Roach: "Chavez Sr so Frustrated with Jr's Prep, left Camp Twice"

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"Overall, we didn't work hard enough for this fight," Freddie Roach exclusively told Yahoo! Sports following the fight. "Living rooms are overrated. Boxing gyms are there for a reason. I'll work with him again. First day he misses [coming to] the boxing gym, I'll go home."

Roach said Chavez Sr. was so frustrated by his son's training situation that he twice left camp. Sean Gibbons, who was working with Chavez, said before the bout Saturday that Chavez worked hard, but did things the way he wanted to do them as he tried to forge his own identity.

Martinez's speed was also a huge factor, Roach said. Chavez attributed his problems to Martinez's style.

"It wasn't the speed, it was the way he fought, the style," Chavez said. "It was hard to figure out and I started too late because of that."
Roach, though, said that was an excuse. He said it was simply a matter of Chavez failing to put in the effort.

He said he had an inclination the fight might go the way it did, but he also knew that Chavez possessed that bone-rattling power that would give him a chance to win despite his less-than-stellar camp.

But as Martinez was potshotting him, Roach said he nearly stopped the fight after the ninth and 10th rounds. The reason: Chavez couldn't do the things he needed to do because he didn't practice and Martinez was hitting him with hard, clean punches as a result.That clearly didn't work.

"Cutting off the ring was something we knew we needed to work on doing, every day, every day, every day," Roach said. "With me [simulating Martinez], he had it down pat. With the sparring partners, he didn't have it down pat.”
Roach shrugged. Though it was a virtual whitewash, he knew it was a winnable fight.

Martinez looked good and there was talk of either a rematch at Cowboys Stadium or a match against Floyd Mayweather Jr.
But the story of this bout was not the veteran Martinez beating up on a relatively green champion, but rather of Chavez blowing a glorious opportunity.

"I showed the sport the respect it deserved, and I did that 24/7," Martinez said pointedly.

He knew, as did everyone else who watched, that Chavez didn't show the sport, his trainer, his father or his opponent the respect that was deserved.

The result was that he ceded his title meekly. He referred to himself several times as a warrior in the post-fight news conference, but that was laughably off-base.

Warriors fight three minutes of all 12 rounds. Chavez didn't fight hard a full three minutes in any round, including the last when he nearly pulled a stunner.

This should haunt him for a long, long time.