Nonito Donaire

The ever-frustrating dream fight of Manny Pacquiao vs. Floyd Mayweather received another major setback as Floyd Mayweather announced this morning at his Nevada Boxing Commission hearing that he will fight 154-pound world champion Miguel Cotto on May 5th, 2012 instead of Pacquiao.

Many boxing fans have already grown sick and tired of the ongoing teasing negotiations of a potential Pacquiao vs. Mayweather fight never materializing, and one of the solutions to this repetitive disappointment is to simply just move on and look on to the future.

The future you may ask? Yes this Saturday, February 4th, Top Rank promotions is giving fans a good solid fight card billed: Welcome To The Future.

Welcome To The Future has two world-title main event fights, with undefeated WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (44-0-1, 31 KOs) vs. Marco Antonio Rubio (53-5-1, 46 KOs) as well as the co-main event of pound-for-pound champion Nonito Donaire (27-1, 18 KOs) vs. Wilfredo Vazquez Jr. (21-1-1, 18 KOs) for the vacant WBO super bantamweight title.

In the co-main event, fast-rising star Nonito Donaire looks to capture another world title at 122 pounds after his knockout of the year victory last year over Fernando Montiel. Donaire's opponent is former WBO 122-pound champion Wilfredo Vazquez Jr., who is the son of legendary Puerto Rican champion Wilfredo Vazquez Sr.

Vazquez has only one loss on his already-impressive record against Jorge Arce, a fight that many had Vazquez winning until he was stopped in the 12th round.

Should Donaire be victorious Saturday, there are endless big meaningful fight options for him at 122 pounds or 126 pounds, for he is widely regarded as the man to beat from 118 pounds to 126 pounds, even though he has not yet obtained titles at 122 pounds and 126 pounds yet.

Possible big fights with Jorge Arce or Toshiaki Nishioka at 122 pounds, or even Yuriorkis Gamboa or Juan Manuel Lopez at 126 pounds, would indeed validate his fight with Vazquez Saturday as a true welcome to the future.

Then in the main event, Chavez, son of living legend Julio Cesar Chavez Sr. looks to take on his hardest test yet in the heavy-handed Rubio, who shocked many by knocking out and upsetting undefeated prospect David Lemieux on ESPN's Friday Night Fights last year.

Since upsetting Lemieux, Rubio has knocked out all of his next three opponents in the first half of those fights.

Many—including myself—are viewing Rubio as the first true test for the WBC middleweight champion Chavez, who has many even harder tests awaiting him at 160 pounds should he be victorious Saturday, such as the widely regarded true middleweight champion Sergio Martinez.

Welcome To The Future: Chavez vs. Rubio and Donaire vs. Vazquez can be seen live at the Alamodome in San Antonio,Texas this Saturday February 4th or on HBO's World Championship Boxing at 10:00 p.m. (ET)/7:00 p.m. (PT).

According to a press release from the executive producers of HBO:

WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP BOXING^®:  JULIO CESAR CHAVEZ JR. VS.

MARCO ANTONIO RUBIO AND NONITO DONAIRE VS. WILFREDO VAZQUEZ JR.

Other HBO playdates:  Feb. 5 (8:30 a.m.) and 6 (12:25 a.m.)

HBO2 playdates:  Feb. 5 (3:30 p.m.) and 7 (12:40 a.m.)

Also prior to all the action is the premiere of “2 Days: Portrait of a Fighter” debuts.  The Feb. 4 installment of this revealing and intimate look at a 48-hour span in the life of a boxer in the lead-up to one of his fights will focus on lightweight Brandon Rios of Oxnard, CA.  The feature is approximately 15 minutes.

We will be live where all the action will take place this weekend in San Antonio, Texas at the Alamodome, so definitely check back here at the Bleacher Report Boxing Community. for all of your latest boxing news going on in the world.

KING J will be ringside at the Alamodome so be sure to follow him on Twitter: @KingJ323

Subscribe on YouTube:     http://www.youtube.com/KingJ323

KING J is the Bleacher Report Boxing Community Leader and Featured Columnist all information was provided directly to him via press release email from the executive producers of HBO.

Nonito Donaire (27-1, 18 KO) and Brandon Rios (29-0-1, 22 KO) have targets on their backs as Cuban boxers Guillermo Rigondeaux (9-0, 7 KO) and Yuriorkis Gamboa (21-0, 16 KO) set out to destroy them.

