Can a Puerto Rican Get a Lapdance Over Here or What?
posted by Large
I can’t believe what I’m reading, in the recaps and opinion pieces at other boxing sites and in the comments here at the Mas. What the hell were people watching last night that they can conclude after that fight that, ‘Cotto has lost it, Cotto isn’t that good, Cotto is still haunted by Margaritoâ€?
To all of these people drawing these conclusions, I have a question: DID YOU NOT SEE THE CRATER OF A CUT OVER COTTO’S LEFT EYE THAT HE FOUGHT WITH FOR NINE FUCKING ROUNDS? JESUS!
To me, the cut essentially invalidates the fight and the result, period. It probably should have been stopped – that might have been in the better interest of both parties. Clottey is right to call for a rematch, and he’ll never get it, which is a shame, although he would have had his rematch if he’d manned up and gone out there and conclusively won those last three rounds, so he’s left to think about that when he’s fighting some up-and-comer on Friday Night Fights in November.
I’ll get to the decision later. It’s definitely debatable. But it was clear to me that Cotto would have been well within his rights to opt out of that fight at any point after the third round. Fights have been justifiably stopped for much lesser cuts. It also was clear to me that around the seventh round, when it was obvious that the cut was not going to stop pouring blood into his eye and making him all but defenseless to right hands, when even the announcers were starting to say, ‘man, they should probably stop this thingâ€â€¦ if the fight had been stopped then, Cotto would have had an indisputable lead on the scorecards. You can debate whether he deserved that decision after 12, but there is no debate that he was up after seven.
And here’s the thing, the one thing that I found really noteworthy in last night’s fight , I don’t think it ever crossed Cotto’s mind to stop fighting, not for a second. I don’t think he considered it from a strategical vantage point, I don’t think he doubted his physical ability or feared for his safety, I just don’t think it was on the table, period.
And that’s a hell of a fighter for you. Put all thoughts of ‘the ghosts of Margarito†bullshit to sleep, because a man haunted by the ghosts of Margarito does not keep fighting a monster like Josh Clottey with a non-stop river of blood on his face. With one eye blinded for the lion’s share of every round after the third, with him having to constantly find open space in the ring to travel to just so he could safely paw the blood out of his vision without getting pounced on, Cotto nevertheless found a way to at the very least keep it close with a fighter of Clottey’s caliber, and in the estimation of some (including me) win the fight.
From this, people conclude that he is shot and that Pacquiao will kill him. Sheesh.
Through the first nine rounds, my scorecard mirrored Harold Lederman’s, with Clottey up five rounds to four, but with the fight tied on points because of the first-round knockdown. I don’t see how you could have had it much differently at that stage. You could quibble about a few of the rounds, the second, fourth and fifth, although to my eyes I thought they were pretty clearly won (I gave Cotto the fourth and Clottey the second and fifth). On the whole, I thought a tie through nine was the exact right place to be. After pulling his strange rope-a-dope vacation in the sixth, Clottey dominated the seventh, eighth and ninth, chewing up the last of the advantage that Cotto had built early with the knockdown.
If you agree with me on that, then how you saw the fight boils down to how you saw the last three rounds. I know that most of you will balk at this, but I gave them all to Cotto, though I admit I didn’t feel great about it because he was so dramatically on his bike. Of the three, I thought the tenth was the most debatable, because Clottey (according to punch-stat) landed more punches, but Cotto finished an inconclusive round with two gigantic left hooks, two of his best shots of the night. I thought they were enough to tip it for him, and in that Harold Lederman agreed with me, I didn’t feel like my admitted Cotto bias had influenced me unduly in seeing it that way.
Lederman gave the eleventh to Clottey, but I saw it for Cotto merely for his activity level. Likewise the final round, which people unanimously gave to Cotto. I started thinking about Ray Leonard and Hagler at that point, and how that decision always has left a bad taste in everyone’s mouth (especially Hagler’s) and yet how when you go back and watch it, you can’t help but score it for Leonard. The thing is, you can win rounds on the bike. If a man doesn’t know how to trap you, or if he is too cautious chasing you and doesn’t let his hands go, if you’re effective enough in your mobility you can end up being the only guy in the ring who’s doing much of anything, and therefore you necessarily come away with the 10-9.
That’s how it went in rounds ten through twelve last night – Cotto went all Ray Leonard on Clottey’s Hagler (although before the haters jump on me let me say right here that Cotto is no Ray Leonard on the bike, nor is Clottey a Hagler in the hunt). After the fight, when Lamps asked Clottey why he hadn’t thrown more punches in the late rounds, Clottey pretty much fessed up to what I saw, saying something like, ‘Cotto is a dangerous fighter… I had to be careful when I was chasing him, I couldn’t just throw myself at him.â€
Well, actually, you could throw yourself at him. It’s been done before (file marked, ‘Margarito, Tonyâ€). But yeah, no doubt, you’re going to get clocked when you do. That’s the thing about a guy like Cotto who can fight on the bike and still get off with power-shots. It’s hell chasing him down, especially if you’re not all that skilled at the chasing game.
