Did Berto knock down Floyd in the 3rd round?

I think you mean Berto, not Broner : so let me correct your post and respond :

I agree that Berto hit air with the overhand right. Floyd ducked that punch, it was a wild miss by Berto. However, just before that, Berto landed two hard jabs upstairs that set up the right hand. We know a knockdown is when someone goes down as a result of a punch right? It doesn’t specify that it’s only a knockdown when the last punch thrown connects. Just that he went down as a result of a punch.

Well it appears that Floyd went down as a result of those two jabs. It was a delayed reaction, and it all happened very quickly, but it was not as if Floyd went down without having been hit by anything. He ducked that overhand right after being hit by two jabs. I think we would agree that in a vacuum Floyd is athletic enough to duck that punch easily and not fall down, right?

We’ve seen many times where there is a delayed reaction to a landed punch, that results in a knockdown and after a moment the guy loses his balance. If you watch the first jab that Berto landed, it was extremely hard, I mean it clearly rocked Floyd. The 2nd jab was not as hard as the first, but still was a clear hit.

I think what made it appear like a slip was the fact that the overhand right that followed by Berto missed so wildly. Had Berto not thrown the right hand and missed so wildly, I think it would have been a knockdown. Had Berto not landed the two jabs right before that, it would be a slip. But with those two jabs landing, I think an argument can be made that those punches caused Floyd to go down. (he got hit by two hard jabs, then he tried to duck the right hand, but was off balance from the jabs and his glove touched)

This wasn’t a slip in the sense that his feet didn’t just randomly slip on the canvas, causing him to fall out of nowhere. What Berto was doing made Floyd fall down. A slip is literally when no punches land and the guy’s feet slide on the canvas causing him to lose his balance on his own. Isn’t the fact that Berto landed two jabs right before Floyd ducked the right hand and fell proof that punches had just landed? Ask yourself, why would Floyd need his glove to touch the canvas when ducking a right hand? Obviously he lost his balance when trying to duck that punch. Why did he lose his balance? Because he slipped? Or because he was put off balance by Berto’s two jabs? If you “slip” after being hit by punches, it’s supposed to be a knockdown right?

However your feel about it, what I ask is that you explain your position. We see a lot of stuff get ruled a slip these days. I think it’s important to note that it doesn’t say that the last punch thrown needs to have landed, it says only that if someone goes down as a result of a punch it’s a knockdown. We’ve seen jabs cause knockdowns or even knockouts, so the argument “it was only a jab” doesn’t hold water.

I think this is an interesting poll and discussion because it really gets to what a knockdown is and how strict you think referees should be about *when* a punch lands and any delayed reaction to the punch. My view is that if there’s combination punching involved, and the other guy goes down as a result of that, then it should be a knockdown.

 

FYI only one of the 3 judges gave Floyd every round : Adalaide Byrd. The two other judges had Berto winning many of the middle rounds. Weisfeld gave Berto the 4th, Moretti scored the 5th and the 7th for Berto, and they both gave Berto the 9th.

Given that all 3 judges ended up giving Floyd that 3rd round 10-9, with those scores, had that been ruled a knockdown in the 3rd, that would have been a 10-8 round for Berto instead of a 10-9 round for Floyd, evening the fight after 3 rounds. This would have given Berto a realistic chance of winning a split decision. After 9 rounds, without the knockdown the scores were 88-83 Floyd and 87-84 Floyd. With a knockdown in the 3rd, the score would have been 86-84 Floyd on Weisfeld’s card and 85-85 even on Moretti’s card. That scores would allow Berto the opportunity to win the final 3 rounds without any knockdowns and win a split decision.