the what fights did you watch today\scorecard thread.

Griffith UD15 Tiger

Fascinating fight this one. The two are so evenly matched on so may different levels. One area where Griffith dominates though, is in strategy. Tiger has decent feet, but he's no dancer and Griffith keeps the fight at the range he wants it for most of the fight. In the first half, this is at distance. Neither guy does really well with the jab, and you can bet that the connect % for that punch in this fight is pretty low, but Griffith doen't just use that to keep Tiger under control, he uses feints and small moves, staying just outside until he is ready to fight. When the fight it's in flashes, but it's generally Griffith who decides when. I think this is a key factor in what is a difficult decision for many. If you're scoring for Generalship, then maybe Griffith edges some of these close rounds. And they're all close, every round is fought for so hard. And although Griffith keeps the fight where he wants it, it's not a range he can dominate at because Tiger is an exceptional technician himself, perhaps better in strictly clinical terms.

When Tiger starts to find the range for his jab, rather than let him run away with the fight, which I think would have happened at this point, Griffith comes inside. Here, he's brilliant, excelling at smothering, protecting. As per Arcel's plan, he also manages to match Tiger for strength and balance for short spell, and although he does get bulled around it's impressive to watch him keep Tiger under control and even push him back in 7,8 and 11. By his own account Griffith was surprised that he was able to do this and it is a testimony to the relationship he had with his trainer that he was prepared to try what seemed, to him, a highly risky and unlikely strategy. But it worked.

Griffith never really got Tiger's right to the gut under control though, and the Nigerian was also sometimes more active in there. Again, every round was really really close.

As to my scorecard, it's pretty much invalid because I don't have round 5. Who has it? How did you score it? For what it's worth, here's what I got:

Griffith: 1, 4, 8, 9, 11, 13

Tiger: 3, 6, 10, 14, 15

Even: 2, 7, 12

So I had it 6-5-3 in the rounds to Emile Griffith. With the crucal fifth round missing. 17/22 sportswriters had it for Tiger, all three judges for Griffith. The 9th was crucial IMO, Tiger was wining that reasonably handy at theKD, which looks like mostly being a slip to me, though a punch went in. Personally, I see this as another Eubank-Watson, you could score it any one of three way and raise no complaint from me. Deeply absorbing fight. Tonight I might watch the second fight, courtesy of GreatA, on YouTube.

 

Nice write up.

 

I'll upload it GP. But don't get your panties in a bunch, because it's only better, it's not that different.

 

Harold Johnson WPTS 10 Eddie Machen. The referee's card read 5-4-1.


This is a genuinely fascinating fight that rewards repeat viewings. Harold Johnson comes out and takes complete control. It's a battle of the jabs that he wins just hands down. He throws a pretty simple jab, Johnson, he doesn't provide much in the way of variety, he throws it form pretty much the same position each time, unless he is throwing it to the body (which he does with success here). The reason it is so successful is that it's unneringly accurate, amongst the most accurate i've seen, and he throws it without selling it even the tiniest bit, in other words there's no sense of his re-positioing it to throw, it comes straight out of the guard. Machen, who has a slightly longer reach, throws it with a little more variety in terms of where it's coming from, but he sees to show it a little more, so although, like Harold's, it's very sharp and he brings a bit behind it, he's being beaten to the punch repeatedly, inspite of there being no discernable differnence in hadspeed. For the opening rounds, Johnson looks absolutley masterful, jabbing, keeping Machen of balance, keeping him at range, spinnng him beautifully on a couple of occasions (inlcuding throwing him way of balance and across the ring a few feet). He also has the most beautiful uppercuts to the body, a sneaky right hand that he lands whenever the two rattle together, and a couple of times from all the way on the outside.

But he doesn't do much work with his straight right, his hardest punch. I think this is sacrificed to keep Machen's left hook under wraps, which he does with success by circling away and jabbing whilst holding the right inposition. Machen doesn't get off many left hooks at all, but the price seems to be his own best power-punch.

In the fifth, Johnson sustains acut and seems to go to peices a little bit. Machen takes over, but he takes over with the jab. In 3 and 4 his jab became avery nervous weapon because he was being out-jabbed, so he took all the sock out of it to try to just get it landing. After Johnson cuts, he starts stepping right in with it. This continues into the sixth, it's fascinating to watch because Johnson has gone from dominating with the jab to being dominated by the jab...Machen also gets a bit rougher inside.

Johnson seem helpless to break this pattern and his own jab suddenly starts falling short. Machen takes over and even starts looking for the left hook. Johnson needs to open up a it, and does so on occasion, but seems to panic when they hit open water and clinches. Machen is banking rounds and Johnson's head goes down a bit.

The fight was decided for me (and presumably the referee, though with different result) on the last round, where Johnson takes small chances for middling rewards to eek out that three minutes. Really fascinating fight.

Johnson: 1, 2, 3, 4, 10

Machen: 5, 6, 7, 8, 9

5-5

I actually uploaded this one, but the quality is not great. You may struggle to enjoy it if you don't have a really good monitor. For those of you who want just a peak though, the film does get better in terms of quality throughout the fight, so here's the end:


[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qkaj7QP-2fI[/ame]

For those of you who want the whole thing, follow the links.

You will likely need headphones if you want the commentary.

Lo-fi classic IMO, and a total jab clinic.