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e 6 showdown claggett hungry to seize great opportunity in azim headliner menu home schedule results rankings search for search for home trufan boxing trufan boxing bazooka joe linenfelser ready to explode on final 2011 espn fnf card chicago aug 17 2011 whether or not his swing bout airs on this week s espn friday night fights fnf card welterweight prospect bazooka joe linenfelser 9 1 1 6 kos a 23 year old boxer from rockford illinois plans to steal the show the final espn fnf card of the year live from hammond indiana showcases 2008 u s olympian demetrius andrade vs the contenders champion grady brewer in the main event and former world champion david diaz vs hank lundy never the less linenfelser plans to rock the horseshoe casino it s going to be great whether or not i actually get to fight on espn linenfelser said i know there are four other good fighters on the card with great records and reputations but people who watch my fight are going to go away asking when i ll be fighting again in a six round fight linenfelser will face his most difficult test to date tough veteran ruben modern day warrior galvan 27 17 4 10 kos who has only been stopped four times galvan has been in the ring against world champions such as zab judah julio cesar chavez jr paul spadafora as well as world title challenger dmitriy salita beating galvan will give me more credibility and hopefully get me ranked by one of the regional organizations linenfelser added it ll help put me on the map and get me a shot at henry coyle in a few months for now though i m fully focused on galvan he is a veteran who has fought a lot of good guys i really don t know too much about him but i m a young hungry pup and i know that i bring more to the table than him when he made his pro debut october 8 2005 stopping 181 fight veteran donnie penelton in the opening round of their fight in iowa 17 year old joe was the youngest professional boxer in the united states in october of 2008 linenfelser registered his signature victory versus former naba nba champion fearless fernando hernandez who joe had previously defeated in a kickboxing fight linenfelser put hernandez to sleep in the fifth round and then into retirement right after their fight in auburn hills michigan next up for bazooka joe was an eight round throw down with 1996 cuban olympian ivan leden 12 8 1 in milwaukee that linenfelser won by decision linenfelser was inactive for 14 ½ months 2010 2011 due to an injury suffered in the ring until his triumphant ring return this past april against jeremy marts in chicago linenfelser dropped marts once in the fifth and twice from body shots in the final round en route to a win by unanimous six round decision i took a year off and during that time i concentrated more on body shots bazooka joe explained i d always been bazooka joe throwing bombs and knocking guys out but i found out that the better the opponent the harder it is to knock em out with just head shots body shots tear down an opponent and then you go upstairs to finish linenfelser has fought almost exclusively as a junior middleweight his only loss was in a fight in which he weighed 171 ¾ pounds but he s dropped down to welterweight for this fight and plans to continue fighting at 147 i had no problems making 147 he concluded there was a time that i had some personal problems but i started praying a lot and everything just seemed to fall into place for me my speed and stamina has improved i m as strong as ever and i ve been running 12 miles a day when i fought at 154 i d balloon up as high as 187 between fights now i eat and drink right and my weight doesn t go way up my father manager jeff has been telling me for a long time that i should be fighting at 147 i haven t felt this good since i was 14 i m excited to fight at this weight i m on a nutritious diet and take vitamins i used to be on a wrestling diet to make weight because i lost weight the wrong way i m living healthy and feeling real strong jl the fighting promoter scores a ko july 20 2011 oceana hall brighton beach brooklyn dmitriy salita met adversity head on and knocked it somewhere into never neverland with his card teetering and tottering as a couple fighters were unable to appear for assorted reasons salita did what fighters do he threw the big punch and not only salvaged his show but put together a crowd pleasing highly entertaining evening of exciting boxing with a mixed pro am card three amateur bouts warmed up the crowd for the originally scheduled professional slugfests and what slugfests they were in the headline light heavyweight rumble local favorite undefeated will rosinsky of queens 14 0 8 ko s came out storming against albuquerque new mexico s jose ramirez who came in with an 11 11 6 ko s record in a shocking scenario rosinsky ran into an overhand right that dropped him in his tracks rising to his feet rosinsky immediately went on the attack with a two fisted bombardment that ramirez