LATEST NEWS FLASH: Manager Jose Nunez vows that “Guzman will knock Funeka out in six rounds.” Fight is on even though Guzman, at 148 pounds now is 13 pounds above the lightweight limit. If Funeka wins, he is the new IBF champion at 135 pounds. If Guzman wins, he just wins a prize fight, that is all. ____________________________ EDITOR’S NOTE, CLARIFICATION: If Joan Guzman is not over 150 pounds at second weigh in, 7 am Las Vegas time, the fight with Ali Funeka goes on. If it does, Funeka will become IBF champ with a victory. Guzman can win the fight but not the world title. Guzman went to sleep Friday night at 148 pounds, nine hours before second weigh in, according to his camp.
COPENHAGEN?Don King loves the old joke about the difference between the black man’s fairy tale and the white man’s fairy tale.
The white man fairy tale starts out with ?once upon a time.?
Black man’s fairy tale, or so the joke goes, begins with ?you ain’t gonna believe this spit…?
OK, so I mistyped ?spit.?
The latest weigh in debacle involving Dominican Dandy Joan Guzman, reverberated to me all the way from the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas to my hotel here in the Valby section of this marvelous Danish metropolis.
In case you haven’t heard over your morning coffee, cereal and whole wheat toast (skip the white bread, brother), the still undefeated Guzman ?lost? yet another bout with the official scales.
And I can reveal to you that the story behind the story on Guzman’s failure to make the 135 pound limit for this IBF world lightweight title rematch against South African giraffe Ali ?Rush Hour? Funeka is linked to the Ricky Hatton Curse which dates back to when the British boxer was destroyed by Manny Pacquiao.
The fight is going forward on HBO only if Guzman makes a 150 pound limit at a 7 am weigh in this morning (Saturday). Neither man can win the IBF title and Guzman has been hit with a $30,000 weight making penalty which is being deducted from his $150,000 purse.
But more on the Pacman-Hatton vortex and the wicked curse in a minute.
Ricky Hatton poses with nutrition guru Kerry Kayes. Kayes was hired by Joan Guzman’s manager to insure the Dominican Dandy made 136 pound weight limit for IBF title bout Saturday night (HBO) against Ali Funeka. In a massive failure, Guzman hit the official scales at 144 pounds, jeopardizing the balance of his pro career. (Saddoboxing.com Photo) Now over to Vegas and embattled Guzman manager, Jose Nunez, who is disgusted by the whole situation, particuarly the photos circulating around the glove showing Guzman smiling and laughing as he weighed 144, an incredible nine pounds above the contractual limit on Friday.
Funeka, who was robbed of a rightful decision and the vacant IBF belt after battering Guzman Nov. 28 in Quebec City, continued to be thoroughly professional, weighing exactly 135. Ricky “Fatton” has made constant jokes about his weight swings but Joan Guzman isn’t laughing at his proble, (AP Photo)
(Guzman has failed to make the proper weight several times in prior bouts slated for HBO and Showtime, most notably in Biloxi, Ms., when Guzman had the rare chance to cop three world lightweight title bouts in a fight against Nate Campbell.)
Nunez said Guzman wasn’t laughing like ha, ha, but was laughing out of embarrassment, though not over being so grossly overweight.
?Joan was smiling because he was nude and they held up a blanket to cover him,? Nunez told me at 3:30 am, Vegas time on fight day. ?He wasn’t laughing like it was a joke or something. Joan did everything they (former Hatton trainer Lee Beard and Hatton’s slef-proclaimed nutrition expert Kerry Kayes) asked him to do. He was smiling because he was butt naked in public, that’s why.
?If Guzman doesn’t make the 150 pounds weight in a few hours, he will have to retire. He will be finished in boxing. He went to bed here at the hotel at 10 pm and he weighed 148 so it should be no problem.?
Nunez said both Beard and Kayes, both part of Hatton’s camp when he got flattened in less than two complete rounds by the Pinoy Ido, repeatedly assured him Guzman’s weight would be no issue this time. Nunez said Guzman showed up in Vegas 10 days ago, weighing 145 pounds so that means he lost one pound from then to weigh in time.
?It was a stupid decision for me to hire these guys,? Nunez said. ?Just stupid. They had him training in England and told me not to worry about weight. They told Joan the same thing. He trained hard. Joan told me he trained better because he was focused on training and not on the weight.
?If he can’t fight this fight, he can hang it up. These guys, especially Kayes, had him drinking water all the time, even just before the weigh in. He was drinking eight bottles of water but they said don’t worry about it.
?Kayes has something he calls a sauna suit and they said they could take 15-20 pounds off, that they did it with Ricky Hatton all the time, in one day. They said it was water weight and it would roll off.
?Kayes brought the sauna suit over here (to Vegas) and then told us he couldn’t make it work because of the different voltage here. So they put Guzman in the hotel sauna bath, something he isn’t used to,? Nunez said.
?So Guzman stays in the sauna for an hour and a half but that’s all he can take of that.? Pacquaio crushed Hatton in less than six blistering minutes in their big fight in Las Vegas (AP Photo) I asked Nunez what explanation for the surprise on the scales was offered, if any, by the trainer and the nutritional expert.
?Kerry told me and Guzman that it was 100 percent he would make the weight here. Guzman, if he keeps fighting, will now go to 140 pounds. Guzman had his confidence back. He did whatever they told him to do in England and over here as well.
?Kerry, he told me he was sorry, so sorry, but I told him I don’t want to hear it.?
If ever Guzman needed some professional perfume, it is now. Beating Funeka over the weight won’t get him any world title belt but it would restore some badly needed credibility.
Not making 150 pounds in a few hours is a second disaster because it means Guzman won’t be in the ring and on the HBO TV screens.
If that happens, Team Guzman won’t be thinking about sauna suits but they could be buried in lawsuits. Guzman is soon to turn age 34 and his career is staggering with all these weight misadventures. Failure to make the weight for Campbell in Mississippi got him a lengthy suspension from that state’s athletic commission.
The Curse of Ricky Hatton has struck again.
