The Cristian 'El Diamanté' Mijares Express!

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There he lay on the canvas, deposited there coutesy of a series of viscious, venomous left hands from an Australian-Armenian Raging Bull. Lou Moret standing above him, administering the ten count, it seemed as though the dream had died, it appeared as though it was brutally extinguished by a man with something to prove. Cries that he was 'shot', or just simply 'overrated' ensued.

It seemed Cristian Mijares had gone too long a way for his career to crumble so drastically on one night. Coming from a large boxing family, which included uncle Vicente Mijares Salvidar, former world champion in the lightweight division, and brother Ricardo, currently a promising up and comer at lightweight, it looked as though after a shaky start to his career Cristian would be the one to have the most decorated career.

After suffering early career setbacks, where he ran up a less than stellar 11-3-1 in his first fifteen fights, El Diamante decided that full devotion to improvement was imperative, and he set about refining himself to the degree that would allow him to get the most out of his obvious skillset that was hidden under his lack of dedication and youth. Results began to improve instantly, a win in 2004 over future world champion Tomas Rojas highlighted his new maturity, winning almost every round, his ring generalship was rapidly improving, controlling the ring against 'Gusano' and countering with ease, Mijares boxed to a comfortable decision win, winning almost every round on the cards.

This added devotion, improvement and maturity culminated in a chance to establish himself in the super-flyweight division as a reward, as he was set to take on the 31-1 Luis Maldonado in an eliminator for the WBC championship. Coming off a victory over the aforementioed Rojas of his own(a split one to be precise) and with his only defeat coming in his third fight, this represented Cristian's sternest test, a test that, I felt, he passed with colours that were flying all over my screen as well as my ejaculant. Out-smarting his more experience foe, it was apparent to most that Mijares had done enough to emerge vicorious in a close but very clear fight. Alas, two judges did not see it that way, overruling the judge who scored for Cristian by scoring it even, resulting in a majority draw. They went their seperate ways, Maldonado decided to challenge Vic Darchinyan for the IBF title(which saw him get splattered all over the ring in eight), which enabled Mijares to get a shot of his own against Katsushige Kawashima in Yokohama for the WBC Interim belt.

Managing to fit in a keep-sharp win for the Mexican title in between, attentions turned to the tough Japanese 'champion'. Feeling the need to wrest the title away in order to avoid what he felt would be further injustice, Mijares sought to engage more than in previous contest, mixing his usual defensive subtleties with an abundance of previously underused power punches, with a variety of hooks and uppercuts, it was all going swimmingly for the Durango native until the tail-end of the second round, where Kawashima unleashed an absolute corker of a overhand right, dropping the handsome Mexican hard(no homo) on the floor. Cristian now found himself in an all out battle of attrition, exchanging punches with the hometown fighter for the full twelve. Both were worn down, but Mijares' ability to turn his head away in order to take away the full force of the shots proved to be of utmost importance, with Mijares landing cleanly for the most part, and the majority of Kawashima's blows only being ones of the glancing variety, allowed Cristian to come away with the 'title' via a razor-slim split decision win.


[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPfXD9qmY5g[/ame]


After getting in a defence of the Interim belt against Reynaldo Lopez where he earned a wide decision win in a somewhat uninspiring affair, Kawashima now had a chance at redemption, getting a rematch with Mijares, now for the 'full' WBC title, once again in his home country, this time in Tokyo. What they hoped would have been revenge for Kawa was only proof of superiority for Diamante, who now got on his toes, controlled the ring with his feet, and the tempo with his jab. The fight was following a similar trend where Cristian dominated, but the tenth round saw him land a tremendous, sensational, magnificent, hyperbole-causing double right hook that sent his man tumbling. A follow up assault filled with venomous volleys had Kawashima in a world of trouble, forcing Mike Ortega to halt proceedings a grant what I hope to be my future boyfriend a sense of fullfillment.


