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23 December 2013 Boxing World January 2014 Year End Awards Issue

Page history last edited by Archer844 8 years, 7 months ago

Posted by Boxing World Magazine on December 23, 2013, 8:06 am

ROOKIE OF THE YEAR: NATALIE DORMER. The Brit beauty crashed the FCBA scene only seven months go
ago, with a pound out of Emily Blunt, but the impact she's made has gone far beyond the nine fights and 5-3-1 record she's compiled. Dormer took current champ Rachel McAdams the distance, shocked top contender Olivia Wilde, proved she's not beyond bending a rule or three, and generally sowed terror inside her own stable, Rampant Fighting. We can't wait to see what she does for an encore!

UPSET OF THE YEAR: COBIE SMULDERS VS. KALEY CUOCO. It can be argued, and persuasively at that, that no lightweight has had a better two years than Cuoco. In that time, the lovely blonde has beaten Vandervoort, Peregrym, Strahovski, Nichols, Biel, and Lawrence twice. Oh, and she both won and successfully defended the lightweight gold. So, imagine the surprise of those in the audience when Cuoco got pounded out in two by a girl who was 5-17 career coming into the fight, a girl she'd stopped in five rounds the last time they'd fought.

FIGHT OF THE YEAR: SERINDA SWAN VS. ADRIANA LIMA. A wild, back-and-forth affair that saw the Lima go down five times, only to come back firing each time. The final two rounds, which featured four knockdowns with each fighter tasting the canvas and a desperate final minute in search of a stoppage were enough to push this one past several other strong contenders into the winner's circle.

BEATDOWN OF THE YEAR: TRACY SPIRIDAKOS VS. KAT DENNINGS. There were quite a few one-sided fights this year, but nothing approaching Spiridakos' victory over Dennings. Tracy won the first six rounds, dropping Dennings four times to lead 60-50 before stopping Kat in the seventh.

KNOCKOUT OF THE YEAR: JESSICA BIEL VS. ADRIANNE PALICKI. 2013 wasn't the best of years for Biel, but her May fight against Palicki showed just how awesome Jessica can be. Biel beat Palicki to the punch knocking her cold with an overhand right that left Adrianne face down and Biel standing over the fallen Wonder Woman with hands on her hips!

MANAGER OF THE YEAR: ODD MAN. Seven words: Sarah Shahi, Claire Holt, and Adriana Lima. Under Odds and Ends' tutelage, Shahi has gone from a 31-year-old with six career fights to a dominant fly who's gone 12-3, won the flyweight belts, and rolled to four consecutive title defenses. Holt won her first eight fights before falling in a title fight to Olivia Munn in her ninth and is currently 9-2 career and ranging in on another shot at the gold. Lima went from afterthought model with a 4-9 career record to victories over the likes of Gemma Arterton, Kate Upton, Kelly Brook, and Brooklyn Decker, the unofficial title of Top FCBA Model and the official one of the first two-time Queen of the Ice Hotel. Considering O&E also boasts one of the FCBA's most exciting fighters, Kendra Wilkinson, one of its most ridiculously hot fighters, Bar Refaeli, and veteran danger girls Christina Ricci and Emmanuelle Vaugier, again, we can't wait to see what the stable does for an encore.

COMEBACK FIGHTER OF THE YEAR: KIRSTEN DUNST. Coming into 2013, Dunst was 1-16 in her last 17 fights and her only win since 2002 was over Winona Ryder. She raised a few eyebrows with her 2013 opener, a seventh-round stoppage of Lindsay Lohan, but, Lindsay, despite being a former champion, is also LINDSAY. A follow up second-round TKO of Amanda Seyfried got folks thinking maybe the Lohan result wasn't a fluke, but it was the unanimous decision victory over nine-time flyweight champion Natalie Portman that made believers out of just about everyone.

FIGHTER WHO'LL HAVE A BETTER YEAR IN 2014: LEIGHTON MEESTER. 2013 has been an Annus Horribilis for Leighton, who has gone 1-5, lost five straight since a January win over Elisha Cuthbert, and gotten buried behind the likes of Tisdale, Hudgens, and Dobrev in the Lookout! flyweight division. But, Leighton can fight, as wins over the likes of Carter, Cuthbert, and Kelly prove, and we think 2014 will be a much better year for Ms. Meester.

FIGHTER WHO'LL HAVE A WORSE YEAR IN 2014: AMANDA RIGHETTI. Oh, don't get us wrong, we have no doubt Amanda will be dominating and right in the middle of the pound-for-pound discussion again next year, but is she going to go 6-0 with five knockouts? We wouldn't put it past her, but the percentages say it's pretty unlikely.

AND NOW FOR THE BIG ONES:

FLYWEIGHT(S) OF THE YEAR: SARAH SHAHI AND JESSICA LOWNDES. Yep. Tie. No one can deny Shahi, who went 7-1, is on a seven-fight winning streak, and currently holds the belts, but there's an argument for Lowndes, too. After three straight wins, she took Scerbo to the limit, then ran off the one-two punch of stopping Hudgens and shelving Williams with a first round KO. Add to that the snark, the image, the look, and the whole if-she-fights-a-tomato-can-we-can-still-sell-ticketsness, and if she'd managed to pull out a nip-and-tuck affair for the JMD crown against Chabert, she might be sitting here all by herself.

BANTAMWEIGHT OF THE YEAR: OLIVIA MUNN. An absolute no-doubter despite her recent loss of the bantamweight straps to McAdams. 2013 was the year the lovely, lippy Munn came into her own and grabbed the division by the throat. She went Danes-Michalka-Holt-Perabo-Vandervoort, won said belts, and successfully defended them twice. All while being trained by Jenny McCarthy. Which gets her bonus points.

LIGHTWEIGHT OF THE YEAR: TAYLOR COLE. No, Cole didn't wear the belts this year, but, it says here that none of the ladies who did can match her 2013 resume. Peregrym. Theron. Regan. Five rounds. Four rounds. Six rounds. That's right. Cole beat two former champions and the greatest fighter of all time. In a row. And worked only 15 rounds to do it. Seems like there might be a title shot in her future. Just sayin'.

WELTERWEIGHT OF THE YEAR: AMANDA RIGHETTI. There has never been another winner of Boxing World's Welterweight Of The Year Award, and, the way Righetti's going, we might have to rename this sucker "The Amanda Righetti Award" in order to give it to someone else. We've already talked about Righetti's work this year, so let's talk about what she'd done since Boxing World began publishing in 2010. 35-7. That's 83 percent. When Hall of Fame level is 60 percent. In a division that's the most difficult in the FCBA in which to win consistently. 83 percent. She's also won the title three times and beaten an all-star team of champions former, current, and future, Upton, Freeman, Law, Menounos, Govich, Loken, Landry, Moore, Henstridge, Garner, Nolin, Bloodgood, Keibler, Warren, Durance, Romijn, Loken, Brook, Heigl, Bjorlin, Palicki, and Theron. Amazing. Incredible. Hall worthy.