the what fights did you watch today\scorecard thread.

Harold Johnson W10 Ezzard Charles

I think I may have seen this one before but can't remember if I ever scored it, so.....

Just a beautiful display of subtle movement and counterpunching from Johnson. Charles can't find his rhythm, and looks off-balance much of the time. Some of this may be wear and tear and Father Time, but most of it is just the timely in and out steps Johnson takes as Charles fires a punch, leaving him leaning in and lunging, open to the crisp counters of the smaller Philadelphian. He's not running, not at all; he just carefully steps out of range to goad Charles forward and then pastes him. It takes a lot to retain the necessary focus to maintain a performance like this, so it's quite a feather in Johnson's cap.

1. Johnson
2. Johnson
3. Charles
4. Johnson
5. Johnson
6. Johnson
7. Charles
8. Johnson
9. Johnson
10. Charles

97-93 Johnson.

 

I think I had this one 6-4. If Charles' KD had been counted he may have earned a draw.

 

I could be wrong, but replayed that one and it was either a really delayed KD or Johnson merely slipped while throwing his own right hand. I thought the latter, based on Johnson's behavior immediately afterward. He seemed relatively unaffected.

 

I thought it was a partial slip as well. It seemed one of those KD's where a boxer happens to absorb a good punch and slip at the same time, making the call difficult both ways. I thought Charles landed a fairly good shot on Johnson.

 

Harold Johnson was a walking boxing clinic.

 

Finished off Glen Johnson vs Clinton Woods trilogy.

2004-02-06 Glen Johnson UD12 Clinton Woods II
That fight wasn't competitive, I think that fight was when Johnson really hit his peak. He was much sharper defensively and offensively than in first fight and I don't believe He was able to fight at that kind of pace in any point in the past, which led to all those close decision losses.
Here, He kept at it for all 12 rounds and punished Woods. I only gave Clinton 1 round.

2006-09-02 Clinton Woods SD12 Glen Johnson III
Round 1: 9:10
Round 2: 10:9
Round 3: 10:9
Round 4: 9:10
Round 5: 9:10
Round 6: 9:10
Round 7: 10:9*
Round 8: 9:10
Round 9: 9:10
Round 10: 9:10
Round 11: 10:9*
Round 12: 10:9
Final Score: 113:115 Johnson
The two met again after couple of years, with Woods the defending champion.

It was the best action fight out of the three. Woods came out trying to fight back more, rather than moving and boxing like in first 2 fights.
It was great effort from Woods, but I don't think He won it. A lot of cheerleading from commentators and some hometown cooking from the judges.

I only had it 115:113 for Glen, but I thought I was being generous towards Woods and that was the best case scenario for him.
Woods won couple rounds early, came back late somehow with couple big rounds, which was very impressive after taking a bit of a beating in rounds 8-10 - but rounds 4-10 were almost all Johnson.

To sum up the trilogy, I gave Johnson all 3 fights. I saw draw in first fight as acceptable, with Johnson not making it clear enough. Second fight was all Johnson, with his best career performance up-to-date - and third fight, while close and hard-fought, was also pretty clear Glen's victory to me.
It was unfortunete set-back for him, but still not end of the road for road-warrior. He got right back at it and got himself another title shot some 18 months later, against Chad Dawson. That's next on the schedule for me.

 

Carlos DeLeon v Leon Spinks (NJ round scoring basis)

I had the first round even and gave rounds 2-6 to DeLeon for a 5-0-1 score for DeLeon. The actual cards were 5-1, 4-2 and a 3-3 with DeLeon up on 2 out of 3. Although I was very impressed with DeLeon's accurate counters and scored it accordingly, I can see how another judge might have Spinks in it as well due to his mega-aggressive style. Regardless, the styles meshed well to give us a good fight.

 

First time I've ever heard anyone address that fight. People act like Spinks fell off the planet after he faced Holmes, and he did, but he had a few good fights at cruiserweight first.

 

Ray Leonard vs. Dick Eklund, 10 rounds at welterweight on July 18, 1978 at Hynes Auditorium in Boston.

The fight, on a Tuesday night, is carried on HBO as one of its earlier boxing ventures, with Don Dunphy and Larry Merchant on the call. It’s hardly the slick production we will come to know HBO by in later years.

Leonard, 22, is 12-0 (8) and weighs 146. He makes around $30-35K for this bout depending on your source. He is booed by the Boston crowd when introduced, seeing as he’s fighting a more local lad from Lowell, Mass.

Eklund, 21, is 11-3 per boxrec but introduced at 14-1 (4). he also weighs 146 and makes $4.5K.

I somehow had never seen this fight, so it was an interesting watch (although not a particularly thrilling fight).

1 — Leonard 10-9: Not a lot here but Ray lands more jabs and his are snappier.

2 — Leonard 10-9: Jabs and a bit of a late rally give it to Ray.

3 — Leonard 10-9: Ray is more aggressive and lands some good left hooks.

4 — Leonard 10-9: More of the same but Ray is having trouble getting through with the right hand.

