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Here's an easy
one. What's the problem with the sport of Women's boxing? Certainly, the
fact that there is a significant decline in female bouts being telecast,
nationally, on ESPN and Fox Sports Network (to say nothing of the fact that
HBO has never, in thirty years, telecast a women's bout) is a major problem.
Add the fact that the "major players" in the sport seem reluctant to climb
in the ring with each other and, also, the approaching end of the career of
the pioneer "face" of the sport, Christy Martin. But here's a pretty big
contributor to the sport's woes: the fighter who many consider the best in
the sport, Sumya Anani, still in the prime of her career, has fought 12
rounds of boxing in the past 20 months.
Sumya Anani is the fighter about whom Teddy Atlas said, after watching her
leave a very tough Jane Couch slumped on the ropes in the fourth round of
their June ' 02 bout on ESPN, "Anani not only knows what she's doing in the
ring, she knows exactly how to do it". Twelve rounds in the last twenty
months, one round in the last ten months for the best fighter in the sport;
that's what's wrong with Women's boxing!
I spoke with Anani, recently, and asked her the obvious question, "Are you
going to fight again"? Sumya was very definite in her answer, "Yes,
hopefully, in about three or four months. I've been in contact with the
Sugar Ray Leonard and Oscar De La Hoya promotion groups and maybe something
will come out of that. I just never realized how important it was to market
yourself in this sport, it's exhausting".
Most of the major female fighters who are "marketed" are the beneficiaries
of sizable coteries of promotional professionals. Anani has none of those
advantages; she has only a prodigious boxing talent that has taken her from
small clubs in Missouri to major fight venues in Detroit, New York and St.
Louis. However, in a larger sense, she really doesn't need to be marketed.
Rather what Sumya Anani needs is for the sport of Women's boxing to
recognize her immense talent and appeal. A talent that if given the proper
exposure to the boxing public can propel the sport to the levels it seemed
to be heading for when Christy Martin was starring on the undercard of
heavyweight championship bouts.
Its all part of what Anani refers to as boxing's "food chain" or as she puts
it, "It all has to come together, all elements of the sport's food chain,
the fighters, the promoters, the media they all have to make their
contributions. The promoters have to stop looking a women fighters as an
afterthought. "Everyone knows about Christy, Laila Ali and Lucia Rijker, but
the fact is there are some really talented female fighters out there who
could easily headline any card in the country. "Kelsey Jeffries, Melissa Del
Valle, Isra Girgrah, Melinda Cooper and many others are fighters only the
hard core Women's boxing fan knows by name, but they put on a great show
every time they step in the ring. "It's up to the media, TV, radio,
newspaper, sports magazines to give these fighters the airtime and print
space they deserve, not just run a story on Martin or Ali or Rijker, and
assume ' that covers Women's boxing'. "Don't get me wrong", Anani continued,
"those three women are great fighters and Christy carried this sport on her
shoulders for years, but, at this point in time, there are more good female
fighters than at any time in history".
"But it's also those fighters' responsibility to do their part, to step in
with each other. I'm talking about the top fighters in each weight division.
They can't be satisfied with taking "walkover" bouts, they need to take
risks, they need to matchup with the other top fighters, those are the
fights that will get the sport back on TV, those are the fights that will
get column inches in the newspaper. "Ten rounds with two quality fighters,
not four rounds of two women who turn their backs on each other". Anani
talks exactly as she fights, she comes straight ahead and throws verbal
"bombs" right from the shoulder.
And Sumya Anani knows whereof she speaks. A year and a half into her boxing
career, in her tenth fight, she pounded out a six round decision over Andrea
DeShong, a tough veteran fighter who had handed Christy Martin her first
loss. Did Anani rest on her laurels, take a "walkover" bout? Not quite.
Eight months later, in a great fight in Ft. Lauderdale, Sumya won a ten
round decision over Christy Martin, who, though nicknamed the "Coal Miners
Daughter" was, in many minds, "The Angel of Death", given the wide swath she
was cutting through the sport of Women's boxing with an amazing string of
KOs. Three months later, in New York, Anani fought unbeaten Denise Moraetes,
a former national amateur champion. Scoring a knockdown midway through the
bout, Anani left the previously invincible Moraetes with a badly swollen
face and her first loss. Two weeks later, back home in Kansas City, Anani
beat her fourth formidable opponent, Dora Webber, one of the original
hardcore boxers in the sport. Thus, in a period of twelve months, Anani was
in with four quality opponents, and came away with four quality wins. So
when Sumya Anani speaks of "taking risks" in the ring, she's not just
"talking the talk", she's been there, she's done that, she's "walked the
talk".
As a result, when Anani states that, "Its all about responsibility, the
promoters to the fighters, the fighters to the fans, the media to the
fighters and the fans", you get the sense she can hardly wait to get back
into the ring. Lets hope it is, indeed, "three or four months" because
Women's boxing needs Sumya Anani. It needs Anani against Rijker, maybe
against Martin, who deserves a proper curtain call on a long career, maybe
Sumya Anani and Sunshine Fettkether. Whoever it is in one corner, if its
Sumya Anani in the other corner, one thing is certain, it'll be as good and
probably better than anything the sport of Women's boxing has offered up
lately. The sport has had the "beatdowns" and the mismatches and the
walkovers, why not the best.
Bernie McCoy |
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