The running joke along press row at the Theater at Madison Square Garden Saturday night was whether those in the big arena watching the championship game of the Big East Conference basketball tournament were as interested in what was going on with the boxing matches are we were in the basketball.  Silly thought.

 

Truth is the 2,400 fans (half-empty crowd) in the Theater didn’t seem all that interested in what was going on the ring either because save for Edgar Santana’s split decision win over Colombia’s Dario Jose Esalas, the rest of the card was about as captivating as a George Bush speech.

 

All could have been forgiven if the main event featuring Sultan Ibragimov and Javier Mora was worth dealing with the New York City traffic and parking fees.  Mora, despite taking the fight on short notice, promised he was there to take advantage of his “opportunity” and would give Ibragimov a battle.  That “battle” lasted all of 46 seconds before the fight was stopped. In that span Mora had charged Ibragimov at the opening bell, traded a couple of punches before the Russian landed a solid left-right combination that sent Mora to the canvas.

 

The inked-up Mexican got up on wobbly legs, but could offer no defense as Ibragimov closed to finish him off.  The referee stopped the fight to put not only Mora, but the rest of us out of our misery.

 

Of course, this came a few hours after Ray Austin’s pitiful effort against Wladimir Klitschko in Manheim, Germany.  In the second round of the IBF heavyweight championship, Austin took a couple of lefts (not even Klitschko’s best punch) to the chin and fell like a tree with no roots.  The fight was over before you could say, “Gesundheit!”

 

And we wonder why no one cares about the heavyweight division anymore?

 

Now we’re supposed to get excited about Ibragimov facing Shannon Briggs for the WBO heavyweight title on June 2 in Russia.  The trash talk has already begun, and maybe I’ll be interested once I stop yawning.

 

The announcement of the fight is hardly going to erase the stench of last weekend.  Ibragimov may have looked like Sonny Liston against Mora, but it’s hard to give the Russian too much credit considering Mora took the fight on short notice, wasn’t in shape and figured he’d try to bull-rush Ibragimov and take him out in the first round.  Bad mistake.

 

Team Ibragimov was all smiles after the fight, happy about how impressive their fighter looked. Yet, this was the same Ibragimov who fought the not-very-impressive Austin to a draw last July in an IBF eliminator.   The idea behind an eliminator is to define a true contender. But that didn’t happen.  Austin became the mandatory challenger to Wladimir Klitschko because Ibragimov suffered a flash knockdown (slip?) in the 10th round.

 

Interestingly, it probably turned out to be the best thing that could have happened to Ibragimov.  He likely had no chance to beat Klitschko, and instead of fighting for the WBO title in Briggs’ hometown and at the Garden he now gets his title shot in Moscow where the crowd will be in his favor.

 

Good for Ibragimov. Bad for Briggs who had to pull out of the March 10 card because of sickness.  The real question is how does any of this advance the heavyweight division? It doesn’t.

 

This was the year we hoped to have some clarity. Sam Peter beating James Toney in January was supposed to be the first step.  But now Peter continues to get stonewalled by the WBC and will probably step aside so WBC champ Oleg Maskaev can defend against former champ Vitali Klitschko who is coming out of retirement.

 

Just what the heavyweight division needs, another Klitschko.

 

Should Vitali Klitschko win that fight, then the two brothers would hold two of the four major belts in the division.  The ideal fight would be Klitschko vs. Klitschko. Now that would liven up the heavyweight division.  But these aren’t the Mayweathers, which means the Klitschkos won’t fight each other so we can forget any notion of unifying the heavyweight titles anytime soon.

 

And just when you thought things couldn’t get any worse:  Evander Holyfield will be fighting Vinny Maddalone on Saturday.

 

Thank God for basketball.

 

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Send questions and comments to: gwillis@boxingtalk.com