Donaire is the former WBC and WBO bantamweight (118 lbs) world champion and budding boxing superstar who moves up to Rigondeaux's weight division of super bantamweight (122 lbs) in February.

Donaire has already stated how he wouldn't fight Rigondeaux because he says his style is boring and Rigondeaux has fired back with death threats. According to Boxing Scene, Rigondeaux said the following:

"If he doesn't want a Narvaez fight, I will agree to a 15-foot ring. This guy is not a real man, he's a traitor to Top Rank. Stop hiding behind your manager and your wife. I'm ready to fight in the summer. If Top Rank allows me to get a fight with this traitor, I will put him to sleep. After I get done with this traitor, he'll be shooting pictures permanently."

The reference to Donaire shooting pictures is a reference to his hobby of photography. Rigondeaux also referenced Donaire's heavily criticized previous opponent Omar Narvaez (35-1-2, 19 KO).

Narvaez opted for a defense that made sure he wasn't knocked out vs. an actual effort to win against Donaire resulting in what was widely considering a boring display.

Rigondeaux isn't the only Cuban calling out a fellow Top Rank fighter. Gamboa, an Olympic gold medalist like Rigondeaux, wants to move up to face popular Mexican fighter Rios immediately.

Top Rank boss Bob Arum originally wanted Gamboa, a former featherweight (126 lbs) world champ, and Rios to face different opponents on the same card to hype up a showdown between each other.

That plan fell through. Gamboa wants Rios next despite the fact he would have to leap two weight classes to meet Rios at lightweight (135 lbs).

Gamboa said this about the move up in weight:

"I've done that all my life. I became a world champion doing it. I've been up and down in weight all my life. I can go up and I can go down. It really doesn't matter."

Gamboa has previously fought at super featherweight (130 lbs) in 2008 and a few matches at lightweight (135 lbs) in 2007 before settling down in featherweight (126 lbs) from 2009 until now.

Rigondeaux and Gamboa seem determined to become stars against their Top Rank counterparts Donaire and Rios. Whether these fights come to fruition is not known at this time.

What is known as that the calls have been made, now it's time for someone to answer.

Reigning WBC bantamweight champion Nonito Donaire is set to face Wilfredo Vasquez Jr. of Puerto Rico in San Antonio, Texas on February 4.

Donaire is fresh from his victory over Omar Narvaez of Argentina last October 22 at the Madison Square Garden in New York, retaining his WBC and WBO bantamweight belts.

The Donaire vs. Vasquez fight will be in the undercard of the Julio Cesar Chavez vs. Vanes Martirosyan main event at the Alamodome.

According to ESPN's DanRafael, Donaire is leaving the bantamweight division to face Vazquez for the vacant featherweight title.

Vasquez is the son of of former world champion Wilfredo Vázquez. Vázquez debuted as a professional in 2006, against Octavious Davis in a fight that he won by knockout

The Puerto Rican slugger made a name for himself after he defeated Marvin Sonsona of the Philippines to win the WBO super bantamweight title in February last year.

Later in May, Vazquez lost to Mexico's Jorge Arce via knockout in the 12th round. Arce has since vacated the title and moved down to bantamweight.

The weekend boxing event is being staged by Top Rank Promotions with TV coverage by HBO Sports.

The similarities between Nonito Donaire and Manny Pacquiao run deep.

They're both Filipino. They went to the same boxing school in General Santos City, South Cotabato. They're both premier fighters.

But Donaire just emulated Pacquiao on Saturday at the Madison Square Garden Theater, and that's a bad thing.

Donaire's boring, sluggish, drawn-out 12-round decision victory over Omar Narvaez on Saturday eerily resembled Pacquiao's win over Shane Mosley in May.

Said Donaire after the fight, via SI.com:

"The crowd didn't deserve this. I'm sorry it didn't come out the way we wanted. [Narvaez] didn't come to fight."

Neither did Donaire, and he knows it.

It was quite the departure from Donaire's second-round knockout of Fernando Montiel in February, when he drew rave reviews and solidified himself as one of the world's elite. The fight was uncharacteristic of Donaire, but sadly, it pointed to a theme for boxing, where bad main events are commonplace these days.

