Kwang was an Olympic Gold Medalist Amateur boxer who wouldn't turn professional until the advanced age of 26. After only 5 professional bouts, he took on arguably the best Light Flyweight on the planet in Humberto Gonzalez and was actually winning the fight fairly comfortably until he was stopped in the 12th round on a Technical Knockout. As a result of this good showing against one of the premiere fighters in the world, Kwang was offered the opportunity to fight Michael Carbajal in America. Just like he had done against Chiquita, Kwang turned in an impressive showing and was winning the fight going into the 7th round where he was caught with a left hook which sent Kwang reeling to the ground. He climbed up off the canvas but Steele was forced to stop the fight once it became obviously that Kwang's legs had completely gone. Kwang retired with a record of 6-2. Let's assume for a second that he had seen out the 12th round against Humberto Gonzalez and became the WBC Light Flyweight champion of the world. We could have seen Kwang build up a respectable title reign in his native Korea before losing a competitive fight with Michael Carbajal. Perhaps he should have turned professional sooner.
Yeah, Kim was supposed to be past his peak physically before he even turned pro.Stayed too long in the amatuers, and lots of brutal gym wars with Chang and Yuh had taken their toll.He could well have been at least as good as Chiquita and Carbajal had he got in the mix earlier. Hi-Sup shin is another South Korean figher from that period that big things were expected from, but he killed a fighter and was never the same afterwards apparently.I've only viewed his later fights so i can't say for sure how good he looked prior to the death unfortunately.
I think Kim's success with both Humberto Gonzalez and Michael Carbajal is a good indication on how well the likes of Myung-Woo Yuh would have done had he jumped over to the states and tried to unify late in his career. Gonzalez, even with his two victories over Carbajal, made hardwork out of a lot of unknown quantities; Yul-Woo Lee, Domingo Sosa, and Kwang Sun Kim to name three. Not terribly consistent operators but then again you could say the same for Yuh. I have Hi-Sup Shin's fight with Santos Laciar, and it's been uploaded on my youtube account. A demolition job.
Well this deserves a bump. I've sadly yet to see Kim's bout with Chiquita -() but have seen his Olympic final and his quality bout with Carbajal. Would love to have seen him fight Yuh. Lora; you say Yuh, Chang and Kim all had wars together?
