Pauly Malignaggi believes heavyweight Martin Bakool should have been brought back to the cards by Turki Al Sheikh in Riyadh after he upset previously undefeated Jared Anderson on the August 3 card in Los Angeles, California.
Malignaggi says the fight was clearly for Anderson (17-1, 15 KOs), not Pacoli (21-1, 16 KOs) as he was not invited back despite scoring an impressive fifth-round knockout.
Overlooked and undervalued
Anderson, 25, was a hugely popular fighter who was being groomed by his promoters at Top Rank to be the next greatest American heavyweight, replacing Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua. Pacioli messed things up by destroying Jared in a triple knockout, and his career is now shaky.
The Riyadh Papers need higher standards for those fighting over them because many fighters do not belong to them. For example, the December 21 card had only one good fighter on the undercard, Serhii Bohachuk, and the rest was terrible.
Bakul deserved to be in the main event challenging unified heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk more than the old, bearded, washed-up Tyson Fury.
No return to Riyadh
“You're talking about the Jared Anderson-Pacol fight. That fight was about Jared Anderson. It ended up being a freebie for Martin Pacolli,” Pauly Malignaggi said. Probox TVHe talks about Jared Anderson's loss to Martin Bakool on Turki Al Sheikh's card on August 3 in Los Angeles.
“We can say, looking at it in hindsight, that it wasn't about Pacoli because no one brought Pacoli back. I feel like he was treated unfairly. He should have been brought back. That was kind of a freebie for Jared Anderson that turned into a freebie for Pacoli And now he is being punished because of this, I feel that Bakul should be brought back.
“If you're going to do that, there should be a standard group. There are a lot of positives. I wouldn't say it's a criticism. I would say it's a constructive criticism in some ways because there's a lot to praise about what's happening there (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia),” Malignaggi said. Saudi Arabia).”
It appears as though Bacoli has been punished for striking fighter Jared Anderson. However, Bakole is not promoted by Matchroom and Queensberry and are two of the promotions Turki uses as a source of fighters to fill his Riyadh season cards. If Baculi had been promoted by one of those companies, he might have been brought back for the December 21 card.
“At the same time, there are things that can be done better, and you want to see the sport and the fighters grow. Some of that is knowing when to overcompensate and when not to overcompensate,” Malignaggi said.
Many of the fighters on Turki's cards are people recommended by British promoters, many of them from hot rod jobs, local advocates, or older people in the business. We see that Tyson Fury and Anthony are getting paid ridiculous amounts of money despite being laundered.
It would be better for the sport if former major players were phased out, and Turki would say no to promoters trying to pad the cards with non-world-class fighters who don't belong on the main cards.
The recent December 21 card was packed with limited fighters that fans outside the UK have never heard of before and will hopefully never hear about again.