So much for Clottey’s assertion beforehand that he was fully prepared for Cotto’s mobility. It’s one thing to be able to catch the guy , Clottey was more than able to do that , but it’s another thing altogether to keep throwing punches at every step of the chase and simply shake off the unavoidable potshots that you get in return as the price of doing business. To do that, you have to be a special kind of raging bull in there, one of the rare Joe Frazier, Chavez, Tony Margarito variety.
Was it a satisfying way for Cotto to pull it out? Not at all. I’m sure he would have liked it to be different. But he had the Gowanus Canal in his left eyebrow , what the hell was he supposed to do? Would he have been more of a man if he’d just stood in the center of the ring and traded bombs and gotten ultimately destroyed because he was fighting with one eye? He actually tried that in the fourth. That was plan A, go right for the kill, get it over with. He quickly discovered it was a big mistake. That’s where, if anywhere, the ghost of Margarito hovered. “Don’t go there, hombre,” the ghost told Cotto. “Down that road, extinction lies.” So he went to plan B. Some are deeming that unmanly or evidence of his weakness. Me, I’m punching his man-card twice just for staying in there at all.
As for Clottey, I didn’t much care for what I saw in him last night. One thing I forgot to mention in my preview was having noting a few times, in different interviews leading up to the fight, Clottey saying things like, ‘Even if I lose, I will have proved something Saturday night.†These quotes influenced my calling it for Cotto (and hey? no love for Large on the spot-on prognog?) because they made me wonder about Clottey’s mettle a little. We know he’s tough at the level that he can take a hell of a punch and take a lot of them. We saw that again last night. But it’s a different kind of toughness that pushes a man to go get it with abandon, and Clottey seemed to lack that toughness in the late rounds of this fight. Combine that with the bizarre behavior after the ‘body slam†(which was bullshit , he basically dove on Cotto and Cotto shook his shoulders , ‘body slam†my ass) and the crying after the unintentional rabbit punch, and it painted a picture of a man who was a little afraid of Cotto, who was looking for an excuse, who wasn’t prepared to go to the place that Margarito went for the ultimate victory.
If Clottey had gone to that place last night, he would have won. But here’s the thing , that’s a hell of a place to go to. Even with that gash over Cotto’s eye, he cast a frightening prospect for a hardass like Josh Clottey. I can only imagine what would have happened in the fight without the cut. Maybe it would have been to Clottey’s advantage, actually, because he clearly was ill-equipped to hunt Cotto down. Based on my observation of the first three cut-less rounds, I thought, as I predicted going in, that it was shaping up to be a great fight, a violent game of human speed-chess on the order of Cotto/Mosley.
The cut robbed us of that, and yet in a way I feel like it revealed something in both men that we might not have seen without it. In Clottey, I saw a very talented fighter who at the highest levels of competition and on the biggest stage is subject to the kind of self-doubt that stops a man just short of greatness. And in Cotto, I saw a fighter for whom courage is so integral to his makeup, so indelibly etched in his DNA, that he himself doesn’t even recognize it as ‘courage,†but merely accepts it as quotidian fact.
You rarely see the truly great ones, not even a blabbermouth on the order of Ali, calling attention to their overabundance of courage in the face of danger. For them, it’s just the way it is. They know no other way, and so they find it unremarkable.
For us, however, the fearful masses, plagued by our teeming anxieties and doubts just walking down the goddamn street… for us, it is exceedingly remarkable. It’s what we feed on in these men who we deem to be our heroes when they get their brains beaten out for the sake of our enjoyment. It’s the hole they fill, the need they assuage.
That’s how I’m feeling about Cotto right now, that his performance was heroic, and that he’s tough in the old, high way of toughness where a fighter just took his lumps and fought through them and didn’t have much to say about it at the end of the day, cause that’s life, that’s what a fighter does. Unlike the various hacks and internet warriors who today, from the safety of their keyboards, are proclaiming last night proof of Cotto’s inadequacy, to my eyes it proved his greatness beyond the shadow of a doubt.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:10 pm
when clottey hurt his knee got punched in the groin and got hit in the back of the head all that shit reminded me of the zab/cotto fight. emanuel stewart was right about clottey he should’ve thrown more uppercuts (but dude wasn’t throwing enough especially in the later rounds to win). cotto won 7 of the 12 rounds in my book.
June 14th, 2009 at 12:49 pm
Even though the fight wasn’t great in a classical, these guys are killing each other way, I still found it to be an insanely fun fight to watch. There was so much drama throughout it, that I was just riveted. Let me say this though, I don’t think that Clottey is getting enough credit for continuing to fight with the knee injury. I don’t know how bad it was, but I do know that in the sixth round I was really thinking that they should stop the fight because it looked like Clottey’s mobility was non-existent and that he was going to get killed in the ring.
