By Michael Katz

Forget the biggest fight in European history (ever hear of World War II?), the transatlantic version of Leonard-Hearns and all that offensive hype. Joe Calzaghe and Mikkel Kessler, fine young men and talented boxers, could not carry spit buckets for such predecessors. The very nomenclature for Saturday’s main event in, sadly, another case of dueling dates, is offensive. To paraphrase the late Sonny Werblin, what the hell is a supermiddleweight? For one thing, it is one word. A “super middleweight” (two words) would be someone like Sugar Ray Robinson, Marvelous Marvin Hagler. One word, and supermiddleweight is just another bastard weight class that dilutes the game.

It’s not as bad as some, especially “superbantamweight,” which is what Werblin, then head of Madison Square Garden, was asking about when his favorite promoter, Don King, brought Wilfredo Gomez to the arena. That was a weight class created by Jose Sulaiman to accommodate Gomez, who would have been weakened trying to make bantamweight and was too small to really be a full featherweight (see Salvador Sanchez).

I’m not sure why supermiddleweight was created, except maybe to accomodate lazy old middleweights a bit of turf, or to give Europeans a chance not to compete against the Haglers. Whatever. At this point, it hardly matters. From super to nuts, Calzaghe and Kessler have what it takes to give us a superior battle in Cardiff, Wales, on HBO, probably less than an hour before Showtime card cranks up its main event, Juan Manuel Marquez against the dangerous Rocky Juarez.

It’s a weekend featuring the Nos. 3 (Marquez) and 4 (Calzaghe) fighters on my personal pound-for-pound list, behind only Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao. And it appears to be a weekend of winning underlays. It’s perhaps not as bad as ring around the collar, but a winning underlay stains my very soul. I mean, how can you bet on something you don’t think is worth the price but suspect is going to win anyway?

Thus there are major caveats to my selections for the two shows. In Tucson, Marquez is a 9-2 or 5-1 favorite. Marquez is one of the best craftsmen in the game and though it would take only one well-placed left hook or right hand to change this opinion, should be too much for Juarez to handle.

Marquez, a masterful counterpuncher, will discourage the usually reticent Juarez from firing when the Houston slugger realizes every miss will be punished. The match could disintegrate into a chess match and you have to go with the grandmaster against the kid. But, and it’s a big one, although the tempo and tactics seem to favor Marquez, there is always the danger of the big punch and Juarez packs one in each hand. His knockouts can be of the highlight reel variety.

Plus, he showed world class grit in his first bout, a disputed decision loss, with Marco Antonio Barrera. The Mexican, who subsequently was clearly outpointed by Marquez, turned from Baby Faced Assassin to boxer in the rematch and easily handled Juarez the second time around. Though Marquez could be leaving the 130-pound division for lightweight and Juarez did not graduate from featherweight that long ago, any size advantage for the favorite will be height and reach, not strength.

I do not believe that Marquez will be looking forward to his long-awaited rematch with Pacquiao. First, with Bob Arum directing the Pac Man’s career, it is no sure thing to occur any time soon. Arum would prefer his icon to face much softer opposition, like lightweight David Diaz. More importantly, Marquez is a pro’s pro, one of the Nacho Beristain family of boxers who shattered the Mexican stereotype of left-hooking brawlers. Marquez has seen Juarez’s power; he’ll be taking this match very seriously. He may not be worth the big price, but he should win.

In Cardiff, where he has a huge home-court advantage, Calzaghe is the 8-5 favorite, but I believe Kessler is the underlay at either 6-5 or 13-10. In fact, the line – unless it moves dramatically in the final hours – has been surprisingly low all along. This is why I believe Kessler might be a winning underlay.

For a lot of reasons, he just doesn’t figure to be this close in the wagering to a universally rated top ten pound-for-pounder like Calzaghe who has been at the top of his game for ten years now. Kessler has had only two of his 39 fights away from his native land; he’ll be fighting in Calzaghe’s frontyard with about 50,000 wildly xenophobic Welshmen who will get even madder when the Dane sports the flag of St. George on his trunks in honor of his English-born mother. Just being Calzaghe’s opponent makes Kessler unpopular; being half-English will infuriate the crowd.

Kessler (39-0, 29 knockouts) is not quite as undefeated as is Calzaghe (43-0, 32). The Welshman has the more impressive victories, starting from ten years ago when he first won a 168-pound belt against the talented, but aged, Chris Eubank in what he says remains his toughest fight. Kessler’s biggest victory was against a 35-year-old version of Markus Beyer last year.

