Luke Campbell retires

Weird how someone who is good enough to win an Olympic gold, world amateur silver, European gold, beat two former world champions in the pros one of whom was coming off a robbery draw they clearly won against Maurice Hooker who was good enough to become a world champion, give the then P4P#1 fighter in the world a competitive fight and do much better against him than numerous other world champions did, and lose a razor-close SD to a prime Linares on a Golden Boy card after losing his father to cancer two weeks before the fight, which as you can imagine was absolutely devastating for him, definitely wasn't good enough to win a world tile.

''I was thousands of miles from home and my family when he died. I tried to block it out but I was having panic attacks.''

“I thought I was prepared but you can never be ready for losing a parent. I was alone in America, my family had all been at his bedside.”

In fact, The Ring Magazine who had Linares right on the fringe of the P4P top 10 at the time, like about #11, actually scored the fight for Campbell


'Most of the tough-to-score rounds Saturday at The Forum featured little action, with Linares’ punches thrown from out of range, and Campbell tentative to counter after the knockdown. It all resulted in a split-decision victory for Linares, after he pulled out the 12th on two cards (the third was even), via tallies of 114-113, 115-112 and a 115-113 score for the Brit. THE RING scored it 115-114 for Campbell.'

You see how close those cards were? Had he not suffered that early KD he would've won on the judge's cards and the fact that he could pick himself up off the canvas after suffering an early KD, whilst being based over in the US on his own and after losing his father shortly before the fight, and battle back so fiercely to push a prime Linares right down to the wire showed a lot of character.



Also from The Ring


BIGGEST WINNER II
Luke Campbell: This is a case of winning in spite of losing.

Campbell (17-2, 14 KOs) was a respected fighter going into Saturday night. He won a gold medal in the 2012 London Olympics, which made him a notable figure in the U.K. He had only one loss as a professional, to Frenchman Yvan Mendy when Campbell wasn’t at his best.

But he had never faced an opponent anywhere near Linares’ ability.

The matchup gave us a good opportunity to gauge how good Campbell really is. The reviews were good.

He overcame what he acknowledged was a miserable start to the fight, evidence that he can overcome adversity. He made adjustments around the fourth round, evidence that he is an intelligent fighter. He matched skills with an outstanding opponent for most of the fight, evidence that he is a gifted boxer.

And he did all that with a heavy heart: Campbell lost his father to cancer a few weeks before the fight, which makes his performance all the more remarkable.

Campbell might’ve won the fight had he fought with more urgency the last few rounds, when Linares picked up his pace just enough to pull out the decision. Judge Max DeLuca, who scored the fight 114-113 for Linares, gave the winner the 11th and 12th rounds. Had Campbell won just one of those rounds on DeLuca’s card, he would’ve won the fight.'


And like I said he dropped Teofimo in sparring and Garcia hard after coming off an 18 month layoff and a loss, again on a Golden Boy card on away soil.


I'm not saying Campbell was some great but he was certainly good enough to win a world title in this four-belt era and had his two stabs at winning one not come against the P4P #1 and a fringe P4P top 10 guy, both of whom were blessed with an abundance of natural talent and are supremely gifted, he very easily could of

 

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