Was It Worth the Trouble?
By Teodoro Medina Reynoso
PhilBoxing.com
Wed, 24 Sep 2025
The brouhaha over the controversial ending seems to be simmering down but the question is begging an answer--was the Oscar Collazo-Jayson Vayson fight worth the trouble?
Apparently, for DAZN it was not, and network execs could still be fuming mad at the experience. The DAZN won the right to cover and air the fight to 200 countries. How much DAZN paid to the organizers is not available as of this writing.
But recouping its investment may not be as significant as keeping the network's subscribers satisfied by airing or streaming quality fights. Which it believed it had apparently failed to deliver with the sudden ending of a fight many perceived could still go the other way.
DAZN commentator Chris Mannix expressed his consternation by saying, "Every person in that (Vayson) corner ought to be fired." Vayson, it turned out was surrendered by his own corner without the boxer knowing it. The referee claimed his corner threw in the towel, whether he meant it figuratively or literally was not clear.
How much did the organizers (Miguel Cotto and Oscar De La Hoya of Golden Boy Promotions which handles Collazo) offered Vayson is also not publicly available. But it could have been irresistible for the Filipino to go down to 105 from 108 where before the Collazo call up, he was already top two contender at IBF. In fact, he was already scheduled to a IBF world mandatory challenger fight versus fellow Filipino, Regie Suganob in Bohol.
The trouble could have been worth it for Vayson for being given an immediate crack at world title at a lower weight as well as an attractive fight purse (perhaps the highest he earned yet). But his camp's decision to pull him out of the Suganob fight (no one could fault them either as it is the promoter's goal to give his fighter his biggest earning fight), necessarily made Suganob a collateral damage--he lost his lofty ranking at IBF at 108 when the Vayson fight didn't happen.
Still, with what happened in the Collazo bout, was the trouble worth it? Trainer Allan Alegria bared that Vayson had to subsist on fruits and water to meet and keep 105.
During the fight, Allegria also bared that the fight supervisor through the referee kept on going to their corner asking how about stopping the fight ostensibly to save Vayson from further damage.
Apparently, the badgering pressured the corner to request for the stoppage to the surprise of Vayson himself, the spectators and most of all Chris Mannix and the DAZN coverage panel.
Vayson corner surrendering the bout in the seventh round amounted to a knockout loss, only his first by such result in two career defeats thus far. Vayson will therefore return to 108 where he rightfully belongs with such as bad mark.
Was chasing Vayson for an opponent in a high profile title defense fight worth it for Collazo?
Most definitely.
By yanking Vayson out of 108, the Collazo camp was able to present a named dangerous opponent in his title defense. So much so that DAZN was convinced to cover and air the fight. But the oddsters didn't bite the hype- Collazo was almost 10-1 favorite to beat Vayson.
Here's another twist that favored Collazo:
As a "penalty" for not defending against any of his top two contenders, both Japanese in the WBA where he is also champion, Collazo even got kicked up as super champion to pave the way for the two top contenders to fight for the "vacant" regular championship.
Ryuse Matsumoto beat Yuni Takada by technical decision in the undercard of the recent Naoya Inoue defense versus Morudjon Akhmadaliev. Suspiciously, it was not only after that fight scheduled for 12 rounds that the bout was announced as for the "vacant" WBA regular minimumweight title. Japan has a new champion at 105 after the Shigeoka brothers!
With this shady background, isn't it prudent to pause and think very hard before coming to a decision to pit Melvin Jerusalem to Collazo in title unification?
The author Teodoro Medina Reynoso is a veteran boxing radio talk show host living in the Philippines. He can be reached at teddyreynoso@yahoo.com and by phone 09215309477.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Teodoro Medina Reynoso.
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