Exposed.

I want to make a thread about the ESB usage of the term "exposed". This has come up in threads about overused phrases recently and it is an issue which does irritate me a bit, so here is my explanation of what "exposed" means and why it is a legitimate term to use in certain situations:

On those threads, people were lining up to slate the use of "exposed" and one of the examples of wrong usage was said to be Miguel Cotto being exposed in the Margarito fight.

Now I am a Miguel Cotto fan, I think he has a good chance of beating Margo in a rematch, and for the first half of the fight I thought he was brilliant against Margo. I was also very proud of Cotto for his heart that night.

However, I think he was exposed. For me, Miguel that night was a dictionary definition of "exposed".

I and many others thought that Cotto, before the Margo fight, was approaching the finished article. He had already shown in his career that he was strong, could brawl etc, then in the Mosley fight I think he showed some excellent boxing skills.

I was unsure of whether he would be strong enough to beat Margo at 147, but I thought he was a well-rounded fighter approaching the finished article.

In the Margarito fight, I believe Cotto was exposed as having very very little idea of how to defend himself. For me, to be "exposed" means to be shown up, to be shown to be deficient in a way that was not anticipated. I did not believe that Cotto had no idea how to defend. He never held once despite Margo standing 1 foot away from him, his slipping and rolling were dire, he simply feebly and lazily covered his face and ate uppercut after uppercut all night. I was shocked. Had he ever watched a Bernard Hopkins fight, he would've known that he didn't need to take those punches. When Margo gets that close, hold him, spin away, get punches off, when he closes the space hold again then move again. It's doesn't make for quite as exciting a fight as Cotto-Margo I was, but it stops you getting busted up and losing!!

Cotto never did this though. He was exposed as a fighter severely deficient in the art of defence.

His conditioning and stamina were also exposed. Before the fight, I thought of Cotto as a top of the line fighter like Mayweather, Pacquiao, Marquez - ie the type of fighter whose conditioning is so good that they never visibly tire and their stamina can be banked on, absolutely relied on, to hold up no matter how the fight transpires. It was apparent that Cotto has not reached that level yet.


I think the disparity in our perceptions of "exposed" lies in the fact that most seem to believe it to be inherently worse or more negative than to say someone loses, whereas I believe it is merely a more particular type of loss and the term is more descriptive than damning.

I think Cotto was exposed, but for me that's a far better thing than simply being "dominated" or "outclassed" To be exposed is a one-off or a temporary blip. Now that Miguel can see his defence and conditioning were exposed, he can address these problems for the rematch.


IMO

:bbb

 

Have either of you actually read my post? It doesn't sound like it.

 

That's not what I believe the term means. It is not inherently more negative than just to say "he lost", it is merely more decriptive. It is not as negative as to say someone was "dominated" or "outclassed". To be exposed just means to be shown to be deficient in a way which was not believed possible before, to have a weakness that was not known. A weakness such as this can be rectified with training and dedication. Thus, it is not as irretrievable as to be outclassed is.

JMO. I am a Cotto fan, but that's my understanding of the term "exposed".

And I disagree with iceman. I don't think Margo is such a stylistic anomaly for Cotto that Miguel would need to be perfect on the night. A simple change in defensive strategy and an improvement to his conditioning should do it - he proved in the first half of the fight he can outbox Margo.

 

Great contribution to this issue. Well done.

 

No it isn't, you are simply incapable of original thought as distinct from majority opinion or popular (wrong) usage.