Has Paulie Malignaggi Plateaued? By Chris Cella

(Photo By; Keisha Morrisey)

Through his 36-fight career, now going on his 13 year as a professional boxer, Paulie “The Magic Man” Malignaggi has thrown hands with some of the best fighters in the world, and has worked his way to retaining the current WBA World Welterweight Title.

Since getting stopped by Amir Khan back in 2011, Malignaggi has since won his last five fights, and recently has been looking to return back to action to defend his belt.

There was some noise made about him battling an aging, yet former champion in Shane Mosley, but it fell through.  Then the talk surfaced about Malignaggi fighting Diego Chaves in Abu Dhabi, and yet again, nothing has materialized.

For the 32-year old technical boxer, one has to wonder, is there anywhere else to go in boxing?  The Magic Man from Brooklyn has been working as an analyst for Showtime Boxing as of recent, and has been more exciting wearing a suit and tie than he has appeared in his last few trips to the ring. 

Malignaggi has kept his name around the top of the welterweight list over the last few years due to his ability to pick apart less than formidable opponents utilizing his fast hands and elusiveness, while doing just enough to hang with the big dogs in the few chances he has gotten to exchange leather with the champs.

But despite his record of 32-4, 7 KO, each time Malignaggi stepped up and fought an opponent with any name, he got knocked back down to reality.  He got stopped by Khan and Ricky Hatton, and lost a UD to Miguel Cotto and Juan Diaz.

Malignaggi’s career can be summed up with one phrase…good, but far from great.

He can be compared to a baseball player with a strong enough skill set to be a standout all-star in the minor leagues, but a small fish in the major leagues.

As time is against him, proving in his last outing when he was awarded a hometown split decision over Pablo Cesar Cano when he clearly got outworked by the younger, stronger fighter, fans and critics must begin to wonder what is next for the Paulie?

So now, this past week, there has been mention of a possible matchup against lightweight champion Adrien Broner.  Why?  So Malignaggi can add another big name to his list of losses?  It would be a lose-lose fight for both fighters as well as fans.  Outside of providing pre-fight hype and trash talk that WWE and UFC fans would ROTFL over, the fight itself would be a big time mismatch and disappointment.  Broner is at a point where he needs to step up the competition to show he is the real deal, and Paulie Malignaggi is not the avenue to explore.

Malignaggi’s career is stagnant; there’s no healthy medium for him.  If he steps up to real competition and big name fighters again, he will be outclassed; and on the flip side, nobody wants to see him beating (or for that matter winning garbage decisions over) second rate fighters.

But don’t worry Paulie Malignaggi fans.  If the Showtime Boxing gig doesn’t work out, and he steps away from the squared circle, he can always find work as an eyebrow model or audition for the next casting call of Jersey Shore.

 ♔EL Boxing Empress & MMA Princess♔, See you at the Fights and Thank You for your time. EL Boxing Empress Online @ Twitter http://www.twitter.com/Keishamorrisey ©®™ 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011 All photos other than specified by "EL Boxing Empress & MMA Princess" Keisha Morrisey, for ♔Empire Morrisey Photo-Studios♔, KCKMT for Bloodline Boxing Communications Entertainment and ★Starlite★ Boxing's Sweetscience Magnews-Online Publication all rights reserved.

Paulie Malignaggi: I WILL Be Fighting In Abu Dhabi, Against Either Chaves or Soto

With the news breaking, that the negotiations between promoter Johnny Eames’ Showtime Sports Events (SSE) promotional outfit and WBA Interim Welterweight Champion Diego Chaves’ camp have been terminated, it seemed inevitable that the proposed title clash between the Argentinian and WBA Welterweight King, Brooklyn, New York’s Paulie ‘Magic Man’ Malignaggi would no longer take place in Abu Dhabi, UAE in May. (Photo By; Keisha Morrisey)

However, following various transatlantic phone calls over the past thirty six hours, between SSE’s Managing Director, Gianluca Di Caro, and Paulie Malignaggi’s lawyer, Steven Bash, the mouthwatering clash, between the WBA’s top ranked Welterweight pairing remains a possibility for the Gulf state's inaugural World Championship event.

The deal clincher came after Gianluca Di Caro agreed to SSE continuing their pursuit of Chaves, by participating in the March 11^th WBA ordered purse bids.

In return Paulie Malignaggi agreed that should their quest be unsuccessful, that he would be just as happy to fight four weight World Champion, Tijuana, Mexico’s Humberto Soto in an equally mouthwatering WBF/WBA unification battle on May 18th.

On his arrival in Las Vegas, where on Saturday evening he will be color commentating on WBA Lightweight World Champion Richard ‘El Tigre’ Abril’s first defense of his Crown against Sharif ‘The Lion’ Bogere at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, Paulie Malignaggi stated.

“The opportunity to fight in Abu Dhabi excites me. 

I am a fighter always searching for new challenges and goals and winning the WBF welterweight title along with defending my WBA welterweight title in a historic place like Abu Dhabi would be a huge feather in my hat. 

I feel like boxing could have a new city to hold mega fights and events and if by me fighting there I could be a part of that, well that is just the kind of situation I look for and it motivates me to strive to continue to be the best. 

Whether the opportunity comes from Showtime Sports Events winning the purse bid or from possibly an opponent change to Humberto Soto it still remains an exciting situation for me as both of those guys are warriors and would be worthy opponents.”

