LAST UPDATE | 29 Apr 2022
THE ATMOSPHERE WAS hair-raising in the the downstairs Hulu Theater at Madison Square Garden as Katie Taylor and Amanda Serrano comfortably made weight for Saturday night’s lightweight title showdown.
The steady stream of green began trickling into MSG a full 90 minutes before the first undercard fighter took to the scales on a sunny Friday afternoon in New York.
It was flecked with red, white and blue, too, Serrano’s Puerto Rican massive showing up from her home borough of Brooklyn and elsewhere.
At one point in the early afternoon, perhaps conscious of the wait that still lay ahead before Saturday’s chief protagonists weighed in, somebody somewhere picked up a mic off-stage and shouted, ‘Who’s here to see Katie Taylor?!’ The place briefly went nuts.
Saturday’s is a Matchroom-promoted show and while Eddie Hearn and co. have accommodated Serrano at every turn, they have made no apologies for the fact that this week, she is the away fighter in her home city.
The discrepancy in the fighters’ respective profiles was illustrated at about quarter-past 12, 45 minutes before the weigh-in began, as Serrano’s de facto manager, Jake Paul, and Matchroom boss Eddie Hearn for some reason took to the stage for a public Q&A.
Paul, the marmite YouTube star and fledgling professional boxer, could only nod in acknowledgement when his invitation to the Puerto Ricans to make some noise for Serrano was eclipsed entirely by Hearn’s rallying call to the Irish.
After three or four questions to Paul and Hearn from the audience, one Irish fan declined to ask a question and instead matter-of-factly stated that tomorrow night’s event would not have been possible without Katie Taylor before blasting out a chorus of ‘Olé Olé.’ The few hundred around him joined in, thanks be to God.
An American press photographer in the next seat leaned over and said to me, ‘This is a shit-show.’ They always are. But Hearn managed to lend the Q&A some dignity, wrapping with a quite sincere soliloquy about how Katie Taylor forced his way into his life and how she was probably the only person who truly believed that she would one day headline at Madison Square Garden when they first joined forces in 2016.
The one interesting note from this bizarre detour was that Hearn raised the prospect of Taylor fighting in Ireland one day soon, a prospect which has simply not been explored since about 2018. It’s possible that he was simply trying to rouse the crowd once more but with the chief obstacles to a Taylor homecoming event — namely Daniel Kinahan and the MTK Global boxing management company — removed from the chessboard, there is a quiet confidence in Taylor’s camp that a big night in Dublin might be doable in the near future.
The undercard fighters weighed in without much incident: only Jesse Vargas and Liam Smith had a bit of a go off each other and, frankly, very few people in the building on Friday cared about tomorrow night’s chief support bout, with the greatest respect to two fine competitors.
Indeed, Vargas and Smith were given cut-off music by the vivacious Puerto Ricans, one of whom produced a percussion instrument which led to chanting in anticipation of Serrano’s arrival to the stage. This was seemingly taken as a challenge by the Irish support who outnumbered their Caribbean counterparts probably fourfold. They responded in kind and drowned it out.
However, rather than have MC David Diamante beckon challenger Serrano to the scales as would be convention, Matchroom and DAZN instead summoned WWE wrestlers Bianca Belair of America and Becky Lynch of Limerick to introduce the challenger and champion respectively.
Belair and Lynch’s intervention was part of a promotional partnership which has seen World Wrestling Entertainment heavily plug Saturday night’s biggest-ever female boxing bout on its various channels and platforms. It was mostly woeful.
Belair and Lynch are two supremely talented physical performers, and great entertainers in their own lane, but it was contextually cringey to watch them pretend to squabble moments before introducing two women who have done literally the opposite all week but will punch each other in the face for real tomorrow.
Thankfully, Serrano’s walk to the stage revitalised the couple of thousand people in attendance, the Puerto Ricans’ roars of adulation met with a din of disapproval from the Irish contingent.
‘The Real Deal’ was effervescent, geeing up her own fans up to the right-hand side of the theatre before taking to the scales, where she came in a full 1.4 pounds under the lightweight limit. (This wasn’t exactly surprising: Serrano believes her optimal weight is featherweight, or 126, and she weighed roughly the same as she did today for her last outing, an impressive 10-round victory over former Taylor foe Miriam Gutierrez).
To accentuate the fact that, as Hearn put it on Wednesday, ‘This is her Garden, this is her house’, Taylor was played onto stage by two violinists. She very apparently enjoyed their rendition of ‘Oró, Sé Do Bheatha ‘Bhaile’ before revving up the Irish side of the crowd herself.
She weighed in a full pound heavier than Serrano, 134.6, and tomorrow night’s protagonists then faced off for the final time before they chuck fists at each other in the ring.
Challenger Amanda Serrano 133.6lbs, champion Taylor 134.6lbs. Got the impression Taylor tried to win the staredown which was unusual. Atmosphere genuinely unbelievable, in fairness. pic.twitter.com/ozkrWuHrsp
— Gavan Casey (@GavanCasey) April 29, 2022
And what a staredown it was. Taylor is usually pretty awkward-looking in these situations — physical intimidation is just not her bag — but this one was different. As the violinists switched gear to the Game of Thrones theme song (which actually…kind of worked?), Taylor did her best to gaze into Serrano’s soul, following the Puerto Rican’s eyes as the challenger began to sway gently from side to side, aggressively chewing gum and nodding repeatedly at Taylor.
Serrano’s trainer-manager, Jordan Maldonado, appeared to have a few choice words for the champion, but Taylor was locked in on his fighter who eventually broke away first. Taylor continued to stare at Serrano for another split second before slowly turning away in apparent satisfaction.
There was a quiet nod to herself and gestures of thanks for her now manic supporters, their noise ear-splitting throughout the staredown and eventually dovetailing into — of course — a chorus of ‘Olé Olé.’ One American boxing journalist commented that he had “never experienced anything like it”.
And this was only an appetiser. There will be five or six times as many Irish in attendance tomorrow, including 4,000-plus from our side of the Atlantic, and far more Puerto Ricans on hand too as Taylor and Serrano finally trade leather. The bout will be streamed live on DAZN, with ringwalks expected sometime after 3am Irish time on Saturday night/Sunday morning.