As for Cotto, I’d be salivating at the prospect of getting Pacquiao. I think he knocks Pac Man out.
June 14th, 2009 at 2:06 pm
A tough fight to make sense of. In certain ways it reminded me of De La Hoya – Quartey, albeit a much poorer version, without that sense of both men in that fight leaving everything on the table. With that, I think, the fault lies with Clottey, who has always shown toughness in the ring, but as Large mentions, seems to lack that extra bit of edge to carry him over the top. Not to mention that the man seems to lack power, if those uppercuts had only been packing a bit more punch…
On heart, Cotto does deserve the decision, the cut was ferocious and in the championship rounds he wanted it more. However, based on my scoring off of a crappy youtube posting, Clottey won the fight by at least a round or two. Even considering that I seem to be the only person who gave him Round 4, he seemed to me to easily take Rounds 2, 3, 5, 7, 8, 9 and I think it’d be hard not to give him at least either round 10 or 11. (I went with 10). This is another reminder of the Quartey fight, in that I would have scored Quartey slightly ahead. I do think Large is a little overly generous to Cotto on his various infractions. In the 5th Clottey was awkwardly trying to clinch, but Cotto definitely put a hand on his back that helped usher him to the ground, and that seemed to cause Clottey’s complete abdication of movement in round 6.
Overall a frustrating fight, somewhat memorable, but there were moments in the first few rounds that a great fight seemed to be threatening to break out. And for various reasons, Cotto’s cut, Clottey’s shyness, Clottey’s knee, it just never did.
June 14th, 2009 at 2:56 pm
Great stuff Large. You put it in really brilliant words, man.
June 14th, 2009 at 2:59 pm
not so great stuff: mayweather is injured, fight is postponed.
June 14th, 2009 at 4:27 pm
i highly doubt floyd is actually injured…pretty funny…i saw somebody on another boxing website, probably a week ago or more, predict a floyd injury in the upcoming weeks…and this theory was based on poor ticket sales and sponsorship…
im wondering if floyd now wants to listen to haymon and try to have this thing moved to regular hbo…that way he cant be crippled at the negotiating table, in the future, due to love ppv numbers
June 14th, 2009 at 4:28 pm
wow…love=low…i dunno how i did that
June 14th, 2009 at 4:33 pm
That’s great stuff for Cotto, with Mayweather gone for a while you can pencil in Cotto/Pacman.
Thank you Large for letting me know that I’m not crazy to think Cotto did a great job last night. Reading all the comentary this morning I thought I had too much to drink last night.
I watched the fight with a nurse last night, she was mortified that the fight wasn’t stopped early. Of course, she would have thought that either way. I was very impressed with Cotto’s resiliancy, there’s no doubt he’s back on top of his game.
June 14th, 2009 at 4:47 pm
i give cotto all the credit in the world for not looking for a way out of the fight. i actually think that a savvy corner-man would’ve tried a bit harder to convince the doctor to stop the fight, especially when it seemed clear that cotto had a lead in the fight.
the extent to which that cut was responsible for cotto’s more measured/cautious approach to the fight is unknown. as a fan, i hope that his seek and destroy style returns after the stitches do their work. however, i’m not optimistic. he has been in a lot of tough fights, it’s only natural that his style might change to help prolong his career. at some point, even jordan gave up some ‘air’ in exchange for a post-up game. time will tell.
i do wonder why cotto didn’t try to work the body a bit more?
hopefully, the FMM/JMM fight is only pushed back a few weeks. but as long as the top guys keep facing one another, that division is going to be compelling for awhile. pretty much any hypothetical match-up between the top 7 or 8 guys is intriguing.
June 14th, 2009 at 4:47 pm
i watched the fight in the hood last night with some puerto ricans…and i definitley had too much to drink
June 14th, 2009 at 4:51 pm
i’m fully on board with the conspiracy theory. and with the HBO vs PPV idea. i love JMM, and think he can give anyone a good fight, but doubt i’d drop $50 on that fight unless i rounded up a few friends to throw in on it. and since most of my friends are cheap bastards, it’d be tough to make that happen.
June 14th, 2009 at 5:04 pm
Great analysis on the fight. Cotto could have stopped this fight early (like after rd. 4) and had the win and gone home and celebrated. But he toughed it out to prove something to everyone. And with Mayweather-Marquez postponed, Pacquiao-Cotto is a very likely possibility now. I know Mosley wants in on the fun, but he’s just not the fighter Cotto is.
June 14th, 2009 at 5:48 pm
I don’t know about calling what Large wrote “great analysis”. Yeah Cotto fought 9 rounds with a cut. So what? He’s a fighter. You can’t quit because you got cut. My God a swollen eye is ten times worse. The blood from his cut didn’t impair his vision at any point. I’ve seen a million worse cuts. Hagler had 3 cuts, with blood flowing into his eyes, and Tommy Fucking Hearns throwing at him and he fought harder!!! Cotto had a guy doing a bad rope-a-dope as fighting technique. At times it appeared as though Clottey didn’t really want to fight last night. Large seems to think a split decision against a guy who sat statue-like in the corner of the ring protecting his head earns Cotto a “heroic” performance label. Sorry. He wasn’t very good yesterday. But that’s the humble opinion of a keyboard warrior.
