Gamo's feedback on Cotto v Tony. Please post, I want to see your thoughts.

[X]

This fight necessitates a rare pure boxing post from X:


Well, I was really looking forward to this fight.


Cotto had looked spectacular in his last few outings, especially against the limited Gomez, where he was able to show off his full repertoire of skills. Squat, balanced, slick and powerful, he was everything that Andre Berto dreams to be.The boxing press and HBO were treating Cotto as The Next Big Thing.


I had seen Margarito sleepwalk through the first 6 rounds against Paul Williams, but then watched him take away Cintron's heart in a performance of almost Duran-like intensity - he plodded through Kermit's bombs like an army at Passchendale ... stoic, unflinching and unyielding, he battered through the barrage. Cintron - a man who'se self-worth as a fighter was measured purely and simply by his power, was utterly broken and may never be the same again.


The build up to the fight was conducted by two professionals who respected each other and not characterised by wrestling-style badmouthing and bullshit. Two REAL fighters, at the top of their game, confident in their ability, either could win .... in a classic Mexico-Puerto Rico clash. World class, qualified international monsters.


To insiders in the game, this was the biggest clash since Hearns-Leonard.

Disappointingly, in an age when the general sporting public want Wrestlemania XX, or boxers with enormous egos and flashy style, or Olympic gold medallists massacring tomato cans, this fantastic event received poor media coverage outside the boxing press (and posters onj this site!) and the man in the street had not engaged with these two fighters (who, in this poster's humble opinion would have competed very well with Sugar Ray and the Hitman in their welterweight days).


At the pre-fight ceremonies.... the shape of things to come ..... Margarito was HUGE. He towered over Cotto by a good four inches and his arms hung down nearly to his knees, he looked like a telescopic welterweight and we were reminded that Cotto has moved up a division to the welters. Miguel was squat, fit looking and he seemed nonchalent allright, but that size difference must have wormed its way into his mind.


The ringwalks ... Margarito enters the ring first, he looks relaxed and is jumping around a lot (maybe he's warmed up properly and won't plod through the first half of the fight because that would be a major error against a fast starter of Cotto's calibre.) He is relaxed enough to milk the crowd's attention and make the arean his own - so that Cotto, a champion too, has to make his ringwalk and entrance into territory already staked out by the Tijuana Tornado .... Margarito has a face hewn out of rock, a wolflike beard makes him look like a renegade pirate and there is no doubt at all that this is a fearsome warrior. Cotto comes in, but he looks nervous, he bounds around the ring and the two fighters avoid eye contact. Cotto disrobes and he looks sleek, his shaven head and high facial features drawing similarities with fighting men of old - Joe Gans, Jack Johnson and innumerable back and white images of stern, teak-tough fighters whose ghosts haunt boxing to this day. The two men receive their ring talk impassively, locking eye contact and searching each others souls .... both know they are facing a real fighting man who will likely die before giving in. It's going to be a long night.


The bell goes, and I got that old adrenaline flush that I used to get for all the great, anticipted fights - finally, let's get to work! Immediately, it's obvious that Margarito will be the aggressor, Cotto cedes the centre of the ring, backing up straight away and I knew that he had noted that enormous size difference - had he already accepted that he would not knock out the Beast that is Antonio Margarito?


The first six rounds pass in a blur - absolute masterful boxing by Cotto, who would have thought that he could do this as well, under such pressure, with so much grace. he is backing up, never in a straight line, slipping and sliding and showing angles that Margarito will never even have dreamed of, he lays his traps superbly and beautifully timed, short combinations and even uppercuts detonate of Margarito's head time after time after time. He even lands left uppercuts on the right side of Antonio's head - he can't even be seeing these coming - but Margarito plods on relentlessly, bombs and missiles exploding all around him ..... what on earth is keeping him up? The man doesn't even flinch, he doesn't draw breath, he doesn't blink or aknowledge the swirling dizziness and pain that he must be feeling. I have never seen such durability in a welterweight, especially one who must struggle to make weight. Cotto is pure poetry - smooth as Mayweather or Leonard, but with a vicious hurtful power that neither possessed. He also has more than arrows in his mental quiver than Cintron, he is not just a puncher, not just a boxer .... we are looking at a complete fighter here.

[X]

The commentators have Cotto ahead after 6, but by less by than I do. Margarito has NOT sleepwalked through the first half of this fight, but he may well have done - Cotto has been supreme. The 7th may well be the round of the year - Margarito somehow, amazingly, courageously, incredibly has upped his pace. he had spent the first 6 looking outclassed, but he had done his groundwork and softening up - he's artfully been cutting off the ring so he was taking three steps to Cotto's six and he had been targeting the Cotto body with wicked hurtful blows that must accumulate. His preparation complete, he moved to a full out blitzkreig assault that Rocky Marciano would have been proud off.

Margarito actually begins throwing punches when he was out of range and he just continues to punch as he literally RAN after Cotto, who found it increasingly difficult to counter this human chainsaw who just kept coming, like some science fiction robot.


The pivotal moment in the fight, halfway through the 7th - Margarito bulldozes Cotto onto the ropes, he leans on him so he can't slip and slide out, and he throws three consecutive left hook/uppercuts.

Now it is worth dwelling on these three punches.


