Worst all time fight decisions

Speaking of John Conteh his "Draw" vs Jesse Burnett was a pretty awful decision. Conteh was dropped twice and rocked numerous times, and somehow salvaged a draw in a 10 rounder which is baffling to me I thought Burnett won it by a landslide.

Wilfred Benitez's Split Decision vs Bruce Curry was also a bad decision, Benitez was dropped 3 times and almost stopped in another 10 rounder and somehow walked away with a decision.

 

Nikolai Valuev vs. Evander Holyfield
Courtney Burton vs. Emanuel Augustus

 

Everett-Escalera was a genuinely terrible decision. I had it 10-3 in rounds to Everett with 2 even (147-141) and it’s known to also be an actually corrupt decision based on one of the judges being bought off, so it has to be at or near the very top of all-time bad decisions.

In terms of individually bad cards in otherwise legitimately close fights, JoJo Guerra’s 118-110 stands out as inexplicable but as has been pointed out, it was a justifiably close fight in real terms and the other scorecards reflected that.

By the same token, Zarate-Pintor was a close fight with one really crazy card due to dubious mathematics as I understand it (145-133).

I thought Gomez-Lockridge was a horrible decision and a hometown call if ever there was one.

 

Pernell Sweet Pea Whittaker vs Jose Luis Ramirez, March 12 1988, I had Sweet Pea winning that title bout in a near shut out.

 

I was actually involved in one. I was managing Kerry Hope, former European champion. He fought a Thai in Hong Kong. Hope barely lost a round or two and even that was a stretch. The two Thai judges scored it a draw and for the Thai boxer respectively. I actually grabbed the microphone off the announcer and said to the crowd you’ve just witnessed an absolute robbery and if anyone can point to me the 7 rounds the Thai boxer won, I’d love to hear from you

Anyway, here’s the fightnews article:
Via Fightnews:

"The August 29 clash in Hong Kong between former European middleweight champion Kerry “The Great” Hope and Thailand’s Petchsuriya Singwancha that ended in a draw has been changed by the WBC to a unanimous decision win for Hope.

“The original decision was quite simply the worst I’ve ever seen and by some distance,” said Hope’s co-manager Matt Clark. “Kerry Hope completely dominated his opponent from the opening bell and there’s no way on God’s green Earth that it was remotely competitive, let alone a draw. I launched a complaint with the WBC and provided them footage of the bout. Kerry has today received a letter from the President of the WBC, Mauricio Sulaiman, stating that the fight has been reviewed and upon review, the decision has been awarded to Hope. The committee reviewing the fight awarded it unanimously by a wide margin,” Clark said.

Hope belatedly claims the WBC Asian Boxing Council middleweight title. Judges Visuth Yingaupagarn and Pongpan Rattanasutorn have been suspended by the Asian Boxing Council and are being retrained.

 

A few have mentioned Holyfield - Lewis I. Yeah, that was awful. Just terrible. Funny thing is, Holyfield - Lewis II was also terrible. If you switched the two scores on the fights, the judging would be pretty accurate. LOL

 

There was a fight Jose Luis Ramirez - Manny Hernandez that was hilarious. Hernandez was supposed to be a tune up for Ramirez with his monstrous pumped up record that is typical of many Latin American fighters. Hernandez danced circles around an out of shape Ramirez, raining punches on Ramirez head all fight long, but they gave Ramirez a wide UD.

The first bad decision I remember watching live was Ali vs Jimmy Young. I thought Young deserved the nod, but of course Ali was the big money maker.

Also I say it was a bad decision to stop the Julio Cesar Chavez - Meldrick Taylor fight, again there is a lot of money in propping up Chavez over - inflated record.

de la Hoya - Trinidad was bad. de La Hoya boxed Trinidad silly for the first two thirds of the fight, then got on his bicycle so he wouldn't get caught. He didn't get caught by anything meaningful, but they still gave the fight to Trinidad. Trinidad was a fraud. After Bernard Hopkins trainer discover the secret of Trinidad's illegally wrapped hands prefight, and made him rewrap, Trinidad was helpless as a baby.

 

Ive seen some,. but scoring scoring has overall gotten better since I began watching fights in 1981 as a fan.

Some notably bad decisions I witnessed live are:

Holmes-Williams
Whitaker-Chavez
Randall-Chavez 2
Martin-Laracuente (HBO had Belinda win 78-74 but the judges scored it for Martin 79-73 x3 IIRC)
Barrera-Morales 1
Lopez-Molina I
Mercado-Hopkins 1

Some other bad decisions (Antuofermo-Hagler I, Ramirez-Whitaker I, Lewis-Holyfield I, Arguello-Ramirez, Foreman-Briggs,, De La Hoya-Mosley 1, Sturm-De La Hoya, Nelson-Martinez 1) I admit that were very bad but I didnt see those live. In fact, in Antuofermo-Hagler 1's case, I didnt even care. I was only 7 that night.

Other decisions (Spinks-Holmes II, Rosario-Ramirez I, Lockridge-Gomez, Leonard-Hearns 2, Hagler-Leonard, Camacho-Rosario, De La Hoya-Molina,, Trinidad-De La Hoya) I saw or heard on the radio live but while I generally agree that the loser should have won these bouts, they were really too close to call. The widest one I have in that list is Lockridge-Gomez and even there I have it by 3 rounds only. As far as Leonard-Hearns 2, I had Hearns by 114-112 when it was originally fought.