Calzaghe is also 35, but still has an obvious advantage in hand speed against the rather predictable and stodgy Dane. The favorite is a southpaw with good foot movement to enable him to attack from all sorts of unexpected angles. Kessler plods straight ahead behind a stiff jab and a threatening right hand that rumors, which I don’t believe, may have been bruised in training. On the other hand, literally, Calzaghe has long had problems with his left, or power, hand. He has been accused of being a “slapper,” not a puncher. Tell that to Byron Mitchell, who knocked him down in the second round, only to have the Welshman get up and score a knockout in that same round.

All these things seem to weigh in favor of Calzaghe in this much ballyhooed fight. I see them and then I see the odds.and I have to think – one, these guys are not as good as the hype (no wonder they’ve been kept safely at home by their connections and thus really under the radar) and Kessler, at 28, must  have some “smart” money on him to account for the closeness in the betting. What do I know? Calzaghe looks too good to be real. The bet has to be Kessler.

There are other reasons to go with the Dane. Kessler is taller – 6-foot-1 to 5-foot-11 ½ - and though they are not competing for rebounds, height sometimes can be a controlling factor. Think of Vernon Forrest and Sugar Shane Mosley. Because of Forrest’s height, Mosley’s faster hands were easily neutralized and not only by a superior jab. Punching upwards, Mosley was unable to launch his quick combinations because Forrest would eventually land some lethal counters. This could be the case in Cardiff.

And when you study the past performances, one thing becomes very clear. Neither man has the kind of credentials that one would associate with a modern-day Leonard or Hearns. For most of his 20 defenses, Calzaghe has opposed riff and raff, almost as if he has been hiding behind promoter Frank Warren’s apron strings.

Yes, there was Eubanks, but his “big” victory was that masterful 12-round performance against the favored Jeff Lacy that opened many American eyes – maybe a bit too wide. After Lacy, Calzaghe has faced only two challengers, both from the Contenders ESPN-level league, Peter Manfredo Jr. and Sakio Bika. And before Lacy, he went through, in reverse order, this all-star lineup: Evans Ashira (for godsake, he fought last month as a junior middleweight), Mario Veit, Kabary Salem, the vowel-challenged Mger Mkrtchian, Byron Mitchell and one of my all-time favorites, Tocker Pudwill.

When you consider Anthony Mundine, Eric Lucas and Manny Siaca, maybe Kessler’s accomplishments are not that far off Calzaghe’s. In any case, these guys may be hot stuff these days, and believe me, I AM looking forward to their meeting, but remember when Leonard fought Hearns, he had already beaten Wilfred Benitez and gotten sweet revenge against Roberto Duran (for some reason, many so-called experts have been saying the 1981 bout was between “undefeated” welterweights); Hearns had stopped Pipino Cuevas in two. For me, Calzaghe and Kessler still fall far short of the 168-pound meeting between Roy Jones Jr. and James Toney, though they may be a smidgeon better than the undefeated welterweight unification bout where Donald Curry knocked out Milton McCrory in two. Curry and McCrory both had trouble with another Welshman, Colin Jones, who at least according to the Brits who were there, was not on Calzaghe’s level.

But to tell you the truth, the real reason why I can’t wait for the fight is so Fred Sternburg will stop bombarding us scribes with rather, for him, prosaic publicity – excepting of course putting in Calzaghe’s mouth the line about Kessler not doing interviews: “Is he in training or the witness protection program?”

PENTHOUSE : Hopefully, for the last time, Chris Byrd, an all-time favorite who needs to think seriously about his boxing future. It’s not in the ring, except as a hands-on trainer. I worried that Alexander Povetkin would obliterate the gutsy southpaw in just a few rounds last weekend. Chris kept fighting back until, finally, his father threw in the towel in the 11th round of the IBFelons’ minitournament to provide an eventual challenger for Wladimir Klitschko (Povetkin will meet the winner of ShoBox’s Friday night bout between Calvin Brock and Eddie Chambers). It was typical that Byrd would keep fighting no matter what – he made a career of facing up to dragons with basically nothing more than his wiles. As a heavyweight puncher, he was virtually bare-handed. If he wishes to continue, that’s his right – but I can’t see how even winning a title at cruiserweight, which would be difficult with his declining ability, would enhance an already sparkling resume. He should make a terrific trainer.

