Mares-Agbeko, What I Saw

[marbleheadmaui]

I watched the fight a second time, this time with the sound on. Al Bernstein is usually a really, really reserved guy so it was shocking to hear just how bad he thought the events of the evening were.

Agbeko was in contact with Mares's upper body/head many of the times Mares landed low, but it looked to me like that contact was incidental only and that Agbeko was not pulling on Mares' head. Mora made terrible errors in my view by not understanding what he was seeing.

If one takes away two penalty points from Mares, a reasonable call in my view over the course of the fight, and properly calls the second knockdown a low blow, it doesn't change the judges decision. Mares still wins by a point on two cards.

Of course that fails to account for the deterrent effect that referees warnings/deductions would have had on Mares overall body attack, the clean part of which was dazzling. Nor does it account for how the low blows must have sapped Agbeko's energy.

More and more I wonder what the hell Agbeko was doing NOT retaliating. At the championship level "protect yourself at all times" doesn't just mean prevent one's self from getting hit. It means in cases like this policing the fight when the referee can't or won't. There is no question Mares was outside the lines, but Agbeko failed in a way as well.

[THE THIRD MAN]

When will we see a referee actually referee again? I like Abner Mares, he is a great fighter, but he is being misinformed by his handlers if he thinks he will get away with this all the time. I thought Vic was just being a sore loser last time, i have changed my mind after the Agbeko fight. Mares should've been DQ'd and until we get a referee who has the guts to just say enough is enough then these controveries will continue. I want to see rematches with either Vic or Agbeko. There is unfinished business here before any of the three take on Nonito!