Ablorah Sowah will fight in the co-main event on the seven-fight "Thunder and Lighting" card, which begins at 7 p.m. Tuesday in HSBC Arena.

The co-main event is a 10-round super-featherweight bout with Philadelphia's Zahir Raheem (22-0, 12 KOs) against Ablorah Sowah (17-4-1, 10 KOs) from Accra, Ghana.

Raheem Chases his Dream

Despite his sparkling unbeaten record, Zahir Raheem is the forgotten member of the Class of 1996. While Olympic teammates such as Fernando Vargas, Floyd Mayweather Jr. and David Reid have seen their fistic fortunes rise and fall in the last seven years, the Philly native has been relegated to the second tier of the featherweight division, waiting for his time, waiting for his shot at professional gold.

“I don’t look at those guys and say, ‘damn I should have got that,’” said Raheem as he prepares for his ESPN2 Tuesday Night Fights bout with Ghana’s Ablorh Sowah (17-4-1, 10 KOs). “I’m proud and happy for them. Now I’ve got to get mine. That’s all I focus on. I don’t let my emotions get negative and think negative about anybody else. I put my emotions to good use, and think positively about what I can do better for myself.”

Raheem, 26, has an infectious enthusiasm that belies the frustration he must feel at what has transpired in his career thus far. 22-0 with 12 KOs, ‘The Z-Man’ fights with speed, flash, and power - a winning combination that should have yielded benefits already.
But it hasn’t. And that came as a shock to the Olympian who thought he had the world at his feet after the Atlanta Games.
“I thought for sure that by ’99 I’d be world champion,” he muses. Then he hesitates before speaking again. “I thought for sure. No doubts about it.”
Yet as quick as one of his lightning combinations, Raheem comes back, optimistic about the future and his place in it.
“It’s very difficult at times,” he admits. “The only way I’m not getting burned out is that I still have that goal and I’m going to it. My goal is to become world champion. If I sit back and think that it’s never gonna happen, then I will get burned out, because this game is tough. There is nothing easy about it. I was at Marquette – Northern Michigan University, and I left school to pursue boxing. There is no, ‘I don’t know if I want to do this.’ I’ve got to do this. This is what I chose to do and there’s no looking back now.”
Looking back is our job. A decorated amateur who made it to the second round in the 1996 games, Raheem was an active prospect in his early days, fighting twice in the last two months of 1996, six times in 1997, and four times in 1998, mostly in New Jersey and Connecticut.
But after a decision win over Pasqual Rouse in January of 1999, promotional issues forced Raheem to the sidelines for over 15 months, killing his progress, but not his spirit.
“I can’t really point my fingers at a promoter or anybody about what happened,” said Raheem. “Things went sour with contracts and things of that matter, and when I was out of the contract with Top Rank, I was on ice for a nice year and a half, which set me back. If I had been fighting for that year and a half, I would have had a title by now.”
That was then, this is now. In the deep featherweight division, Raheem is the wild card, a fighter who can win a title from any champion on any given night, but one who needs a marquee fight to re-establish himself in the public eye and regain the momentum lost by his layoff. Now aligned with promoter Tony Holden, who has put Raheem on ESPN and Showtime, the ball is firmly in the fighter’s court.
Raheem has even re-located to Holden’s home base of Oklahoma to help further his career. And though he has seen results, ‘The Z-Man’ hasn’t lost touch with his Philly roots.
“I didn’t adjust,” says Raheem of life in Tulsa. “It’s strictly business for me. I came out here because it’s better for my career. I’m just business-oriented right now. Everything I’m doing now is to better my career. I don’t really sit back and try to get comfortable. I’m not ready to settle down yet.”
Looking progressively better in each bout, he has stopped Luisito Espinosa and Juan Polo Perez and decisioned Joe Morales and Isidro Tejedor in his last four fights, all victories over quality foes. Needless to say, his phone isn’t ringing off the hook with offers from the class of the division, who will probably choose to wait until Raheem fights his way into a mandatory position before taking him on.
“Let me compare it to something,” said Raheem. “Tony Holden just did a deal with Joe Mesi. Joe Mesi knocked out David Izon on ESPN, and that was a pretty good performance. Then you’ve got Evander Holyfield coming around saying he wants to fight him for four million. You’ve got Lennox and all these guys looking at him, and looking to fight Joe Mesi for three, four million dollars. Not taking anything away from Joe Mesi, but why is nobody calling to fight me? Why isn’t Barrera, Erik Morales, or the Prince calling? Why does nobody want to fight me? I’m making phone calls trying to get the fights. And it’s so tough. I don’t understand what’s going on. I think I’m being blackballed sometimes.”
It’s probably nothing as sinister as that; it’s just a matter of Raheem being too much risk for too little reward. That’s something only exposure in front of national television audiences can cure. Yet in modest fashion, Raheem doesn’t even think he’s touched the surface of his talent.
“I’m my worst critic,” he says. “I haven’t had a performance yet where I could say, ‘oh man, I looked beautiful.’ A lot of performances I thought I looked okay or pretty good, but I haven’t had that performance where I could exhale and say, ‘ahhh, I’m ready for whatever and whoever.’ But I’m not running and hiding; I’m not ducking from nobody. I’m taking on all comers. I just want to prove myself and get my recognition and my just due.”
Tuesday will be Raheem’s next chance to impress the powers-that-be, from network execs to ratings chairmen. He plans on making it a show to remember.
“I want people to feel like they’re in the ring with me,” says Raheem. “I want them to feel the emotions I feel. How I smile, how I look, how I use hand speed and power. I even get a little goofy sometimes. But I like to draw the fans around me and not do things that the conventional fighters do. I like to change it up a little bit. Even if I got to look into the camera and talk, that’s just me. I’m having fun. I’m like a baby in the playpen.”