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The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by 88Chris05 Mon 22 Jul 2013, 5:18 pm
Afternoon, lads.
Part six of eight for this series now - the finishing line is just about starting to creep in to sight! Perhaps surprisingly, compiling a worthwhile countdown for the Bantamweights has proven to be by far the most difficult article in the series so far, much more so than the Flyweights, even. Frustratingly, the Bantamweight division has a long list of classics which aren't available in full on YouTube (one thing which I always try to make sure of when writing these articles) and, of all the 118 lb title fights which are available to view from start to finish, it takes a fair bit more trawling through to find ten worthy of inclusion. But nevertheless, I've managed to get it done, just about!
Anyway, you all know the drill by now; the fights are available to watch online for anyone who hasn't seen them but is interested, and I've included 'the skinny' (a run through of the fight) and my reasoning not only for why I've picked it, but also why I've decided to rank it as high / low as I have. Again, forgive me for any daft spelling errors you might come across!
It's all below if anyone is interested, anyway. Cheers fellas.
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# 10 - Nana Konadu W TKO 2 Veerophol Sahaprom, WBA title, 1996
The skinny: It seems absurd that a fighter, even in the era of multiple sanctioning bodies, could hold a recognized world title after just four professional fights, but that's exactly what Veerophol Sahaprom had achieved by 1996. In the wake of outstanding champions such as Khaosai Galaxy and Sot Chitalada having already retired, Thai boxing was looking for a new hero, and Saraphrom appeared to be it. Nana Konadu's record suggested a solid professional, but also one who was unlikely to ruin Saraphrom's planned route to world domination at 118 lb.
Sahaprom started off looking sensational. A sharp and compact boxer blessed with a healthy dose of speed, he initiated proceedings with a neat left hook and followed it up with a textbook one-two. And later in to the round, when he lured Konadu in to making a mistake, cleverly ducked under the African's hook and fired off a superb counter left to deck the challenger, it looked as if things couldn't have been going any better for the WBA titlist and home favourite. However, if Konadu hadn't shown anything else so far, he was at least showing that he was tough - he sprung up almost instantly, although the champion continued to take advantage of the gaps in his defence, boxing away the rest of the round without any trouble and scoring regularly.
There were more worrying signs for Konadu as the second round got underway, too. Being beaten to the punch time and again - and being countered on the few occasions that this wasn't the case - a big straight right down the pipe seemed to have him wobbled, and the following left hook from Sahaprom had the challenger's knees dipping.
But if, as Harold Wilson once said, "a week is a long time in politics", then a second can be a long time in boxing, as the unfortunate Sahaphrom and his legion of fanatic supporters were about to find out. Growing in confidence and, understandably you could argue, feeling as if he had the time, space and freedom to do as he wished in the fight, the champion looked to open up and push for the finish as the round neared it's end, but out of nowhere Konadu came up with the perfect reply - a compact right hand counter on the inside, which exploded perfectly on to Sahaprom's jaw.
In a flash, the frenzied cheering of the audience switched to a worried hush as their champion wobbled back towards the ropes from the impact of the shot. Inexperienced in the art of survival, having never encountered such a situation before, Sahaprom opted to try and brawl his way out of danger, which proved a huge error as Konadu, dogged and determined, continued to club away at his man, eventually sending him to the canvas with a left uppercut followed up by a right. Sahaprom, whose world had fallen apart in a matter of mere seconds, did beat the count - but he was clearly still badly disorientated and, much to the shock, amazement and despair of the crowd, the referee waved the fight off.
Why it's here: Long, drawn out battles can be superb, but so too can short, bloody and brutal shootouts such as this one. Despite lasting only two rounds, the fight also represented a huge turnaround, the sort which us viewers love to see every now and then, and it also reinforced the dictum that it's dangerous and foolhardy to overlook any opponent. Sure, there may be no footage of them and their record might be padded with journeyman - but as Saraprom found out here, they can turn out to be very, very good on occasion!
# 9 - Mashiko 'Fighting' Harada W PTS 15 Alan Rudkin, World title, 1965
The skinny: Having upset probably the greatest Bantamweight of them all - Eder Jofre - to win the world 118 lb crown, Japan's Mashiko 'Fighting' Harada could have been forgiven for opting for a 'safe' first defence of his title. But as first defences go, this one promised to be a tough one. Alan Rudkin, the challenger from Liverpool, had already won the British and Commonwealth titles, and had shown his world-class credentials by scoring an upset stoppage victory over Johnny Caldwell, formerly Europe's world title claimant. His sole professional defeat, a cuts stoppage, had been avenged, and despite not being a big puncher, he was known for setting a pace almost as scorching as the one the indefatigable Japanese champion was famed for.
