Team Ruiz Counters Sauerland’s Attacks

Team Ruiz blasted Wilfried Sauerland and his promotional company about derogatory remarks made against two-time World Boxing Association heavyweight champion John “The Quietman” Ruiz, 43-8-1 (29), after the latter responded to a press release in which Team Ruiz demanded a full videotape of Valuev-Ruiz II to further review for evidence of alleged corrupt practices in their August 30 fight in Berlin.

Team Ruiz’ points of contention included Judge Takeshi Shimakawa improperly keeping a running score during the fight; Ruiz not being credited with a legitimate knockdown when he floored Valuev in the second round; Judge Antonio Requena scoring two rounds even despite WBA instructions that there should be no even rounds scored in championship bouts; most importantly, throughout the fight Valuev’s cornermen received judges’ scoring results as the rounds went on.

“Team Ruiz is not as concerned with media quotes in Sauerland’s hometown newspaper,” Ruiz advisor/attorney Tony Cardinale emphasized, “as they are about quotes from international publications from several years ago like Tim Graham’s Dec. 2, 1999 column regarding the federal criminal charges against the IBF’s Bob Lee, ‘How to get ranked in boxing’ on espn.com: “Two other alleged scenarios involved George Foreman and Axel Schultz. According to the documents, Foreman’s people paid (past IBF president Robert) Lee $100,000 for an exemption to defend his title against the unranked Schulz. Big George got more than he bargained for and sweated out a majority decision. Then Schulz’s management allegedly paid Lee $100,000 to order a rematch. He did, but it never came off.”

(Team Ruiz note: Sauerland was Schultz’ management team.) “We had a good laugh reading what Team Sauerland said, but we are more concerned about what went on in this fight. We want to review the full, unedited Valuev-Ruiz II videotape to strengthen our position outlined in the original release about the issues.”

PunchStat results of Valuev-Ruiz II revealed that Ruiz connected with nearly twice as many power punches as Valuev, 98-52, and that the 7’ 0”, 318-pound Valuev threw 99 jabs compared to Ruiz’ 49. Valuev also instigated 79 “clear” clinches to Ruiz’ 29.

“This wasn’t the amateurs where jabs count as much as power punches,” Cardinale noted. “John had Valuev running around the ring, despite the tremendous difference in their sizes (Ruiz stands 6’ 2” and weighed 239 pounds), when Valuev wasn’t throwing that freakishly long, light hitting jab of his to hold-off John, he was holding and pushing John down.”

Upon review of the full videotape of the fight for review, Team Ruiz indicated that it planned to petition the WBA to rule the bout a no-contest and Valuev be stripped of the WBA title for a blatant violation of WBA rules. Team Ruiz will also seek sanctions against any officials involved in permitting these violations to happen.