Julio Cesar Chavez vs Meldrick Taylor - 35 anniversary

35 years later and still an incredible fight. Say what you will about the stoppage whether you agree with it or not that made the fight itself even more famous seeing such a surprise comeback. It’s also the fight that helped solidify Chavez’s greatness.

 

Lampley, at 1:03:42 of the first video, which was midway through the 10th round: "Taylor beginning to look more the worse for wear than the action of the bout would have led you to believe."

Yep. I thought that the night I watched it live on HBO, and still think that after watching again just now. A "blowout fracture" to the orbital bones surrounding the left eye, bleeding in the kidneys, a swollen mask of a face. Chavez took several rounds to get his offense going, yet Taylor's face was still becoming a mess. I don't recall Taylor having a problem with busting up like that in other fights, but maybe I'm wrong. It's been awhile.

Seems like Chavez had some RIDICULOUSLY heavy hands, maybe the heaviest in the history of the sport lb. for lb.

 

Bloody hell!!
Where does the time go??

Anyway, yes brilliant fight.
Up there with Tyson Douglas as one of the first 90 s great fight s.
Great memories.

 

Great match, perfect to start a great decade, the 90s. The ending is still discussed today but I honestly didn't see anything controversial. Steele in my opinion simply applied the rules, the referee must decide if the boxer is able to continue the match, it doesn't matter if there are 2 seconds or 2 minutes left in the round. Steele decided that Taylor, in his opinion, was not able to continue after the knockdown and stopped the fight.

 

End of the second round Chavez landed three hard rights. One of those fractured Taylor's orbital bone.

 

talk about robberies!

 

One of the best fights of the 90s and most unforgettable endings ever.

Taylor was winning but taking a beating all the way through. Chavez had a good 2nd round where he seemed to hurt or stun Taylor briefly with a left hook, and opened a cut inside Taylor’s mouth.

Taylor won his rounds with his incredible workrate. People would later look at Whitaker’s success against JCC and think they were alike due to speed, but Taylor and Whitaker fought nothing alike. Whitaker frustrated Chavez and won more rounds due to great movement, angles, defense, and even had success up close and in the clinch. Taylor was winning because he was throwing a gazillion punches a round. He was still eating hard Chavez punches throughout.

Taylor declined badly after this, but it wasn’t immediate like you sometimes see with other fighters. A year later when he won a title against Aaron Davis at 147 (a division Taylor was not suited for), he looked very good. But he just declined so fast after that. I’ve said this many times before, but I think he was always going to have a short stay at the top due to his style/size and the talent level at 147, and I think his team saw the writing on the wall and cashed out on him against Terry Norris.

I also imagine him being in brutal Philly gym wars which further sped his decline.

 

Horrible corner advice by them telling Taylor he needed the 12th round.
Taylor's corner- Duva- let him down so bad.
And then they sacrifice Taylor in a big money fight - vs Norris when he absolutely had 0 chance of winning. And they did it because they knew Taylor was damaged goods.

 

Just reading an old "best I faced" in ring magazine where Taylor says he thinks Chavez' gloves were loaded