Roldan vs Kinchen or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Juan Domingo Roldan

My take aways from this bout from 87", on the under card of the mega bout between Marvin Hagler and Ray Leonard...

People ooh and aah at the uppercut (Yeah, you already know the one, admit it) Vitali Klitschko ate against Lennox Lewis but what about fights like this one where an iron chinned guy like James Kinchen takes a dreadful pounding without "flaring up" as Gil Clancy loved to say? He just takes these flush right hand bombs time and time again, body language, facial expression, nothing changing. A hell of a poker face and a hell of a chin...

Roldan takes his foot off the gas a bit around rounds 6/7 and does his best impersonation of boxing, and shows that he's actually not half bad at at!! Flicking a light jab, trying to work some facsimile of a left hook into his game, and moving a bit.

Roldan lands an extremely sneaky right uppercut flush in round 7 that temporally has Gil Clancy at a loss for words and makes the crowd gasp. They pick it as the punch to replay in-between rounds and it was indeed a peach of a shot. Love it. Later on in the fight Clancy calls Roldan a "natural", who throws punches that aren't taught to him in the gym.

I was literally a few months away from being deposited in my mothers womb in April of 87" so I didn't get to see the hype of Hagler/Leonard first hand, but good god almighty, I had no idea what a circus it was. It was it's days Floyd Mayweather circus. The hype was huge! I didn't know nearly ruining an event via over saturation and advertising and a fight taking six years to materialize were a thing done 30 years ago. I thought that more of a modern boxing scene issue. Shows what I know.

Last thought before shutting up and showing you the damn fight is that I adore Gil Clancy and would gladly make some kind of personal pact with an evil entity if I could just sit down and pick the mans brain over dinner and a few beers. What a personality, and I mean that in the best of ways. Love listening to a legitimate, "real" sort of man, a real living conduit to the old school if there truly was one, continuing into the 80's and 90's. RIP Mr Clancy.

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I believe the opposing corners here were the trainer of Carlos Monzon for his title reign in Roldan's corner, and Eddie Futch in the other. Some real legends here, maybe a combined record of quality of some sort for a match up occurring in the 1980's? Pretty interesting to see.

 

When Roldan steamrolls he looks really good. When he doesn't, the warts and flaws of his style surface. He really did not look all that hot in his first big bout against Teddy Mann. And certainly a guy like Nunn is not a good match for him either.

I always wanted to see Roldan in there with Barkley. What a fan's fight.

 

Roldan looks like a super MW, while Kinchen was barely MW.

 

This was on the undercard of Ray Leonard/Marvin Hagler.

I watched this card on Closed Circuit on a huge screen at Charlestown Raceway in Charlestown, West Virginia.

A few months later I purchased my first home PPV - Spinks/Cooney.

I thought going in that Kinchen would win this.

I think in retrospect he was struggling mightily to make 160 lbs.

He was somewhat weakened and the very strong Roldan overpowered him.

Kinchen had the ability to move and box and he did not employ this strategy for whatever reason.

 

No, Kinchen was having problems making 160 lbs.

He moved up to 168 after this fight and looked very strong. See the Hearns fight in late '88

I don't think it was a matter of him being a small middleweight. It was a matter of him being weakened by draining to make 160 lbs.

 

James Kinchen played linebacker for a Texas H.S football team 15 miles north of my home. They were State Championship contenders back then.

 

Interesting that Kinchen is NOT given credit for his competitive fight against Hearns.

JK was 5' 9-1/2", TH 6'-1"
Hearns was knocked down in the fourth round. When he got up, he grabbed Kinchen and refused to let go when referee Mills Lane tried to break them. After the round ended, Lane deducted a point from Hearns for refusing to break.

1988-11-04 : Thomas Hearns 165½ lbs beat James Kinchen 166 lbs by MD in round 12 of 12

• Location: Las Vegas Hilton, Hilton Center, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
• Referee: Mills Lane
• Judge: Bill Graham 115-112
• Judge: Larry Rozadilla 114-114
• Judge: Cindy Bartin 114-112

• Unofficial AP scorecard: 114-112 Kinchen
• Unofficial UPI scorecard: 114-113 Kinchen
• Unofficial KO Magazine scorecard: 114-113 Hearns
• Unofficial Ring Magazine scorecard: 115-112 Hearns
• World Boxing Organization Super Middleweight Title (Vacant inaugural title)
  
• NABF Super Middleweight Title (1st defense of Kinchen)

 

I'll give Kinchen credit for something for sure, a certifiable iron chin... especially if he was a drained, weakened fighter here. Guy could take a damned punch.

 

Kinchen had a great albeit obvious nickname...James "the Heat" Kinchen.

Clancy had a bad toupee but Howard Cosell's was the ATG worst.

 

Toupees were still a big thing back then huh? I don't know if they've gone the way of the dodo or just gotten so good we can no longer tell what a toupee is...

 

Juan Roldan how unlucky. In his three title fights he floored Hagler ( slip )
rocked Thomas Hearns and his final fight stopped by a prime Micheal Nunn.
Could you imagine if Roldan was around in the 70's fighting Philadelphia
160 lb legends Willie Monroe , Cyclone Hart , Beeny Briscoe and Bobby
Watts. Roldan would definitely be in the mix.

 

Too many medical options that look a lot more natural than a toupee although Tony Bennett hasn't heard about them. He's got more hair now than in 1950. Dude can still sing though.

 

Fighters like Roldan were an asset to the game. Be brought it, and knew how to fight. He certainly would have been in a mix and the mere thought of Eugene Hart, one of my favorite fighters, makes my stomach jittery with butterflies at the mere fight of the fireworks such a fight would produce.

 

With 4 MW titles today, Roldan would have won one of the ABC titles. Then a Title unification bout
with GGG / Canelo on Revolution Day May 25th in Argentina. Plus a bunch of hot Argentine gals
running around (pre- and post-fight).

(La Revolucion de Mayo (the May Revolution) occurs each year on May 25 to mark the anniversary of Argentine independence from Spain in 1810.)