I scored this fight for Terrell but I do believe he got some gifts. For instance, I think Williams should've gotten the verdict against Terrell.
Same thing when Ernie Terrell fought Eddie Machen on March 5 1965 for the vacant WBA Title, many in the crowd booed the verdict, that was given to Ernie. Machen had Terrell hurt in round 15.
Official scorecards: Luftspring Terrell: 455 554 555 555 554 = 72 Chuvalo: 554 455 444 444 445 = 65 Nobert Terrell: 555 455 555 555 554 = 73 Chuvalo: 544 545 444 454 445 = 65 Burke Terrell: 555 554 555 554 443 = 69 Chuvalo: 543 435 453 455 555 = 65 Billy Burke certainly was generous with his 2-point rounds.
My opinion too. I much prefer Cosell. But Harry Carpenter, Bob Sheridan (sometimes), Chris Schenkel, Ferdie Pacheco were all good.
I haven't actually made a scorecard of my own. I'm quite sceptical about the whole idea of scoring fights from film, specially old films like this one which don't have the precision and clarity you get nowadays. You can never really tell how hard or how cleanly a punch has landed. Not the way you can when you're sat at ringside.
Thanks for posting this. What impresses me is how few rounds were a consensus: Rounds for Chuvalo by at least one of the judges-----1, 4, 6, 12, 13, 14, 15 Rounds even by at least one of the judges-----1, 2, 5, 6, 8, 11, 12 Adding this up, 11 rounds had one or another of the judges voting for Chuvalo or as even. One or another of the judges had Terrell winning or even in 14 rounds. I scored the 1st and the 15th rounds even. Chuvalo got 2 of 3 votes, with the other even, for the 1st. Chuvalo got all three votes for the 15th, with Burke giving him a two point round. The only round I scored for Chuvalo in which there was a consensus for Terrell was the 10th. Very interesting to me to see how subjective the voting was and how little actual consensus on any given round there was even with the final one-sided scores. My reaction is Terrell got the benefit of the doubt in the close rounds which he definitely did not get in the Spencer fight.
Hey Jason maybe you would know this, but is their any reason in particular Terrell lost to Spencer? He was demonstrably the superior fighter and on paper this should've been no contest. Styles? Off night?
Yes, I've seen this elsewhere - even when the final tallies show the judges more or less in agreement, the round-by-round scores can be all over the place.
Tends to happen in repetative rounds with a style clash. Still haven't properly rewatched this but I see Terrell controling the action more, landing more but his clinching is driving me mad!
Well, I had Terrell losing but closer than the very one-sided final judges votes. Terrell was knocked down and hurt badly in the second round. In the fifth round Spencer threw an overhand right and missed. Terrell countered with a left hook and Spencer went down with what looked to me (and to commentators Schenkel and Cosell) to be a knockdown, but the ref ruled it a slip. Terrell used his jab and had Spencer bleeding most of the fight, but Spencer was harder to tie up before getting in a shot or two than Chuvalo, as he had much quicker hands. The ref penalized Terrell two points for a low blow in the 10th. The final scores for two judges were 118-110. The other was 116-110. Terrell really went into the stab and grab mode in the last few rounds. As I said, if one is cynical, it was certainly in the interest of the NBA and its financial backer, ABC, to not have Terrell do well in the tournament, or even worse, win it, right after he was so badly humiliated by Ali. Were judges given marching orders about how to evaluate close rounds? Was the ref told that if at all possible rule flash knockdowns slips? I doubt if there was an open fix, but were the officials instructed to put their fingers on the scales to tip the balance in a competitive fight? One has to wonder. As for Terrell, he grabbed quite a bit against Williams, but far less than he did against Machen, Chuvalo, and Spencer. The grabbing and running ended up being so extreme that I think one could judge these fights against him regardless of leather landed. Holding is a foul after all. Running should be penalized. But to me Terrell didn't land more leather against Chuvalo or especially against Spencer.
Jason, I scored Terrell-Chuvalo 70-66 for Terrell. Also, here is how I scored the Terrell-Spencer fight. Round 1: 10-9 Terrell Round 2: 10-8 Spencer (Spencer scored a knockdown) Round 3: 10-10 Even Round 4: 10-9 Spencer Round 5: 10-9 Terrell (should be 10-8 but the ref disallowed the knockdown) Round 6: 10-10 Even Round 7: 10-9 Terrell Round 8: 10-9 Spencer Round 9: 10-9 Spencer Round 10: 9-8 Spencer (I scored the round 10-9 Terrell, but the ref deducted 2 points from him for low blows) Round 11:10-9 Spencer Round 12: 10-9 Spencer 116-111 Thad Spencer
That is about the way I saw it, but I didn't do a round by round in the Spencer fight. I did think it was about even after ten before Terrell was penalized, and that is how you would have had it without the slip ruling. Even fight after ten with Spencer winning the last two rounds as Terrell did nothing but run and grab. Without the penalties, I would end up with Spencer up by about three points, I think. And the penalties would make it a five point fight. I would have scored the 2nd 10-7 as Terrell was really hurt while the 5th round knockdown of Spencer was more a flash knockdown.
