A Decade’s Worth of Hits…and Misses
With only hours remaining before the book on the last decade is closed, it’s time for one last look at where boxing excelled over the past 10 years and where it fell short of fans’ expectations.
Biggest Hits
5. HBO’s “24/7″
From the mind of Floyd Mayweather Jr. – and the funding of HBO – came an innovative new show focusing on the life of a boxer as he prepares for a big fight. The first use of this introspective series helped promote the superfight between Mayweather and Oscar De La Hoya in 2007 and was appropriately titled “De La Hoya-Mayweather 24/7.”
“24/7″ was used to build up seven fights and featured eight different fighters. The financial success of the biggest fights of the last several years, including De La Hoya-Mayweather, Mayweather-Hatton, De La Hoya-Pacquiao, Mayweather-Marquez and Cotto-Pacquiao has all been, at least in part, the result of the insider access fans get by watching “24/7.”
4. Showtime’s Super Six World Boxing Classic
In one of boxing’s late but most important successes of the decade, Showtime came up big by organizing a tournament-style competition pitting the top super middleweights in the world against one another to battle for supremacy. With one round completed, the boxing world is as intrigued as it is entertained by the happenings thus far.
Showtime’s success is now boxing’s success as HBO will undoubtedly organize similar tournaments (the organization currently is trying to form one with the junior welterweights). Rather than dealing with unwarranted mandatory opponents and indefinite layoffs between fights, the top boxers in each division should be clashing more and more often going forward.
3. Mega-Money Fights
In what currently sits as the highest-grossing fight in boxing history, the biggest name in the sport – De La Hoya – took on the best fighter in the sport – Mayweather – in 2007. While the fight was more of a chess match, the promotion was unbelievably big and caught the attention of sports fans the world over. Boxing was very much mainstream again.
Mayweather emerged victorious with a split decision in that fight and went on to take Oscar’s place as the top dog in the sport, a position for which he now competes exclusively with Manny Pacquiao. This, in turn, will likely lead to more records being broken with a fight between Mayweather and Pacquiao in early 2010.
2. A Trilogy of Trilogies
Boxing fans were treated to three incredible trilogies in the decade, beginning with the very personal and very real battles between Erik Morales and Marco Antonio Barrera – the first and third of which were instant classics that took Fight of the Year honors. Barrera emerged victorious by winning the rubber match in late 2004.
Arturo Gatti and Mickey Ward fought an even more brutal trilogy within the span of about a year from 2002 to 2003. As was the case with Barrera and Morales, the first and third fights won Fight of the Year. Gatti lost the first meeting – a contender for the greatest fight of all time – but won the next two. After their epic rivalry, Gatti and Ward formed a friendship that lasted until Gatti’s shocking suicide this year.
Israel Vazquez and Rafael Marquez closed out the decade with three memorable battles of their own. Vazquez surrendered after a nose injury in the first fight but came back to knock Marquez out in the rematch, which won Fight of the Year in 2007. Unlike most trilogies, they saved the best for last. Vazquez won by a point in the rubber match – 2008’s Fight of the Year – after scoring a last second knockdown.
Marquez and Vazquez are now gearing up for a fourth fight in early 2010 to start the new decade off with a bang.
1. The Greatest Fight…Ever?
The Fight of the Decade and a legitimate candidate for the greatest of all time was the first encounter between WBC Lightweight Champion Jose Luis Castillo and WBO Champion Diego Corrales in 2005. Having cleared out the opposition, including former champions Joel Casamayor and Acelino Freitas, Corrales and Castillo were set to clash and determine who was the best in boxing’s then-most exciting division.
Corrales nearly pulled the plug on the fight in 2004 but saw the importance of the match and, in his own words, “walked through hell” for nine brutal rounds to stop Castillo in the tenth – a round in which Corrales twice hit the deck and had to spit out his mouthpiece to buy recovery time. Corrales somehow came back to finish the granite-chinned Castillo moments later in a finish that had to be seen to be believed.
Biggest Misses
5. Shane Mosley’s Steroid Scandal
There could be no bigger miss in the next decade than the proposed Floyd Mayweather Jr.-Manny Pacquiao showdown falling apart. As it stands at the moment, the only detail keeping that fight from being signed is an argument over how the fighters will be tested for steroids and illegal substances.