[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPDnGjn2wO0[/ame]


Immediately following this was a Mexican superfight with the warrior Jorge Arce, in Texas:blood, in one of 2007's most impressive performances. The champion bludgeoned Jorge over the full twelve, slicing his face with a series of slashing counter-blows on his aggressive foe. With nimble feet to stay out of range, he was also able to side-step El Travieso's desperate advances, before making him pay with a variety of jabs, straights, right hooks and uppercuts high and low. Headbutting Cristian's fists proved to be an unsuccessful tactic to acheive his goal, and Mijares ran out a comfortable victor on the judges scorecards.

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(It's a testament to Arce that he's come back from that so well, he was labelled as shot after, but he rebounded with some impressive wins. It was when the Darchinyan fight came along that he truely looked done)

A few gimme defences were taken(which was acceptable considering his hectic period before that) before his appearance on HBO against Jose Navarro, which is known by most who were aware of it as the bout that displayed possibly the worst judging in the history of anything, including the judgement to close Audley's playground, as a rather comfortable performance where he never really got out of first gear somehow transpired to be scored a split decision, as judge DOUG TUCKER every single round to Navarro, which was so bad it actually took the emphasis off another judge who scored it bizarrely close at 115-113. It was far from convincing, and he took far more than neccessary, but that he was a worthy winner was never in doubt. They tried to rob him on national TV, but Diamante fought the establishment, and used his immense ring IQ to out-smart everyone who tried to deny him the chance to further enhance his legacy.

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We next saw what is arguably, and in my opinion is the best outing of his career, where he nullified the very hard hitting, dirty ******* of a Venezuelan in Alexander Munoz in a super-flyweight unification for the WBC and WBA 'Super' title. A fight in which many saw as 50-50 was made to look, well, not, as Cristian turned what was supposed to be an entertaining back and forth into a clinic, taking away Munoz' power and clipping him inside and out with well-placed counters(sounding familiar ain't it?), frustrating his opponent to the extent that Alexander perpetually twisted the rules in less than subtle fashion, digging his head in whenever the opportunity arose and continually rabbit punching, which saw him have a point deducted in the 6th. His hometown crowd in Durango were left ecstatic with the display put forth by their(and my) hero, in one of 2008's best performances. Once again, rather odd scoring was put forward, with the new unified champ only getting the benefit from two of the judges.


[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6M7hsMpalgY[/ame]

A quick TKO win over Chatchai Sasakul lead to the pound for pound ranked Mijares to have a super-fly super fight with IBF champion and monstorous puncher Vic Darchinyan. It was, despite the fact it was the only time I've ever picked against him, the most heart-wrenching viewing I've had had the displeasure of enduring. Mijares is the kind of fighter who needs to find his rhytym to be comfortable in the ring, which was never a problem for the most part as he was that good that he could easily obtain it rather early in a fight, and despite the fact he's an abundantly better boxer and more well-rounded fighter than Vic, the Armenian's brand of awkward aggression was bound to dictate the outcome of the fight. The usually defensively adept Mijares was made to look inept when it came to defending himself, being consintently caught with big shots from one of the hardest ever hitters at the weight, he was never able to gain a foothold, and was stopped in nine soul-destroying(for me) rounds.:verysad

His ill-fated move to bantam is stricken from my memory, as far as I'm concerned it never happened. He should have never moved up, he never belonged there even though I still ascertain he deserved the win in the first of the Cermeno double.

 

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His comeback fights didn't tell us much about how much he had declined, if at all. Francisco Arce aside, he fought nobody of note, and even then Jorge's brother isn't particularly good. It was his IBF title winning escapade against Topo Rojas that has defined his return to the spotlight. From watching it, I still think he ain't too far off his best. He's slowed a bit in terms of speed and reflexes, but other than that, he's still got a lot of what made him successful in the first place. He is still very clever(one of the best ring IQ's in the sport without doubt) and has good ring generalship. And he still sets traps and employs a lot of subtle little movements to avoid oncoming punches. The range-finding jab and the laser-straight counter left are still evident, as well as that he's incorporated a lot more sustained body punching, particularly blows to the liver. Rosas was a perfect opponent for him, just the kind Mijares likes to fight. It was not only a world title fight but also a confidence builder, his handlers did very well in that respect.