Perhaps sensing the danger the challenger posed, the remarkable focussed Harada made a blistering start, replying to Rudkin's nice left hook to the jaw by firing off a quick double-right hand, one upstairs and one down, to put the challenger down for a count in an admittedly untidy manner. Finding the swarming, ever-jolting Harada a difficult target to pin down, it wasn't until the third that Rudkin found any real momentum, meeting Harada's customary charge with a series of stiff jabs and banging in an emphatic right cross as he grew in confidence. When Rudkin continued to flurry and intelligently slide out of harm's way throughout the fourth, he must have been confident that he could bring the belt back home to Merseyside with him.
However, the champion always had the knack of forcing his opponents to fight his kind of fight, and so it proved to be the case in the fifth as Rudkin curiously stopped using his accurate jab and instead traded in close with Harada, coming off second best as both men attacked the other's body at a searing pace. The champion's constant attacking and prodigious work rate looked to have swung the fight firmly in his favour for the next two stanzas, but Rudkin was back on song in the eighth, getting back to his superior pure boxing and probing for openings patiently as his movement finally managed to keep the champion more or less in check.
Rounds in which either man looked truly dominant or clearly superior were becoming increasingly rare by this stage, with Rudkin starting the ninth, tenth and elevenths ones well before Harada came roaring back in the final stages of them, but once the champion seemed to be getting the better of the action again in the twelfth and thirteenth with his withering body attack, British hopes seemed to be fading fast.
Rudkin, though, had no desire to go away quietly, and he produced his best round in a while in the fourteenth, a three-minute stanza which was fought with great intensity and at a phenomenal pace considering how far in to the bout both men were. In something of a role reversal, it was Harada scoring with the neat, straight punches while Rudkin connected with wild, swinging hooks which had all of his might behind them, but it was the Liverpudlian showing the better and cuter defence and, despite shipping a big right hand in the final seconds, he'd done enough to give himself a slither of hope going in to the fifteenth and final round.
However, it had taken a super-human effort by the Englishman to even keep pace with the Japanese world champion, and it showed in the fifteenth as Harada made the first real statement, reeling off a trio of hard left hooks in succession which rocked the challenger. Gamely and, inevitably, at a frantic pace, Rudkin battled gamely, but Harada knew he was closing in on the victory line and proved just too resilient for Rudkin to make a dent in him. After the final bell sounded, the verdict was announced - unanimously in favour of the champion - and if some felt that Harada had merely stumbled across the title in the short term, his reign was well and truly underway now.
Why it's here: Despite being a defeat, this fight proved to be the announcement of Alan Rudkin as a truly world class fighter back in 1965. For a man of such (relatively) small experience to jump in there with a champion as accomplished as Harada and hold his own so admirably is impressive indeed, and this effort deserves to be remembered as one of the better unsuccessful world title attempts by any fighter from these shores. Harada's career opponents read like a who's who of lower weight boxing throughout the whole decade, but nevertheless Rudkin remains one of the most impressive names on his ledger and, once more, he showed in this fight what being a great champion is all about - taking them all on, and finding a way to win when you do, no matter what. An all-round excellent fight.
# 8 - Lionel Rose W PTS 15 Mashiko 'Fighting' Harada, World title, 1968
The skinny: Getting so close to the summit of Bantamweight boxing hadn't been easy for Australia's Lionel Rose, whose tendency to be spotted smoking a pipe was no gimmick, but rather a regular indulgence. He'd learned his boxing in the Down Under outback in a ring crafted from the remains of a picket fence and some string which acted as ropes, and had been forced to take up the sport professionally at a very young age and with no amateur experience after his father died suddenly of a heart attack, leaving his family with precious little income. Rose had vowed that he would become a world champion in his old man's honour, and now he had his chance. Mashiko 'Fighting' Harada had achieved one objective in becoming champion by usurping the legendary Eder Jofre, and his three successful title defences in the meantime had ticked another box - namely, convincing he boxing world that his win over the Brazilian had been no fluke, and that he was a worthy champion in his own right.
The betting odds said that the Japanese whirlwind would defeat Rose, but clearly this had no ill bearing on the challenger, who boxed exquisitely from the off with precision, great movement and effortless grace. As ever, Harada pressed at every opportunity and darted across the ring at the beginning of every round, but he was stung by a stream of jabs in the first, staggered by a perfect counter left in the second and out sped throughout the third.
