The rawest of the Americans, Deontay Wilder will win the US’ only medal. But what color?

Its been a wild weekend in Beijing as far as boxing goes, with favorite after favorite being dismissed and analysts left wondering if anyone actually wants to win a medal. There’s been press conferences about scoring, questions about the reffing, talk of conspiracy theories and fixes. In other words, your average Olympic boxing session.

The big stories are obviously the failures of the US team (not the biggest surprise) and the that of the Russians (a big surprise) as many of their top men have been eliminated. As such, both teams have complained that the system was somehow set up to give the Chinese victories they didn’t deserve. Oddly, no one seems to be able to pick out any matches the Chinese shouldn’t have won, making the criticism ring somewhat hollow.

There are legit criticisms though. For one, scoring is way, way down at the Olympics compared to the World Championships of a year ago, and that most affects offense minded boxers who end up in far closer fights than they should be. In 2007 at the 81KG weightclass, the average winner from the rounds of 32 on who actually made it to decision won with no less than 14 points on the board for themselves. Only one fighter in the Olympics has exceeding 14 points in any fight in the tournament thus far at that weight. Three bouts in the round of 16 were stopped. Only one in that round at the Summer Games was. There’s been all of one ref stoppage due to outclassment (fighter is behind by 20 before the 4th round) in the Games, and yet Korobov of Russia won that way three times in Chicago.

With that breakdown, fights have begun to credit only the strange, unorthodox, and boring. No worse example comes to mind than Serik Sapiyev’s shocking loss to Manus Boonjumnong. Sapiyev came forward and threw far cleaner punches, but Boonjumnong’s style (which melded together John Ruiz and Cory Spinks) coupled with scoring on slapping blows put the 2 time World Champion out of the tournament and gave new life to a former gold medalist seen coming in as washed up. American Raynell Williams had similar issues in his bout against France’s Djelkhir. This has come together to make this year’s Olympic Games some of the least memorable.

From here on in, I’ll try to do these daily. I’m also gonna shy away from spoilers, just because I’d like to watch the bouts too.

48KG: Luis Yanez decided to not throw punches, and now he’s out of the show. Zou Shiming nearly joined him in a shockingly close bout with Oubaali that needed to go to accepted scores (raw data of people pressing the buttons). Amnat Ruanroeng seems on the surface to be the only guy who can break up a Hernandez/Shiming final, but the way things have gone at this Olympics, who knows?

51KG: One of the strongest remaining fields. With Warren of the US out, Somjit Jongjohor is now the clear favorite. His long armed awkward style is the kind getting the most points from the judges here in Beijing and he’s looked the best against a higher level of opposition than anyone else. Balakshin, Lafitta, and Arroyo are among those on the opposite end of the bracket looking to break into the medals, and they’re all very good fighters as well.

54KG: Akhil Kumar beat Vodopyanov in one of the more surprising match results of the Olympics. It was, however, a closely contested bout with both fighters employing similar awkward slick styles and few punches landing cleanly. If he can beat Gojan in the next round, he will have gained a huge amount of respect for the Indian boxing program. The favorite in the abscence of Vodopyanov switches to the almost pro styled Badar-Uugan of Mongolia.

57KG: Vasyl Lomachenko gets the Chinese fighter in the next leg after beating two very strong opponents (Sooltonov and Selimov). A win against Yang would probably solidify his chance at winning outstanding boxer awards at this games. Idel Torriente and Shahin Imranov represent the toughest of the other bracket, and they’ve been pitted against one another in the quarters.

60KG: Domenico Valentino getting run over by Ugas of Cuba wasn’t a terribly big surprise, but the following round bout with Popescu would seem on paper to likely send a finalist for the weight class. Aleksi Tishchenko should have an easy run into the finals as well, though he needs to focus and go after it in better fashion than many of his Russian compatriots.

64KG: I already mentioned the loss of Sapiyev, but he was joined by Russian Gennady Kovalev, Bulgarian Boris Georgiev, Brit Bradley Saunders, and Romania’s Ionut Georghe. The draw has gone the way no one expected, and the sole European in the Semis has turned out to be Alexis Vastine. Manuel Felix Diaz of the Dominican Republic has hardly looked like a champion thus far but took advantage of a weak draw to advance. Boonjumnong/Iglesias is the key bout of the semis, with Inglesias looking to get revenge for countryman Judel Johnson Cedeno’s loss at the 2004 Games in the Gold Medal round. Boonjumnong’s return to glory is a big surprise after he was knocked out of the World Championships in the first round.

67KG: It was looking so good for Demetrius Andrade. He had just beaten Russian Andrey Balanov and looked to be in the zone to win a gold. Then he inexplicably lost to his overmatched, undersized, flat out mediocre Korean opponent. Andrade blamed the system, even the American announcers blamed his inactivity and linear style. He had set himself up to be countered, and he was regularly, leading to his dismissal from the tournament. Bakhyt Sarsekbayev is now the favorite for the remainder of the tournament, though there the semi final match between China’s Hanati Silamu and Cuba’s Carlos Banteaux should be quite interesting as well.

75KG: Matvey Korobov’s loss to the Kazakh boxer Artayev was a big shock. Also emerging as a threat for Gold in his abscense is Emelio Correa of Cuba. The British could shock the world, however, with another upset for James DeGale. DeGale is a very talented fighter who’s rarely put everything together, but has did so in easily dispatching Shawn Estrada of the US.

81KG: Beterbiev is yet another Russian favored to win his weight class to end up on the sidelines, his loss the result of Zhang Xiaoping’s performance in the round of 16. Kenneth Egan continues to plod along on the other side of the brackets, seemingly destined for at least a Bronze. On the opposite side, Djakhon Kurbanov and Yerkebuian Shynaliyev meet in a rematch of the World Championships. Kurbanov was the Asian Games champion then and was DQed in that bout. A win against the strong Shynaliyev could establish him as the man to beat at 81KG.

91KG: Deontay Wilder hasn’t even been boxing 3 years, and yet he’s beaten all expectations by showing up in the medal rounds of the Olympics, just a year removed from him being knocked out of the opening round in Chicago. He’s nowhere near perfect and very likely to lose to Clemente Russo of Italy, but is hardly without a shot. Russo is incredibly awkward but not necessarily super fast, and Wilder will always have a punchers chance. Osmay Acosta of Cuba hasn’t been startlingly great either and it would surprise me if be actually beat Chakhkiev in the semis. Expect a rematch of the 7-6 World Championships finals, except with perhaps a lower score.

91+KG: Roberto Cammarelle seems to be headed to another final and it is exceedingly likely he’ll see Glazkov when he gets there. David Price and Jaksto will decide the only possible wrench in those plans. A win for Price would complicate the picture greatly, and provide the UK with a suprising medal at 201+.