Like I said before the fight, I give Khan credit for even taking this fight given his shaky past in the ring with punchers. That he also won the fight after being hurt by Maidana is testament to his desire and heart. I give it up to him.

After watching Hatton and Maidana fight PBF and Khan, if I'm a swarming, inside fighter, I would NEVER agree to Joe Cortez as the ref. Significantly, he broke up the fight when he shouldn't have. He did an all around poor job. It definitely felt like Maidana may have had him out of there if Cortez hadn't hadn't consistely interfered.


Here is a good article on Cortez's bum job: A Note on Khan vs. Maidana: Overly Involved Joe Cortez - Boxing News
  • Notably, Cortez broke the fighters up prematurely 36 times.
I gave round 10 to Maidana with a 10-8 score and rounds 11-12 to Maidana as 10-9 rounds. I thought it was pretty clear. Maidana landed more punches than Khan and controlled the pace. Khan just spent the rounds retreating. It's what he had to do to win. Nothing really wrong with it to win, but you don't win rounds doing it.

Here is the link for the compubox punch statistics: Amir Khan vs. Marcos Maidana - CompuBox Stats

Quick summary of rounds 10-12 (note that Khan's output dropped in half after round 9):

Round 10: AK -12/35, MM - 26/85
Round 11: AK - 12/29, MM - 19/64
Round 12: AK - 11/32, MM - 20/83

Given that I gave rounds 10-12 to Maidana with a 10-8 round for Maidana in the 10th, I had Amir taking a close decision win. I thought if Cortez hadn't deducted the point from Maidana (or had deducted one from Khan for holding), I wouldn't have been too upset with a draw. Well, I'm not sure, I need to see it once more, I had Khan winning this fight though.

CompuBox at Ringside: Khan-Maidana, Ortiz-Peterson - Boxing News

I thought Khan would dominate Maidana from piller to post for 12 rounds and instead Maidana made the fight very interesting. So, in a way, Maidana's stock rose more than Khan's did for me. On the other hand, Maidana looked sooo slow in there, and the reason was probably because Khan was sooo fast. Also, Khan showed grit and determination that I didn't know he possessed. Strangely, even though he survived Maidana's bombs, I still believe punchers are Khan's weakness. Paulie is a much better boxer than Maidana, and much faster, but Khan dominated Paulie. His performances against the two boxers couldn't be more different.

Hats off to El Chino. He came into the fight the vast underdog. He was up against a boxer with a much better pedigree (Freddie Roach-trained, Olympic medal winner, vast amateur experience etc). He showed championship heart too.