Your favourite 'golden oldies' moments

Good evening lads - how slow has it been on here today!?

Anyway, onwards and upwards. Just recently I've been revisiting the career of the great Azumah Nelson, a man who was, in my mind and in the mind of many other fight fans, the greatest African fighter of them all. I have remained a huge admirer of 'Zoomy' for years and will always remain so, not least because, even in the latter years of his career, he had that ability to seem, well, ageless I suppose.

I took another, closer look at his second fight against Gabriel Ruelas in late 1995, and his third outing with Jesse James Leija in mid 1996. Nelson was thrity-seven for the former outing, and almost thirty-eight for the latter. Lest we forget, the Ruelas bout was something of a comeback; Nelson had been out of the ring for eighteen months after losing his WBC Super-Featherweight title, which he'd held for six years and ten successful defences, on a decision to Leija in 1994, who'd also held him to a draw a year beforehand. Ruelas had only found himself the loser first time out against the man from Ghana via an extremely close points verdict and, buoyed by the confidence of displacing Leija as the 130 lb kingpin since, was roundly expected to be too much for the returning Nelson.

Instead, Zoomy thrashed him out of sight. After some slightly sub-par performances in the years immediately before, this was the Nelson of old - working the high-low brilliantly, proving hard to tee off on thanks to that disciplined high guard, pushing his man back at will. He was boxing with the legs of a twenty-one year old and the much younger, much fresher Ruelas, himself no pushover, had no idea what to do with him. Nelson, in the final moments of the fourth round, luring his man in to the pocket, bouncing off the ropes and making space to deliver a series of blistering left hooks to both the body and head, to floor Ruelas for the second time in the bout, was one moment of particular brilliance. The end came in the fifth and Nelson, against all odds, was a world champion again.

Wind the clocks forward six months, and he's taking on Leija, a man already with a 1-0-1 ledger against him and, judging by those two fights, a man with the wood on Zoomy. But yet again, Nelson was utterly brilliant. The slow start you'd expect from a man of his advanced years was nowhere in sight - had it not been for the bell to end the round, Leija would almost certainly have been hammered to defeat in the opening stanza of the fight, after Zoomy decked him heavily with a booming right hand over the top, thrown with surgical accuracy as Leija went to deliver a hook of his own. Again, a revitalised Nelson was just too busy, too strong and too heavy-handed for the youngster - it was as if the African was a completely different fighter to the one against whom Leija had managed to have things largely his own way a couple of years previously. In the sixth, referee Richard Steele had to put a beaten and battered Leija out of his misery.

This was a whole fourteen years and twenty-three world title fights since Nelson's first shot at championship glory, in which he'd pushed the great Salvador Sanchez all the way in 1982 in what turned out to be the Mexican's last fight. Remarkable longevity from Nelson, and remarkable performances from him too, all things considered.

I can't quite put my finger on why, but I absolutely love these kind of fights - a great boxer, written off as being past their best, too old and the like, coming back to upset the odds and keep the young'uns underneath them in check. For me, it's part of boxing's mystique; a fighter will always have that indomitable spirit, and it also highlights how invaluable experience is in a sport where the practitioners are so overwhelmingly left to their own devices, with few excuses to hide behind. A new brush may sweep up a little quicker, but an old brush knows all the corners, as they say!

In any case, the two examples by Nelson above are just a couple out of a shed load, so I'd like to know - what are your favourite 'golden oldies' moments? I'm not asking for single careers (ie, the likes of Moore, Hopkins etc, although the latter's dismantling of a hitherto unbeaten Trinidad, nearly a decade his junior and highly fancied amongst the bookies, would be a fine example in it's own right), but more individual performances, single cases where the old man has, as the saying goes, taken his younger foe to school. For the sake of simplicity, how about we agree that, in order to quality, the victor must be thirty-five or older when handing out his boxing clinic 101 to the younger man?

If anyone wants to give their suggestions, or highlight any particular moments of a fight which they feel embodies the elements I've mentioned, then fire away. Cheers, fellas.

Corrie Sanders was 37 when he dished out the shock beating to Wlad, then again Sanders was never regarded particularly high so don't know if it counts.

Pretty sure Baldomir was about 36 when he turned up with a real determined performance against Judah much to most people's suprise. Judah was almost messing about then in the 7th Baldomir almost had him out, didn't get done on the cards and won a career best decision which then managed to line up fights against Gatti and FMJ, only then years later to be used as a punch bag for up and coming fighters like Canelo.

