Fights that should have been stopped earlier?

Gavilan-Bratton 3. This fight absolutely ruined Johnny.

I try to never criticize a referee for stopping a fight too early unless he's doing a hometown job to save the local hero the trouble of winning legitimately like I've seen on some fights in places like Italy and Argentina.

 

Razor Ruddock vs Michael Dokes. Dokes was out with that first smash, ref should have been in position to stop that one much earlier.

 

Sweat Pea-Hurtado
Holmes-Cobb

 

Did you not see the constant eye blinking from McClennan.2nd sign wasn't able to hold mouth piece in mouth from rd 5 on.McClennan former trainer E.Steward said he started to see big red flags by round 5.Kim couldn't sit still on his seat in the corner like he had worms & was slurring his words late in the fight.McClennan trainer was more of a cheer leader than a trainer,real trainers care about their fighters & know what to look for in case they need to stop the fight.

 

Love The Bomber but he screwed up on that occasion.

 

IIRC, the ref could've got in sooner in the Norton vs Cooney fight.

Not his fault, but it's interesting that Ingemar Johansson figured in two of the more outlandish refereeing performances in the Machen and first Patterson matches. Also, I'm not sure if Machen couldn't have been ruled at the least to have touched down but the ref. let Ingo throw several more shots.

Again, IIRC, I think Miguel Angel Gonzalez could've been pulled out sooner in his fight against Kostya Tszyu. Far too tough for his own good and he should've been looked out for better.

 

Did you watch the fight live back in 1995? I ask because a lot of people tend to be wise after the fact about that one. If you were calling for it to be stopped then fair play to you but it didn’t seem as obvious at the time in the heat of battle. It was only when McClellan went down on one knee and the ref counted him out that way that it started to look like there was something wrong with him. You can argue the ref should have noticed it but I’m not sure that’s fair in this case. Plus McClellan had the upper hand for a lot of it - it wasn’t a one-sided beatdown.

 

Any fight that ended in a fatality or serious injury is obviously a consideration but it’s not usually one-sided fights that do the damage, it’s those ones where the loser remains competitive and stays in the fight - those are the hardest to stop and really it comes down to the corner to make the call on behalf of their fighter, not the ref - they know their fighter better than the ref does.

 

Just what I was thinking Jel. The signs are there, if viewed in retrospect with the benefit of knowing the outcome. I watched it live (albeit I was only a teenager), don't recall thinking McClellan looked in unusual distress and seem to recall the UK commentator (I assume it was on free to air national TV in the UK, as I didn't have subscription satellite TV back then) proclaiming "he's quit, he's quit", as McClellan took a knee, so it certainly wasn't obvious to him.

 

Didn't Ferdie Pacheco also claim "he just quit"? So you guys are right about hindsight. It just wasn't overly obvious at the time.

If I was to add in another one I might say the Lupe Pintor-Johnny Owens fight. Not to jump on a bandwagon - because I can't say how I would react as a ref if I was looking at Johnny - but he had incurred a lot of facial damage as I recall upon arising from a knockdown. I mean he really looked in bad shape before being allowed to box on. As it was, it was the next punch that did it.

 

Ali Holmes

 

Tommy Morrison vs Ray Mercer

This content is protected

the fight should have been stopped a few seconds earlier.

 

Enrique Sanchez v Nestor Garza - I saw this fight a year or so ago and I made a note that I would not have let Sanchez out for the 12th round. Garza took the decision anyway, but it was noticeable on why I jotted that note. Sanchez stood for the 12th round with his right eye closed, 2 cuts over his left eye that his corner couldn't control. And finally, I'm pretty sure his nose was broken in the first round as it was swollen and bleeding like a faucet. There was no need to continue and was his corner's fault.

 

Lloyd Marshall v Ezzard Charles I - Here's another instance where the corner wouldn't stop the fight. Before the referee stopped the fight in the 8th round, Marshall had Charles down 8 times. After the bout, Charles' corner claimed he had a hip injury going into the fight. Really? Down 8 times with a hip injury and you didn't think enough of your blue-chip prospect to pull him out?

 

At least Cobb didn't look like he was on death's door. I sort of understand why that fight wasn't stopped -- Cobb was still game, and I don't know that they understood CTE well enough back then to realize that a total one-sided mismatch like that should just be stopped.