Nicknames echo through the pages of boxing history, from the briefly monikered Piano Mover Jones (a nom de guerre imposed on Dave “Bomber” Broom for one night in 1936 by a famous foe making his professional debut, Archie Moore), to Mr Superb, who fights in Manchester on Saturday night.
Except the unassuming Diego Magdaleno would rather not carry the handle that the business has lumbered him with. He is good enough without it, as Terry Flanagan will discover when making the first defence of his WBO lightweight title.
Not that the American is above talking about himself in the third person, because that is what boxers do. “Come Saturday, the UK fans are going to love what they see from Diego Magdaleno,” the Las Vegas visitor said this week. “I guarantee to bring a lot of excitement, fire, heat, explosiveness. Plus, I’m an artful boxer.
“Terry Flanagan seems a stand-up guy. He knows how to box, use his reach, move his feet. He has many good qualities. But I just don’t think he’s fought a guy of my stature before. I’ll be bringing something different.”
What he brings besides a 28-1 record and eight years of knowledge is one of the best trainers in the business, Joel Diaz, renowned for his work with the world-class operators Tim Bradley, Abner Mares and Omar Figueroa.
Flanagan-Magdaleno is a quality headliner on a strong BoxNation card and the unbeaten Mancunian champion will need all the help a home crowd can deliver to hang on to the title he won on a second-round injury retirement against Jose Zepeda in July.
The undefeated Liverpudlian Liam “Beefy” Smith contests the vacant WBO light-middleweight title with the Apollo Kid, known to his mother as John Thompson, of Newark, New Jersey, and owner of a 6ft 1in frame and 17-1 record.
That defeat was a clean knockout in the second of eight rounds in January last year, delivered by a right hook from Frank “Notorious” Galarza, an unbeaten 30-year-old New Yorker with no great names on his record. That should give Smith encouragement.
Of the other bouts, the stylist and former Olympian Thomas Stalker and Welshman Craig Evans – who gave Scott Cardle a decent argument over 12 rounds in his last fight – should provide the best entertainment fighting for the vacant WBO European lightweight belt.
Indeed it is a busy weekend everywhere. A trawl through the global calendar might be an eye-opener for the uninitiated or outright hostile but confirmation for the committed that the rough old business is ticking along quite nicely.
On Saturday night alone, from Shanghai to Buenos Aires, from Riga to Managua, and a score of points in between, filling small halls, back rooms and stadiums, there will be an estimated 156 bouts of varying quality. Quite a few of the willing coves will box for money that will barely cover their expenses; 17 bouts will have titles attached to them.
Among the dross there is a diamond or two. An interesting clash is that between Jorge Linares – who kept his WBO world lightweight title with a brutal stoppage of Kevin Mitchell in May – and the moderate Mexican Ivan Cano in Caracas. If a challenger who has drawn twice and lost twice in his last six outings is worth a title shot, surely Mitchell can earn another go at Linares, because theirs was one of the fights of the year.
Further down the road, speculation this week that Amir Khan is going to be Manny Pacquiao’s next and probably last opponent before the Congressman gets serious about his politics, needs firming up.
Khan deserves the fight after the disappointment of missing out on a shot at Floyd Mayweather (and there is not a good judge in the business who would deny the Bolton fighter would have been a worthier opponent for the champion than was Andre Berto). But, remarkably, Mayweather now seems to be holding out slim hope to Pacquiao that they can do a rematch of their disappointing but hugely rich fight of last May.
The Filipino told reporters in Doha this week he was not ruling it out but the odds are he will be as disappointed as was Khan.
