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DETROIT – It’s only appropriate that Mary Joe Sanders is fighting in her
backyard, because she expects Eliza Olson to turn their WBC welterweight
championship fight into a brawl.
“We have two different styles. She’s more of a come-right-at-you brawler and
I’m a boxer-puncher so it’s going to be a good fight,” said Sanders, who
tipped the scales at 142 pounds Friday evening and looks to keep a perfect
16-0 (5 KO) record unblemished. “But you just have to really use your jab
and know how to fight backing up. Jab, big time, keep everything behind the
jab. Don’t get into her fight, don’t brawl. So we’ve been working on a lot
of things in the gym. I’m constantly learning, and those things will come
out on Saturday.”
The two will meet tonight at Cobo Arena in Detroit for the recently created
WBC women’s welterweight belt. Sanders is a native of Detroit, and daughter
of popular ex-Detroit Lion Charlie Sanders, who still works for the team.
Her’s is a co-featured bout along with the comeback fight of the Motor
City’s Tommy “Hit Man” Hearns, meaning there should be a large fight night
crowd.
“It’s electric. There’s nothing like it. You feel like there’s an army going
in there with you,” Sanders said about fighting at home. “But once the bell
rings, its just you. But there’s so much energy, it’s incredible. “You want
to do the best you can, and put on a good show It’s more the support factor
that I feel rather than pressure.”
The gregarious Sanders, 31, says it’s her dad that gets more worked up than
she does before a fight.“He’s probably paced about 17 miles by now,” she laughed. “One of my other
fights at the Palace, Coach Mariuchi had seen him, it was the night of the
fight and he was just drifted off at his desk and Coach was like “Charlie,
just go.’ He gets into it like he’s going into one of his football games. He
gets all that energy, and it really revs him up.”
She most recently won the IBA’s Welterweight Continental title on May 14
with an impressively lopsided decision over talented Belinda Laracuente, who
took the bout on short notice. Her perfect mark includes wins over Chevelle
Hallback for another IBA continental belt,. Layla McCarter, Melissa Del
Valle and Lisa Holewyne.
For Olson, the scene is all too familiar, with this her fifth try at a world
championship, with a deceiving overall record of 8-5-2. The Redwood City,
California welterweight has draws with Jamie Clampitt, a decision that was
particularly controversial, and Sunshine Fettkether. She also has “road”
losses against Aga Rylik in England and Myriam Lamare in Paris, France. Like
Sanders, she sports a win over former WIBF champ Holewyne.
Although Northern California has been good to women’s boxing, and in
particular Jessica Rackozy and the now retired Jennifer Alcorn who both have
developed big fan bases, the granddaughter of world middleweight champ Carl
“Bobo” Olson is once again as Willie Nelson would say, “on the road again.”
“It always matters (where the fight is), but I just don’t have the backing.
She was supposed to fight me in San Jose and she didn’t,” Olson (145)
offered. “I just really concentrate on what I have to do. I love the sport.
It’s in my heart. I don’t care where I am. I’m a professional fighter and a
warrior. I can only do what I can do, and that’s try my best. I mean I feel
like I’ve won world championship fights. But I go into people’s hometowns
and that kind of stuff is going to happen, until someone picks me up and
makes me a hometown fighter. I keep on trekking, that’s what I do.”
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