Is Zou Shiming the real deal?

If credentials are anything to go by, then China’s popular flyweight boxing hero Zou Shiming is the real deal.

Zou makes his professional debut on a blockbuster Top Rank card at the luxurious Venetian in Macau on Saturday. The fight card will take place at the Cotai Indoor Arena, which has a seating capacity of 15,000 and has played host to major basketball, tennis and boxing events as well as concerts featuring such celebrities as Whitney Houston and Lady Gaga among others.

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A two-time Olympic gold medalist and a three-time world champion, Zou makes his professional debut in a four-round bout against Mexico’s Eleazar Valenzuela who has a record of 2 wins, 1 loss and 1 draw with one win coming by way of knockout.

It isn’t impressive but it’s the first step on the road to what Top Rank promoter Bob Arum believes will be a world championship fight next year.

The most astute promoter in the business, Arum realized the incredible potential of the Chinese market and went after Zou after WBC president Don Jose Sulaiman somehow showed the way by staging the first world title fight in Kunming where Xiong Zhao Zhong won the vacant minimum weight title against Mexico’s Javier Martinez Resendiz via a unanimous twelve-round decision last November 24.

Sulaiman persuaded Filipino promoter and boxing manager Aljoe Jaro to get his fighter, mandatory challenger Denver Cuello, to step aside for $25,000 with the commitment that he would fight the winner.

In the obvious desire to exploit the Chinese market where the WBC had an ally in TV executive and promoter Lu Dang, the WBC board of governors effectively ignored the commitment and voted to give Zhong one voluntary title defense which is scheduled to take place in Las Vegas in May.

With an audience of 125 million that reportedly watched the title fight on free television, the potential was too much for someone like Arum to ignore. He went after the most popular athlete in China and signed him to a contract that offered him a record-breaking $300,000 for a four-round fight in his pro debut.

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Arum isn’t in denial mode. When he was on a three-way call from Hong Kong with this reporter from Yahoo! Philippines and well-known Australian promoter Peter Maniatis and Mark Fine, his co- host on “Ringside”, the number one weekly boxing show in Melbourne on SEN Radio, Arum confirmed rumors of the $300,000 purse. “That’s absolutely true” he said. It was unusually candid for a man who normally isn’t inclined to release purse details.

Arum revealed that when he first made the deal to sign Zou he realized that he had “this great Olympic background but didn’t really know how good he was.”

He had Zou train at the celebrated Hall-of-Fame trainer Freddie Roach’s Wild Card gym where they put him in to spar with reigning WBO/WBA flyweight champion Brian Viloria and some top Mexican bantamweights.

Arum was impressed enough to exult “this kid is really phenomenal” and confidently predicted that over a four-round limit he would take him with anybody up to bantamweigh. Of course, major boxing matches, particularly a championship bout, are scheduled for twelve rounds.

To Arum, the challenge is having “to make sure he can go a full 12 rounds if necessary as he progresses as a professional and at top speed.”

Banking on Roach’s assessment which he noted is generally fairly conservative, Arum disclosed that the trainer who had worked to wean Zou Shiming away from his amateur style told him as well as the media that Zou Shiming “will be a major champion within a year.”

That effectively helped the promoter lay out the Chinese fighter’s career path.

Arum revealed that “obviously a Viloria-Zou Shiming fight is something that as a promoter is always at the back of our minds.” The parallel plan is to have Viloria “very often on these Asian cards and if he retains his championship and as Zou progresses-and it looks like he’s going to progress – sometime next year Brian will defend his title against Zou and it will be by far the biggest payday in Viloria’s career.”

Viloria, who has been sparring with Zou, conceded that the Chinese boxer “is quite quick-fisted but doesn’t have much power”, adding he kind of expected that because of Zou’s amateur background.

However, Viloria confirmed advance reports that Zou has “great foot speed and ring generalship but has to get his bearings as a pro, first” which is what Roach is working on.

Clearly Arum is hoping that Zou will turn out to be the real deal because of his investment not just in promoting his professional career but building him up as a future superstar because in the assessment of Arum “he is extremely marketable.”

Talking of markets, the fight card with the unusual prospect of a four-rounder making his pro debut as the main event is unheard of but eminently realistic as Top Rank factored in the economic potential of the Chinese market.

Arum boasts that this is “the biggest promotion ever in China and the Venetian is going all out. There will be a huge crowd and some of their biggest customers are coming. They (the Venetian executives) are extremely pleased with the way things have been going.”

In fact, it has sparked a tussle between the Venetian in Macao and the Singapore Venetian for the right to stage Manny Pacquiao’s ring return planned for September. Both venues want the Pacquiao fight and Arum believes that when he sits down and talks to the top executives this weekend it will all be sorted out.

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The Zou Shiming fight and the other title fights on the card will be televised “ live “all over China through its national network and all the regional networks, according to Arum.

He predicts they will have “a tune-in audience we believe of between 200-300 million homes which will make it the most watched professional boxing match in history.”

Arum said “it will also be shown in the US thanks to HBO 2. Its second network will take this fight by tape on Saturday morning (US time) and play it in the afternoon in the US for fans. We really believe they are going to do very well with it and get a big audience.”

In addition, the fights will be telecast on the giant Philippine broadcast network ABS-CBN on Channel 2 on Sunday at 10:15 along with the Viloria-Juan Francisco Estrada title fight and the Milan Melindo showdown against Tommy Seran of Indonesia.

These two fights, the fights of the Penalosa brothers Dodie Boy Jr and Dave and the WBO super featherweight title bout between Roman Martinez and undefeated Diego Magdaleno and the WBO International super bantamweight title fight between former world champion Wilfredo Vazquez Jr and Japan’s Yasutaka Ishimoto will also be telecast at 3:00 p.m. on Studio 23.

The Viloria and Melindo fights will also be telecast over The Filipino Channel of ABS-CBN which has a wide audience especially in the Middle East.

Arum noted this will “absolutely enhance the audience for these fights.”

The shift in venue from the bright lights and casinos in Las Vegas to the burgeoning gaming industry in places like Macao and Singapore signals something of a change.

As Arum noted “everybody had always looked to the US as being a pot of gold and performing in the United States was the ultimate. But I’m not sure whether that’s going to be true anymore with what’s happening in Singapore and Macau and the interest of the Venetian and some of the other things we are working on. It won’t be such a big deal to fight in the US.”

He said Top Rank “might very well do (Zou’s next fight) in the US but the exposure fighting in Asia might be greater.” It will all depend on the economics.

The economics of investment guided Arum who “paid for Zou to come to the US to train, paid for his trainer Freddie Roach and his cutman Miguel Diaz and his conditioning coach.”

The logic? He says Zou “is one of the great, great legendary athletes in China, a country with 1.4 billion people. It’s a country that is ready to explode as far as the interest in boxing. ”

Whether Zou Shiming explodes and proves he is the real deal will be known by at least 200 million people over the weekend. It’s something truly worth waiting for.

Editor's note: The blogger's views do not represent Yahoo! Southeast Asia's position on the topic or issue being discussed in this post.