That's not sufficient to stop the fight. Eubank wasn't looking at the referee after Calzaghe knocked him down a few seconds into the opening round.
But that doesn't explain why he asked the question a second time. If you ask a question, then you should give the other person a chance to answer. I guess we're going to have to agree to disagree on this one!
and so the boxing world has disagreed on this since the night of the fight, neither this thread nor the others dedicated to this topic have resolved the issue by consensus.
For the sake of argument let's say Steele's sees that Melrick is in bad shape but he wants to essentially fix the fight for him so he lets it's continue because there are only 2 seconds left. Follow me...now allows the helpless Taylor to continue but there is actually 5 or 6 seconds remaining. Chavez walks in a drops another right hand bomb to a badly damaged fighter. Taylor goes down and dies. Who has to live with it?
Eubanks was fresh and didnt have both eyes swollen nearly shut, didn't have a fractured eye socket ,and hadn't gone 11 hard rounds. he was up at 2 smiling , spoke twice to Calzaghe nodded twice he was okay and looked at Joe Cortez as well. No comparison Taylor was staring off into space! Here is the Eubanks kd for comparison, This content is protected
The other 11 rounds do matter. Fighters that get injured it usually happens over a long accumulation of punishment that's why you need to watch the whole fight. Taylor gave a great effort but no one should have expected Richard Steele to fix the fight for him. Basically that's what the Taylor argument is. Steele should have fixed the fight for him and no that is not Justice is not fair. Chavez won the fight and Steele did his job. and no I don't think Steele was the best referee though on this night he did what he was supposed to do
I know. You said Taylor wasn't looking at the referee and I was responding to that. And at least the ref gave Eubank the chance to respond...
Everything I have said is about Steele disregarding the red flashing light right in front of him that was telling him there was only a few seconds left and his failure to give Taylor the chance to answer his question. The accumulation of punishment isn't really relevant when there is no more time for further punishment to be administered. And I never said anything about Steele fixing the fight for anyone. Maybe Steele wasn't being serious enough for you.
Your a little confused about what a referee's job is. He had nothing to do with the time. His job is to protect the boxers. You implying he should estimate the time remaining to give Taylor a chance is fixing the fight for him. Period. If he can't continue, he can't continue. There is no rest of the story. He asked Taylor if he was ok got no response but you ignore that he looked squared into a battered fighters eyes, closely and saw nothing there. We haven't even brought up the fact that Taylor wasnt totally standing on his own power. I guess Steele could have asked him to step forward so he would have fallen. He couldn't have walked that far on his own.
Taylor was out of it.Steele was right in front of him he could see his eyes and gauge his reactions.I cant find fault with his decision.Thats my opinion, another mans is as valid as mine.
I know a referee's job just as well as you do and it is to protect the boxers, I haven't disputed that at any point. The point I am making (and have made again and again and again...) is that there was a red flashing light right in front on Steele indicating there was seconds left, he asked Taylor if he was OK and didn't give him a chance to answer... Being aware of the fact that there is insufficient time for another punch to be thrown is not 'fixing the fight' for Taylor ... (sigh), nor is it protecting the fighter from further punishment because it was not possible for there to be any further punishment.
I can't fault Steele's decision either except that he asked Taylor if he was OK, didn't give him a chance to answer and immediately stopped the fight when there was no time for another punch to be thrown despite there being a flashing light right in front of Steele telling him there was only seconds left.
