Boxing Lesson Rocky 6 Fails to Teach Us
By Mortz Ortigoza
I just saw the flick Rocky 6. It’s a $ 26,033,000 box office hit directed and screen played by Sylvester Stalone that was released in the U.S last Dec 22. But already a ubiquitous and measly priced DVD stuff at the sidewalks here in the Philippines.
To buttress its verisimilitude, some of the personalities were real boxing honchos like HBO Pay Per Views’ Analyst Bert Randolph Sugar, Commentators Jim Lampley, Larry Merchant, and Max Kellerman, Ring Announcer Michael Buffer, and Referee Joe Cortez.
Mike Tyson was there too, and was seen inside the MGM exchanging invectives with Antonio Tarver a.k.a Mason “the Line” Dixon-- the heavyweight nemesis of Rocky Balboa.
Even as this film piggyback on the marquee Hopkins-Taylor II in Las Vegas, Nevada, even as the 14,000 crowd at the MGM excitedly roared “Rocky, Rocky, Rocky” when Stallone was seen emerging from his bunk, I had still that high level breath taking psychedelic feeling whenever a Manny Pacquaio, an Oscar dela Hoya, or a Roy Jones (during his prime) ingress the hallway.
Despite the multi-million budget the producer had invested, the film still lacks
some boxing expert advises.
On the third round, Dixon grimaced from an excruciating pain after he broke his left hand after he hit with a debilitating left hook the bony part of Rocky’s right waist. He acknowledged this fracture to his chief second on the round’s one minute break.
In the following rounds, Dixon was like a black Zorro thrusting, hooking, upper cutting, you name it all the possible thing words he could do so his able right hand could helped him as he mixed with Rocky.
After another sequel of rounds, his broken left hand miraculously recovered and started to bombard Balboa like a whack-whack gun.
Then the controversial part started to roll before my eyes in the last 10th round of this exhibition fight, when a left hook caught the right chin of Balboa that made him twist 180 degree to his left side and eventually fell but was cushioned by his left fist that he planted on the canvass.
He looks like an aging former Olympic player in the old days preparing to make a last dash of his life.
A child who is treated by this stunt could exclaim: “Mommie, I thought we are watching Rocky, but what does old Ben Johnson been doing there on the big
screen?”
As this heart stopping drama of Rocky started to fall at the deck like a log—ala Saddam Hussien going for a free fall as seen on YouTube-- a flashback momentarily snatched my attention as the film brought back some of the past fights of the hero in Rocky 1 to 5, and his loved ones.
Flashback in slow motion ended.
Then the celluloid, brought Rocky standing up, and referee Cortez commanding the two warriors to continue to box, as Lampey, Merchant, and Kellerman continued to spruce up with gusto the audio with their blow-by-blow scripted commentary.
Now here is my beef:
Why in heaven sake Cortez, Lampey, Merchant, and Kellerman didn’t protest to Director Stallone when they were filming about this patent and wanton violation of a knockdown rule?
To quote a ruling in the Nevada State Athletic Association (NSAC) (A body that governs all boxing bout held in Las Vegas
“An unarmed combatant shall be deemed to be down when: a) Any part of his body other than his feet is on the floor…”( NAC 467.760).
To attest the mandate of this statute, the Tarver-Hopkins real life scuffle (that ensued months after the Rocky 6 shooting in the Taylor-Hopkins II ) showed how Tarver was counted for a knockdown when he staggered backward and touched his hand on the floor as a result of a flushed punched from Hopkins.
Rocky should be counted first by Cortez of the mandatory 10 counts. And if the former dominated the said round, he would be awarded with a 10-8 score.
If this 10 round fiasco happened in real life, Cortez I feared would be sleeping by now on the cold floor of Alcatraz, if not suspended as what his colleague Laurence Cole suffered because of an unethical actuation in the Manuel Marquez- Jimrex Jaca tussle in Texas recently
.
Though Rocky 6 is a fiction, the lesson we can derive here is boxing commentators like those HBO guys (who were part of this 10 round rigmarole)
And other commentators out there should be knowledgeable about the rulings
that govern pugilistic game.
They should read intently regulation embodied in NSAC , Association of Boxing Commissions, Professional Boxing Safety Act , and other stuffs that oversee matches on a particular area to add not only excitement but education to those who bothered to listen on their gabs.
(Send comments at
totomortz@yahoo.com, and mobile phone # 09192760964)
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