tried fighting back against but rosinski was relentless in his pursuit dropping ramirez and stopping him at 2 20 of the first round of the scheduled eight rounder the co feature a junior middleweight bout scheduled for six rounds showcased rising star boyd melson west point grad captain in the us army reserves and one of the two fighters on the card whose trunks were adorned with the star of david the southpaw melson wasted no time in going after zacharie schumack minneapolis mn 2 2 1 scoring well with his right hand it was the second round where melson turned up the heat battering schumack almost at will he dropped schumack with a whip like left uppercut game but maybe too brave for his own good schumack pulled himself up and tried fighting back but bleeding heavily from the nose was dropped for a second time by a solid right hook this time when schumack got up he ran into another jarring blast to the head prompting the referee to step in and halt the bout an impressive tko at 2 23 of the second round bringing melson s record to 5 0 3 ko s melson scored big again when he addressed the crowd after the fight explaining his mission to fight for stem cell research the charismatic young man obviously has a heart even bigger than his punch he doesn t ask for what he doesn t give himself donating his entire purse to the cause in a four round junior middleweight bout long islander cletus the hebrew hammer seldin improving his professional record to 2 0 1 ko savaged hector rivera passaic nj 2 9 1 ko in a bout that never should have been permitted to go to the final bell a quick handed free swinger seldin pounded away without letup dropping rivera twice one knockdown in the opening stanza being disallowed as seldin hit rivera when he was down and punishing him so badly without retaliation that the crowd was pleading for a stoppage all officials scored every round for seldin with all scorecards reading 40 35 in the opening professional bout brooklyn s ian james 134 1 1 1 ko blasted out bohemia new york s john passante 134 0 4 at 23 seconds of the opening round with a stunning right uppercut the star of david inc boxing promotions is developing a fine slate of young talented prospects and the show they put on tonight in front of an enthusiastically cheering standing room only crowd was a step in the right direction history tells broner defeat no surprise nicolino el intocable locche he turned professional in 1958 and ten years and one day after his pro debut he became a world champion nevertheless it was a long road for argentine defensive wizard nicolino locche by the time he met paul fuji in tokyo japan for the world boxing association light welterweight title locche had amassed over one hundred fights he halted the pained and frustrated fuji in the tenth round to capture the crown from the beginning locche fought almost all his battles in his native argentina his early career had its ups and downs but he won far more times then he lost or drew in 1963 he burst on to the international scene with a decision win over former world lightweight champion joe old bones brown in 1965 nicolino met newly crowned lightweight titlist the slick ismael laguna the non title overweight affair was judged a draw laguna then lost the title back to the great carlos ortiz and in 1966 locche met ortiz in a non title affair again the crafty nicolino had to settle for a draw locche then set upon securing a world title shot for himself in 1966 he won a non title ten round verdict over reigning world light welterweight champion sandro lopopolo in 1967 he beat rugged l c morgan and former champion eddie perkins in 1968 he defeated mexican al urbina then the shot came against fuji who had defeated lopopolo in 1969 locche defended against former champion the very dangerous carlos hernandez and the talented joao henrique in 1970 he turned back the challenge of the able adolph pruitt in 1971 he defeated domingo barrera corpas and scored a masterful victory over antonio kid pambele cervantes finally in 1972 nicolino was enticed to go to panama where he met alfonso peppermint frazier the underdog frazier out hustled the aging locche to annex the crown nicolino would then put together a four fight win streak while frazier lost the title to cervantes in 1973 nicolino met cervantes in venezuela and was stopped in the beginning of the tenth round no longer a champion the proud locche reeled off seven straight victories in hopes of regaining his crown finally in 1976 it became apparent that a title shot was not going to materialize so nicolino hung up the gloves for good locche ended up with an amazing 117 4 14 record although he was not a hard hitter as he scored only fourteen knockouts nicolino was a master boxer he ranks right up there with the great willie pep as a defensive genius he was not nicknamed el intocable the untouchable for nothing nicolino was inducted into the international boxing hall of fame in 2003 he passed away in 2005 leaving behind a true legacy of