The reason for the debate probably stems from the fact that Shane Mosley did not test positive for steroids prior to his second fight with Oscar De La Hoya in 2003, though he has since admitted to using two illegal substances at the time. If the Nevada State Athletic Commission’s tests can be circumvented, then its authority in matters of testing for banned substances should be questioned.
4. The CSAC Takes the Wrap(s) on Antonio Margarito
It’s hard to condemn an organization that sanctions violence for just anything – but when its absent-mindedness could cost a man his life, it’s a serious issue. Prior to his bout with Shane Mosley in January, Antonio Margarito was caught loading his gloves with bits of plaster of Paris. He was caught not by appointed California State Athletic Commission officials but by Mosley’s trainer, Naazim Richardson.
The discovery of Margarito’s illegal tactics brought into question the legitimacy of his other victories, namely his biggest against Miguel Cotto, whose face was busted up and grossly contorted after losing to Margarito. Fortunately, Margarito and his trainer had their licenses revoked, but Margarito has the opportunity to earn it back at a forthcoming hearing – before the same commission that failed to catch him.
3. Diego Corrales vs. Jose Luis Castillo III (2006)
After their first encounter easily took home Fight of the Year in 2005, Corrales and Castillo fought a rematch just five months later. Before the fight, Castillo weighed in well above the 135-pound limit, and one of his trainers was even caught attempting to take pressure off the scale to mask the fact. Corrales, the champion, agreed to fight anyway and was knocked out in four short rounds.
The rubber match was even more anticipated once Corrales stated that the fight was now personal. But Castillo again failed to make weight the day before the third fight, and this time, Corrales wisely walked away rather than put himself at risk. Neither fighter ever recovered from the incident as Castillo was fined and suspended and Corrales died tragically in a motorcycle accident the following year.
2. Lennox Lewis vs. Vitali Klitschko II (2003, 2004)
Lennox Lewis’ last defense of the Heavyweight Championship came against late substitute Vitali Klitschko in the summer of 2003. Lewis had been planning to fight Kirk Johnson and came into the bout grossly out of shape a few months shy of 38 years of age. What ensued was arguably the best heavyweight fight of the decade – won by Lewis on cuts after six hellacious rounds.
A rematch would have done big pay-per-view numbers, but Lewis, knowing his body better than anyone else, decided against risking his legacy against Vitali again. Instead, Lewis rode off into the sunset and left the heavyweight division in its current predicament – with no champion and few legitimately great fighters to clamor for that title.
1. Roy Jones Jr. vs. Bernard Hopkins II (2002)
Roy Jones Jr. beat Bernard Hopkins by unanimous decision in 1993, which was Hopkins’ only loss over the next 12 years. After Bernard knocked out Felix Trinidad in 2001 to become the undisputed Middleweight Champion, the stage was set for the long-awaited rematch between Jones – the consensus number one fighter in the world – and Hopkins – the consensus number two fighter in the world.
But egos got in the way as each refused to budge enough to hammer out a deal. Jones didn’t want to fight too far below 175 pounds, and Hopkins didn’t want to go too high from 160. They couldn’t agree on the purse split either, even though attempts were made through the decade. When Danny Green knocked out Jones this month, so too did he knock out the fight that refused to happen, once and for all.
The best two fighters in the world once again have the opportunity to face off in the next decade, with Mayweather and Pacquiao currently in talks. Both men would be wise to reexamine the enormous failure of Hopkins and Jones to make a deal and how it robbed boxing of one of the most meaningful fights in history.
Conclusion: Any boxing fan would agree that the hits over the last decade far outweighed the misses. Classic battles and high profile money fights made the sport as strong as it has been since the end of the last decade, which was marred by bad decisions like Oscar De La Hoya’s controversial loss to Felix Trinidad and Lennox Lewis’ disgusting draw with Evander Holyfield. With HBO and Showtime using their resources to deliver the fights fans want to see and producing in-depth looks at the fighters that comprise them, boxing is in fantastic shape heading into 2010.
