These are two of my favourite boxers and their bout for the WBA Middleweight Title Belt in 1989 was a really good fight. Two of the best underrated middleweights prime for prime going at it. Before reading my own analysis you can watch the fight again if you want to or if you havent seen it. Here it is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iv1kUSBJAXg&feature=related This is the fight as I saw it: The first two rounds McCallum was clearly befuddled by Graham's style and no amount of sparring with unconventional southpaws seemed to have prepared him for Graham, he was outboxed and made to quite silly at times. The third saw a change and you have to admire McCallum's ability to adapt, he upped the tempo and began to try and work on the inside for the first time and although not entirely successful he landed the far more meaningful punches and won the round. Graham won the next two with the fifth a controversial one with a knockdown scored by Graham, but was it a slip? Probably. Anyway thats the first round thats difficult to score. I had McCallum coming back to win the next two rounds. In the sixth for some inexplicable reason Graham decided to trade with McCallum on the inside and despite some success, lost the round. I dont know why he switched but he didnt really recover for the rest of the fight. The eighth was another controversial round with Graham deducted a point for spinning McCallum into the turnbuckle but it was a round that could have gone either way and was arguably the turning point in the fight. If you scored it 9-9 in favour of Graham he became favourite, if you scored it 10-8 in favour of McCallum he became favourite. I scored it 9-9. McCallum won the next three rounds for me as Graham began to tire and the Bodysnatcher began punishing him. A real treat was the ninth, I had forgotten how good that round was, Graham began trading with McCallum again and it was actually a great forgotten round and definately the best of the fight. The last round was far from the prettiest with lots of wrestling with Graham impressing at the start of the round and McCallum taking over towards the end, I scored it a draw. Thus I had McCallum emerging victorious 114-113 in a very close battle with a real clash of styles. Please voice your own opinions.
I thought Mike had some serious trouble in this fight...but showed what kind of mettle he has because even though Herol consistently gave him the fits, he still managed to find a way to edge it out. Its a dull fight in some ways but I reckon seeing it live would have been a bit of a nailbiter.
it was very interesting to watch live i had mccallum winning by one point but it could of gone either way
It is a tough one to score McCallum was definitely the better boxer overall but Graham gave him fits here. He did well to work his way back into the fight. He did the same thing in the Curry fight but in a different way. Great adaptive boxer.