He was good, but nothing special. Awful to watch. He got a gift vs. a young Marquez. Ran away, ref blew a knockdown call in a round that ended up going his way and landed about 52/53 punches all night. I think he’s a good enough spoiler to beat some good guys but not the elites of most eras. I think he’d have a good shot at Santa Cruz, Frampton, Russell but not the likes of Lomachenko.
The win over Marquez still gets him ink. That was honestly the worst performance of JMM's career. I think that fight taught him (Marquez) that he couldn't lay back and counterpunch everyone like he did to Robbie Peden and Marcos Licona. It was a horrible dud of a fight, and tagged Marquez with a bad reputation that took years to erase. Later on, losing to Chris John on the other side of the world for $30,000 reinforced that lesson, and Marquez never looked back. Norwood also beat Daryll Pickney shortly after Pickney had stopped Junior Jones and Guty Espadas Jr. He also beat Vuyani Bungu, which is another pretty good win given how good Bungu turned out to be in the long run. His other good non-title win was a decision over the extremely rough customer, Agapito Sanchez, who famously drew with Manny P!!! All in all, Norwood was decently strong, for an alphabet titlist. Despite being principly known for two ugly fights: JMM and Gainer, he was clearly skilled.
