"Close" Fights That You Don't Consider Close

Lewis vs. Holyfield 2.

Evander mounted a middle rounds rally that made things interesting, but Lewis book ended this stretch with dominance early and late that approached what he achieved in the first fight.

Oscar De La Hoya supposedly made his fight with Trinidad close with his late fade. I disagree. Oscar won 9 rounds.

 

I thought the fight was a close but clear Frazier win.

Anybody who gives it as a draw or an Ali W, after the 11th and 15th round, isn't scoring very well.

Ali had the clear edge early, over the first half, but Joe BOSSED the late rounds

 

Hagler-Anteufermo I-I had it around 11 rounds Hagler, 3 rounds Anteufermo, 1 round even.

 

I think people often get "competitive" and "close" fights mixed up.

The last two Pac/Marquez bouts are perfect examples. Their second fight was genuinely a close bout, fight decided by a round or 2. Their 3rd bout in 2011, was competitive, however it was not CLOSE, as Marquez was robbed of a decision outright.

Like Duran/Leonard 1, it was more competitive than it was close.

Oscar against Sturm kept it competitive, but again, it wasn't really a close fight and clearly Oscar got a gift in that bring on BHops! :bbb :bbb

 

Leonard vs Hagler.

Leonard, and it wasn't that close. 8-4 to be exact (for me)

 

I totally agree about Ike again Vernon (RIP)

I thought Barkley clearly beat Hearns in their rematch. I don't see how Hearns won on one scorecard...which brings me to

Hearns-Benitez. Hearns clearly won that fight by no less than three/four rounds.

I didn't think Froch-Johnson was close on the scorecards. It was hard fought but Froch won handily on points. No way was that a draw.

 

I thought Hagler won, but that's being awfully generous to him. That was actually a close fight, at least to me.

 

Hearns vs SRL 2

Hearns the winner......Leonard had that funny, little apologetic smile on his face at the end of the fight like he did against Duran #1.

 

Ward-Froch was totally one-sided. Anyone that tries to argue it was 7-5 or even 8-4 is being awfully generous to Froch.

 

I find it hilarious that the British judge wasn't one of the guys who scored it that close. The British judge had it 118-110 Ward I think.

On topic, both DLH-Mosley fights. Mosley won the first fight pretty clearly, 8-4. Brawling was just his thing, and DLH trying to walk him down and slug it out played right into his hands.

DLH, however, absolutely tooled Mosley in the rematch. Oscar swept the first 7 rounds pretty clearly for me. Mosley's roids kicked in after that, and Oscar was forced to fight in spurts, but Mosley hardly dominated those last 5 rounds. They were still close, competitive rounds where Oscar was able to counterpunch and box off the back foot very well. I gave Mosley 4 of the last 5 for it to end 8-4 DLH, but one can easily argue DLH deserved 2-3 of the last 5 rounds.

 

I thought Leon Spinks was miles ahead of Ali in their first bout. Ali needed a ko in like the 13th round.

 

Both were close fights.

I forget my round-by-round scorecard for DLH-Whitaker, but I had it 7-5 for Oscar at the end.

DLH-Quartey, I scored the first 4 rounds to Oscar. Quartey was quite slow and rusty out the gate, and DLH started quickly, outworking and outlanding him to start. Quartey started to box well after that, though, and I gave him rounds 5-9. Oscar took round 10 because he stopped being gunshy like he'd been in every round since round 6 and wobbled Quartey at the start of the round before controlling the rest of it. Then Quartey came back and boxed well enough to take round 11. And then Oscar got a 10-8 round in round 12.

Thus, my final scorecard is 114-113. It always ends up that way no matter how many times I watch the fight.

 

Agree on the Holyfield fight. He avoided punches better than the first fight, but he just could never land anything himself. He's a guy that needs to land a lot of combos and that Lewis defense was too hard to penetrate for him to do that. But he had to be very careful with his energy level and could not fight a high pace against this guy. It was a do nothing and concentrate on defense and do a few 4 second flurries bout. Those 4 second flurries look good, it's the other 2:20 of the round where all he does is try to nullify.


He hung in there and I thought Lennox showed up with his B game as well--why prepare at his age to get razor sharp for a guy he dominated A to Z, except on 3 scorecards? He knew he could land on Evander and still got the win---unlike many heavies that lose automatically when their B game is all they have when the bell rings.