Quote Originally Posted by amat
Definitely a fun fight to watch. Feliciano was being absolutely dominated and I don't think he won a single round up until the KO round but I can't help but feel Rodriguez gave him the fight! Maybe that's not fair to say since he was so persistent but still, Rodriguez lost it as much as Feliciano won it.

I really liked Rodriguez in the early going and I was figuring him to vault himself into the rankings in that fight because honestly he was impressing the hell out of me. The way he was laying traps by inviting Feliciano inside then killing him with the uppercut. And the uppercut was really working wonders, it was completely stopping Jesse in his tracks and he really had no answer for it. Even when he got onto the inside he was so worried about that uppercut he really just moved as far inside as possible and smothered Rodriguez. Masterful performance.

But then Feliciano made an adjustment. He picked his head up and stopped leaving himself open for the uppercut. He basically picked his poison and instead of getting tagged with uppercuts he didn't see, he picked his head up, got tagged with the right hand but he had vision on the inside and was able to move in, score to the body a bit and when he landed his first really big right hand Rodriguez got a little fired up. Instead of standing his ground and playing the role of the sharp shooter, he dropped the left hand and shoulder, popped off with the jab a bit more (one of the rare times a consistent jab hurt a fighters chances imo) and instead of standing his ground and being patient he started moving more. The change of pace hurt Delvin and was the main reason he tired out imo.

And when he did tire, and when Feliciano continued to walk through his jab (which upset the timing on the right imo) Rodriguez started moving backwards. Straight backwards. He started that at the end of round 7. And when you move backwards with your left hand down against a guy who's sole purpose in the fight is just to lunge with the right hand, well you get what you saw in round 8.

I feel bad for Rodriguez because he made a mistake just about every prospect in boxing makes and it took away from an otherwise fantastic fight. But that's just the nature of the beast when facing a guy like Feliciano. And that's why all those people who said Feliciano wasn't a step up in competition for Rodriguez were kidding themselves. I wish more people would watch FNF. Great fights.
Impressive attention to detail in your analysis. Very informative post.....