Large you also absolutely tore into Hatton after his fight with Pacquiao calling him “amateurish and a glorified club fighter”…going to the bizarre extreme of saying Dawson’s performance the following week as “more impressive than Pacquiao”(you may be the only person in the boxing world to hold that view, but hey you are original). If you were so unimpressed by Pacquiao because of his weak competition, how can you be impressed by Cotto? Clottey was weak. He didn’t want it. I wanted to see a strong Cotto and get excited about future fights with Mayweather and Pacquiao. But the guy I saw last night won’t give either much of a fight. Because unlike Clottey, Mayweather and especially Manny would not turn into statues during the fight.
June 14th, 2009 at 7:56 pm
I just watched the fight again. It really was a hell of an interesting night, although not in any of the ways that I expected.
I remain convinced that Cotto deserved to win, and I felt more watching it a second time how Clottey did not seem like he wanted the victory somehow, like he was looking for a way out. I stick to my guns on the “body slam” – Clottey left his feet (he has a weird way of leaping forward in certain moments) and Cotto shook him off to keep fighting, so Clottey went down (didn’t actually look to me like he even landed on his knee). The rabbit punch still looked like an accident to me, and as for the low blows, there were plenty to go around on both sides. Only Clottey complained about them. Cotto never bitches about low blows.
As for Floyd’s injury, yeah, there must be doubts. Thing wasn’t selling shit tickets-wise. I always thought that him coming back to fight Marquez was a strange move, but the strangest move of all was making it PPV. He’s got all the negotiating leverage in the world based on the fact that he outsold Pac against both Hatton and Oscar. But him fighting Marquez is just not the kind of matchup that was destined to break the PPV bank. I think it might have pushed 600, 700 K with a strong 24/7 performance (Floyd is definitely Mr. Cash Money on that 24/7) but that still comes up short of Pac’s last fight and steals his negotiating thunder. Absolutely no way he cracks a milly against Marquez. So no doubt, one has to wonder if his injury is really a rethink on the business front. Hard to imagine them just pulling it from PPV, though. The press release I got from HBO said a makeup date would be announced in the next two days. We’ll see.
Brad, a million worse cuts? That thing was at least two inches long, and it split into two, with one part of the gash coming down below the brow to his actual eyelid. And “didn’t impair his vision at any point”? Did you actually watch the fight? Did you see him relentlessly pawing at his eye round after round? Do you think he wants to be doing that? Do you think Cotto is actually so incompetent defensively that he couldn’t get out of the way of a single right hand that Clottey threw?
That cut was as bad as they get. If his corner had pushed for the early stoppage, no one would have complained about it. You think I’m overstating the case for Cotto’s heroism, check the opinion of Manny Steward, who was right there for Hagler/Hearns, who’s been around some cuts (and some wars) in his life. He was calling for them to stop it in the 8th round last night, and despite having an obvious hard-on for Clottey from the start of the fight, by the end he was showering Cotto with praise for fighting on and being one of the true warriors of the sport.
I agree with you that Clottey didn’t do what he needed to do to win that fight last night, and he has to bear the weight of that responsibility. But I also think a lot of the credit for that goes to Cotto’s savvy. Whatever you think of Josh Clottey (he rope-a-doped for only one round, let’s remember), he is no Ricky Hatton. Give Pacquiao a cut like that bleeding into his eye and nine rounds to go with Josh Clottey, and I’m not sure he makes it out in one piece.
In conclusion, I’ll give an early preview: Right now I think Cotto beats Pacquiao at 47. They fight at 43 and I’m not so sure. Cotto is a BIG welterweight now. No official scales last night, but I heard Cotto was about 158, and he looked lean in there. I think every extra pound hurts Cotto a lot, because I think he battles to make weight. He says he won’t go below 45. Honestly, I wonder if the fight will happen. That Mayweather/Pacquiao payday promises to be huge, and anyone who thinks that Pacquiao is a cinch to beat Cotto is out of his mind. I can’t see them risking it.
June 14th, 2009 at 10:29 pm
Good point. Cotto was killing himself to make 140 before he moved up. Going back down to a catch weight will be hell. Of course, the money will be too great. Cotto will go down in weight and therefore down in a decision.