OUTHOUSE: Villas for everyone. Let’s start with Frank Warren, the British promoter who prefers to keep his fighters out of harm’s way. He expects a huge crowd Saturday at Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium for Calzaghe-Kessler, so what does he give them for a supporting bout? He wanted Enzo Maccarinelli’s cruiserweight title defense to be against 39-year-old Ezra Sellers, who had been retired for three years. The WBOobs approved, but the British Boxing Board of Control did not. Sellers, who had a lone victory this year against a club fighter as his only action since being knocked out in two by O’Neil Bell three years ago – his first start after being knocked out by Kelvin Davis, in fact, all seven of his losses have been by knockout – was replaced by perhaps someone even inferior. I got to see Mohamed Azzaoui, an Algerian based in New Zealand, in the opening bout on the recent Sultan Ibragimov-Evander Holyfield pay-per-view card (yes, I bought it, someone had to). He continued unbeaten, but believe me, he can’t fight a little bit. Warren should be tarred and feathered for the way he treats his customers….Let’s not forget HBO, though, for moving back the start time of Calzaghe-Kessler to interfere with Showtime’s card Saturday night. Boxingscene.com’s Jake Donovan theorized, rather intelligently I thought for someone who writes for this site, that HBO was mad at Oscar de la Hoya and Golden Boy for taking the Marquez-Juarez fight, which had originally been scheduled for HBO, across the street after the postponement. HBO had no room on its 2007 schedule for the makeup and so de Hoya, who grew up on HBO and has been enriched millions of times over by the network, moved it to Showtime. Originally, HBO was going to allow Calzaghe-Kessler to start at 11 P.M. Welsh time, for live showing 6 P.M. Eastern time (and 3 P.M. Pacific time) with a taped telecast later in the evening. Now, however, the first bell has been pushed back to 9 P.M. Eastern time (6 P.M. Pacific), which means it starts at 2 A.M. in Cardiff, giving the lads plenty of chance to get dangerously drunk. There should be no conflict with Showtime’s main event, but its semifinal, an attractive featherweight “title” bout with Robert Guerrero defending against the capable Martin Honorio, will probably be missed by viewers watching Calzaghe-Kessler. It’s a typical HBO move – “heart and soul” of boxing, my fat ass…..Do you think Referee Mike Ortega, who gave Samuel Peter precious extra seconds before allowing him to continue against Jameel McCline, got the assignment for Calzaghe-Kessler as some kind of reward? Peter was up at six in the third round, but was not allowed to continue until Ortega played 20 questions with him. Yeah, fighter safety….Not only did Showtime advertise its Antonio Tarver fight – opponent TBA – as a “title” bout, which it is not, I thought I heard the boys across the street plug Marquez-Juarez by calling the American an Olympic gold medal winner. All that glitters is not gold. Juarez won silver.

BIGGEST OUTHOUSE: This is too dastardly to be included in the regular OUTHOUSE. Promoter Dino Duva was suspended by those jokes in the New York State Athletic Commission for peeking at the official scorecard being kept for the Peter-McCline fight. Hell, the commission chairman Ron Scott Stevens was seen doing that very thing during his many years as matchmaker and promoter. It’s one thing to fine Duva, who admitted his guilt. But to suspend him for six months means that all fighter contracts he has will also be suspended – and that includes the one with Peter, who is scheduled to finally challenge Oleg Maskaev for the whatever-it-is heavyweight title belt Feb. 2 in New York. Or maybe you think Duva’s partner in Peter, the wonderful Don King, will make sure his buddy will be taken care of?

DIS AND DAT: Yes, Juan Diaz was breathtaking in his assault of Julio Diaz, but please, his next opponent should be Joel Casamayor, the real lightweight champion (and I don’t need Ring magazine to tell me that)….Another reason to worry about in Oscar de la Hoya’s purchase of Ring is his close relationship with Al Haymon, one of the biggest players in the game….And please stop with the nonsense that with Ring a title can only be won or lost in the ring. What if Dennis Rappaport or Frank Warren ever got lucky enough to have a fighter win the heavyweight title? You think any legit contenders would ever get a crack at it? Or do you want the good old days when Jack Dempsey could defend three times in a decade?…So I bought the pathetic Holyfield bout – forget about him retiring, the promoters should be outlawed – and was now anxiously awaiting to hear what the Real Deal had to say about going to the back of the line and waiting his turn again when my cable channel suddenly ended the telecast from Germany and instead of Holy’s dream we got advertising for the next pay-per-view event. “Jerry Springer: Naughty Nightmares.”…The soothing voices of Nick Charles and Al Bernstein make it very easy to sleep through fights….At first, I thought the 15-second stoppage by Referee Raul Cadiz Sr. in T.J. Wilson’s upset of previously unbeaten heavyweight Travis Walker was outrageous. But after watching the slo-mo replays and seeing Walker’s hands drop and his head slump, no complaint will be lodged. A rematch is still in order….Okay, two nice bouts this weekend, then the biggie I’m really up for, Miguel Cotto defending his strap against Sugar Shane Mosley….And I’m beginning to think maybe Ricky Hatton does have a chance against Floyd Mayweather Jr., especially since it’s not a dance….Pretty Boy enhanced his image, of course, by saying the judges were out to get him when he was booted from Arthur Murray’s.