But the champion finally managed to make it his kind of fight in the fourth, driving his head in to the challenger's chest and dragging him in to an inside brawl as the pair of them showed that they could take a shot just as well as they could administer one to an opponent. Things turned a little ugly, from just about every possible angle, in the sixth, as Harada at first somehow managed to throw himself to the floor, so wayward and wild was one of his swinging hooks, and as Rose was then docked a point for consistent use of the elbows as he attempted to fend Harada off when it came to the inside exchanges. Harada, who could rough it up with the best of them, answered with four cynical (and illegal) kidney punches in the next clinch, but if that was the worst of him, then he showed the best of him in the seventh, stunning Rose with a big right hand over the top and driving his man back to the ropes.
The ebb and flow continued as Rose once more got back in to his rhythm, throwing series of piston-like jabs, all of which scored cleanly, and in the ninth he left Harada swinging at thin air as his speed, movement and stinging right hand - which earned him a flash knockdown at the end of the round - took control. As the fight moved in to the late stages, Rose looked as if he might completely run away with it, repeatedly getting off first with his jab (which looked as if it simply couldn't miss by now) and almost always being just that little bit out of range for the champion to launch a worthwhile counter-attack thanks to his deft footwork.
Harada, knowing that his title was slipping away, came back well in the thirteenth, a string of impressive body attacks helping to release the aggression and pent up frustration which had seen him beginning the round by angrily banging his gloves together. When Harada again managed to get in close to go to work on Rose's body in the fourteenth, it seemed that there might yet be some hope for the champion. However, as he was forced to back away ever so slightly, it was Rose who had the final say, sending Harada's legs in to spasm with a heavy right cross and then having the confidence to fight on the inside once more with the Japanese star for the rest of the round, more than holding his own.
True to form, Harada took nothing even close to representing a backwards step in the final round, but Rose wasn't to be denied - a stunningly fast triple jab combination set the tone, and once more the classy counters and clever pivots which had characterised his exceptional showing throughout the fight were there for all to see. At the final bell, there was no doubting Rose's superiority - he was indeed the brand new Bantamweight champion of the world.
Why it's here: Quite simply, Lionel Rose's showing in this fight ranks as one of the most outstanding and complete exhibitions of boxing you could ever wish to see, for my money. Harada was seldom beaten in his championship career across three weights in any case, and even when he was he was never even close to being outclassed when at his peak - apart from this one night. Styles make fights, so they say, but if you're looking for the perfect blue print of how a textbook boxer should handle a world class, unorthodox and relentless stalker, then look no further. Outstanding stuff and a performance which would be nigh-on impossible to improve upon.
# 7 - Rafael Herrea W PTS 15 Venice Borkhorsor, WBC title, 1973
The skinny: Going in to this 1973 bout, Rafael Herrera had been on the Bantamweight scene for a long time and had mixed it with some truly outstanding company; he'd had the wood over the legendary Ruben Olivares, a fellow Mexican who enjoyed an almost God-like status amongst Latin American fight fans, had gone 1-1 with Chucho Castillo, the man who'd battled out an outstanding trilogy against the aforementioned Olivares, and also boasted a pair of wins over Rodolfo Martinez, who'd already spent a good few years ranked highly in the division and would go on to win a world title there the following year. By contrast, Herrera's opponent for this Inglewood, California (where Herrera had garnered a massive following) fight, Venice Borkhorsor, was little more than a new kid on the block in Bantamweight terms. His one real win of note, against the highly-respected Betulio Gonzalez, had given him a world title, but that had been down at Flyweight. Stepping up to 118 lb, there weren't a great deal of people willing to give him a chance of adding a second title against a man as experienced and grizzled as Herrera.
However, while the Thai Borkhorsor had a reputation as being a bit of a brawler, he was a handy boxer, too, and showed that from the off, controlling Herrera with his neat left hand counters in the first round and visibly stunning the champion with a gorgeous hook upstairs. Herrera, like almost all Mexican warriors, continued to press and work the body, and had his success, but the Thai southpaw was growing in confidence all the time, to the point where, by the fifth round, he felt he could start throwing his left hard and straight without even setting it up through the jab. Even more worryingly for Herrera, these punches were landing on the button time and time again.
