- The results of boxing matches aren't usually decided in a
federal courtroom. Technically, the bout between Russian heavyweight contender
Alexander Povetkin and heavyweight world titleholder Deontay Wilder wasn’t, but
the important part of the fight came down to the judges’ scorecards - just not
the judges seated ringside. No, the judges for this bout, which never actually
happened, were ones in the jury box in U.S. federal court in New York. That
jury took just 32 minutes to reach a verdict finding that Povetkin used the
performance-enhancing drug during the leadup to what was supposed to be a
mandatory fight against Wilder last May in Moscow, but the fight was canceled
nine days before the fight when a Voluntary Anti-Doping Association-conducted
test found that Povetkin had meldonium in his system. Meldonium was banned by
the World Anti-Doping Agency on Jan. 1, 2016, and after the bout was canceled,
Wilder and promoter Lou DiBella sued Povetkin and Russian promoter Andrey
Ryabinsky of World of Boxing in U.S. District Court for the Southern District
of New York for breach of contract and at least $5 million in damages.
Ryabinsky countersued them in the same court for breach of contract and
defamation on the grounds that they unilaterally canceled the fight before the
WBC made its decision, resulting in a three-day trial that the jury handled
quickly and ended by handing Wilder millions in damages. Now that this has been
settled - pending appeals - here’s hoping that these two actually get into a
ring together at some point, because that should be a rather contentious
affair……..
- Come to Albania….and see what we have under our waters. Truth
be told, there aren't a lot of big draws to visit the hard-to-find Eastern
European nation unless your Liam Neeson/Brian Mills, doing battle with the
human traffickers who abducted your daughter, tortured you and your wife and
played stereotypically ridiculous action movie bad guys in the “Taken”
franchise. But Albania is hoping to chance that view by promoting the
archaeological finds in the waters off its southwest coast as a means of a)
attracting tourism and b) getting support from power players in the archaeology
world who can help preserve the discoveries. The effort is being spearheaded by
the Albanian National Coastline Agency, which has opened an exhibition of 30
pictures showing underwater finds of potential archaeological significance from
the last decade. It’s always good to have a nonprofit like the RPM Nautical
Foundation involved, mapping Albania's coast from Saranda to Vlora, because folks
tend to be nicer to those who aren't out to make money off something. National
coastline agency head Auron Tare claimed the scan found 38 shipwrecks, six of
them more than 2,000 year old and noted that these deceased ships and artifacts
"show ancient Illyria (Albania's predecessor) was a commercial pass rather
than a pirates' place." Buzzzzzzz! Wrong answer, A. People love pirates
and if you really want to draw in the tourists, you need to play up the
swashbuckling angle and sell eye patches to go with every tour, matey…….
- This would never happen in Texas. In the Lone Star State,
a sheriff wouldn’t be stopped and de-weaponed when entering a hockey arena. But
in Washington, Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich was about to enter Spokane
Arena to promote a charity hockey game when he was forechecked by arena
security, who told him that even though he was on duty, he had to surrender his
gun before he could enter. “This is bureaucracy and bureaucrats run wild. I’ve
never seen anything quite like this,” Knezovich said. “It makes zero sense.”
According to Knezovich, arena security told him that he would have to take off
the gun and leave it outside due to an arena policy, as outlined by the arena’s
website, which list the very general category of weapons as some of the
prohibited items inside the facility. “I can understand if we are off duty, if
there’s liquor being sold there, I can understand that. But when you are on
duty and representing the county at an event, I’ve just never heard anything
like this,” Knezovich fumed. He removed his gun because he was in a hurry and
had to get inside, but it’s clear he has a major beef with folks such as Kevin
Twohig, the executive director of the public facilities district that runs the
arena. Twohig, who probably should obey all traffic rules to the nth degree for
the near future, had the audacity to suggest that just because the sheriff wasn’t
in full uniform, arena security had no way - no Google access? - to know if the
sheriff really was law enforcement. Sounds like the arena will not any time
soon be host to the gun show……..
- Here’s a shocker….Arnold Schwarzenegger may be set to
return to the world of comic book hero-based movies. Yes, the man with limited
command of the English language and an even more limited acting range is
reportedly being considered for a role in the upcoming Wonder Woman film, a
part that would represent a return to the DC Comics movie universe for the 38th
governor of California, who last occupied DC real estate when he played super
villain Mr. Freeze – who also goes by the name Dr. Victor Fries – in the
gawd-awful 1997, Tim Burton-directed film “Batman & Robin,” which starred
George Clooney one of the very worst Batman versions of all-time. It also
included Chris O’Donnell as his sidekick, Robin, in a movie that we’d all like
to wash from our collective cinematic memories. Schwarzenegger may be in line
for a small role in “Wonder Woman,” which will hit theaters this June. The
current rumor is that Schwarzenegger may only “appear” as the voice of a CGI
version of the villain he played in the franchise before. The pieces of
evidence for this one are the fact that Schwarzenegger was followed on Twitter
recently by Wonder Woman director Patty Jenkins and DC Film chief Geoff Johns
and other circumstantial nonsense, but Schwarzenegger is fairly free these days
when he’s not getting Donald Trump’s reality TV sloppy seconds……..
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