The 'what fights did you watch today?' thread

Mathew Saad was a beast and i really think he is underrated these days. IMHO he's one of the best light heavys ever. Adversity and pain meant very little to him.

People just think he was a "Micky Ward action fighter type", but he had some very good skills and also had excellent one punch power. His back story is also amazing and just imagine if he was around today? He would be a star and all the light heavys would be in serious trouble.

 

Azumah was meant to be a routine, "easy" type of fight for Salvador. Nobody knew how good he was and that he would go on to be a HOFer. Sanchez would've been entitled to be a little Ped-off at his people for thrusting that upon him.

 

It also showed what an animal he was. The guy had a horrendous cut which would've stopped most fights and he was still going for the kill (no pun intended).

 

How'd u rate Valero Slip

 

I thought he was an animal with a special fighters mentality. Almost Monzon-esque in terms of his mental approach. Was he technically brillient? no, but he had a lot of intangibles and ingredients to do big things IMHO. Things you can't teach, like said mentally and punching power to go with it.

His story is Ibeabuchi-esque. We don’t have to make Valero out to be anything though he was a exellent fighter. IMO he was the third best light welterweight in the world and he had not even fought at that weight yet.

People criticise him for the DeMarco fight, but we saw a man get elbowed in his head and suffer a gash deep enough to touch his skull and he fought like nothing had happened. Now that's something you have to admire. We've seen how known tough fighters have reacted to cuts over the years.

It's too much to say he would've been another Pacquiao or to even compare him Manny, like some people do, but there was definitely something there and it's a shame how it all ended. We'll just never know how good he would've been.

 

Yep, clear win for Meldrick. It was in truth the only fight he looked good in, post the JC Chavez fight. After that his balance was horrible and he took ill-advised match-ups like fighting Terry Norris.

 

I just watched the Glenwood Brown fight, and he looked poor, particularly in the early rounds. He just scraped it on my card by winning most rounds after the 4th, but his start to the fight was nothing short of awful. Brown was exactly stellar either, so to give Taylor the fight that he did, knocking him down twice, really gave an indication of what state Taylor was in. The only positive attribute Taylor showed in that fight was his handspeed, which was still a shadow of what it was. No surprise Norris wiped him out straight after.

Nice to see you back :good

 

Cheers, mate. :good

Yeh, that Brown fight was when you start to notice his awful balance and that it had totally gone, Meldrick pre-Chavez and the one of the McGirt schooling would've never went "life and death" with Glenwood Brown. Remember he also struggled with Garcia and you could make a case that he lost that fight.

The Norris fight is hard to watch, Norris always picked on smaller guys and it's one of the things that puts me of Terry. Here was a Meldrick Taylor who was a small welterweight, who'd struggled with "average" guys like Glenn Brown and Luis Garcia and he was fighting a beast of a light-middle.

Meldrick didn't have the best reflexes, but he could shoe shine like crazy. IMO his team never really worked on his strengths and hiding his weaknessess. He always fell in and finished with the same punches all the time.

 

I haven't seen the Garcia fight, but it's one that I am eager to score. I've had no luck finding it online though, so I'm tempted to just buy a Meldrick Taylor career set and watch it on that. I love watching Meldrick fight, even when he was past his prime and undersized at Welter, he still produced exciting fights.

I like Lou Duva, but I don't think he was a particularly good coach. IMO he relied on his talent (speed, power, reflexes (at LW & LWW), and flashy combinations) to win most of his bouts. His team never really seemed to give him the right advice. I mean, telling him to go all out in the last round against Chavez was one of the most absurd things I have ever heard from a corner. It made Norman Stone look like Angelo Dundee :yep.

 

im watching wlad sanders in a bit

 

robinson vs lamotta (6)

 

Yep, Meldrick was always in exciting fights, even though most of the time it wasn't to his advantage. He's a perfect example of how being very fast physically doesn't mean you're very fast mentally and gonna have great reflexes. Meldrick never really had great natural reflexes.

His biggest problem technically was falling in and going off balance when he shoe-shinned to the body and then brought his combos upstairs. It was always the same sequence and therefore he became easy to find against top fighters. If you watch him even at his best he falls in and always finishes with a left hook up top. JC Chavez figured this out quickly and sidestepped him, used that falling in against him and set him up for big punches, in fact that's how that knockdown came.

They should've worked on his balance and making him more boring. He had too much fight in him though and wasn't the sharpest so who knows, they might've tried to...

In my opinion, Duva was a ****. He thought he knew more about boxing then he actually did. Very arrogant inbetween rounds. He was an absolute disgrace in the Chavez fight. The guy was basically a promoter working the corner.

 

I completely agree, good post :good

 

Just watched Haye vs Big Mac, as I had a spare 8mins....

Mac took some big shots before the finish, and \hayes hand speed was unbelievable during that finish

 

Over the last couple of days:

Frampton vs Chacin
Proksa vs Rea
Nurse vs Owen

Frampton looked very good. I especially like his body punching and that all of his punches have mean intentions. Maybe a bit too overeager to get the stoppage, but very little you can criticise about this performance. Ref called it off after a cut over Chacin's eye became worse.

Proksa at times reminded me of Pirog with his unorthodox style and head and body movement. Fist knockdown was a push, second a punch behind the head but the third and fourth were body shots that finished Rea off. Exciting prospect who needs to be stepped up.

Nurse vs Owen was a good, close fight. Nurse controlled the action for the first three rounds in my opinion, but as he tired Owen got back into it. Nurse, who had all the physical advantages, was fighting on the inside too much and trading with Owen. As I say, close fight but Nurse was the deserved winner.

Oyewale Omotoso vs Samuel Colomban
Johannes Mwetupunga vs Luke Moloney

Omotoso vs Colomban was a very good fight! Seemed like it was over when Omotoso floored Colomban twice in the 2nd, but Colomban survived and got himself right back into the fight. Omotoso, a unorthodox fighter that throws a variety of wild shots, was too open at times and Colomban kept finding the target with straight shots. The 100-89 card for Omotoso was worse than the recent wide card for Broner over de Leon. Colomban left the fight with a modest 10-3 record, but don't let that fool you; he's a very good fighter (his record is now 19-3).

Mwetupunga, for me, won this fight. However the judges awarded Moloney the split decision (another bad card in this one; 98-92 for Moloney). Mwetupunga looked talented and had a nice defence. Moloney, boxing on the back-foot, could rarely get through with solid punches. I'm glad to see Mwetupunga, who had a 2-2 record after this fight, has went on to win his last 8 fights and the Australian middleweight title.