his tremendous talents jim amato march 8 1971 42 years ago the greatest show on earth took place there are certain dates that will stick with you as long as you live your birthday the birthdays of family members anniversaries the day that you got your divorce s etc happy and important days that mark milestones in your life one such date i ll always remember is march 8 1971 the battle of the century it was so aptly named two undefeated boxers who each had a legitimate claim to being the heavyweight champion of the world would collide when muhammad ali first won the title in 1964 his name was cassius clay he would shortly thereafter change his name and then proceed to change the face of boxing he dominated the scene until 1967 when he refused induction into the us military due to his religious beliefs then came the eight man elimination tourney that was won by jimmy ellis the powerful new york state athletic commission would recognize the winner of a match up between unbeaten boxers joe frazier and buster mathis a bout in which joe won in 1970 frazier stopped ellis to claim the vacated title later that year muhammad ali returned to ring wars and halted highly ranked contenders jerry quarry and oscar bonavena the stage was now set ali and frazier would clash for the undisputed title the first ali frazier bout was the epic that all others are compared to even today there is no reason in this article to describe the bout itself reams of print have appeared documenting the action that took place in the ring that magical night what i would like to share is the impact that fight on me and probably millions of others i have never before or since march 8 1971 felt the same way about a prize fight yes there were a few that stirred my anticipation like duran dejesus ii and iii leonard duran i leonard hearns i pryor arguello i hagler hearns and leonard hagler still to this day ali frazier i tops them all was ali frazier i the best action fight of all time i would have to say no but for sheer anticipation drama and excitement this fight was the whole package you had movie star burt lancaster as a commentator and frank sinatra as a photographer each boxer would receive 2 5 million for their nights work that was an unheard sum of money for one fight in 1971 i have never been so wound up with anticipation for a boxing match in my life i was a few months shy of my seventeenth birthday and had been a boxing fan from the time i was ten i had closely followed all the events leading up this day in boxing history on fight night i was at a party and we gathered around the radio listening to the round by round summary we were pretty much split on the outcome of the fight but almost all of us were rooting for smokin joe from the round by round reports we could sense that this was a bout with shifting momentums the ever proud ali realized that joe had come to fight this evening maybe ali took frazier too lightly maybe muhammad rushed too soon to get back in the ring after his lengthy layoff maybe just maybe the joe frazier of march 8 1971 was one of the greatest heavyweights of all time i ve never seen a boxer who laid it all out for one fight like joe did that night you ve heard it said that a boxer would rather die then be defeated on this night joe would have died a hundred deaths before giving in to ali round after round went by and as we listened to the radio in the eleventh frazier rocked ali and we as a collective group cheered even the ones who had bet on ali to win as the bout moved into the championship rounds we were all on the edge of our seats then it happened it was announced on the radio the joe had decked ali in the fifteenth round more cheering and now the wait finally it was time to render the decision the winner and still heavyweight champion of the world joe frazier oh what a night forty two years later i can remember it like it was yesterday joe frazier has passed on and ali my friends and myself are in the twilight of our lives still when i think of that night it takes me back to my youth and to the ultimate excitement that probably the greatest single sporting event of all time brought me thanks joe and muhammad jim amato short on heavyweight jose luis garcia he knocked out ken norton there may have never been a more talent rich period in the heavyweight division then from 1968 to 1978 with muhammad ali a k a cassius clay on the sidelines due to his draft case other big men emerged they would compete with each other on an almost equal basis for the next decade joe frazier had risen to the top of the heap but the level below him would remain as mainstays in the ratings for years to come jimmy ellis jerry quarry oscar bonevena floyd patterson george chuvalo and henry cooper would eventually give way to ron lyle joe bugner ken norton earnie shavers and jimmy young all time great champions like george foreman and larry holmes also made their mark and ali re emerged to reclaim his throne lost among the giants of that time period wa...