Rigondeaux KO1 bodyshot last night

I don't doubt that Arum and Top Rank were upset about Donaire losing to Rigo, especially in that manner. But they were more than willing to keep showcasing Rigo. Problem is that it's hard to sell a crowd when you have someone that's always overly defensive and doesn't care to put on a show. That gave the other top fighters a good enough reason to swerve him even if it was obvious that they were ducking him.

Also I remember that Willie Casey fight. Rigo looked like an absolute terror the way he dispatched Casey. I kept waiting to see that Rigo show up in his following fights but was always left disappointed. The offensive minded Rigo only came about sporadically.

 

Rigo can be the most boring fighter at times, but I am genuinely curious if he still has it in him to win a title.

 

Arum intentionally sabotaged Rigo after Rigo beat Donaire. TR took good care of Rigo up until that point, but they developed issues before the Donaire fight.
Once Rigo whooped Donaire, old Bob was out for blood. They kept him out of the ring for nearly 8 months and then rewarded him with a headliner on HBO vs Joseph Agbeko, in Atlantic City out of all places! Rigo had never once fought in that region. There is no way anyone thought that was a good idea.
Oh, and Rigo was up against the excellent SHO quadrupleheader:
Malignaggi-Judah
Alexander-Porter
Bika-Dirrell
Lara-Trout

My theory is that HBO had nothing to really put against the SHO card(this was during the boxing Cold War) and Arum just threw Rigo out there to just fill the air. But instead of getting a decent opponent that made sense, they got him Agbeko who was basically coming off of a multi year layoff and had never fought at 122.
At least the undercard featured some decent names like: Matthew Macklin, Jesse Hart, Toka Kahn Clay, Matvey Korobov. But they were all in mismatches. Fortunately the co-main was Kirkland vs Tapia. Sadly it outperformed the main event in the ratings. More people watched Kirkland smash my boy Glen than Rigo do nothing for 12 rounds.

After that TR owed Rigo one more fight and finally got him one vs a relatively unknown Thai on a Pacquiao card in China. Ever since then Rigo has been bouncing from one promoter to the other. This at least shows me that he is difficult to work with and likely is to be blamed for his career going the way it has. Even PBC ended cutting ties with him and they were on a good run together.

 

Hard to believe that it´s the same guy just a couple fights apart. Went toe to toe with Ceja in an excellent firefight and then ran for dear life against Casimero, refusing to engage in any sort of a fight.

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Yeah that Ceja fight was a fun fight and one of the few times where Rigo was willing to stand and trade. Funny enough fans actually complained about it and wanted him to revert back to his usual boring style.

Rigo was also involved in another good scrap against a Japanese fighter who he ended up breaking his jaw. It really takes two to tango when it comes to Rigo. I’m just stunned that Rigo flat out refused to engage with Casimero when he had every opportunity to easily pick him apart but chose not to.

 

Rigondeaux was a master technician who was avoided. His destruction of Donaire was a masterclass. His problem was that if his opponent was defensive then his fights were boring, and most of his opponents knew very early he was too good. He would not chase guys around and fight with risk, instead he would counterpunch. Too bad, one of my favourite fighters.

 

Rigondeaux was an all-time great talent.