I guess Vinny Pazienza gets nervous every time he turns the key in his car nowadays. He said, after all, that if he lost to Dana Rosenblatt, he'd tell a friend to put a hit out on him. The fight with Rosenblatt was competitive, but I had Dana the winner by a score of 115-112, as did two of the official judges.

	Rosenblatt could be an opponent in demand.

There was a lot of fanfare leading up to the New England matchup. While it was not one of the fights of the year, it wasn't bad either. Meanwhile, Rosenblatt has established himself as a contender at super middleweight, should he choose to continue campaigning at that weight. If Rosenblatt drops back down to middleweight, he would probably not have to wait long for a title shot. He is marketable, credible and beatable, which are three things guys like Bernard Hopkins and William Joppy might very well be looking for while they wait for bigger money bouts.

Love the heavyweights
In the Oct. 27 edition of "Boxing to the Max," I called Oleg Maskaev and Hasim Rahman a pick-em-type fight. Well, it went Maskaev's way, in a big way, and now Oleg must be considered a top six heavyweight. He's right behind Lennox Lewis, Evander Holyfield, Ike Ibeabuchi, David Tua and the winner of the Michael Grant-Andrew Golota fight.

Maskaev caught Rahman with a devastating right hand that sent Rahman through the ropes and out of the ring. It was the most brutal heavyweight knockout since Derrick Jefferson's near-decapitation of Maurice Harris earlier on the same card. Jefferson hit Harris with as devastating a left hook as you will ever see. Nevertheless, Harris should be commended, not only for taking a dangerous opponent on short notice, but also for the way he never stopped trying to win.

There were several moments in the fight when Harris could have given in and taken the count, or else just fought to survive until the final bell. He did neither. Instead, he continued trying his best to catch the larger Jefferson with big shots, and as a result was knocked out, rather than decisioned. Due to Harris' fighting heart, we all got to see a war we will not soon forget. Harris' stock was not hurt by this loss. Jefferson's stock, however, was certainly helped.

Getting back to Maskaev for a moment, he is trained by Bob Jackson, who has been in the fight game for years without much notice. Bob is one of the really good guys in boxing, and we could use more like him. It is nice to see that he is training a legitimate heavyweight contender; he deserves a lot of credit for the progress Maskaev has made.

Who's hot
Now that Ibeabuchi's bail has been reduced from $3 million to $750,000, he is hot again. When Friday Night Fights started up in October 1998, I was determined to shine the spotlight on two fighters who were not given the press commensurate with their ability, simply because they were not as heavily promoted as some other fighters in and around their respective weight divisions.

These two fighters were Ibeabuchi, whom I felt the boxing media was ignoring in favor of the much more heavily hyped Grant, and Zab Judah, who was still on his way up. I did my best to make people aware of Ibeabuchi and Judah, and now the boxing world's attention has been more consistently focused on them. However, even though Ibeabuchi will surely be hot again if he indeed makes bail, I will waste no more of the boxing world's time writing and talking about him at every opportunity.

Ike could be champ, but it appears he is not willing to make the necessary sacrifices outside the ring in order to reach greatness. Ike seems unwilling to do what it takes to stay out of trouble. He will have to convince me, for one, that he is serious enough about his life to modify his behavior. I hope he straightens himself out, but I am not counting on it.

A look ahead
One good thing about sinking as low as boxing has sunk in 1999 is that it is hard to sink much lower. Going into this year, boxing looked to Lewis and Holyfield to lift the sport by providing fans with the kind of heavyweight action we haven't seen since Evander took on a young Riddick Bowe back in 1992. After 12 rounds of boredom, we were left with a terrible fight, and an even worse decision.

Now, at the end of '99, we are all hardened by the year's events. We are as cynical as ever, and not expecting anything at all from Lewis-Holyfield II. If the fight stinks, boxing does not take a huge hit, because the fight is supposed to stink. But if the fight is good or -- better still -- if the fight is great, boxing will look good for the first time in a long while.

One thing is certain: Evander isn't going out like a punk. Holyfield will fight hard and fight to win. Lennox, looking to be more offensive than in their first fight, will likely take more chances. The potential for a surprisingly good fight is there. Let's hope Holyfield and Lewis fulfill it.

As for Friday Night Fights, we have Vladimir Klitschko on the undercard of the Tracy Harris Patterson-Junior Jones fight on Friday. Of course, Vladimir won't be fighting anyone (Phil Jackson) with a chance to beat him. Still, it should be fun getting a look at the highly touted (once-beaten) European heavyweight. From what I have seen, he is actually a better overall fighter than his more famous brother, Vitaly.

Both Klitschko brothers are big and strong, and hit hard. Questions remain about their stamina and their chins, but I can tell you one thing about Vladamir right now: He sure can jab.

As for the main event, Patterson was once trained by his adopted father, two-time former heavyweight champion Floyd Patterson. Floyd was trained by the famed Cus D'Amato, who used to say that a once-great fighter, past his prime, can sometimes summon one last great effort. Tracy Patterson was never great, but he was very good. Maybe he has one last very good effort in him, and maybe it will come out against the favored Jones.

If Patterson fights the way my gut tells me he will, we will have a very good fight on our hands. Hope to see you there.