5 — Leonard 10-9: Ray’s jab is again the key punch, but Eklund lands his right hand for the first time and does the Dicky shuffle to play to the crowd.

6 — Leonard 10-8: Ray floors Eklund with a right hand late, also does some good body work; this was actually Dicky’s best round before the knockdown, starting with a nice flurry early fighting as a southpaw.

7 — Leonard 10-9: Big round, lot of pot-shooting.

8 — Leonard 10-9: Hurts Eklund early but a bit wild with an amateur flurry of a ton of shoeshine punches. Eklund cut over left eye.

9 — Leonard 10-8: Leonard pot-shots and batters Eklund and scores another knockdown. Ray goes down late in the round off a push and Eklund stepping on his foot, rightfully ruled no knockdown (but Dicky will brag for years that he put Leonard down before finally retracting it) … but the ref did start counting. Strange round.

10 — Leonard 10-9: Leonard utilizes the uppercut well, lands solid throughout and puts Eklund down again … this time the ref rules no knockdown but hard to understand why. Dicky in pure survival mode.

My card: Leonard 100-88. Actual cards: 100-89, 100-90, 99-89.

Dicky is game as heck and fights with a lot of frenetic energy. Good footwork, knows how to clinch when hurt and handle himself inside. Down three times (two of which counted) but never really seemed in trouble; also pretty good defensively. I’d have liked to have seen him fight Pete Ranzany, who was similar — better offensively but stiffer and not as gifted defensively — or Randy Shields.

Leonard, the 1976 Olympic gold medalist at light welterweight, of course will go on to boxing fame as a multiple-time world champion and appear on HBO many times (and spend some time as a commentator on the network).

Eklund, for his part, will go on to appear twice on HBO in a different way. The network’s 1995 documentary ‘High on Crack Street: Lost Lives in Lowell’ follows three people hooked on crack from the town over 18 months, Eklund being one of them. Then he will be portrayed by Christian Bale in the movie ‘The Fighter,’ which portrays the relationship between Eklund and his half brother Micky Ward.

You can see the truth of the ‘did he or didn’t he knock Leonard down’ by fast-forwarding to the ninth.

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Old school eloquence Pat. You talk long and communicate a lot, all clear.

 

Well I definitely talk long, lol.

 

Evander Holyfield v Carlos DeLeon (cruiserweight unification)

Round 1: 10-10 Even
Round 2: 10-9 Holyfield
Round 3: 10-9 Holyfield
Round 4: 10-9 Holyfield
Round 5: 10-9 Holyfield
Round 6: 10-9 Holyfield
Round 7: 10-9 Holyfield
Round 8: Ref stops the fight as Holyfield batters DeLeon

Total: 70-64 Holyfield (actual scores: 70-63, 69-64 and 70-61 all with Holyfield leading)

Wanted to see DeLeon again after the Spinks fight. Saw this back in the day, but wanted to check it out again. Man, Holyfield was really unloading hard on DeLeon in that 8th round. He just popped it into another gear and DeLeon's 'lay on the ropes and counter' tactic just wasn't going to work. One could say DeLeon should have stayed in the middle of the ring, but we weren't subjected to the bombardment and don't know what was going through his head (other than a left hook).

 

Brian Mitchell W12 Jim McDonell

I like watching Mitchell. He doesn't have a lot pf power, but he's very, very crafty and intelligent. Strong, too. He uses exceptional head and upper body movement as he consistently moves inside. His opponent never gets a break. He's right in front of you, but not as easy to hit as one might imagine. Excellent conditioning, too. For a style like that and with so little power you're guaranteed to go to the scorecards more often than not, so he understood the need for focus and diligence.

McDonell is hard to watch. Great conditioning, but too much of that gangly, long-armed run and grab thing going on. Absolutely no power whatsoever and no physical strength to speak of, so this fight was a matter of Mitchell finding his rhythm and working on the body. He found his true stride about midway through and almost ran the tables from there, just too much physically for McDonell. He also made the challenger miss a huge portion of his punches on the way in, as described before. Just a different level here, though McDonell was determined. He just didn't have the tools.

1. Even
2. Mitchell
3. Mitchell
4. McDonell
5. Mitchell
6. McDonell
7. Mitchell
8. MItchell
9. Mitchell
10. Mitchell
11. McDonell (one last furious attempt to take a round. Volume punching, no damage)
12. Mitchell

117-112 Mitchell.

 

Mitchell’s lack of power made his title run all that more impressive, given that he had to fight away from home (and often in opponents’ backyards) for the entirety of it with the ban on title fights in South Africa.

He had to be pretty dominant and never have an off night to keep winning decision after decision (and also never get in position to have a bad stoppage against him) on the road like he did.

Absolutely splendid fighter and a joy to watch.

 

McDonnell was probably a little unlucky to run into such a fine pair of champions like Mitchell and Azumah Nelson in his two title tries.

If you haven’t seen his fight with Nelson, it’s well worth a watch.