Premier Boxing Champions is giving us two cards Saturday night. The night cap will be headlined by Danny Garcia and Brandon Rios on Showtime, but first we have a FOX show featuring Devon Alexander and Victor Ortiz in the main event. That’s right. Victor Ortiz and Devon Alexander are a broadcast network show main event in 2018. We live in a mad world, dear readers.
I’ve been looking over the ledgers of Devon Alexander (27-4, 14 KOs) and Victor Ortiz (32-6-2, 25 KOs) to try to decide when would have been the best time for the two to meet in terms of making it the biggest fight possible. The most interesting part of this exercise is trying to determine when Victor Ortiz was at his peak in terms of being a prestige fighter, a guy fans want to see because they think he is good.
I’ve come up with two possible spots on his timeline. The first is heading into his fight with Marcos Maidana in 2009 as an unbeaten prospect. Coming into that night, Victor Ortiz was considered by many to be a special prospect. He was a young fighter a lot of people were excited about. Hell, he was a prospect that I was excited about. “Vicious” Victor was a clear power puncher with some skill, the looks, and the charisma. Golden Boy thought they had a star on their hands and so did everyone else.
Marcos Maidana burst into our lives by exposing Victor Ortiz’s mental weakness in that fight and he has never quite recovered from it. He almost did though. After four straight bounceback wins over mostly faded opposition, Ortiz stepped back up to meet Lamont Peterson in 2010. The once beaten prospect started strong early with a pair of third round knockdowns, but Peterson rallied down the stretch to steal back a draw. That was the set back that makes me hesitant to claim this version of Victor Ortiz as the premiere one, but it tempts me anyway because of his next fight.
Four months later, Victor Ortiz met unbeaten Andre Berto in what turned out to be one of the best fights of the year. It was skillful and savage. Both men were down twice. That night in April was the one time in Victor Ortiz’s career that he met serious adversity and triumphed, scoring a clear cut decision at the end of the fight. The Berto win was so big for him that it even got him a fight with Floyd Mayweather Jr next time out.
Of course, the Mayweather fight was the beginning of the end of Vicious Victor as a contender. Following a blatant headbutt, Ortiz apologized with a hug. After he went in for a weird second hug, Mayweather caught him with an unexpected shot that put him out. It was a weird, albeit entertaining end to the PPV broadcast. Next time out Ortiz quit after his jaw broke against high level journeyman Josesito Lopez. He found himself on a three fight losing streak after being knocked out by skilled, but generally light punching Luis Collazo in only two rounds.
Since the Collazo loss in 2014, Berto is 3-1. The three wins have come against low level opposition while the loss was a fourth round stoppage loss to Andre Berto in a rematch between two fighters in much worse positions in the sport than they were the first time they met. Ortiz did put Berto down in that fight, but it didn’t matter.
If I had to pick between the Victor Ortiz going into the Maidana fight or the one after the first Berto fight, I’d say the latter is probably the most prestigious version that the now 31 year old has ever been. Unfortunately, by that point Devon Alexander was not being well received by the boxing public and it wouldn’t have been the peak time to match them.
Devin Alexander was a major prospect from St. Louis being brought up by Don King as one of the controversial promoter’s last real contributions to the sport. He received his first real exposure on the bizarre 2008 HBO PPV pitting sad, old versions of Roy Jones Jr and Tito Trinidad against one another. That night young Devon craftily outboxed DeMarcus “Chop Chop” Corley for his first notable win.
Eighteen months and four fights later, Alexander received his first title shot against longtime top British junior welterweight Junior Witter. The St. Louis fighter exceeded expectations that night, easily dominating the veteran and causing him to retire after eight. In his first fight as a titleholder, Devon Alexander immediately jumped into a unification fight on HBO with hard nosed Colombian puncher Juan Urango on HBO.
That night in 2010 was undoubtedly the peak of Devon Alexander in my view. Sure, he was expected to win, but the way in which he destroyed Urango with a highlight reel finish in the eighth was really something else. Urango had the reputation of being an extremely durable man following his brave performance against a still elite Ricky Hatton, but Alexander put him down and out mercilessly.
Unfortunately, the dominance didn’t hold. Since then, Alexander has mostly been down with one very significant up. After the Urango show, Devon put on a poor performance against tricky Ukranian Andriy Kotelnik. Many feel he should not have gotten the decision. Next he met Timothy Bradley and was largely dominated. He rebounded with a win against Lucas Matthysse, but again, like with the Kotelnik fight, few watching it really felt like he deserved the decision that he received in the end.
