Nicholas Walters, aka the Axe Man, lost his featherweight title today, not in the ring but on the scale?
Nicholas Walters, aka the Axe Man, lost his WBA featherweight title today, not in the ring, as no one feared, but on the scale.
He will fight Miguel Marriage at New York?s Madison Square Garden Saturday night as scheduled, but only the Mexican can win the title.
Walters will be fighting for credibility.
Walters weighed in at 127.4 lbs., a whopping, relatively speaking, 1.4 lbs. over the featherweight limit. He was given an hour and a half to lose the extra poundage, but he probably needed a day and half, as he was still .4 lbs overweight.
?I?m coming off an eight-month layoff,? Walters said. ?I tried everything.?
Carl Moretti, speaking on behalf of Top Rank, the Axe Man?s promoter, said, ?He worked out as hard as he could, but the last couple of pounds are always hard for him to get off. He tried to, but physically he felt he would have nothing left if he kept working to get that last pound off,? adding that Walters ?put an honest effort into it.?
Sometimes even an ?honest effort? is not enough. Maybe Walters is not a featherweight. Maybe same day weigh-ins need to be reinstituted, so this kind of thing, an embarrassment to all involved, can be avoided in the future.
