Boxing Perspective: Forgetting The Flip Side

Like many of the people who visit SaddoBoxing, I find myself spending a lot of time on the forum. We have some of the most knowledgeable boxing fans in the world who post there daily. It’s always fun, you can get into a good debate or two and no matter how well schooled you are about the sport, you can always learn something from your fellow members.

I personally have found myself looking at a fight, that was considered very close, in a different light more than once after another member pointed out something that I had missed while watching it the first time. I have even found myself becoming a fan of a fighter I had never before cared for after a fellow member posted a link or two of bouts I had missed of that particular boxer. So it’s reasons like this I have become such a big fan of the boards.

Recently, there was a thread that had changed focus at mid-point. It had turned from being about the boxers to a referee. Richard Steele had become the focus of this thread and in particular, his stoppage of the first Meldrick Taylor vs. Julio Cesar Chavez bout.

Richard was criticized for ending the bout with just a few seconds left. Another poster had stated how was he supposed to know there was only two seconds to go. This is a debate that has ensued dozens of times over the years. Steele is a good referee who has been involved in dozens of world title or high profile bouts. 99% of the time his job is done to perfection but due to the Chavez-Taylor I fight and the controversy around it, he will forever be haunted about his decisions in the ring.

I personally have felt there are fights he stopped too soon but truth is if not for Chavez Taylor, I may not have even given most of his decisions a second thought.

As fans of the sport, we want to see all bouts come to a KO end. We love knockouts and lets face it, that is the most craved ending in any fight. I will be the first to admit to seeing a guy deliver a three or four punch combo that lands hard, sending his opponent to the floor, gets my blood pumping.

This is why guys like Tyson, Foreman, Duran and Hearns over the years have become so loved. For their KO power. We also love the fighters who can give us toe to toe action all night long. Guy’s like Gatti and Mayorga who have one mode, win or lose, and that is fight until you can’t fight anymore.

A few nights ago, while watching ESPN Classic Boxing after the replay of the Hector Camacho vs. Patrick Goosen fight, something happened that made me think back to Richard Steele and the post from earlier in the day on the boards.

After the ESPN bout ,they went back to the studio to hear the comments from the analysts there, as they normally do ,and one of the announcers (who at the moment escapes my mind) made a comment about Hector Camacho and his speech starting to slur as an obvious sign that a guy has been taking to much punishment over the years and might want to think about getting out of the sport.

When they panned back to the post fight interview with the “Macho Man”, I had noticed it quite clearly. Something I may not have, if not mentioned by the broadcasters. Camacho indeed had the loose drawl more commonly know as “Punchy” or “Punch Drunk”.

This again brought me to thinking about the boards and a thread about Evander Holyfield, where it seems that the people who responded to the thread are divided about his return. Half are for it and have faith in him while the other half feel he should get out before he gets hurt. This is something I found interesting for several reasons.

The first reason is that we all like to criticize the refs and fighters for what they do. Be it how
a fighter should happen to perform on one particular night or how a ref should make an error in a judgment call. We all do it myself included. This is part of being a fan and the fun of it.

The second is that many of us give no thought (again I am including myself in this) to their situation. What we don’t see is what happens with these guys after they leave the ring. We are not there when they are no longer involved in the sport; it is easy to speak of something that you don’t have to deal with.

As people, it is our nature to be critical and we will continue to be that way, but when we look at it from the other side, maybe we can understand it just a little bit better.

When we blast a fighter for his poor performance in the ring, what we fail to realize is he is just like us. An everyday person who has his good days and bad. I know we have all gone to work and just had one of those days where nothing goes right or we are so swamped that we seem to get nothing done. Good thing about it is that we can go home at 5 o’clock, return tomorrow and finish what wasn’t done or get some help from a co-worker to finish up what we have to do.

We will still be paid the same. We have the comfort of knowing one bad day isn’t the end of things. We can call in sick if we don’t feel well one day and finish up left over projects the next.

Fighters do not have this luxury. They train for months for 36 minutes of work. If the day comes to getting the job done and the fighter is having a bad day, they can’t just call it off. They have no sick pay or another fighter who can fill in for the evening. If they don’t fight, they don’t feed their family. It’s that simple.

An off night can take away their marketability. A loss can knock them out of the big picture. Another thing we forget is that it doesn’t matter if a guy makes $3,000,000 a fight or $500, he still goes in and puts his health on the line and takes the chance of everything he has worked for and dreamed of being taken away in the short amount of time between bells.

Boxers are a rare breed of people and it takes more than just two fists in a pair of gloves to do what they do. It takes a dedication that I don’t think we as fans can fully understand. A disastrous night can mean more than just a few bumps and bruises.

