Not a fighter that gets mentioned much, other than in reference to his knockout against Benitez. Any opinions on him?....unfairly forgotten perhaps?.His fights with Mattioli and Benitez are up on youtube, if interested.
When he dethroned Mattioli, he dropped Rocky in the opening round with a succession of massive southpaw lefts, and Mattioli landed on his right arm, shattering it. With one of the gutsiest displays I've ever seen, Rocky made a tremendous rally through great pain with his left alone, and it actually looked for a moment as if he might actually save his title, but he had far too much to overcome. His courageous display overshadowed Hope's crowning moment. For the rematch (which I only viewed live), I got the impression that Mattioli's early bodywork could regain the title for him, but he got away from it, then faded. Hope did show good punch variety in closing the proceedings. Hope himself had early success with Benitez behind his southpaw jab, and the commentators made note of how draining it could be for Wilfredo to continually counter it off the ropes, but Hope inexplicably got away from it, and started letting Benitez take the fight to him. When coming forward, Wilfred's power became lethal, and Maurice paid for it. (Not surprisingly, the deplorable issboxWRECK has recorded this cleanest of knockouts as a TKO.) I'd be very interested in seeing Hope's stoppage of Antuofermo, as I've been told here that Vito was in desperate straits, and not from a cut.
I saw radar benitez have him spiting out his teeth back in the day, I dont care to see it again. Thanks
I'm not the biggest fan of him myself to be honest(though for other reasons than speed mostly).I'll post my thoughts later.
Was watching Zapata vs Olivo and it mentioned Hope was in the frame for Durans comeback after Leonard II
I liked Maurice Hope as a fighter, 'cos he was British and he was around at the time when I just started to get into boxing. I remember being very disappointed when Benitez stopped him.
Hope was a pretty solid fighter. Not one of the best obviously but a man who gave his fans their money's worth. Too bad he suffered a detached retina and fought only once more after having his teeth knocked out against Benitez.
I would have definitely liked to have seen Maurice Hope fight Ayub Kalue, and though he probably would've lost, a good fight could have been made.
Well, my thoughts on Hope are that he was a good fighter, very good in some respects, but with some glaring flaws and also not one i particularly enjoy watching. Overall i'd put him in the same broad category as fighters like Wright, watt, quartey, Bruno, MCkinney etc...fighters that often tended to fight in straight lines and very much emphasised the jab, or one-two as their main weapons.Most preferring to have someone come straight onto their offensive arsenal, so they can counter and break up rhythm. Hope had a great southpaw jab, good versatile straight left and could occasionally add in other combinations and liked the left uppercut up close.He was a good puncher as well, notably being the only man to have anything other than a cuts stoppage on Vito.Good workrate, and generally a very steady fighter.Speed and physical ability not really notable. On the other hand it's a fairly basic and not particularly versatile style and the two main things i don't like aobut him are his footwork and defence.Though he can do more than fight in straight lines, he's got an odd barely balanced rhythm when he tries to add more angles or lateral movement, often dragging his back foot and looking uncomfortable until he plants himself once more. Defensively he didn't usually use much more than a bit of awkward, instinctive footwork for distance control, while often doing a randy turpin and widening his stance and pulling his head striaght back to avoid punches.He was pretty good at it, but it's hardly an efficient approach. Overall i wouldn't put him in the upper-echelons of junior middle champions, and like Terry Norris he's not going to fare too well if you put him in with a lot of full middles.Vargas,Vazquez Wajima, Ki-soo Kim, Mazzinghi,DLH, MOsley, Drayton... is the sort of class of champion i would rate him with.Good solid fighters at the weight with some nice attributes and clear drawbacks. A fight with Winky Wright would be an interesting battle of jabs.
Good to see him getting some recognition. Unfortunately I have only seen the fight with Benitez; one thing that also demonstrates is that Benitez could really bang when he wanted to, that being at Junior-Middle as well.
i can remember him pasting vito antuofermo as well as mattioli twice.he wasn't very good to watch,a typical southpaw of the time. still a champ though and worthy of note.