We've seen Ali, both Sugar Ray's, Pretty Boy, Roy Jones and others throw three consecutive left hooks. We marvel at their athleticism, skill and coordination.


Margarito's three lefts were different. They were sickening blows. They were smashes. If you've ever seen a streetfight and someone stamping onna defenceless man's head, that's how these blows were. There was no 'thwack' of leather, these made a meaty 'splat' as they landed. And, sometime between the first and the third punch ...... something physically broke in Cotto's face.

You could tell he was stunned and hurt, his mouth and nose streamed blood and this continued to pump out aggressively for the rest of the fight, to the extend that he clearly couldn't breathe through his nose and had to keep swallowing or spitting out blood for the rest of his time in that ring.


Those three brutal, clubbing thwacks had changed the tempo of the fight. The moon and the sun and starts were now with Margarito. Where previously, Cotto was slipping and avoiding, laying traps and detonating counterpunches like a seasoned and expert guerilla campaigner, now it was HE who was retreating in straight lines, looking for survival, employing all his skills to stay in the ring with this relentless madman while he couldn't breathe.


Margarito was driven, it was as if he was possessed by some ancient demon of boxing - a throwback to the grim brutality of the battle Royals, the Early Prize Ring, Cobblestone boxing, where to pause - to show mercy, to rest - were punishable by your own maiming and eath. Antonio Margarito was fantastic.


The tables had turned, Margarito's size, aggression and durability - he was like a piece of leather that no matter how hard you beat it, twisted it, gouged it, scratched, bit or ground, it always just springs back into shape .... shaggy and battered, but a functional and serious piece of equipment - that might be a fitting epitaph for Margarito the fighter!

In a strange twist, emphasising the duality of boxing, it was only now that only really saw how complete Cotto actually is .... he was spent by the end of the eighth ...... he couldn't breathe, he was losing lots of blood and having to swallow it so the ref wouldn't stop the fight - anyone remember Chavez-Taylor? , but he showed a true Champions heart and real fibre.

Anybody who has ever boxed will tell you that it's the worst feeling in the world to be physically finished, your body has absolutely nothing left to offer and you are in serious pain, but your heart won't let you quit. You'll stay up out of pride, but you know that you can't protect yourself.


Imagine having that feeling, and knowing that Antonio Margarito was going to come rampaging after you, knowing he is frutrated and angry, knowing he is pitiless.


Cotto showed me something that few fighters have the opportunity to show - he took a beating from the 7th onward, he is in his prime and many fighters don't recover (but look at Joe Louis, he learned a few lessons from his battering at the hands of Max Schmeling when he was still young and hungry) I think Cotto will as well.


When Cotto finally, almost reluctantly went down, it wasn't his heart that let him down .... his body had completely shut down. face smeared in bolld, eyes unfocused, in pain and (I'm sure) holding an enormous oxygen debt, he folded to the canvas... and the fight was over.


The aftermath - dignity from both fighters. I think Cotto is the better boxer of the two, his skills were awesome to behold, power, speed, economy of movement, elusiveness, heart, fitness - the full package. he'ss be back and he will be a better (but less feared) fighter for it. Would he give Mayweather fits .... absolutely.


Margarito - derided by some for being one-dimensional .... and yes he is. But so what. He was the better FIGHTER on the night. He is a tough-as-nails, straight forward aggressive puncher with a chin and heart second to none. He follows in a long and distinguished line of glorious Mexican fighting men. What a great dimension to have, who needs more than that one?


Would Antonio beat Floyd .... no, he can be outboxed (and while he absolutely won the fight fair and square and would have competed with any welterweight in history that night), If you put Antonia Margarito in a telephone box with Wlad Klitschko, I know who would come out the winner.............. but I wonder how things would have panned out had he not smashed Cotto's nose and lip in the seventh.



What a fantastic fight. Two great fighters ... and as you can tell, I seriously enjoyed it!!

Hope you enjoyed the read.

[Spicoli]

Awesome....thats just top notch a great description and breakdown X I do believe Cotto was putting on a boxing "How to" early on,but at the same time he was feeling those shots big time beginning in the 2nd.Tony worked that body big time all the way through,Great fight!

[Kev]

Congratulations on getting married Gamo. And to think it was only yesterday when you were asking the members here for pregnancy advice when your g/f wanked you off into your boxers

I guess you'll almost be ready for full sex soon

Hope it's all going well mate, miss you not being on the boards.

[OumaFan]

Well Bilbo beat me to it and said something similar to what I was going to say but I did find it kind of funny that El Gamo's married. In all seriousness congratulations. Hopefully there was somebody there to make sure you got to the right ceremony on time.

As to the fight, I thought Cotto was a bit too good but obviously I was wrong on that.

[El Gamo]

Thanks for the congrats,I miss you guys alot!I'm definitely going to try to be online more once the "honeymoon" period is over!!! It's hard at the moment! How's everyone else on the board? All the legends still here(Wacko,Mick,Sheep,VD,Amat etc etc etc?)

As for Cotto outclassing Tony,I think I can fairly easily say you were...WRONG! And I disagree with those that say Cotto was winning easily. He was boxing way wya way more than he is used,and on his bike way way more simply because of the pressure TOny was putting on him. And his body was getting hammered from the start.