Fighters Completely Losing Their Punch Resistance

Bobo Olson after Archie Moore. Until then he was known as a tough workman-like fighter who came back to win after being hurt several times. Afterwards he was known as the man who never gets up.

 

Conteh post parlov robbery when he really went off the rails.Certainly an exception to the chin being the last thing to go when a fighter goes downhill.

 

i suppose its not fair thinking of one where the boxer came out of years of retirement, and only base it on one fight....but i'm thinking of leonard v camacho

 

Cuevas was known for his chin until Hearns. Espada II was a brutal war which saw Pipino actually hammered clear across the ring to the ropes as one point. Then, Stafford drops him, Duran floors him twice, Herman Montes takes him out in three, then Vaca and Aquino, and he's done.

SRL was not dropped in his first 33 fights, then seven times in his final seven bouts. (It bears repeating that ten ounce thumbless gloves were used with Hagler. In addition to being two ounces thicker than the eight ounce standard, the fact that they were thumbless reduces the impact of a regular power punch by 25%, and a jab by 50%. That meant that Marv's right jab, his best weapon, was reduced in potency by half.)

Sean O'Grady says he retired because, "All of a sudden, I couldn't take a punch!" I think the real reason he couldn't take a punch was because he tried stepping up in class, and couldn't make the grade. Hilmer Kenty had walking pneumonia when Sean beat him for the WBA LW Title. But when O'Grady stepped up against Little Red, Ganigan and Verderosa, he got taken out. Ranzany was 30 when he beat Sean for his final big win.

 

Mayorga used to have a chin made of granite but his resistance was declining later in his career. Facing shots from Forrest, De La Hoya, Mosley, & Trinidad repeatedly will do that to someone's chin.

 

Doug Dewitt after the Hearns fight...and Sean O'Grady, right after winning the title from Kenty.

 

Danny Williams was always tough but I've never, ever seen a fighter look as shot as he was against Chisora. Everything badly hurt him. He was stopped against Klitschko, almost stopped against Tyson but took bombs. Gradually that chin faded and in the end, it had gone completely.

 

For O'Grady, the Ganigan fight was the catalyst. Some others are:

Berg after the 3 round blowout against Canzoneri
Tate after Weaver
Curry after McCallum
Fenech after Nelson II
and of course Cuevas against Hearns is the template

Scartissue

 

Given what happened to Tate against Stevenson in Montreal, I don't know that he's a good example. I think he was careful and mindful of that Olympics episode when taking on Mercado, Bobick, Knoetze and Coetzee. Gerrie did stun and buckle him, but John retreated to the ropes and rode it out. Later, his knees were similarly dipped by Weaver in round 12, and he again weathered it. In 15 fights over a span of eight years following Berbick, Big John was not dropped again.

 

Frank Fletcher after Juan Roldan.

 

Excellent choice. Tony Braxton, Clint Jackson, Caveman Lee, Hard Rock Green, Scypion and NeSmith could all hit, and the Animal was no defensive specialist. Getting taken out by Mugabe when he was is no surprise, but the flagging Curtis Parker is somebody he might have been expected to defeat before Roldan. (Parker's own punch resistance was not ruined by Mugabe, and he trucked on for a few years after that starching.)

 

I would call him shell-shocked as the level of his competition after Berbick was strictly clubfighter.

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More recently, Juan Diaz....after being KTFO by JMM, his punch resistance has gone downhill...Went from taking shots from hard pucnhers like Freitas, to being wobbled by Paulie Malginaggi.