The sixth, an absolutely fantastic round of non-stop action, finally saw Herrera moving the neat-boxing Thai in to the position he'd wanted all along - right against the ropes, where he was twice able to force the younger challenger to cover up and try to roll with shots. By the eighth, Borkhorsor's followers must have been worrying that the pace was proving too much, as he was again forced to suck up some evil body punches and appeared to be on unsteady legs at the end of the round as he was easily bundled to the floor, and when Herrera recovered quickly from two nice counters to dominate the remainder of the tenth, most indications seemed to point towards a steady defence of the Mexican's crown.
However, Borkhorsor managed to find an extra spring in his step in the eleventh, upping the pace of his own attacks and once more showing that he was the purer boxer of the pair, and in the thirteenth he stunned the pro-Herrera crowd in to something approaching silence, reeling off four hard left hands in a row to close the champion's right eye and brilliantly make him miss over and over again, while all the time being close enough to take full advantage and counter sharply. Suddenly, the Thai was producing his best form of the fight, and he was sublime once more in the fourteenth; Herrera made his statement first, digging in some nice body hooks, but then a crisp right hand from Borkhorsor quickly turned in to a blistering four-punch combination, all of which were on the money, and he spent the rest of the round controlling the champion behind his jab before putting the seal on a fantastic round with a sharp left hand which sent Herrera tottering to the ropes.
The champion, admittedly, produced an admirable effort to nick the fifteenth round on pressure, but to most observers it made little difference - to them, Borkhorsor had won, building up an unassailable lead with his dominance for much of the final third of the bout. Judge at ringside Chuck Hassett returned a score of 145-141 in the Thai's favour, which seemed just about right. However, incredibly, the two other judges, Larry Rozadilla and Ruby Jordan, scored the fight in Herrera's favour, 143-141 and 144-142 respectively. The Mexican had retained his crown - but only thanks to one of the most controversial and disputed points verdicts of the era.
Why it's here: It could be argued that the decision rendered by the judges - which was and continues to be widely condemned - takes the shine off of what was a superb fight. However, when looking back on a series of great fights, it never hurts to throw in a little bit of controversy now and then, does it? It always makes for good debate and, regardless of how you score the fight, it can't be denied that, between them, Herrera and Borkhorsor served up one hell of a treat for anyone who has an interest in the Bantamweight division. A classic, pure and simple.
# 6 - Lionel Rose W PTS 15 Alan Rudkin, World title, 1969
The skinny: By the time he boxed Lionel Rose in 1969, Alan Rudkin had already won the Bantamweight British and Commonwealth titles, but it was the world title he really wanted. This was to be his second attempt, having lost on points two years previously to the man who Rose, the handsome Australian of Aborigine heritage, had dethroned, Mashiko 'Fighting' Harada.
Rudkin was prone to slipping between being a boxer and a brawler at times, but there was no doubting which category the champion fell in to; Rose was a stylist through and through, and it was his smooth work which got the better of the early rounds. Countering nicely and winning the battle of the jabs, Rose swept the first two rounds before, in the third, Rudkin realised he was going to have a seriously hard time trying to out jab the champion and upped the tempo, getting his first real foothold in the fight as he scored repeatedly with his right hand, thrown in multiples as he applied constant pressure going forwards. However, this round was only a hiccup for Rose, it seemed, as the champion opened a cut over the challenger's left eye in the fourth and then lured him in with his cross-arm defence in the fifth, compounding Rudkin's error by scoring with a perfectly-executed right hand counter.
Despite this, Rudkin (known for his superb stamina, an attribute he put down to the fact that he made weight so much easier than many of his opponents) showed no intentions of simply going away. He completely abandoned his jab in the seventh and eighth rounds, but won both of them, loading up in twos, threes and fours (often to the body) and somewhat negating Rose's smooth jab with his sheer pressure. Rose stopped the rot in the ninth, rocking Rudkin's head back with a stiff right hand and getting the jab flowing once more, but in the tenth there were perhaps signs that the pace of the fight was beginning to tell on the champion, as he faded after a good start and allowed the Liverpudlian challenger to outwork him.
It almost seemed as if Rose was now taking a one round off, one round on approach as he bounced back brilliantly to boss the eleventh before looking in a spot of bother in the twelfth, as Rudkin bounced a booming right hand off his jaw, almost certainly his best punch of the fight until that point. The thirteenth could have been fought in the ol' phone booth, as both men slugged away viciously on the inside, but it was all Rudkin in the fourteenth as he once more abandoned his jab and any other refined techniques, instead opting to simply work Rose over with his outstanding pressure.
