Probably one of the weaker collections of rounds but still some good stuff. McGuigan-Cruz was good - just clean, uninterrupted action. Lacked a bit of wow factor. Boza-Limon started great and had some excellent exchanges, but a few lulls. Holmes-Norton was good back and forth. Ali-Frazier 3 - obviously a pivotal moment as Ali took over but without that context, it was only okay. Saad-Conteh was probably the weakest in terms of action plus Saad dropped Conteh twice so it was one-sided. Chacon-Limon 4 - this had everything you need and was the only clearly great round. An easy winner.
In both Limon rounds we had the identical throws both hands up after taking a barrage in true ‘is that all you got’ warrior fashion. Not to mention the Boza shuffle!
That's true - the one he tried against Chacon pretty much turned into a hug as Chacon just went for him. God, I love that fight!
So sad this tread is nearly over but here are my rankings for this round 6 Saad-Conteh 5 Holmes -Norton 4 Limon - Boza Edwards 3 Cruz -McGuigan 2 Ali-Frazier 1 Chacon -Limon
If we're saying 'greatest', it depends on how you define 'great'. Most great rounds have endless action and that all-important shift in momentum . Al-Frazier 3 had no shift in momentum but it had greatness by the lorryload. Ali, biting down and putting the exhaustion of the heat, the effects of Frazier's attack and his own sparse preparation to one side, willed himself to keep punching. Hard. Frazier, half-blinded, his face a mess and his body exhausted, just kept steaming in, taking hard punches he couldn't see coming and trying to capture lightning in a bottle with one last almighty hook. I have never seen a round in which both men showed that level of will and courage. They were both superhuman in their own ways in those three minutes. I can't think of another round, any round, that I can say the same about both fighters.
I look forward to it. I started this as an exercise to have a long-running feature that could maybe help some of us through the lockdown times. Looks like it won’t outlast the virus, alas. And the premise was to create one 15-round fantasy fight of rounds 1-15 (thus no rounds ending in knockout — you can’t have a 15-round fight that is stopped in the third, seventh, eighth, 11th, 12th and 13th rounds or whatever). But I have decided that once we get through 15, I want to then have a final tally taking those 15 rounds that one and let’s vote on the best of them all. I figure we’ll allow each person to vote on three rounds of the 15 and see which gets the most votes — if it’s a tie we’ll have a box-off with the two (or three or however-many) rounds that tied at the top.
looking forward to round 15, maybe my series will help down the road. I was intending to do the same thing with my 80 More Great Fights of the 80s, which I am still working on.
In a come-from-behind (voting) thriller, our Greatest Round 14 of All Time winner is ... Bobby Chacon-Rafael “Bazooka” Limon IV!!!
I think we all knew that. Afterall, Ali-Frazier III was the only other one to get any votes. I originally voted for that round, but changed my mind.
