Cotto And Margarito To Rematch Next Summer

[Taeth]

Wow,thats alot,well thought out there but the bottom line is should Cotto stand in /Tie up and put himself at range even more so......The damage will accumulate faster Imo.He could not,did not deter Margarito in the least although his head shots were great. Margarito.....while not an accurate explosive one punch bomber.....was having a very noticeable effect on Cotto as early as the second round,he cut the ring off and was busting the body hard.This one comes down to imposing physicality all over again for me.Sometimes the reason fighter A will/did not do something is because fighter B did not allow it!And vice versa.

Cotto did not "Give up" on his own volition,he fought his set off.....Margarito had quite abit to do with that decision making process.

You think if Cotto was in the middle of the ring he would accumulate more punches than if he was on the ropes? what kind of logic is that? When your opponent is on the ropes you can plant your feet, you get more leverage on your punches, you don't need as ,uch footwork or anything. Also when Cotto was on the ropes Margarito can dictate the range. Cotto wouldn't accululate damage faster because there is the concept called smothering. If Cotto gets too close, Margarito will not be able to land as many punches, nor will he be able to get that many off

Because of COtto defensive style on the ropes Margarito is able to throw 4-5 punches in a row. If you watch Mayweather against Hatton especially who was an even more pressuring fighter you will see that the way to get around this is to slip a punch and get inside and clinch your opponent.

People will say that this isn't COtto's style, but a great fighter isn't subject to one way of fighting. I just watched the fight and I admit Cotto will not be able to punch and run for 12 rounds against Margarito, he isn't quick enough, and he will tire himself out, He basically ran for 11 rounds last time.

For Cotto to win this he needs to use more lateral movement in the middle of the ring, he needs to clinch after the first or second punch Margarito throws when Margarito has him on the ropes, and he needs to make Margarito move laterally a lot more, in doing so he will take steem off Margarito's punches, He will take away Margarito's ability to plant his feet(like Hopkins did to Trinidad), and he will make things easier for himself.

Personally I think Margarito doesn't like fighting truly on the inside, people say he outmuscled Cotto, but I don't see it, Duran muscled opponents around, Hatton muscled Tszyu around, they used their strenght to literally push their opponent around, Margarito uses his stamina and indestructibility to come forward and break the will of his opponents through a barrage of punches. I've noticed Margarito can throw short punches, but he loves the distane just outside of in-fighting. ON the inside he is a little too long to be effective, and on the outside he is too slow and untechnical to beat opponents, Cotto needs to learn from Hopkins and Mayweather how to take away that middle range, their greatness has been based on that, now Cotto if he wants that same greatness needs to do the same. I have no doubt if they are in close Cotto's body build will make him the stronger guy, a much lower center of gravity and shorter arms are more important the closer opponents get, and so Cotto needs to mix up by beating Margarito to the punch on the inside, and countering him effectively on the outside.

Pretty basic logic actually.It is obvious....Cotto can not maintain an inside perimitor and mount an effective offense if he is concentrating so much on clinching.He can tempo this with sharp circling to a degree Imo but all in all I see Martgarito as just to strong one way or the other.Find me a line where I said Cotto should stand on the ropes against Margarito....?? I can find you many where I stated prior that said it would be his down fall though!!

Cotto only chance of winning this I believe will be a doubled up severe body attack and tight boxing.It is very apparent that hitting Tony in the head is akin to throwing rocks at a tank.Do not under estimate Margaritos inside bodywork as well,ecspecially the short left upper-hook.Plain and simple......I do not believe Cotto can/will stand on the inside with Margarito and maintain the middle of the ring...Tony is too strong...and when He boxes out,Coto will be pushed to the ropes.

I have nothing but respect for Cotto and am of mind that he will rebound in the future to attain status once again,But he is No Hopkins.Hopkins transformed over career from an in your face offensive machine to a tatical sharpshooter and some would argue an inside grappler not ashamed to make it ugly,its apples and oranges here.Cotto is far from this complete tranformation at this point in career and I dont see anything off the last fight that leads me to believe he can pull it off suddenly in rematch........Frankly,I think an immediate rematch with Margarito is a mistake.He needs to rebuild,retool and go graduale Imo......his pride is apparent.

Magarito likes it close to a degree, I am talking about right inside. Margarito has shown great durability, but once again there were a few times Cotto literally spun Margarito around onto the ropes because Cotto such a strong base and he is strong himself, but after he would turn Margarito around he would just back off.

Margarito did a horrible job of cutting off the ring, he was chasing Cotto as opposed to really cutting it off, its just Cotto was making it easy to pressure him, because he was moving straight backwards, and wouldn't everytime Margarito would start punching Cotto would go into a shell on the ropes.

What I am saying is that Cotto doesn't need to make the full transformation Hopkins did(which isn't entirely true if you see his fights against Echols where he first truly transformed to that style) Hopkins wasn't a pure boxer yet, but he payed attention to the footwork, and realized how important it is. You say Cotto can't maintain an effective offense while focusing on clinching, I say watch Duran-Leonard 1, watch Hatton against Tszyu, but mainly watch Holyfield against Tyson 1, Holyfield let Tyson come in, he would clinch Tyson once they were on the inside then he would let off the quick short punches. This is how he beat the stronger, more powerful, faster Mike Tyson.
Cotto doesn't even need to really have an effective offense if he is negating Margarito's offense by clinching. I am not saying he should tread stupidly forward into oncoming shots to clinch on Margarito which it seems you think I am saying, i am saying after he dodges a few punches which he was able to do the first time, he shouldn't always counter and move away, its too tiring.

Hatton was praising Mayweather's ability to find spots to rest, and thats because Mayweather would was able to tie Hatton up. But not just by clinching he also made sure they maintained close proximity which smothered Hatton's punches, and Hatton a lot shorter and quick punches then MArgarito.

As for what I said about Cotto being on the ropes, if Cotto doesn't stand his ground the obvious outcome is him on the ropes, hence why I brought up the ropes. If Cotto doesn't move laterally, and he doesn't stand his ground, he will move straight backwards like he did in the first fight for the most part. If you move laterally you don't run out of room as quickly, you can set up your opponent, and it makes it a lot harder for them to actually get their punches off effectively.

As for MArgarito being too strong, where did he show that? Where did he, without punches, move Cotto around the ring? He showed he could take Cotto's punches and come forward, but once again he didn't enforce his strength on Cotto.

As for why won't going to the body work for Cotto? Its simple. YOu can't be willing to give your chin for a bodyshot. How Cotto fought he was on the ropes, and it was impossible for him to go the body because Margarito was perpetually throwing punches. Cotto can't put the combinations together off the ropes like he needs to in order to set up that left hook to the body, unless he can get Margarito to stop coming forward he won't be able to go to the body effectively.

The other reason is that Margarito had his elbows down the whole fight, nothing was going to land cleanly on his body.