "package from DirecTv and I'm about to watch me some hockey.

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