June 14th, 2009 at 11:07 pm
when a cut appears to have its own tributaries….it’s a bad cut.
i definitely never had the sense that clottey was afraid or intimidated by cotto. and i’m not even sure he was all that physically spent. i think that in his mind, he felt like he was blocking the majority of cotto’s punches and landing quite a few of his own. he showed no desperation at all. in fact, the most frustrating thing about the fight was that clottey didn’t appear to wilt down the stretch, so much as he just put his shit on cruise control (it was the same lack of urgency that i saw from ike quartey in a few of his fights, though definitely not just a ghanaian welterweight thing).
plenty of good fighters treat the 12th round of a championship fight the same way they’d treat the first round of an opening bout on an untelevised card. but, as is the case in almost any sport, the ones with an uncanny ability to take their game to the next level in crunch time are the ones we remember as great. cotto has done that several times (even once in defeat).
clottey can beat most welterweights in the world fighting the way he fought last night, but if he loses a close decision without having left it all in the ring, then it’s harder to advocate for him. i still really like him as a fighter, just wish i’d seen a killer instinct over the course of the last few rounds.
June 15th, 2009 at 4:32 am
The thing is, Clottry really has a tendency to drop his output in the end of fights, it was the same against Margo and Corrales. I don’t know why, but he just fades in the end.
One thing Large pointed out greatly and surely played a roll in that drop is, that following Cotto around is a harsh job. It was the same with Shane Mosley when Cotto outboxed him the last rounds of their fight. Cotto still has a huge hook and those two he landed on Clottey at the end of the 10th (?) were probably the best punches of the fight.
Another thing I noticed: Large, you pointed out before the fight, that Cotto has “decided to train himself”. He also seemed to make his own tactical decisions in the fight. His corner was begging him to attack Clottey and “put him on the backfoot”. While Cotto decided to circle and wait for Clottey to punch and counter himself (a bit like Manny Steward was advising all the time).
There was not a second of a doubt in my mind, that Cotto wouldn’t fight this one out. He is a pure warrior and that is more important for his fans, than a loss would have been.
June 15th, 2009 at 4:53 am
Well as far as Cotto winning at 47 against Pacquiao…..it’s a moot point. It’ll never happen, mainly because Pacquiao is THE MAN right now and he doesn’t have to cave for anyone. Certainly not for a fighter who got badly beat by Margarito then barely beat Clottey(thanks to Clottey passive fighting style). Let’s just say Cotto needs Manny far more than Manny needs Cotto.
Speed kills. Oscar looked horribly slow when he faced against Pacquiao. Everytime Hatton took a forward step he got popped by the lightning quick hands of Pacquiao. After seeing Margrito land all night on Cotto and Clottey connect on Cotto whenever he wanted to (which wasn’t very often for some reason) I can only imagine how easily Pacquiao would find Cotto to hit. Cotto doesn’t feint well (if at all)with his head or shoulders. He’s easy to time and Pacquiao, better than any fighter I’ve seen in a long time, gets his range and timing homed in quickly. It’d take him about 20-30 seconds to start nailing Cotto. Miguel would never even see most of the shots. My God Freddie Roach must have watched that fight with a huge grin on his face.
As far as the cut, I need to watch the fight again. I was overserved at the establishment I watched the fight at, so I may be wrong about the “I’ve seen a million worse” thing. Chuck Wepner, Henry Cooper, Vito Antuofermo… I grew up watching these guys and cuts were simply part of it. You can’t “invalidate the fight and the result” because of a cut. I’ve seen Ali fight ten rounds with Norton with a broken jaw, numerous fighters fight with eyes completely closed, broken hands, etc….it’s a tough sport, fighting with a cut like that isn’t that “heroic”…for a boxer. Just like getting your teeth knocked out and still playing isn’t unusally for hockey players. If I got cut like that at work I’d probably take a week off to heal….but I’m not a boxer. I’m a keyboard warrior.
June 15th, 2009 at 5:08 am
Regardless of what you have as your exact score or who you thought showed courage in the fight, I took away something else from last nights action. It is damn hard to win a decision as a “punch-blocker”. The compubox stats show Clottey landing 40 more punches than Cotto with fewer thrown. That is because Compubox recognizes all the times Cotto threw bombs that had no effect because of Clotteys high guard, which are simply punches thrown that don’t connect. In the judges’ (and our) minds however, I believe Cotto receives some level of credit for those punches, when in reality the opposite should be true. Defense is supposed to be one of the 4 things that a fight is scored on, and judges generally give credit for slick defensive head movement of the Pernell Whitaker/Floyd Mayweather Jr. variety, but none for the “I got my hands up so you aren’t landing shit” Josh Clottey/Winky Wright variety. I don’t believe this is fair at all and I think it is probably the reason Clottey lost the fight on the cards last night, but it is what it is.
June 15th, 2009 at 6:25 am
Brad, I agree that back in the day, fighters fought with cuts, gashes, broken bones, eyes swollen shut and the like. But most of your examples of such warriors occured in the era of 15 round bouts and Parkinsons on the horizon. These days, as we all know, the fighters are protected from themselves, and a culture has been created where fights can’t go on if one guy is clearly handicapped because of something that occurred in the ring. Its for their own good.