I'm gonna bring it up again, I love the third round of the Topo Rojas fight, the sheer number of shots he slips at such close range, often backed against the ropes, is exceptional. James Toney himself would be proud watching this, it's absolutely immense. You can count on one hand how many punches Rojas lands, if Cristian doesn't slip them, he's blocking them. It was a round that illustrated how the fight went in general, and showed that he's still maintained his physical attributes for the most part to go with his genious.



[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zInrfnD2tc[/ame]





El Diamante's most recent fight was against Nicaraguan Carlos Rueda. From a fans perspective, it's a bit frustrating that he was left with Rueda, both Malik Bouziane and Raul Martinez would've made for intriguing match-ups, but unfortunately both pulled out. If he hadn't of taken this as simply a marking time fight, I'd be a bit worried. Mijares won just about every round, but wasn't particularly impressive, he didn't make Rueda look as much out of his depth as he was. Then again that could be because he was forced to lead for a lot of it, which is a distant second in terms of his most effective way of fighting. Rueda mostly just moved around before lunging in with uneducated, unbalanced burst of winging punches, which will never trouble someone as defensively adept as Diamante, even if he is taking it easy. But alas, that's what he did, take it easy, and I'm sure we can expect a higher level opponent for his next defence, which should be soon.



[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5VLRS_Zdxw0&feature=player_embedded[/ame]



A lot of great fighters have had a lull in their career, and judging by recent events I think Mijares falls under that category, as it stands he's one of the best super-flyweights ever, and I'd like to think that he'll be able to continue in enhancing that legacy that is already extremely impressive if I may say so. The rest of the division is strong, with fellow champions being Omar Narvaez, Hugo Cazares and Tomas Rojas, with a good depth in able contenders such as Rosas, Nobuo Nashiro and Cesar Seda amongst others, but I have no doubt that the current Diamante can overcome almost all of them.



I'm so glad that this guy didn't retire, he epitimises just what a pure, intelligent boxer is, and this thread is in essence an outlet for me to voice that. Contribute in whatever way you can, your opinions on him, how he stacks up with 115lbs-er's of the past and today, or just your worry for my strange love affair with him.



Stay classy, tigers.

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I thought your old joke was that you'd watch him if you wanted to fall asleep?

 

Thanks man.:good

I think he'd beat Galaxy myself, it would be fascinating all the same. The likes of Sung-Kil Moon, Jino Watanabe, even someone who isn't really an all time great like Masamori Tokuyama and of course, as you say, Roman too. Right now I'd love Mijares-Narvaez, two excellent boxers like that colliding would be such an attractive proposition for lovers of the sweet science.

 

I think as long as Mijares didn't get stupid against Galaxy he'd beat him, and when have we ever seen Cristian fight stupid? Khoshai may well be the strongest ever at the weight in a purely physical sense, but he hasn't got the style to defeat Mijares I don't think. Darchinyan-types are Mijares' kryptonite, as he had a fair bit of ring savvy and awkwardness to go with his power and aggression, Galaxy wouldn't be able to implement that physicality though because he wouldn't have the smarts to do it, he's not the kind of fighter than can stop Mijares from finding a rhytym, and I think Cristian would find it after a few rounds and be able to counter pretty effectively for the most part while avoiding the Thai's wild swings. Of course, Diamante does leave himself somewhat open to the body when he isn't being hit there consistently, and that'll bother him in the late going, but it'd be too little too late for Khoshai in my opinion, and Mijares would take the decision.

 

Oh, and I forgot to mention that his next opponent will more than likely be Raul Martinez, who he was supposed to fight instead of Rueda, but Raul pulled out due to a cut suffered in sparring. Should be a decent fight, Martinez' only loss is to Nonito Donaire, but one that he should win handily all the same. Martinez is nothing all that special, to get a shot he won an eliminator against the extraordinarily tough Rodrigo Guerrero by a tight split decision, which kind of tells you that he ain't particularly great. Aside from his in-human ability to sustain punishment, Guerrero is very average, and Martinez looked bothered by the fact he couldn't shake him and was quite pourous defensively against an offensively limited adversary. The fact that, if the fight happens next, Martinez will have been inactive for what will in all liklihood be a year will be a factor too.