For any boxer starting out his career, to become a champion is the ultimate goal. For those that succeed in becoming a champion, the next step is to become a great champion. Boxing enthusiasts are a hard bunch to please though, and the “great” label is a tough nut to crack. It is a label made even harder for fighters to attain by critics who choose to move the goal posts, even when a champion has excelled above and beyond his peers in those aspects typically used to define “greatness”. Floyd Mayweather is one such victim.
To see why, delve with me for a moment on a journey back in time. I want to take you first to the evening of October 3rd in the year 1998. Bill Clinton was the president of the United States, with the Monica Lewinsky scandal breaking just months earlier. ‘Gazza’ had recently been dropped from the England football team (my American friends will just have to trust me – it was a really big deal). A new teenage sensation called ‘Britney Spears’ was storming the charts with her first hit. And the ‘War on Terror’ was something you might find in a sci-fi movie. It was also the night a young ‘Pretty Boy’ named Floyd climbed into the ring to contest his first world title belt, stepping through the ropes to challenge the seasoned, world-class Mexican Genaro Hernandez for the WBC super featherweight title.
Ruslan Provodnikov – 139.8 pounds
Demetrius “Boo Boo” Andrade (19-0, 13KOs), the 2008 U.S. Olympian and one of the most decorated American amateur pugilists, will get his long awaited opportunity at a world title after several delays and opponent changes, when he takes on the former 2004 Olympian, Vanes “Nightmare” Martirosyan (33-0-1, 21KOs) on November 9th in Corpus Christi, Texas, for the vacant World Boxing Organization`s (“WBO”) Junior Middleweight Championship. 
SAN ANTONIO (Oct. 18, 2013) – SHOWTIME Sports® will present a world championship doubleheader on Saturday, Nov. 30, as Devon Alexander “The Great” defends his IBF Welterweight World Championship against Shawn “Showtime” Porter in a 12-round bout at Freeman Coliseum in San Antonio, Texas. In the co-main event, also scheduled for 12-rounds, the WBC Super Bantamweight Championship is on the line as Leo “Teremoto” Santa Cruz defends his title against Cesar Seda.
Bernard Hopkins: It’s good to be back home in Atlantic City where my first fight was at in 1988. I’ve been there a few times, but to come there again at this stage is pretty exciting. It’s pretty exciting in a lot of ways. This never gets old for me. That’s been a love that’s still there and the energy is still there because this never gets old for me. You can’t do it all your life, but it never gets old. And when it gets old it gets kind of through the motions. When that happens there can’t be nothing positive come out of that. But I’m looking forward to next Saturday to, again, continue to add another page to this long book.
Bruce Binkow
Wladimir Klitschko (61-3, 51 KOs) has been widely criticized in these latter stages of his career for cherry picking his opponents. Going into his fight with Alexander Povetkin many people thought it would be a good match up, but as I feared, even though Povetkin was tougher than most, he completely failed to give Klitschko a good fight. A fighter’s challenge to a title is validated by who they have fought. This is what makes a man deserve a shot to take down Klitschko. 
MONTREAL(October 17, 2013) — The World Boxing Council (WBC), The Ring Magazine and lineal World light heavyweight champion, Adonis “Superman” Stevenson (22-1, 19 KOs), has promised to be a spectacular, popular and active champion. He is keeping his word, fighting more impressively with each other victory, as he now prepares for his fourth fight in 2013.
Before facing Alexander Povetkin, it was quite a while since Wladimir Klitschko was placed against a formidable opponent with the promise of an exciting match. Most of Wladimir’s opponents were written off by the boxing community before the first bell ever rang, similar to how Mike Tyson used to tune the boxing public to believe that the fight was never going to be competitive.