For one night and one night only, Devon Alexander the elite talent made a reappearance in his next fight in 2012. In February, Alexander downright routed Marcos Maidana on HBO. Their fight was a bell to bell outclassing. As Maidana rose to great heights in his destruction of Adrien Broner and two fight series with Floyd Mayweather Jr while at the same time Devon Alexander struggled, this fight became more and more of an outlier. You can’t take it from the former unified junior welterweight titleholder though. He put on the performance.
Alexander did become a two division titleholder with a win over an aging, and never really great Randall Bailey that same year at welterweight, but that was a pretty tedious fight to watch. After a soft defense, Alexander lost the title in a minor upset to now elite welterweight Shawn Porter. He was supposed to be auditioning for a fight with Floyd Mayweather Jr, but Devon forgot to win first.
He returned with a tougher than expected win over Jesus Soto Karass before losing widely for the first time in his career against Amir Khan. That night looked like rock bottom, but it wasn’t. Khan is extremely talented and highly skilled despite his flaws, so losing big to him is something that happens to a lot of guys. Losing his bounceback fight to Aaron Martinez was a different story. Don’t get me wrong, Aaron Martinez can fight and was coming off a good performance against Robert Guerrero at the time. It is just that he is basically a gate keeper, a tough guy with little athletic talent and no power. Someone with the physical gifts of Devon Alexander is not supposed to have any trouble with an Aaron Martinez, let alone lose to him.
After that fight the St. Louis fighter took two years off, not returning until this past November against soft touch Walter Castillo. A lot emerged about Alexander’s struggles in the build up to that fight, namely his very quiet and personal addiction to painkillers. The basic narrative that emerged was the Alexander stopped living up to his talents because of his addiction. Now he is clean and back. To help that story, he did look pretty good against Castillo too.
But let’s return to the original question. At what point in these two fighters’ careers would have been the optimal time for them to meet to make the biggest fight possible? There are two options, I think. The first would be in late 2010. Devon would have been at the top of his game following the Urango highlights and Victor would have been 4-0 since his meltdown against Maidana. The fight could have been sold as Ortiz’s potential redemption would and done pretty well. The other time could have been in 2012 following Alexander’s schooling of the very same Maidana that ended the Ortiz hype train a few years back. It would have been the once promised new Golden Boy’s first fight back since the very high profile Mayweather debacle and again sold well I think.
I can tell you unequivocally when this fight would not be at its peak marination point. 2018. Tomorrow. How bizarre is it that this is a broadcast network main event fight in 2018? Clearly PBC is looking for a credible but not too threatening opponent for their elite welterweights, but to use a FOX main event for this? Honestly, it is kind of gross.
Still, it could be a decent fight. Whatever else to say about him, there is never a dull Victor Ortiz fight. I just don’t trust him against anyone with any talent, really, so my prediction is that maybe he gets buzzed or something and quits. I always think he is going to quit because he always kind of does. He could have kept going against Maidana and Lopez, and he probably could have kept going against Collazo and in the Berto rematch. He didn’t though because he is a quitter without the kind of heart that we are used to seeing out of fighters. I know that is harsh, but that is how I see it. I don’t really buy the Devon Alexander is clean and therefore back narrative because the addiction started with the Maidana fight and he was struggling before that, but I don’t need to. He’s good enough to get in Victor Ortiz’s head.
The co-main event here is a pretty good step up fight for PBC super middleweight prospect Caleb “Sweet Hands” Plant (16-0, 10 KOs). Plant is a fluid, flashy combination puncher with coordinated hands that has been brought up against the standard soft competition for a prospect. That ends Saturday night against Rogelio “Porky” Medina (38-8, 32 KOs). In some ways, Porky is a limited fighter for sure. But he is tough as nails, ultra aggressive, and packs some power in his leather. Seeing how Plant reacts to a fighter like Medina is an interesting idea indeed. The show will be opened by 21 year old 2016 US Olympian Carlos Balderas (3-0, 3 KOs) in a six round walkover against a Mexican club fighter. That fight won’t be competitive, of course, but Balderas is definitely talented and worth a look.
The card starts at 8 PM on FOX. It will end before PBC’s 10 PM Showtime card, so don’t worry about a conflict there. These two coupled with the World Series of Boxing semifinal fight between George Groves and Chris Eubank Jr in the UK during the late afternoon, early evening hours make for a full day of boxing for us to enjoy.
