Which fighter got ruined most in their first defeat?

Indeed.

I met Terry on a few occasions (from 6 degrees of the boxing highlight vid I made) and I asked him every question under the sun that I could...

When I asked him who his toughest foe was, surprisingly he said Eddie Neblett. He also has Parkinsonism (not to be confused with Parkinsons) and he said that he started noticing all the problems right around the Keith Mullings fight.

 

Cash-out fight. I guess they saw how he looked against Brown, maybe he looked less than stellar in the gym too or was slacking off, and decided they'd get a decent payday before he lost to someone lesser. Espana would've always given Taylor hell though. Another terrible style matchup for him.

"Ruined" is generally pretty extreme and overused, but I don't think he was ever fully the same post-Trinidad. His punch resistance diminished after Vargas. He was dropped and hurt early on against Rivera in the next fight. If you want, you can just chalk that up to being a perfectly timed punch, but I remember Rivera later hurting him in that fight to the body. He looked mediocre against Flores. It was no secret going into the DLH fight that Vargas's punch resistance was a question mark, Oscar and especially Mayweather Sr. kept talking about it. Vargas fought well in that fight however.

It wasn't just his chin though, the guy also had serious back problems that hurt his mobility in the ring.

 

Hatton was not Kostya's first loss. atsch

 

Yep. Being a bit of a bully in fighting smaller guys, and the fact that he had a tough time comprehending the rules of boxing.

Terry, your opponent being on the floor does NOT mean you get to hit him.

I found some post-fight interviews with him around this time period, from 96-97, and it's kind of tough to watch. You can definitely notice the slur in his words.

He rarely took prolonged beatings in the ring, his chin didn't allow it, but is said to have gone all-out in sparring.

People always talk about wars in fights causing brain damage, but sparring is no joke.

 

He didn''t do to bad with that chin of his. He's a HOFer and perhaps the best light middleweight of all time and it was almost impossible to outbox him. Someone like Calzaghe and Toney, who were arguably just as talented have more question marks, leave a lot more room for criticism and had truly frustrating/underachieving careers in regards to their talent and potential.


The only thing that works against Norris is, he didn't move up and most of his big fights were against smaller fighters. I really think Norris was a big welterweight who was more effective at 154 and he knew it. That's why he always called out smaller guys. I think after what Jackson did to him he knew fighting middleweights would be a big problem for him. I never liked how he tried to bully smaller fighters and wanted people like Whitaker, Curry, Trinidad etc. But wanted nothing to do with all those middleweights in his time.

I, too, only own one, Norris. I always go to get one, and then stop at the last minute and watch some fights via YouTube. I'm definitely going to get some in a while though, no excuses.

 

Some people act like Norris only fought 147 pounders or shot fighters which is not the case. Carl Daniels(was undefeated), Jacquot, Castro, and Vaden were good wins agaisnt fellow 154 pounders who were undefeated when Terry fought them(Vaden, Daniels) and/or belt holders at some time(Jacquot, Castro at MW, Vaden). As far as punchers, Castro was a puncher as was Mugabi but Norris recovered from the JJ ko loss and took them to school.

 

I think I pretty much covered it in my above post but yeah, I agree. I'm not downplaying Terry's accomplishments, but you can't seriously doubt that it was an extremely frustrating aspect of his reign that he called out a lot of 147lbs, not necessarily fighting an awful lot of them, but you can't dispute the fact that he tried to land fights with smallers guys, but wanted nothing to do with the men a weight above himself.

 

No doubt. I actually think his win against Quincy Taylor is a bit underrated...it was a dangerous fight for him, early in his career against Taylor who was a national amateur champion and highly touted prospect at 10-0 and Norris handily outboxed him.

 

Vargas and Taylor are the obvious choices.

 

Prince Naz, he only fought once more.

 

Meldrick Taylor, Fernando Vargas, Nassem Hamed

 

Yeah, I've noticed that quite a few of his fights have been against smaller fighters, and fighter who weren't really at their best. It's a shame really, because he was certainly a well rounded and excellent talent. Not to say that he didn't fing some quality 154/160 pounders.

I don't think he should really have been disheartened by what Jackson did to him. Not many on earth took Jacksons best shots, maybe Mcclellan, but he was hard as nails. Terry didn't have a good chin, but like you said, he managed to carve out a pretty impressive career.

Yeah, I do that alot

I'm tempted to get career sets of the likes of Trinidad, Gatti, RJJ and Starling, but I never seem to get round to it. Plus I'm not exactly rolling around on the floor with money ATM. Hopefully my collection will expand in the near future.

 

Right, we spoke about that also. He said he used to have 12 round sparring sessions several times a week in preparation for his fights. And his main sparring partner? His brother - who was a cruiserweight/heavyweight...so goes to show you that his training was probably as much a factor in his early demise.

Saw him in October and noticed his speech sounded much improved from when i saw him a year earlier...I was wondering if maybe I was just getting used to it or what, but turns out he said he has been going to speech therapy classes several times a week. Was good to hear him sounding better, he is a really nice fella.

 

Taylor is the best example.
Vargas was never the same after tito also.

 

That's good. I've heard he's a nice, soft-spoken guy, although you'd never guess it from watching him fight. I don't know if I've ever seen a fighter (although Dwight Qawi is a strong contender) that seemed to enjoy beating up opponents as much as him. Definitely one of the most visible mean streaks I've seen from a boxer in the ring.

There's supposed to be a documentary about him and the evils of boxing coming out. Probably about his health problems and how Don King and Terry's manager stole money from him.

Saad is a good purchase.