While the sport might not be as pure as you remember when you grew up watching boxing, I think its unfair to condemn Cotto for the era in which he is fighting. That was a doozy of a cut, and Cotto kept fighting on with no hint of wantign to stop. That’s today’s era of a warrior defined. The tough thing is that Cotto has to be disappointed with the way he won, and I’m sure that had the cut not occurred it would have been more decisive, one way or another.
June 15th, 2009 at 6:42 am
I’m not trying to deny Cotto of anything. I like Cotto. He’s a tough dude that would have been tough in any era. He said after the fight(in Chuck Johnson’s piece for HBO.com) that the cut didn’t bother him til very late in the fight. His exact qoute was “I didn’t lose any kind of view..til the end of the fight when it started getting in my eye”.I don’t think it’s the reason he had a tough time with Clottey. I just think Cotto is past his peak and should have lost that fight. I don’t see him beating Mosley, Mayweather, Williams or Pacquiao. Going into the fight I was excited about the welterweight division, but I’m not so excited anymore. Clottey doesn’t appear to have “the right stuff” and Cotto’s best days seem to be behind him. I’m wrong all the time (I picked Wright over Williams and thought Clottey would get rid of Cotto in 7) so I hope I’m just off in this view.
June 15th, 2009 at 9:15 am
I won’t go against the PAc-Man again – but Man, Pac has still not been hit by a real 147 Pounder. And imagining Manny getting cornered and hit by those body shots is … wow. I love that fight and I think it will happen.
June 15th, 2009 at 9:16 am
Word on Briks’ comment. I caught a case of the giggles watching the fight because of the beautiful cognitive dissonance between the flag-waving Garden crowd’s reactions “Ohhhh! OHHHHH!!!!!” to hard-punches to the gloves and arms.
We’re talking way too much about the plots of this fight, which is understandable: there were a lot of dramatic moments. And it’s fair to say that Clottey wouldn’t have landed over 100 shots to the left side of Cotto’s face if it weren’t for the cut; it’s also safe to say that many of those punches would have been thrown to the body instead, and many would have landed.
But I’m really angry about the result of this fight, in a Chad Dawson-Glen Johnson I fashion (or even a Lennox Lewis-Evander Holyfield I fashion, where the British judge claimed he thought Lewis won convincingly, but was stunned to see he’d called the fight even on his own fucking card), because the man who did the most damage did not win. Boxing isn’t scored as the sum of all punishment, and it’s only every now and then on a fight like this that I wish it oculd be, particularly in the 12 round era, where going the distance in elite fights is more and more assumed.
Glen Johnson won the fight, though Chad Dawson may have bicycled enough to win the cards. (Not by the ridiculous margin of that corrupted fight, though.)
Lewis-Holyfield isn’t worth discussion.
Clottey, even excepting the eye damage, hurt Cotto far more than Cotto hurt Clottey. Saying “He didn’t do quite enough to win the fight because of Underdog Status/New York City/Puerto Rican Day Parade/His Style” doesn’t work as an argument because it assumes the worst of this sport we love. That’s not argument, that’s justification.
And though I don’t really see it happening, Pacquiao TKO 9 Cotto.
June 15th, 2009 at 9:19 am
Also, Don Trella (116-111) needs to be run out of big fights for a term of 5-10 years, but instead, he’ll be ringside at the Klitschko-Chagaev thrillfest.
And Dan Rafael (116-111) is a much better boxing writer than observer. Apparently. I always thought highly of him.
June 15th, 2009 at 9:20 am
Large,
I absolutely agree with you on Cotto being a warrior. That cut was almost as nasty as the one that big Klit had against Lennox Lewis. It was long and deep and right over the eyebrow. He definitely showed a lot of heart, especially since it looked like he shot his load in the sixth round and never got his energy level back after that. I haven’t watched the broadcast but I was only about twenty rows back, so I had a good view of the fight.
My impression was that this was another hard fight that put a few more miles of abuse on Cotto. He got busted up again and took some hard knocks. Not unexpected against a tough guy like Clottey, but it still counts. Why I feel that he would be Pacquiao’s easiest option is simple – you’re only as good as your last fight. Mosley just looked a lot better against Margarito. I also just think that Mayweather is a better boxer than Cotto and more of a troubling style matchup. If Cotto had banged Clottey out or beat him more decisively, I might feel differently – but that wasn’t the case and you’re right, I’m sure the cut played a huge part in that.
Do I think Berto has a shot against him? It depends on how much this took out of Cotto. Berto is definitely a cut below the upper level guys at 147. However, I don’t blame Lou for wanting that fight coming off of this one.
June 15th, 2009 at 9:52 am
Michael Woods also scored it 116-111. I think Teddy Atlas had the best analysis of the fight when he called it a draw at 114-114 saying Cotto fought at times “with the ghost of Margarito hovering over him.” But Atlas said, correctly, Clottey had lost his right to complain about the decision by letting Cotto off so many times. He compared Clottey’s performance to Oscar De La Hoya’s in the Trinidad fight. Trying not to lose rather than trying to win.
