At some point a word for the art of inducing black magic, “mojo,” became a synonym for momentum. Today there’s even a popular Hollywood website that tracks movies’ box-office momentum and calls it mojo. Boxing has its own such mojo.
It’s a variation on the risk-reward ratio that keeps managers awake at night. A fighter with mojo makes lots of money relative to the risk his competition poses. If you were to take a fighter’s purse, then, and divide it by his opponent’s assumed risk rating, what you would have left is a fighter’s mojo.
Well, this weekend somebody’s mojo is going to go in San Antonio. That’s where Mexican Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. battles Ireland’s John Duddy for something called the “WBC Silver Middleweight Title” in the 15th installment of promoter Top Rank’s “Latin Fury” pay-per-view series. Marco Antonio Barrera will also be there, accompanied by local prospect Raul Martinez, Mexican namesake curiosity Salvador Sanchez, and Phoenix superstar-in-the-making Jose Benavidez.
Top Rank is as much a participant in this show as any fighter because the risk-reward ratio of its main event has an uncharacteristically asymmetrical look to it. Neither Chavez nor Duddy will see his mojo improve greatly with a victory, and either Chavez or Duddy will see his mojo vanish with a loss.
This event will happen in a stadium, Alamodome, and feature two Top Rank fighters. It will be the third time Top Rank has employed this formula in 2010. Earlier this month, it put Yuri Foreman and Miguel Cotto in Yankee Stadium. Earlier this year, it put Manny Pacquiao and Joshua Clottey in Cowboys Stadium. Top Rank takes some deserved criticism for using only its own fighters in major events, but it also deserves credit for being an anomaly: It’s the only promoter better at selling tickets than pitching television executives.
Both of Saturday’s Top Rank fighters have fan bases disproportionate to their achievements. Duddy has built a large following among Irishmen, both in the Old Country and the new, with his handsomeness, charisma and an action fighting style that in any other context could be called Mexican. He’s also benefitted from a paucity of prizefighters in shamrocks; the turn of this century gave Irish eyes fewer men to smile on than the turn of the 20th.
Chavez, meanwhile, built his following the real-old-fashioned way: He inherited it. Trafficking in his father’s name, Chavez has become the biggest draw in the “Latin Fury” franchise. How much genuine affection Mexicans feel for Junior is debatable. Mexicans’ brand loyalty, though, is not; they cheer the name of the one man who gave them anything to cheer about during Mexico’s abysmal stretch from 1988 to 1996. In return for such loyalty, Chavez often treats them to a rousing impersonation of someone uninterested in fighting.
Chavez made his professional debut almost seven years ago as a super featherweight. Without once challenging for a world title, he has climbed five weight classes. That distinction is remarkable when you consider the WBC’s profligacy with championship belts, the WBC’s Mexico City headquarters, and what the Chavez name means to Mexican athletics.
Most of Chavez’s wins have been “Big” – in the collegiate sense of the word. Junior recently finished up a five-year reign of terror on the Big 10 and Big 12 conferences. After back-to-back-to-back bludgeonings of Hoosiers, Chavez vanquished a total of 11 representatives from Indiana, Missouri, Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, Minnesota and Michigan. Not since Pancho Villa’s raid in 1916 has a Mexican made so many Midwesterners so nervous.
And perhaps not ever has a Mexican prizefighter been so protected. Possibly, Top Rank is fed up with Chavez and done protecting him. His latest caper was a failed drug test in November, when he apparently needed diuretics to make 160 pounds.
Chavez’s recent hiring of perennial Trainer of the Year Freddie Roach only makes things more curious. Right now, Chavez could don a Philthy Rich Records t-shirt and boast, “Forty-two have tried, and forty-two have failed.” Isn’t a prospect supposed to lose before a rehabilitation tour with his new trainer?
All signs would point to a victory for John Duddy, were it not for Duddy’s performance against Mexican Michael Medina in Cowboys Stadium three months ago. Duddy looked rather hittable in that affair and won a close split decision. But both fighters wore green gloves, prompting one ringside handicapper to quip, “When a Mexican wears green gloves into a fight with an Irishman, bet the Irishman.”
Saturday in San Antonio, on the other hands, both fighters will wear the equivalent of red, white and green gloves. Or will they?
There’s a curious affinity between the Mexicans and Irish – two peoples that love battle with only a secondary interest in victory. A bottle of tequila, a bottle of whisky and a good row; really, you’d be hard pressed to find a frown in that crowd of Mexicans and Irish, whatever the result.
And that’s before you consider Los San Patricios, a battalion of Irish artillerymen conscripted to fight as U.S soldiers in the Mexican American War of 1846. Told to kill fellow Catholics, Los San Patricios deserted the American army, fought on the side of the Mexicans, and were hanged for treason by the man who would become America’s 12th president.
In South Texas, the way men acquit themselves in battles with Mexicans still means plenty. Which is why Alamodome is a proper venue for this match. It is also the place Chavez’s father fought before the largest indoor crowd a domestic prizefight has yet recorded, in 1993. That record will not be in jeopardy this week.
Wither Saturday’s fight? Duddy will fight as he always does, reducing the match to a question of courage, if he’s able. Chavez will fight something like a child of privilege – a “fresa” in Mexican parlance – who resents usurpers. And odd as that combination might sound, Chavez-Duddy will be a hell of a fight.
Bart Barry can be reached at bbarry@15rounds.com
