"The main thing I want to see, man, I want to see the judges and the referees collectively do a better job and I want to see them held accountable for their actions when they make a mistake. I really think that some of these unfair decisions that get handed down by a judge or a referee changes a guy's life around. It really does...that's what I hope happens next year is that some of these guys are just made to fight. Everybody wants to get paid and you only got 20% of these kids really willing to take a tough fight. They say one thing publicly, but privately, they say something completely different," stated world-class trainer Stephen "Breadman" Edwards, who looked back on the biggest winners and losers of 2015, discussed what's in store for 2016, and much more. Check it out!
PC: I wanted to do a recap of the year in boxing with you. With Floyd Mayweather announcing his retirement, who do you see as the new pound-for-pound king? Who replaced Floyd on your list?
SE: You know what, Perc? I think it's up for grabs. I would say Guillermo Rigondeaux, but he's inactive and he didn't look good in his last fight; maybe that was because of the 2-weeks notice. I think the broadcasters did him a little bit of a disservice because they should have pointed out that he did take the fight on 2-weeks notice. If you twist my arm, I would say Andre Ward. I think he is the best fighter in the world because he's the guy that has accomplished the most out of the people in the argument. I'm a big Ward fan, but he's been inactive also, so it kind of takes the argument away. He's fought maybe two times in the last 2 or 3 years I think. I don't have a problem with Roman Gonzalez being named the best guy. He's a 3-division champion, he's 44 and 0, and the eyeball test shows me he's a great fighter. He's fought some really good competition; we just don't know all of his opponents. I don't have a problem with Ring putting him as the number one guy. I actually think that it's going to change. It's going to kind of go from hand to hand over the next 2 years. I don't think we are going to get a consensus #1 like we had with Floyd Mayweather, Manny Pacquiao before him, and Roy Jones before that where you had one guy who was the #1 guy for a 3, 4, 5-year stretch. I don't think we are going to have that for awhile because I think there are too many guys that are kind of clustered together where with a loss here and a loss there, it will kind of change. Right now, they may say Roman Gonzalez is, but the winner of Andre Ward and Sergey Kovalev would certainly get a lot of votes next year if that ever takes place, which I think it will. How can you not put that guy as your #1? I don't care what Roman Gonzalez did, that fight is so big and so historically relevant that that guy is going to be the #1 guy. I think it will kind of flip flop with performances. It's going to go up and down and through a few guys' hands for a little while.
PC: You mentioned Andre Ward and Guillermo Rigondeaux's inactivity. Add in Mikey Garcia and that is 3 of the top guys in the sport who have been very inactive. How detrimental is that to not only their careers, but to the sport to have 3 of your top guys on the sideline for whatever reason?
SE: Everybody has a personal thing; they have their own personal situation that they need to work out. I'm a fan of all 3 of those guys and they all fight totally different styles. But it's never good for boxing when you have undefeated guys that are in relevant divisions that have big fights that they can be in...you're talking about 3 guys in the top 10 or 15 in the world and none of them are fighting often or consistent. It's definitely not a good thing for boxing and it hurts them from a boxing standpoint because the old saying goes, "If you rest too much, you rust too much!" Maybe they all can come back and be the same or maybe they won't. Who knows? But it definitely drops your stock when you go away from this sport unless you are somebody that is considered a superstar. All of them guys are great fighters, but none of them are just a flat out superstar where you can take off and the demand for you to come back is so big that it kind of outweighs the fact that you took off. Like Ray Leonard can take off and he can come back and be bigger than ever. Ali can take off and he can come back and be bigger than ever. Mike Tyson can take off and he can come back and be bigger than ever. Floyd Mayweather can take off and come back and be bigger than ever. Those guys is what you call great fighters, they are championship fighters, but they haven't reached the superstar status yet, so when they take off, it hurts their appeal a little bit. It's not the superstar going away to where you are the prodigal son and you come back and everybody has been waiting for you like, where have you been? Those guys are still more or less building their legacies to where the other guys who took off, they kind of had that superstar status already, so when they leave for a little while, it kind of makes their appeal go up. Ward, Rigondeaux, and Garcia, it doesn't make their appeal go up. It kind of makes people forget about them. If Ward was active, let's be honest, it wouldn't be an argument over who was the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world. The only reason Roman Gonzales is considered the best fighter in the world is because Andre Ward is not active anymore. Andre Ward is in a more relevant division, he's an Olympian, he went through the Super Six, so if he was still fighting and he was fighting guys like DeGale, Dirrell and Badou Jack and Kovalev and Adonis Stevenson, if he had those kind of fights on his ledger over 2013, '14 and '15, would we really be arguing over who was the best fighter in the world? It would be a consensus opinion. I definitely think it hurts their stock to a degree.