June 15th, 2009 at 10:03 am
I’m gonna weigh in and say i scored the fight Clottey. Watched the fight 2 or 3 times by now and all I have to say is the argument that Cotto took a beating to his left face was largely due to vision impairment on the cut is a weaker argument than Cotto kept his left hand at his chest. You can’t stop the beating to your face if every time you throw the jab you pull it back to your chest first. I think Clottey saw this and monopolized on it (not as much as he could have).
Either way Clottey didn’t throw himself in their like he said he wanted it and I would have been tempted to give it to Cotto’s pair just because Clottey didn’t even try to take the fight when he had it. The crying didn’t help much either. Didn’t mean he didn’t win it.
June 15th, 2009 at 10:04 am
Yeah, the cut was terrible. According to my sources, no one on press row thought the fight would make it past the fourth. People were already banging out their “fight stopped on a cut” pieces. They couldn’t believe it kept going, couldn’t believe the doctor didn’t just step in and end it.
Saying the cut invalidated the result was too strong on my part. It didn’t invalidate the championship when the Bulls beat the Lakers in the NBA Finals. But the fact that Magic was injured for the whole thing definitely put an asterisk in the minds of all who saw it. I think the cut so significantly altered the outcome that it’s hard to know what to make of the fight when trying to assess it in a cutless universe. I don’t think we got a great look at where Cottois at right now as a complete fighter because, no matter what he said in the presser, all evidence in the ring pointed to the fact that the cut completely fucked with him from the fourth round on.
And I actually think Clottey might have been better off without Cotto getting cut as well. He didn’t seem comfortable in the chase role, and it seemed to me like he got tired too. I really doubt that Cotto would have been on the bike in that way if he wasn’t cut like that. The thing basically made it impossible for him to stand and trade for any prolonged period, cause his whole left side was completely vulnerable. What he was doing was clear, moving left incessantly, moving his blind side out of danger. I do wonder why he didn’t try to go southpaw, but I think he was in emergency mode in there, not in the mood to play around with another stance.
Now, in the wake of Floyd’s postponement, it looks like Arum is going to be able to hammer through Cotto/Pacquiao for November. And I know that people are feeling like this is the easier fight for Pac right now, and yes, there is no doubt that Cotto just got another beating from another hardass and who knows how many more miles that stacked up on his odometer. I guess if I were Pacquiao, I’d rather fight Cotto than Mosley right now too. But I’m telling you… what that Clottey fight told me about Cotto is that he is ridiculously tough. I also think he hits hard as hell too. Watching it a second time, I thought I saw part of Clottey’s reticence being a respect for Cotto’s pop. He blocked a lot of punches, yes, but he ate some doozies, and a couple of times I saw them get his attention in a way that I’ve rarely seen from Clottey.
In the end, Clottey is a mean motherfucker, and anyone who’s thinks that he was a walkover in that thing is unfairly underestimating him. With his whole game tremendously compromised, Cotto found a way to beat a guy that I’m not sure that Pacquiao could beat when he’s 100% (depending on the weight, of course – Clottey is maybe the physically strongest welter out there right now… at 47 I think he’s just be too strong for Pacquiao). I can see why people are feeling like Cotto’s on the downward trajectory, but I’m not sure about that. I liked what i was seeing of him in the first three rounds the other night.
Another thing – based on what I’ve heard from Freddie Roach, I don’t think he’s at all thrilled with the prospect of Cotto. On that score, though, Cotto needs to get his ass a real trainer pronto. His fucking corner had the feeling of Tyson’s against Buster.
June 15th, 2009 at 10:13 am
From Rafael – 14 stitches to close the main cut, and then 6 more to close the tributary that ran down the eyelid. 20 in all. That’s some fucking gash, man.
As for Dan, he’s a great writer and really knows his stuff, but he can’t score a fight for shit. I remember he had Jermain Taylor beating Pavlik in their rematch by like three points.
June 15th, 2009 at 10:28 am
Sugar Ray Leonard took 60 stitches after the third Duran fight (the fight was a boring and Duran barely moved at all but I’ve never seen a single punch open up a worse cut than the one he caught Leonard with). Hagler was the king of literally cutting opponents up. Hamsho took 55 stitches in his 1981 fight with Hagler and poor Vito Antuofermo took 75 stitches in his first fight with Hagler. I’m not trying to be an asshole, just throwing stuff out there.
June 15th, 2009 at 10:55 am
Brad – it’s true Antuofermo got cut the hell up by Hagler, and he’s still complaining about it. Says it made it impossible for him to win, that the butts were intentional and dirty, and also, I believe, says the fight should have been stopped.
Ray Leonard’s cuts came in the eleventh and twelfth, one in each eye, and they were terrible, took about 20 stitches a piece.
You’re talking about two great fighters in two great fights (both of whom lost), so I don’t know what the argument is. That there have been bad cuts before? Yes. But you know as well as I do that 20 stitiches for a single cut is a mighty bad cut. So why doesn’t Cotto deserve serious props for fighting through it (it was also in a terrible place) for nine rounds and beating a guy like Clottey? I don’t see it.
