{"id":44903,"date":"2011-01-12T00:00:25","date_gmt":"2011-01-12T05:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/?p=6673"},"modified":"2011-01-12T00:00:25","modified_gmt":"2011-01-12T05:00:25","slug":"andre-ward-the-shocks-and-surprises-of-the-super-six-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/?p=44903","title":{"rendered":"Andre Ward & the Shocks and Surprises of the Super Six"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>By Gina L. Caliboso<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s only January and I already feel like it\u2019s a year to look forward to \u2013 sort of \u2013 in boxing, but first, some business still needs to be taken care of.<\/p>\n

From 2010, the Showtime \u201cSuper 6\u201d Super Middleweight Tournament still remains and with the semifinal rounds to take place, followed by, gulp \u2013 the final round, I wanted to give another recap about the tournament, but more so about how it\u2019s really revealed the pleasant and unpleasant side of the mad and frustrating world of boxing.<\/p>\n

First, I\u2019ll start with the pleasant. <\/p>\n

Out of the Super 6, I\u2019d have to give the pleasant nod to the emergence of Andre \u201cS.O.G.\u201d Ward, 23-0, 13 KO\u2019s. It has been an excellent opportunity for the young Oakland, California, fighter to become an even better boxer by fighting well with each fight. I predict he will win the tournament.<\/p>\n

In his first fight against Mikkel \u201cViking Warrior\u201d Kessler, 43-2, 32 KO\u2019s, Ward successfully defeated him with an 11th round TD. Ward then followed up with a 12 round unanimous decision victory over replacement fighter Allan \u201cGhost Dog\u201d Green, 29-3, 20 KO\u2019s.<\/p>\n

Finally, he fought, on a second viewing, what looked like a Muay Thai fight. There were headbutts and elbows being thrown in his bout against Sakio \u201cScorpio\u201d Bika, 28-5, 19 KO\u2019s. It was a physically challenging match for Ward, but he did win with a 12 round unanimous decision, however ugly. Ward now leads the tournament with 6 points. The young Ward will now face \u201cKing Arthur\u201d Abraham, 31-2, 25 KO\u2019s in one semifinal.<\/p>\n

The second pleasant surprise was Andre \u201cThe Matrix\u201d Dirrell, 19-1, 13 KO\u2019s. In the first round against Carl \u201cCobra\u201d Froch, 27-1, 20 KO\u2019s, he went over to fight in Froch\u2019s home territory in England. Although he lost the bout with a split decision, he did get a touch of international competition and learned about fighting decisions and getting a win. Dirrell was deducted a point in the 10th round for pulling on Froch, which I still don\u2019t get because I call it \u201cbeing in the clinch.\u201d Also, he was winning over Abraham (which will be discussed later, of course).<\/p>\n

Finally, as mentioned along with Ward, it\u2019s wonderful to finally see Glen \u201cGentleman\u201d Johnson, 51-14-2, 35 KO\u2019s, re-emerge into the semifinal round against Froch. Johnson is a workhorse of a fighter, always engaging, always battling, but could never convince the judges. He defeated Green rather easily with an 8th round TKO. I like his chances against Froch and it will definitely be a battle. Both Johnson and Froch will have to establish authority in the fight early and I predict the fight will go 12 rounds in favor of Johnson.<\/p>\n

The pleasant emergence of two fighters Ward and Dirrell coupled with the re-emergence of veteran fighter Johnson has re-vamped an interest in boxing. But now, on to the unpleasant surprises of the tournament, which also reveals some of the strangeness of how unpredictable boxing can be.<\/p>\n

At the center of the unpleasant surprise lies Abraham. The brawling, unorthodox Armenian fighter was about to lose against Jermain Taylor, but slowly, \u201cBad Intentions\u201d felt the fight slip away \u2013 as far as away and too close by any standard. In the 12th round, with a few seconds to close out a victory, Abraham scored a KO. With this loss, Taylor pulled out of the tournament.<\/p>\n

In the second round of bouts, Abraham lost by DQ to Dirrell when he clearly hit him while he was on the canvas. I hate recalling this incident. Good call on the part of the ref, but Abraham looked surprised. Dirrell was not quite right after the bout. And to my surprise, an unfortunate surprise really, he pulled out of the tournament. Meanwhile, Green enters the tournament, but doesn\u2019t put up much of a fight and loses to both Ward and Johnson.<\/p>\n

To recap, Kessler and Froch go at it, and Kessler wins over Froch, but then pulls out of the tournament due to injury. Like I mentioned, this boxing tournament has been filled with the unpredictable.<\/p>\n

When the tournament first started, I tuned in because I felt like the tournament was really about American fighters going up against European fighters. I hadn\u2019t heard of Ward or Dirrell, but had known about Taylor. Then, as the first round started with such surprising results, I thought that the American fighters revealed a level of competition, intensity, depth, and even excitement about going against other European fighters. The points based, tournament elimination format revamped the notion that boxing can put fights together within a weight division with some rather high stakes.<\/p>\n

As a boxing fan, I tuned in, cheered, and rooted for fighters I may have never known.<\/p>\n

But as the Super 6 presses on, there is still one fighter that remains at the top with 4 competitors waiting to take him on. Canada\u2019s Lucian \u201cLe Tombeur\u201d Bute, 27-0, 22 KO\u2019s, is currently ranked #1 in the super middleweight division. Bute will have no shortage of fights in the near future.<\/p>\n

However, I will argue that he needs to fight outside of Canada. It\u2019s something that all boxers, all fighters, or at least all good fighters\/boxers, need to do in order to put to rest any doubts that the judging in a hometown fight is, to say the very least, partial. Bute needs to fight in Vegas against Ward.<\/p>\n

So there it is, a new look, or re-evaluation of the possibilities of the completion of the Super 6 tournament. As the tournament is now in its final stages, I can guarantee I\u2019ll see it through to the end with Ward being the final winner. I can only hope there are no other surprises, because my goodness, what else can possibly happen? With the Super 6, and at this point, I\u2019ll tune in, because I just don\u2019t know either.<\/p>\n

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By Gina L. Caliboso It\u2019s only January and I already feel like it\u2019s a year to look forward to \u2013 sort of \u2013 in boxing, but first, some business still needs to be taken care of. From 2010, the Showtime \u201cSuper 6\u201d Super Middleweight Tournament still remains and with the semifinal rounds to take place, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[57,105],"class_list":["post-44903","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-boxing-news","tag-andre-ward","tag-boxing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44903","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=44903"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44903\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=44903"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=44903"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=44903"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}