PC: We are in a sport where, with the exception of an occasional draw, we have a winner and a loser. Who won in boxing this year in your opinion? It can be a promoter, network, or fighter.
SE: I don't want to answer my guy because it's always going to come off as biased, but he had a good year. But I think Deontay Wilder won. Deontay Wilder had a tremendous year in my opinion because I think he improved. He finally got rounds up under his belt. He was a guy that didn't have rounds. He went the distance; a couple of guys took him into the second half of the fight. He really performed, so I think Wilder won. Tyson Fury won. He became the lineal heavyweight champion of the world. You can't get no bigger than that. That was a huge accomplishment. Obviously Floyd Mayweather won. He won the legacy defining fight. If Floyd does not beat Manny Pacquiao, as messed up as this is, it would have definitely damaged his legacy. That's a guy that he had to defeat. If he didn't beat him in 2015, people would have assumed that he never would have beat him in 2010. So Floyd had to win that fight. All the promoters that are with PBC, those guys are winning (laughing). They are making a whole lot of money. I don't have to name all of them, but those guys are getting plenty of work. Canelo Alvarez is winning. He got the lineal middleweight championship of the world at 155 pounds. He's the A-side to anybody except for Floyd Mayweather, so he won big. I think Roman Gonzalez won. He got to be the #1 pound-for-pound fighter in the world. He finally got a chance to get on HBO and he's a 112-pounder. Historically they don't make a lot of money in that division, so he definitely won. Those are some guys I consider that really had good years in 2015.
PC: Unfortunately we have to look at the flip side of that. Who took a loss this year in the sport?
SE: I hate talking negative about boxers because people are so hard on boxers already, but if I'm going to give you an honest answer, Brandon Rios lost. Timothy Bradley is not known as a puncher. Rios gets another big fight on HBO and he gets knocked out by Bradley. He seems to be...guys who fight with his style don't usually have a lot of longevity. I can't see Rios having...he may go from being a championship level fighter to sort of a gatekeeper kind of a guy. I don't like to use that word, but it's going to be tough for Brandon Rios at 147 to become relevant again. Bermane Stiverne lost. He's a heavyweight and it's a shame that he came in so overweight for his fight with Wilder. He took a bad beating in that fight and he didn't look good in his next fight after that. So to be the heavyweight champion of the world and to lose your title, it seems like he left a piece of himself in the ring for that particular fight. I think Roc Nation lost. They had a lot of big signings, but besides Cotto, they haven't done anything relevant in the sport of boxing. They have Andre Ward, who I think is a fantastic fighter. I just think he could be showcased a lot more than he is. They lost with Cotto, who is their biggest star and Cotto just lost to Canelo, which is not a good thing when you have one guy who is sort of keeping your lights on in your company and then that guy takes a loss. That was a really, really important fight between Roc Nation and Golden Boy and Golden Boy came out on top. But I want to see everybody do good. Hopefully everybody that I named can bounce back next year. The more people that do good in boxing brings more prosperity and positive vibes to the sport.
PC: Who was your breakout star of the year?