To me, Cotto put himself in a class of toughness with Antuofermo and Ray Leonard with that performance. I would think you’d be inclined to celebrate that as well, instead of getting all everyone-wad-tougher-back-in-the-day about it. Name me a fight where someone had a cut as bad as Cotto’s for as long as he did and still managed to beat a fighter as good and as tough as Clottey. I can’t think of a guy going that long and winning with a cut that bad except for Gatti over Joe Hutchinson. And Joe Hutchinson was not exactly the wide world of sports.
June 15th, 2009 at 11:00 am
Wait – Sugar Ray won that third fight. Of course. I’m not sure I’m exactly ready to celebrate that as a great moment of heroism (Ali took something of a beating from Ron Lyle too), but no doubt Ray Leonard was a seriously tough SOB, something that is not written enough about him.
June 15th, 2009 at 11:11 am
Well Large the Antuofermo-Hagler fight I mentioned would be the perfect example. Hagler cut him early and after 8 rounds legendary boxing writer George Kimball wrote that Vito’s face looked “someone had used a fungo bat on an over-ripe tomato”….fucking Kimball was my favorite boxing writer. By the 12th, Hagler totally was in command but back came Vito winning the 14th and 15th rounds on all cards and earning a draw(also holding onto his belt). Leonard won his fight with only one cut, over the left eye….again I’m not trying to be a everyone was tougher back in the day kind of guy. Your post about stitches just brought back some memories. That’s all.
June 15th, 2009 at 11:53 am
The Antuofermo fight definitely counts, I agree, although I personally think he should have lost that fight, so much so that I often think of it as a loss in my mind. But Vito… man he was a badass. Although that fight was pretty much the end for him. As Hagler is always happy to point out – he softened him up for Minter.
You sure Leonard didn’t have two cuts in Duran III? I thought he got one in the eleventh and then got the next one, the really bad one, in the 12th.
And, you know, let’s face it – everyone was tougher back in the day. Those were different times. Cotto earned himself some of that cred, I think, for staying in the fight Saturday, just because he could have pulled out if he’d wanted to and it would have been in his best interest to do it. He tells the doctor in the 5th that he can’t see, and that’s it, he wins, and saves himself an unnecessary beating. But it never crossed his mind to go that route.
Never crossed his corner’s mind either. For that, I have less admiration.
June 15th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
so its looking like pac/cotto on november 14th….cotto will be able to afford many lapdances…i wonder if he hires himself a real trainer…and if so…who?
June 15th, 2009 at 12:17 pm
You know Ricky, there can only be one: Floyd M. senior!
June 15th, 2009 at 12:19 pm
Its an unfortunate side-note that the only way Cotto was going to get a Paq fight was to come out of the Clottey fight looking vulnerable and beatable, which he did. I love Cotto, but you can’t blame Arum for wanting Cotto right now. He took 2 hellacious beatings in a row. Cotto could be my favorite fighter, but I’m beginning to think that the Margs thrashing took more out of him than he could ever admit, and we won’t see the fighter I hope we could have. I hope I’m wrong, but I see Paq destroying Cotto, especially as it won’t be over 145.
June 15th, 2009 at 12:30 pm
I don’t know about the two cuts in Duran-Leonard 3, that was a very bad fight that I’ve tried to blot out of my memory. I just remember Duran catching Leonard coming in with one right hand and that eye just opening up.
As far as Vito goes, most everyone thought he lost but he did come back in that fight. Hagler was convinced there was a conspiricy about to keep him from the title. He actually cut up another guy pretty bad in his next title shot come to think of it. A Brit named Alan Minter. Brutal shit. They actully stopped the fight from cuts in the third round. Hagler just cut people to shreds for some reason!!
Cotto had my respect long before saturday nights fight. He could have thrown his hands up and said “No Mas” and that wouldn’t have changed my opinion of him. The thing that was disappointing to me is I think he’s sliding downhill. Fast.
June 15th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
Ricky I hear Floyd Joy Mayweather Sr. is available to train Miguel. He is the greatest trainer of all time, and he would love to even the score with the dreaded Freddie the joke Roach…..what do you think?
June 15th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
Sorry Trickster, you beat me to the punch…how about Ann Wolfe. She’s available.
June 15th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
lol@ann wolfe
June 15th, 2009 at 1:19 pm
Holy shit.. Ann Wolfe! I’d love to see her in a 24/7 talking smack and beating up Freddie.
July 19th, 2010 at 10:54 am
Hello I am so delighted I found your blog, I really got you by mistake, while I was looking on Aol for something else, Anyways I am here now and would just like to say thanks for a great post and a all round entertaining blog (I also love the theme/design), I don’t have time to read it all at the moment but I have bookmarked it and also added your RSS feeds, so when I have time I will be come again to read more, Please do keep up the great work.