I love Ivan, but I thought his 'movement' in this fight was sometimes dangerously close to running. He was fighting the much bigger man to be fair.
Ivan definitely won the fight and outboxed Cazares, despite some really rough moments. His movement was more like Cory Spinks than Pernell Whitaker's. But I agree with you in the fact that he was facing a much bigger and very powerful man. Cazares gave a good account of himself and Calderon continued to show why he is among the very best pure-boxers in the game. He's so slick...
You can't criticize Calderon for "running" in this fight and being so cautious. He's a very light hitting boxer who is small for a strawweight and it is unnatural for him to even be fighting at 108, especially against Cazares, who has very good power and is huge for a junior flyweight. He was playing it real safe and sometimes running/potshotting, but he showed big heart just for taking the match and big heart for coming back after getting knocked down. It's sad that Calderon isn't making the money he could be making if he was heavier. He's barely 5 feet tall and he outclassed a top 108 pounder fighter who was almost a foot taller than him! One thing that I wondered about him.. how big is he in Puerto Rico? Do non-boxing fans know him there at all?
One of my favorite fighters, and I did preface my comments with the fact that he was seriously outsized. Still, I felt at times that he could have stayed in front of Cazaras a little more, he is just so slick defensively.
