I almost never see Paez discussed on boxing boards, either this or other ones. Personally, I was pretty impressed with Paez when he first came up. He was a very skilled (if awkward) technician, with quick hands and good counterpunching ability, very strong for the weight, and a pretty solid puncher with both hands. In some ways, he was almost like a cross between James Toney and Jake LaMotta; or perhaps Archie Moore without the one-shot KO power would be a better comparison. As a featherweight, he won his title by upsetting a pretty good-looking titlist in Calvin Grove. After being outboxed for much of the fight, he pulled it out by dropping Grove three times in the 15th and final round - one of the last times a fight ever went 15 rounds I believe. In a rematch, he pounded Grove into an 11th round stoppage. After that, he also had impressive (and exciting) performances against big punching Louie Espinoza and ex-champ Steve Cruz. The Espinoza fight was officially declared a draw, but Paez was a clear winner IMO (the fight was on Espinoza's home turf in Arizona). The fight with Cruz was billed as a grudge match with a lot of trash talking and bad blood between the two fighters. Paez rose from an early knockdown (the first time I ever saw him go down) and muscled his way to a clear decision win. Personally, I had thought Paez might be on his way to being a good and long reigning FW champion. At one point, his two co-champions were Antonio Esparragoza and Jeff Fenech, and a unification fight between any of those three would've been most welcome. However, Paez had a reputation for ballooning in weight between fights the way Hatton and Toney did, and he weighed up around 135 for his non-title fights. Ch!nks began to show in his armor when he defended against Troy Dorsey, who was thought of as just a clubfighter at that time, and Dorsey bullied and hustled Paez around the ring all night long. I thought Dorsey was a clear winner, but Paez somehow came away with a split decision that I thought was one of the worst I'd ever seen - and a lot of other people shared the same sentiment. Paez then had a unification fight of sorts against Espinoza (who had the WBO title after their first fight). This time it was a genuinely close fight and Paez rallied to pull out a split decision. He then gave Dorsey a deserved rematch. This fight followed a similar pattern as the first one, with Dorsey relentlessly swarming and Paez looking to counter with the cleaner, harder punches. This time, Paez managed something of a rally toward the end to pull out a draw. Before the Dorsey rematch, Paez had declared that he would go up to 130 and challenge Tony Lopez for his title, and then up to 135 and fight Whitaker for his. Despite failing to beat Dorsey, Paez actually followed through on his word. He moved up and fought Lopez in a lighter weight megafight. The jump in weight figured to do Paez some good, but it turned out he'd met his match in Lopez. Lopez ignored all of Paez's trickery and turned in one of the best performances of his career, outboxing, outmuscling, and outhustling Paez to a clear decision win. Paez then went up to 135, and curiously, it seemed like that weight actually suited him better than 130. He looked fitter and stronger after the move than he had in some time, which suggested to me that perhaps he was always a natural LW sucking down to 126. He took on unbeaten contender Tracy Spann in what was considered an eliminator for a shot at Whitaker's title, and he battled his way to a close and exciting split decision win. Even more noteworthy was that Spann had a similar style as Whitaker, which further fueled interest in their title match. When that fight came, Paez performed very credibly, taking the fight to Whitaker from start to finish and working him over as best he could on the inside. Surprisingly, Whitaker chose to stand toe-to-toe for much of the fight and fight Paez on his terms - and even more surprisingly, got the better of it. The fight was exciting and fairly evenly contested through 6 rounds or so, but Whitaker's cleaner punching and all-around class took over in the middle of the fight and he went on to win a fair decision. Paez's last great effort came a year or so later against rising contender Rafael Ruelas. In a brutal all-out war, Paez was floored twice in the first round but battled back to level things out by the middle of the fight. Once again though, he could not maintain the necessary pace, and Ruelas came back down the stretch to batter Paez into a 10th round stoppage. Paez eventually got another title shot against Freddie Pendleton, but lost on points. After that, he fought a fast-rising former Olympian named Oscar DeLaHoya and was shockingly blasted out in two rounds - the first time he ever was KO'd in such a manner. After that came a familiar story, as Paez was used as fodder for up-and-comers like Angel Manfredy and Jose Luis Castillo and took some sad beatings from them. Even more sad is that Paez was still fighting in clubshows up until just a few years ago. On a side note, it always used to irk me that HBO would blatantly lie and promote Prince Hamed by claiming he was the first fighter to bring color and high TV ratings to the FW division in recent decades. It was like they just pretended Paez never existed. Then again, it wouldn't be the first time HBO acted like fighters who weren't under contract to them never existed. What are your thoughts on Paez?