SE: My kid! I really think Julian came on this year. He fought 3 times. He didn't lose a round in any of his fights. He worked his way up to a mandatory eliminator fight. He was denied a couple of big fights, but I really think that if he wasn't a contender last year, he is 100% a contender now. There are no more prospect labels on this kid. I think a kid that he can fight, Jermall Charlo, finally got a title shot. He is the champion of the world right now. He really broke out this year. James DeGale really impressed me. I was always a big fan of Andre Dirrell and James DeGale came over here to America and fought him and beat him. That was a very significant performance. Andre Dirrell is a really talented fighter and to beat him on American soil was a really big accomplishment. Badou Jack...I know Badou Jack casually. I speak to him and say what's up, but you talk about a guy who turned his career around, man. I am super proud of that guy. He's very humble. He won two fights as the underdog and that's not easy, man. People don't even take fights if they are the underdog in this day and time. He went into two fights and was the underdog and won both of the fights cleanly against George Groves and Anthony Dirrell. Out of everybody, he was definitely the Breakout Fighter of the Year in my opinion. He had an incredible year. I don't know if he will be the Fighter of the Year, but he should definitely be Comeback Fighter of the Year. He got knocked out in the first round about 3 or 4 fights ago and that dude just totally turned it around with just hard work and perseverance. Like I said, he took fights when he was the underdog. Nobody does that in this era. They just don't do it. You got guys that always want to be the favorite, they hide behind their promoters, and that guy took two fights where he was the underdog and won them both, so I definitely think Badou Jack deserves all of the props that he's going to get, man.
PC: What would you like to see happen in the sport of boxing in 2016?
SE: Obviously drug testing, but we spoke on that. But the main thing I want to see, man, I want to see the judges and the referees collectively do a better job and I want to see them held accountable for their actions when they make a mistake. I really think that some of these unfair decisions that get handed down by a judge or a referee changes a guy's life around. It really does. To go through a 8 or 10-week camp and to have somebody make a bad call, you lose your drive to go through that again. People don't understand what fighters go through, so to put everything into something and still come up short is devastating mentally and they don't have that to keep going through that. And I also want to see the powers that be, the promoters, the big time managers or whatever you want to call them, I think they gotta start making these guys fight. It's too much politics involved in boxing. And people keep using the politics as an excuse, but it's really guys just not wanting to fight. They are hiding behind their company. That's just what it is. Now I don't believe that a fighter has to fight a killer every time out because you will shorten your career. You don't have to do that. I remember when Manny Pacquiao was with Murad Muhammad, he fought freaking Marco Antonio Barrera, then he turned around and fought Juan Manuel Marquez, he had an in-between fight and then he went straight to Erik Morales and I was like, "Damn! They trying to kill ol' boy." That's not easy for nobody and I get that, but these guys just hide behind their companies so much and then they get rewarded getting a fight that they know they can win. And they get a decent payday. It may not be the huge payday, Perc, but the guy gets a win and he gets a nice 6-figure payday, he's going to keep doing that for the rest of his career. Nobody is going to fight the 50/50 tough fight against a guy that has a chance to beat them when they can keep fighting 70/30 and 80/20 fights for a little bit less money, but the risk is way less. I just think that guys have to earn their money to an extent. You don't have to fight killers all of the time, but it's getting a little bit crazy now because everybody is fighting showcase fight after showcase fight after showcase fight. It's like, come on, man, how many of those fights are you going to fight? You should at least sprinkle it out; fight a tough fight, then a showcase fight, fight a tough fight, then a showcase fight, fight two showcase fights and then come back and fight a tough fight. But to just fight showcase after showcase is getting old now. People not stupid; they know who is a real threat and whose not. That's why Badou Jack gets so much credit in my opinion because he jumped in the ring with two guys who was supposed to beat him and won both fights. He deserves a showcase fight if anybody does. He probably won't get one, but if anybody deserves a "go ahead and knock out a turkey sandwich that's not top 15", it's Badou Jack. But he'll probably have to take another tough fight. I'm hearing about him and DeGale, and I'm sure he don't mind, but if anybody deserves it, it's a guy like him. That's what I hope happens next year is that some of these guys are just made to fight. Everybody wants to get paid and you only got 20% of these kids really willing to take a tough fight. They say one thing publicly, but privately, they say something completely different.
[ Follow Percy Crawford on Twitter @MrLouis1ana ]