Juan LaPorte, he fought'em all

A really good fighter of the old school who would fight anyone anywhere.

 

I read in Barry McGuigans autobiography that when LaPorte caught him at the end of round 9 with that right hand, he didn’t know what had happened…it’s the hardest he’d been hit.

 

I read that too.

 

He gave prime Chavez one of his toughest bouts, and I thought Pedroza should have been DQ’d against him.

 

One of the best chins in boxing history. If he’d let his hands go a bit more, who knows what might have happened.

 

And that was his issue. He seemed reluctant to engage against the better opponents, like he was over thinking what he was doing. Watched him fight many times, against his better opposition, seemed the same thing always happened.
Eusebio Pedroza simply mugged him with dirty tactics , and he wouldn't retaliate. Just complained to the ref. A great fighter would've made Pedroza respect them with some nastiness of their own.... That's when I realized there was something missing with him. That fire to be great.
Good fighter though, with possibly the greatest chin in that weight class.

 

You couldn’t hurt LaPorte with a baseball bat. What a chin — maybe the very best ever.

Wasn’t he contracted to fight Sal Sanchez in a rematch when Sal died?

You have to favor Sanchez but I’d give about anything for Sanchez to have avoided his tragic fate and been able to fight on, starting with this one.

 

Pedroza was a dirty fighter, it has nothing to do with edge. If you are talented you do not need to cheat to win.

 

The Sanchez vs La Porte rematch was scheduled for Sept 15 1982 in Madison Square Garden, unfortunately it did not happen as Sanchez was tragically killed on August 12 1982.

 

I share with you the wisdom of the late Classy Freddie Blassie:

Win … if you can.

Lose … if you must.

But always, always cheat.

 

But in my wisdom if you are talented enough there is no need to cheat. Maybe Eusebio Pedroza should have followed my advise, that guy was a dirty fighter, backhands, low blows. I never saw Salvador Sanchez fight dirty, he had talent.

 

There’s so many layers to this and needs to fight dirty IMO has nothing to do with it.

Harry Greb has a reputation for being a dirty fighter. You can look at his record and surmise that either he wasn’t very good but beat all those people because he cheated or he was very good and cheated anyway (cheated/fought dirty/whatever).

Did Mike Tyson need to try to break peoples’ arms? Did he need to get warned for everything from hitting after the bell to hitting on the break to low blows to head butting to using his forearm and everything else to beat Razor Ruddock? No, but he got warned for pretty much everything in the book.

Roberto Duran fought dirty sometimes. He hit Ken Buchanan as hard low as anyone you’ve probably ever seen. He thumbed Davey Moore. He mauled people with wrestling tactics. Did he need to?

You seem to look at boxing like some gentlemen’s sport in the days when matches happened at the old athletic clubs, where everyone swore an oath to the Marquis de Queensbury and shook hands in agreement to have a test of skill.

A lot of fighters — to be great, or to give themselves an edge, or just because deep down they’re very nasty people — look at it as a FIGHT. It’s the hurt business to them. They want to win any way they can and to rough up the other guy every way they can. The ref’s job is to draw the line on what they can and cannot get away with and they let the ref handle that and they go about fighting … not having a boxing contest … FIGHTING.

There’s also a psychology to it in many cases. If Fighter A gets so flummoxed he’s turning to the ref every exchange asking for help, then he’s not focusing on hurting Fighter B. He’s not staying focused on his game plan. And if he’s worried about the elbow shiv (a la Tyson) then maybe he doesn’t guard properly against the right hand or the hook … and the offender gets an edge.

You either win or lose (unless it’s a draw or no contest). They don’t put asterisks by results to say ‘but he fought kinda dirty.’

I understand where you’re coming from, but at least throw Tyson and Greb and Duran in the same pot with Pedroza whenever discussing them. Tyson fans will bring up Holyfield’s head butts and you can post video of him breaking basically every rule in the book (including ear biting) and they’ll pretend they don’t see it … because they like Tyson.

I don’t think a fighter is lesser because he fights dirty — hell, I have great appreciation for a guy who can bend the rules every which away and get away with just enough that he doesn’t lose because of it. Hell, it’s an art. But this ain’t badminton … it’s professional prizeFIGHTING.

 

You have your opinion, I have mine. What if when I was in Cross Country or Track which I was in High School, I tripped my competitor in a Cross Country or Track meet to win, it's cheating. I am into good sportsmanship, it shows great skill, Pedroza should have been DQ'd in some fights, Sanchez was a very talented clean champion, if you are talented you do not need to cheat to win. I do not care for cheaters. It's like cheating on a test in school, I have the same virtues that I have always had. Another example, Would You Ever Cheat On Your Spouse If Given The Right Opportunity, You Are A Man ! I would never do that, i have been presented with opportunities, but I have rejected them.

 

So take this opportunity to call out Tyson, Duran and Greb — call them the dirty, rotten cheaters they were just like Pedroza.

And as I said before: it’s not about NEEDING to cheat to win in many cases. It’s a different mentality. You are positing that Pedroza could not win without cheating since you’re saying he needed to.

As far as cross country:

1) Cross country isn’t a fight. It’s a race. Great sport for nice guys. Boxing, not so much.

2) How far do you take it? What if you cut off someone and bump them in doing so — did you cheat? Did you NEED to cheat or could you have politely yielded the right of way and then caught up with them and passed them?

Don’t tell me there aren’t gray areas. None of Pedroza’s tactics rose to the level of DQ, so he wasn’t DQ’d. If he lost points for fighting dirty and still won, so what? If he got warned but didn’t commit the same infraction again and didn’t lose a point, I guess he didn’t need to cheat.

Every infraction is not cheating. There’s never been a fighter who didn’t commit one, or at least not an experienced fighter. Fighters get warned all the time for this or that.