Paulie ‘Magic Man’ Malignaggi, against either Diego Chaves or Humberto Soto, for the WBF and WBA World Welterweight Championships, will headline a World Class evening of professional boxing at the Zayed Sports City, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates on May 18^th.

Co-headlining sees IBF Flyweight World Champion, South Africa’s Moruti ‘Babyface’ Mthalane competing against Filipino super star Sonny Boy Jaro for the vacant WBF Flyweight title.

Supporting the exciting double header sees at least two further World Championship bouts, including WBF Light Welterweight Champion Zolani Marali defending his coveted Crown against mandatory challenger, WBF Interim title holder, Tijuana, Mexico’s Antonio ‘Cañitas’ Lozada Jr.

At least one further World Boxing Federation (WBF) World Championship bout is expected to announced shortly.

The final Championship bout of the night features former British and IBO World Champion Colin Lynes battling it out with Poland’s EBU-EU Champion Rafal Jackiewicz for the vacant WBF Inter-Continental Welterweight title, as well as earn the right to challenge the winner of Malignaggi – Chaves or Soto for the World title later in the year.

Supporting the sensational feature Championship bouts will see four future World Champions in action - two time Lithuanian National Amateur Heavyweight Champion Paulius Kasiulevicius, exciting Turkish Light Heavyweight Onder Ozgu, Albanian Middleweight Festim Lama and sensational London, UK based Saudi Light Welterweight Zouhair Siddiq, a highly exciting young prospect who was not only selected for the Beijing Olympics (unable to compete due to injury) but also won the prestigious London ABAs.

♔EL Boxing Empress & MMA Princess♔, See you at the Fights and Thank You for your time. EL Boxing Empress Online @ Twitter http://www.twitter.com/Keishamorrisey ©®™ 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011 All photos other than specified by "EL Boxing Empress & MMA Princess" Keisha Morrisey, for ♔Empire Morrisey Photo-Studios♔, KCKMT for Bloodline Boxing Communications Entertainment and ★Starlite★ Boxing's Sweetscience Magnews-Online Publication all rights reserved.

Argie Bargey – Malignaggi-Chaves Negotiations Fail, Scuppering Abu Dhabi Flagship Event.

Showtime Sports Events (SSE) today announced that all negotiations for WBA Welterweight World Champion Paulie Malignaggi to defend his crown against interim Champion, Argentina’s Diego Chaves, at their inaugural event at Zayed Sports City, in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates on May 18^th have been terminated.

 

The Showtime team first entered negotiations with Malignaggi on the 23^rd January, with the intention that Brooklyn, USA based Malignaggi facing WBF Welterweight King, Tijuana, Mexico’s Humberto Soto, however the following day the WBA ordered Malignaggi to face mandatory challenger Chaves.

 

After some nifty negotiations by Malignaggi’s lawyer, Steven Bash, the SSE team agreed to a switch of opponent and immediately made a substantial offer to Diego Chaves’ management.

 

However, whilst Malignaggi was firmly on board in January, it was not until the 14th February, some three days after the deadline set by SSE for acceptance of the offer, that the Argentinian’s promoter, Osvaldo Rivero, actually began negotiations.

 

With the clock ticking, SSE’s matchmaker, Olaf Schroeder, and lawyer, Tony Wyatt, set to work in an attempt to secure Chaves’ signature.

 

With no further correspondence being received from Mr. Rivero by February 21^st, just a few short days before both the WBA and proposed PPV provider’s deadline of February 24^th, Showtime Sports Events Managing Director, Gianluca Di Caro intervened, by personally writing to Mr. Rivero.

 

Neither Mr. Rivero or the Argentinian’s camp responded, leaving no viable option but for SSE to terminate all discussions, regarding Chaves, and focus on other options available.

 

 

With the news breaking earlier today, that the WBA have now called for purse bids on March 11th for Malignaggi-Chaves, these options seem rather limited.

 

Even so, Showtime Sports Events promoter, Johnny Eames, remains relatively sanguine about the whole affair, saying,

 

“As much as we tried to get the Malignaggi-Chaves fight on, it seems this is now a non-starter.

 

It’s a month since we had Paulie Malignaggi agree to the fight, but for some reason Chaves’ people have decided they don’t want the fight on our show, even though the offer we made is much higher than Chaves has had for his previous fights.

 

It’s so disappointing, Chaves is the #1 contender to challenge for Paulie Malignaggi’s WBA title.

 

The WBA were happy for us to put it on, Golden Boy were happy for us to put it on, but it seems someone, probably not Chaves but someone in his camp, was holding out for more money because it’s in Abu Dhabi.

 

Either that or they had no intention of signing and were holding out for the WBA to order purse bids, so they can have the fight on home turf.

 

Either way, so it goes, they didn’t sign by yesterday and now we’re going to have to look elsewhere, hopefully though with Paulie Malignaggi still top of the bill, possibly against WBF World Champion Humberto Soto.

 

If it doesn’t work out that way, so be it and we’ll put Paulie on another of our shows later in the year, because he has been so easy to deal with and we don’t want him losing out on the big purse we offered him.”

♔EL Boxing Empress & MMA Princess♔, See you at the Fights and Thank You for your time. EL Boxing Empress Online @ Twitter http://www.twitter.com/Keishamorrisey ©®™ 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011 All photos other than specified by "EL Boxing Empress & MMA Princess" Keisha Morrisey, for ♔Empire Morrisey Photo-Studios♔, KCKMT for Bloodline Boxing Communications Entertainment and ★Starlite★ Boxing's Sweetscience Magnews-Online Publication all rights reserved.