Howard Eastman

Now that he's effectively cleaned out the Guyanan branch of the middleweight division over the last couple years, will he emerge from his erstwhile home to again compete on the European or American continents against anybody ranked? :huh

He's pushing 40, and has always been slow and easy to hit, but he's also always had a punch. If he's going to remain active anyway, why not go for one last run?

 

KTFO by Miranda? :rofl:rofl Have you seen it? It was not a great stoppage (unless you're influenced by Atlas and Tessitore shrieking); Eastman was on his feet until the end and had his hands up defending himself. OK, so four flush power punches landed - that happens all the time with Eastman's style. Miranda nearly got KTFO himself that night, the first time he was badly hurt.

Duddy also struggled and was lucky to get the hometown win; Eastman's uppercuts couldn't miss.

Seriously, did you even see either fight?

I don't rate either terribly highly - Miranda was overhyped and Pavlik exposed his fatal flaws, and Duddy has turned out to be more of a blood-and-guts warrior than a world-beater - but neither proved themselves much the better man than Eastman when they got wins over him.

I'm certainly not saying he's poppin' fresh - he was already slipping when he met Miranda...but he can still hit and he's been around the block and has some disrupting savvy. He's lost to three good fighters and three great fighters, never a bad one. With a lot of the upper echelon at 160 consisting of untested young guys and some guys who can be hurt, you never know.

 

It was a few seconds of unanswered blows - he was most certainly not asleep against the ropes.

Try posting video instead of a still image (they can be deceiving).

http://www.6rooms.com/watch/501021.html

From :33 seconds left in the 7th round until :29 seconds left when the ref began to wave it off, Miranda got four flush power punches in and Eastman never once stopped defending himself for a second.

 

Yeah, sorry for the LQ. :yep

IMO, Eastman was certainly stunned when he got trapped in the corner there but could have used his survival skills as he had already done a couple of times by that point in the fight (getting through rough spots in round 4 & 5), and would have still had his own puncher's chance to pull it out (he came back and had Miranda almost ready to go in the 6th). Time was running out in the round, there's a good chance he could have made it to the bell. I'm not denying that Edison got some eye-catching bombs in (particularly the first right hand) - the kid had serious power at 160, as did Eastman. It looked worse than it was though - Eastman was clearly not on the verge of being put to sleep judging by his posture at the exact moment of the stoppage (his guard was up and his eyes clear) and immediately after. Someone like Howard with a reputation for being unknockoutable should be given the benefit of the doubt there; with another couple of flurries like that and nothing coming back it might be OK to stop it via TKO but in this instance the intervention was premature.