Takahiro Aoh, more than Larios' hangman?

I have been watching the Tokyo based featherweight Takahiro Aoh for some time now, since he defied my expectations and beat the far more seasoned veteran Richard Carillo in 2006. Before that, an expatriate friend of mine who lives in Kanagawa told me the kid was really sharp, really tough and that I should look out for him on the world stage. Like many Japanese fighters, Aoh seemed to languish within his national borders against guys with thin, padded or long overstuffed records. All I could think was, Well I remember once hearing this same rap about Eagle Kyowa when he was still Eagle Akakura.

Then, out of nowhere Aoh drew with the excellent Hiroyuki Enoki in a fight for the Japanese featherweight title I thought Aoh won by a slim, but clear, margin. I began to expect big things...then comes the part that leaves me scratching my head.

He takes on Oscar Larios for the WBC strap and loses a narrow decision that I thought he pulled out by a point or two. However, it's hard to know whether Aoh performed on the world stage or Larios was, for obvious reasons, past it and underperforming. Larios, having suffered that brain bleed that ought to have ended his already long, brutal, stories career after his fight with Jorge Linares, took horrific punishment in the first fight with Aoh. And whether or not Aoh was a world beater or Larios just needed to save himself from boxing, I just wanted him to retire and let somebody else check the kid's credentials. Of course, Spartan that he has always been, Larios has a return fight with Aoh and is firmly, again brutally, punished in a clear points loss.

What can we make of Aoh as a fighter from those fights?

How can Larios still be competitive, eve if in some reduced form, after a career of fights that ought to have ended his career?

Do you find it irresponsible for Larios to be cleared by commissions to fight...even in the hands off Mexican system?

 

i hadn't heard larios made the announcement...i sure hope he hung them up.