When it comes to a fighter’s career, we tend to forget that their window of earnings are limited. We have 65 years to keep putting food on the table. A fighter has less than half of that. They have no social security or pension. If they happen to mismanage their investments, or make the mistake of not saving for a rainy day than they must continue to fight, If they want to continue to eat. Sometimes long after their bodies are willing to allow.

God forbid they become hurt and cannot fight anymore. They are dependent on what they have made previously to live on. Having to pay extreme medical bills that can run an account dry before you can say ding. They take this chance every time they put on the gloves.

They do this for the same reasons that we watch the sport and that is love of the game.
Except unlike us, they can’t sit back and point fingers when disappointed with outcomes. They can’t simply move on to the next topic. This is something I don’t think we as fans can fully understand. I don’t think it is even something that is able to be fully appreciated unless you have to live with it.

The referees have just as much tension and weight on their shoulders, every time they don the bow-tie. We all complain about the ref. Hell, it’s almost like that’s what he is there for. It almost seems like a job too simple to mess up, I mean how hard can it be to walk around the ring make sure a guy doesn’t hit behind the head, hold too much and keep his punches above the belt?

Truth is, the ref holds a fighter’s future in his hands with just one mistake. If the ref is out of position, he could miss an important foul or even mistake a borderline punch for a foul. A ref who doesn’t do his homework about a certain fighter’s style can make a disastrous call against him. For example, a guy who likes to use a hit and hold style can be mistaken for someone not willing to fight. The ref may penalize them a point for unwillingness that can cost a fighter the bout if it goes to the judges and is close on the cards.

A guy who lays on the ropes and prefers to absorb shots so he can counter, can often be mistaken for a fighter in trouble. So, if he is caught with a good shot and the ref is not familiar with the fighters technique, it could cause him to stop the bout thinking the fighter has had enough.

If the guy is a bleeder, the ref must know exactly what is normal for the fighter. A guy like Gatti, who swells easily, could be mistaken for a guy who is getting beat up worse than he is. A ref must know the difference. A referee must also know when a fighter has had enough even if he visibly shows no signs being hurt.

Poor judgment of these situations can be crucial to a fighter’s future. Not just inside the ring but outside, too. A bad call could leave a man broken for the rest of his life. The only way I could compare an error like this would be if you lets say…. I don’t know, …you’re driving down a road and you look left for oncoming traffic. When you do you suddenly hit someone who came from the right and the person you hit ends up in a wheel chair for the rest of their life. You now have the burden of always wondering why you looked left and how you could of avoided this tragedy.

This is the weight an official has on his shoulders if he makes a bad call. If you ask me, it’s a lot of responsibility to take on every night. Of course, this rarely happens but the chance of it is always there.

When I think about the criticism against Richard Steele and his stoppages and the state of many fighter’s health, I almost have to wonder if sometimes the fights should have been stopped even sooner. If every bout was stopped a punch or two sooner, maybe some of the guys out there wouldn’t be suffering the effects of the ring they do now.

Look at guy’s like Holyfield, Hearns, Bowe and Norris. They all slur and have the drawl from being hit too many times. What about the tragic figures of the past? Benny Peret, Doo Koo Kim, McClellan, Quarry and Taylor. All suffered either fatal deaths due to boxing or long term side effects that interfere in everything from speech patterns to day to day living.

This is the sport of boxing and these things happen all the time; bad calls by refs and nights that a fighter just isn’t on his A game. They will continue to happen for as long as the sport exist. They are the things that we tend not to think about.

So, as a fan who takes the liberty to point blame and criticize I would like to say something….

To the boxers who step between the ropes: win, lose or draw, you are all champions in my book. It doesn’t matter if you are the pound for pound best or the guy with the 2-50-12 record. You put it all on the line and I as a fan appreciate it every time you do. Whether I love ya or hate ya, I wish you the best of luck.

To the refs who watch over the bouts and make sure the fellows go by the book: make sure the fighters get a fair shake and do your best to keep them out of any serious harms way. I applaud you. It is a responsibility that I wouldn’t want on my shoulders everyday. You guys do a great job, to the best of your ability, and I respect that.

I cannot lie; after I write this, I will return to the boards and complain about and blast every single one of you if the situation warrants it. Whenever one of my favorite fighters is insulted by another poster or a ref makes a call against them that I feel was costly, you can look for me to be at the top of the finger pointing list. When a fighter has an off night and performs badly, I will still be more than glad to point it out. Except now I will appreciate it a little bit more.