I would think Paez would get mentioned on ESB more. He was hilarious,entertaining and had the SKills to back it up. His antics in fights would crack me up. He was also fighting on even terms with a prime Chicanito when the fight was controversaly stopped on cuts. I was at the Delahoya/Paez fight and Oscar was just to big,looked like a middleweight against a feather Paez was kod in a delayed reaction type ko he went down like a couple seconds after he was tagged. The Grove fight was the last 15round title fight ever.
Top post. I'm not too familiar with Paez's fights, so I'll soak up any thoughts in this thread. He gave Whitaker a pretty close fight (relative to most of Whitaker's other fights) but I felt Pernell never got out of 2nd gear for that one and disdainfully stood flat footed and took anything Paez had without ever trying to do more than he had to to win.
The charismatic big-tent performer had the tools and he went far. I just think that, once he became a world champion, he decided to milk it for all its worth, but as too much a part of the circus atmosphere that can easily surround a rags-to-riches individual. Once he starred with Gloria Trevi on the big screen in '91, it had to be downhill from there.
He kind of reminded me of a water downed version of Hector Camacho with all the flair. Good fighter very short if I remember. His loss to Freddie Pendelton finally gave Pendelton the respect he deserved when he won the title. Im sure everyone knows this but Paez came from a family of circus performers.
whitaker did seem to do as he wanted against paez but paez should never really of gone up to lightweight he did baloon between fights .he always entertained even his haircuts were entertaining and did'nt he do standing backflips after winning.he had chuck bodak i think in his corner and he used to stick pics of paez all over his bald head
I was just going to say...a poor man's Hector Camacho..he was so bizarre and entertaining, and I enjoyed him, but was impressed by Tony Lopez's finally figuring him out. Wonder what he's up to today?
Yeah, Lopez showed that if you ignore his antics and just keep working for three minutes of every round, Paez has a hard time keeping up. Whitaker and Ruelas had similar success against him by staying busy and never allowing Paez to coast.
That was joke. He grew up in a circus family. Bygones Nice post My2Sense. With some of the other names that frequent this area all to often, it's actually nice to see Paez mentioned. I believe that this is when Whitaker began to further demonstrate what Georgie Benton envisioned as the correct method of boxing. Benton believed that boxers should not waste unnecessary energy. When Whitaker was a lightweight, Benton wanted Whitaker use his legs less and angles more. Benton believed that a boxer should always remain within striking distance of his opponent, and circle rather than move to and from. Benton was also Meldrick Taylor's trainer. Benton wanted Taylor to flurry less, and look to throw more meaningful punches. Jim Lampley commented on this during one of Taylor's fights, I believe it was against Glenwood Brown.
You could see a change in Whitaker's style between the first and second fights with Ramirez. In the first fight, he fought as a "runner" for much of the fight, and his caution allowed Ramirez to come on late and make the fight somewhat close (although I still thought Whitaker probably should've had the edge). In the second fight, Whitaker stood in front of Ramirez and banged him hard, and discouraged him from pressing him. I think that was Whitaker's most perfectly realized performance.
I've only seen about four or five of his fights, the first being against Espinoza at featherweight. He impressed me with his toughness and he seemed as strong as a bull, and yes, it was hard not to be entertained by the guy. Espinoza could punch but Paez didn't seem the least bit fazed by anything Louie threw. If I recall, he was known as 'el maromero', which translated into the clown or something similar. I think for the Cruz fight he had the Batman logo styled into his hair, and he sometimes somesaulted over the top rope into the ring. I never saw the Whitaker fight, but I was quite surprised at how close the bout seemed on paper.
Just the flair and flashy combos. Camacho used his legs more. Paez was always fought of the ropes alot and when not doing that he was coming forward.
Paez was a television fighter on NBC in the last years of free boxing on Saturdays..he was the Chris Eubank type fighter..arrogant but could back up his mouth and antics with strength and boxing skills,,, made u root for someone to beat him ..had a couple of dodgy decisions go his way but he was always exciting.... miss fighters like hi who were always televised.... shame those days are over
Agreed. I used to love ABC's Wide World of Sports on Saturdays. They covered fights happening all over the world at the same time.