Calzaghe was 34 when he boxed the ears of Lacy so just about meets your criteria, chris.

Good shouts, Alex and 'Fly. Thanks for contributing.

Was going to leave this one for Tino, as I know it's a favourite of his, but as he's AWOL I'll throw it out there - Mike McCallum systematically dismantling and totally nullifying Harding up at Light-Heavyweight, a decade or so after winning his first title at 154 lb. A performance which oozed class from the 'Bodysnatcher.'

Mosley's shellacking of Margarito, a fight in which he was expected to take something of a beating after looking over the hill for a good while beforehand, was mightily impressive, too. For the first time since being upset by Forrest, Shane really did look like his old Lightweight self that night.

Maybe not to the same degree but JMM against Manny last year.

He wasn't given a prayer by many including me but won the fight in most people's eyes.

88Chris05 wrote:
Was going to leave this one for Tino, as I know it's a favourite of his, but as he's AWOL I'll throw it out there - Mike McCallum systematically dismantling and totally nullifying Harding up at Light-Heavyweight, a decade or so after winning his first title at 154 lb. A performance which oozed class from the 'Bodysnatcher.'

Sorry Chris, work has been stupidly busy over the last few weeks so I have been more of a part-time reader than contributor.

This one was enough to tempt me out of my shell though. What a performance from McCallum. Harding, although relatively limited, was no mug by any stretch and a real tough man. McCallum was just brilliant though. If anything, he looked like the younger man in every way other than his facial features! I haven't watched it for a while, and I'm sure my memory is probably a little distorted, but all I can see is McCallum boxing beautifully, hitting Harding with those trademark body shots and then snapping his head back with uppercuts every time Harding had the temerity to try and get close which, ironically, was probably his only chance of winning. Brilliant performance by the 'Bodysnatcher' and he totally took away anything that Harding had to offer.

How about the great man Sugar Ray Robinson in his re-match with Fullmer? I think he must have been older than 35 (?) and I believe, although I could well be wrong, that he went into that fight as the underdog following their fight earlier that year. He changed his tactics for the re-match, stood his ground a bit more, and, of course, produced that left hook to win back the title from his younger opponent.

Some good picks by all, not one as great as others have suggested. But worth a shout and one I particularly enjoyed was Herol Grahams comeback at around 37/38 years old when he boxed an unbeaten heralded up and comer in Chris Johnson, no one fancied old Herol and feared for his safety. However Herol turned backed the clocks and delivered a punch perfect performance stopping Johnson I believe just after half way, he followed that by outboxing toughman Vinny Pazienza, he then performed admirative against defending champ Charles Brewer dropping him twice before running out of gas.

Nice one as always, Chris.

Cheers

Rodders

Hopkins handing Pavlik his behind is one of my favourites, very few saw that coming and you could see how much it meant to Hopkins after the fight.

Thanks everyone, more good examples there. Robinson doing a number on Fullmer was, indeed, an incredible feat. Fullmer was a good bit younger than Ray and had a chin of iron, too. For Robinson to flatten him with a single left, at the wrong side of thirty-five and visibly on the slide, is the biggest feather in his Middleweight cap, for me.

Cracking shout on Herol by the way, Rodders.

Tino, I took a closer look at McCallum-Harding fight a while back on the back of your praise - had only seen bits and bobs of it beforehand. It was a top performance by McCallum, for sure. A lesson in how to contain and counter the bigger man.

Buddy McGirt's performance against Simon Brown is another great example of that, one of my favourites in fact, although Buddy was obviously still pretty young at that stage!

I'd have to go with Mickey Ward, a generally uninspiring boxer at times - was beaten rather soundly by boxers that kept away from his fight of brawling, but my god - his fights with Augustus and Gatti - what a man, it was amazing to see him go full out for every minute of every round, you get 20 somethings blowing after 3/4 rounds now but in his mid 30's he was stood relying on stamina and courage alone. May not be the best but good god its inspiring.

Juan Manuel Marquez, at 35, was ten years older than Juan Diaz when he soaked up everything 'Baby Bull' could throw at him before striking back with a peach of a ko in the fight of the year. Never tire of watching that bout, everyone thought the younger, bigger, stronger Diaz would have too much for jmm and so it looked early on, but he showed his ring smarts, skill and toughness in getting the win. Great golden oldie moment!