It seems that boxing fans have been reduced to going down the ladder, seeking one top fighter who will give them a fight worthy of the price of admission. Donaire was the latest disappointment.

According to CompuBox, via ESPN, Donaire landed just 99 of 666 punches (15 percent), while Narvaez landed 74 of 299 (25 percent). Donaire can say Narvaez turned defensive after the fourth round (which he did), but he knows better than anyone he should be able to break through that defense.

Pacquiao was supposed to knock out Mosley in May. Donaire was supposed to knock out Narvaez. Floyd Mayweather Jr. was supposed to knock out Victor Ortiz. Neither happened, and that makes three of the top five boxers in the world who have disappointed in the last five months.

Welcome to the deplorable state of boxing.

While Nonito Donaire doesn't get as much hype as Manny Pacquiao or Floyd Mayweather Jr, Ring Magazine ranks him as the fourth best pound-for-pound fighter in the world. The Filipino Flash helped prove that point by defeating Omar Narvaez on Saturday.

The loss was the first of Narvaez's 11-year career and was also the first time he fought in the United States. After the match, Donaire expressed his displeasure with El Huracan's defensive style, which caused the fans inside Madison Square Garden to get a little rowdy (via Yahoo! Sports).

“I was bored,” Donaire said. “When I know that the guy wouldn’t open up, I kind of got bored because no matter what I opened my hands, I opened my face and the least you can do is hit me with a jab, hit me with something.”

It was just the second fight out of Donaire's last 11 that didn't end in a knockout. He did defend the WBC and WBO Bantamweight World Titles in the process, which he won with a TKO of Fernando Montiel in February.

The Filipino Flash hasn't lost since March of 2001 when he came up on the wrong end of a unanimous five-round decision against Rosendo Sanchez. He defeated Saul Santoyo three months later as has been on a roll ever since.

The Boxing Scene reports Donaire's next bout could come against Jorge Arce as he wants to move up to the super bantamweight division. Arce is 57-6-2 and hasn't lost a fight since Simphiwe Nongqayi beat him by unanimous decision in 2009.

That match will likely serve as a precursor to a mid-2012 battle with Toshiaki Nishioka, who is currently taking some time off after knocking off Rafael Marquez earlier this month.

Both fights will help Donaire get more widespread exposure as he begins to take on more high-profile opponents. And after his great run, it will be well deserved praise.

Nonito Donaire has built a reputation as one of the most exciting boxers in the world. His career record is 27-1, with 10 of his last 12 wins coming via (T)KO. In his fight on Saturday night with Omar Narvaez, though, he put forth one of his worst performances. 

Even though the fight failed to live up to the lofty standards that Donaire has built his entire career around, he scored an easy decision victory. In fact, it was a "perfect" score from all three judges, 120-108. The way that he did it has left a lot of fans and analysts feeling numb. 

As Dan Rafael of ESPN.com wrote, this was probably the worst possible outcome that Donaire could have had in this fight, with the obvious exception of losing.

"Yes, Donaire won, but this was not the sort of star-making performance he or anyone on his team wanted to see as he prepares to move up to junior featherweight for his next fight—even if it was not his fault," Rafael wrote.

"'It was very frustrating,'" Donaire said. "'The fans didn't deserve this. My first time on the East Coast, Madison Square Garden. I apologize deeply for this. I wanted a knockout. It happens. He was definitely disappointing.'

"It was bad. So bad that, besides the booing from the crowd at various times throughout the fight, Donaire told trainer Robert Garcia while on the stool after the 11th round, 'I'm bored.'"

Donaire's popularity was growing in this country, thanks in large part to the way that he has performed in the ring. Of course, his close-knit relationship with Manny Pacquiao helped too. 

As any fight fan knows, one bad fight can sully any fighter's reputation. Even though the reason the fight was a dud had nothing to do with Donaire, he is the one who will suffer as a result. 

Narvaez fought like a man who did not want to be there. He was out of sorts from the time the first bell rang, and his performance over the course of 12 rounds left a lot to be desired. 

Even though Donaire did not have the dynamite knockout against Narvaez that we have seen him have, he gave his all in a fight with someone who wanted nothing to do with him. But that does not matter. All that matters is his fight was bad and it will take time before the fans are back on his side.