Kermit Cintron has been on this stage before. Since 2004, Cintron has been at the doorstep of breaking through to the upper level of the sport. Just one win away from the big money fights, Cintron has come up short each time. On Saturday night at the Home Depot Center in Carson, California, another such opportunity presents itself. Standing in his way is one of the world’s elite and most avoided fighters, Paul Williams.
Cintron (32-2-1, 28 KOs) of Houston, Texas by way of Carolina, Puerto Rico, can sympathize with the oft-evaded Williams. In May of last year, Cintron took on the most feared junior middleweight prospect at the time Alfredo Angulo. Cintron, known to be much more of a puncher than a traditional boxer, put on a clinic and won eight rounds on all three judges’ scorecards.
In winning the fight, especially by such wide margins, one would figure Cintron would be in line for a high profile fight, or at least welcomed back with open arms by HBO, which televised the Angulo bout. Neither possibility happened for Cintron in the ensuing twelve months. Adding insult, Angulo has fought twice on the network since last May and even picked up an interim title. Meanwhile Cintron has fought just once during that stretch, stopping journeyman Juliano Ramos in Puerto Rico.
Cintron’s promoter Lou DiBella is understandably a bit bitter about the whole situation. “It is frustrating when you beat a guy from pillar to post and then the guy gets two easy touches and a lot of money on premium cable while you have to fight a keep busy fight and wait for a guy who frankly most people in boxing don’t want to fight,” said DiBella during Monday’s conference call. “The idea that you can lose nine out of twelve rounds, and you are brought back as if you won, and the guy that won is sitting around waiting, that’s troubling. The other thing that is troubling is when you get passed over by the WBO for a vacant interim title, when you have beaten the guy that is fighting for it and you are not even offered the fight.”
While the Angulo aftermath clearly bothers Cintron, he has seemingly put it into the rearview and used it as motivation for Saturday’s fight. “The whole situation with Angulo, them putting him ahead of me, it is what it is,” said Cintron. “I’m not going to cry about it. I know I beat his ass, so right now I feel like I am the champion. I’m just going to move forward in my career and I am looking forward to May 8 against Paul Williams. We are going to put on a good show and the best man is going to win. I am going to go in there with the attitude that we are going to win, because I am not an opponent for nobody.”
When a big fight comes along, it is customary for fight scribes to compare their performances against common opponents as a way to gauge the outcome. Cintron and Williams have three common opponents. Williams beat all three, while Cintron went 1-2-1 against the group. They both stopped Walter Matthysse, which makes their fights against Antonio Margarito and Sergio Martinez the most notable. Last December, Williams edged Martinez in a close and competitive fight and fight of the year candidate. Earlier in the year, Cintron struggled against Martinez in an awful fight that most felt he should have lost. Cintron was counted out in the seventh after he went down from what he thought was a headutt, but the fight was allowed to resume. Later in the bout, a point deduction from Martinez would seal the draw.
Cintron’s most defining fights to date came against Antonio Margarito. Two years before Paul Williams outpointed Margarito, the “Tijuana Tornado” completely dominated a young and raw Cintron before scoring a fifth-round stoppage. Three years later, and trained at the time by Emanuel Steward, Cintron was stopped by Margarito again, this time by a body shot in the sixth. The events of last January, namely plaster of paris being found in Margarito’s hand wraps, put a cloud of doubt over those two Cintron defeats.
DiBella puts those three Cintron performances in perspective. “Particularly the second loss to Margarito [hurt him] and Kermit is not the type of guy to complain, but with all respect Margarito is a cheater, the worst kind of cheater,” stated DiBella. “Right now you have Sergio Martinez standing right with Paul on everybody’s pound-for-pound list. That was a tough fight for Kermit, but when you look at it now in 20/20 hindsight, and how competitive a lot of those rounds were, you see that he stands with the best fighters in the world. And again, you should not be penalized for being willing to fight the best.”
The best fighting the best, regardless of titles or treatment from the premium cable outlets, is what Saturday’s fight is all about, especially to Cintron. “This is a great opportunity for me to be able to fight Paul Williams,” stated Cintron. “A lot of fighters are avoiding us and best needs to fight the best. That is why I am here, to fight the best and to be the best.”
Photo by Jan Sanders/Goossen Tutor Promotions
Mario Ortega Jr. can be reached at ortega15rds@lycos.com.
