As a former world titleholder and current contender at 115 pounds, Andrew Moloney is obviously very good at a lot of things in his chosen profession. What he’s not very good at is retirement.
“Yeah, it was a short retirement, very short,” laughs the Victoria native, who faces Jakrawut Majungoen on December 15 at The Melbourne Pavilion. It’s his first start since announcing that he was leaving the sport in May after a controversial split decision loss to Pedro Guevara.
Thar retirement didn’t even last long enough for him to pull out his rocking chair for some peaceful days on the porch, but it was understandable in the moment because boxing, quite frankly, is not like the other sports, where scoring more points than your opponent means you win the game. In boxing, there is no hard and fast scoring criteria (at least none that are universally adhered to), so each judge can see things quite differently and score fights accordingly. So when Moloney felt that he beat Guevara but didn’t get the nod, he was fed up enough to want to leave the sport behind.
“That’s why I lost my temper that night and announced my retirement because I’ve had my fair share of bad decisions and things not go my way and bad luck in this game,” he said. “So it starts to really wear you down, but I’ve still got that fire, that passion for this sport. This sport just grabs hold of you and you fall in love with it, even though it treats you like that sometimes. I still love the sport, and I’ve dedicated my life for 20 years to this sport and I’m not satisfied with what I’ve achieved. So there’s still more that I need to do before I walk away.”
Once Moloney shook off the disappointment of his fourth pro loss and got surgery to repair a torn biceps tendon, he set his sights on a rematch with Guevara, but that went by the wayside when the Mexican battler instead fought “Bam” Rodriguez last month and lost in three rounds.
“First, my motivation was to get that rematch with Pedro Guevara and right that wrong,” said Moloney. “I know that I’m a better fighter than him. I fought that fight with one arm, so I had surgery after the fight, and throughout the rehab to get that right, my motivation was just to get back in the ring with him and prove that I deserved to win that fight and that I was the better fighter, and that’s what we aimed for. I was promised the rematch and I really, really pushed hard to get this arm ready so that I could go into that rematch and unfortunately, he was mandated to fight Bam, and obviously he was going to take that fight. So when I heard that, that was quite tough because my motivation at the time was to get that fight.”
Instead, he gets Thailand’s Majungoen, a 55-fight veteran who has won three straight, albeit against a trio of foes who have yet to win a pro fight. Not ideal, but understandable as a keep-busy bout after major surgery. And with Willibaldo Garcia Perez and Rene Calixto Bibiano fighting for the vacant IBF title at 115 pounds on December 21, the number eight-ranked Moloney hopes to put his name in the mix for a 2025 shot at the belt.
“Thankfully there’s been some movement in my division, particularly in the IBF,” he said. “The IBF title became vacant and they’re fighting for that. I really believe that I have what it takes to beat both of them. So my plan is to get back in the ring this weekend and climb those IBF rankings and hopefully get my opportunity to fight the winner of that fight.”
As disgusted as Moloney sounded after the Guevara fight, he’s pulled a 180 these days as he starts with a fairly clean slate in a division with some big names in Rodriguez and future Hall of Famer Roman “Chocolatito” Gonzalez. Win this Sunday, and he’ll probably be even more excited about what the New Year will bring for him.
“I know that I need to win this fight to push me close to fighting for world title again and to set up a really big year for me next year,” he said. “So yeah, the motivation’s still there. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel and I hope that a win in this fight pushes me up those IBF rankings and maybe we can have an eliminator early next year. So the motivation’s there and the motivation to become world champion is there, and what’s got me out of bed every morning for the camp is becoming world champion and that not being too far away if I do my job properly.”
So, it’s just like the third installment of The Godfather trilogy, where he gets pulled back in just when he thought he was out?
“Yeah, even though it’s given me some very, very dark times and been very, very frustrating throughout the years, I still feel like there’s more to do and I want to have one more roll of the dice, one last crack at becoming world champion again and make sure that I give it absolutely everything I’ve got so that there’s no regrets at the end of the day.”
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