Going in to the fifteenth, the fight was clearly still in the balance, but as suggested earlier it was Rudkin who looked the fresher and more energetic, outworking and outpunching the champion, albeit without ever really having him in any real trouble. Rudkin's wait for the verdict must surely have been agonizing - but not as agonizing as the moment in which he learned that, in the eyes of the judges, he hadn't quite done enough to grapple the belt away from the Australian. His big finish hadn't been enough, and Lionel Rose had successfully defended his Bantamweight title on a split decision after a wonderful contest.
Why it's here: Traditionally, the sixties has been viewed as one of the poorer decades in the history of British boxing, with no fighter from these shores managing to defend a world title, and fewer managing to win one to begin with in any case. I, on the other hand, see that decade of 'failure' more as a case of British fighters regularly being the contemporaries of some truly outstanding champions, and that was certainly the case for the unfortunate Alan Rudkin. Despite losing this fight by an extremely narrow margin - and I agree that his big finish was just about too little, too late - anyone wondering just how good a fighter Rudkin was could do much worse than have a look at this fight. As one of Britain's most underrated historical fighters, Rudkin deserves his moment in the sun - and besides, it's not as if the fight itself was lacking in great action, either.
# 5 - Ruben Olivares W PTS 15 Chucho Castillo, World title, 1970
The skinny: By 1970, the fearsome-punching Ruben Olivares looked totally untouchable. Boasting a 57-0-1 record, which included 55 knockouts, many boxing fans and scribes were wondering when a challenger to his world title would come from who could even give him a decent argument. Lionel Rose and Alan Rudkin, for instance, had been two of the outstanding performers in that classic era for the Bantamweight division in the sixties, their battle against each other for the title as well as their respective fights against the likes of Mashiko 'Fighting' Harada all being closely-contested and totally absorbing contests. And yet Olivares had taken just five rounds to batter the classy Rose to defeat to win the world title in 1969, and a mere two rounds to annihilate the normally durable and resilient Rudkin. On that form line, no Bantamweight should have stood a chance against the Mexican, and certainly not his compatriot Castillo, whose record by 1970 suggested that, while he was a capable and solid performer, he was some way short of the elite bracket of which Olivares was a part.
Suffice to say, then, that when the champion was decked at the end of the third round having been largely in control for the action which had gone before, there was a sense of shock amongst the California crowd who had gathered to watch Olivares, whose famed punching power had made him perhaps Mexico's most revered champion up until that stage. It was a hard left hand that did the job, and though the champion bounced straight back up (taking another two flush shots amidst the confusion of whether he was to be given a count or not), it was now clear that the fight was not going to be the cakewalk many had predicted.
Castillo's classier jabbing and movement took the fourth and fifth, as Olivares, not used to being made to work so hard for openings, lagged behind, stuck on the outside and unable to utilise his incredible punching power. A strong left hook finally gave the onlooking crowd a glimpse of that power in the sixth as Castillo was forced to hold on just a little for the first time, but after a minute-long break the challenger's confidence seemed as high as ever in the seventh, to the point where he felt he could even take the champion on in a vicious inside exchange on the ropes. Incredibly, he was more that holding his own, too.
Olivares made his short body hooks count in the eighth, ninth and tenth, outworking the more mechanical challenger, but in a frantic eleventh round, in which jabs were almost totally abandoned, it was Castillo who had the bigger say, starting the round with a classy double hook to the body and then trading hard right hands upstairs as the round drew to a close. That effort seemed to take something out of Castillo, however, and he seemed oddly subdued in the next two rounds as he threw nowhere near enough to prevent Olivares stalking him and ultimately walking him down with his power, but he produced a fine effort in the fourteenth, jolting Olivares' head back many times with some great uppercuts on the inside.
The fifteenth belonged to Olivares, however, who kept a cool head to string together some beautiful high-low attacks, and although Castillo had given him much more of a scare and run for his money than anyone would have predicted beforehand, it wasn't enough - Olivares, going the distance for just the third time in his remarkable career, had run out a unanimous decision winner.
Why it's here: For both men, this was the beginning of one of the best and most entertaining rivalries / series in the history of the 118 lb weight class; they would go on to contest two more world title fight, Castillo gaining revenge with a shock cuts stoppage win in the second before Olivares again peeled himself off the canvas to make the saga 2-1 in his favour. More than that, however, it was a further confirmation of Olivares' greatness. When a champion has been running through opponents, a question always remains - will they be able to cope when they're finally forced to think, suck it up and win 'ugly'? Well, Olivares was asked that question here, and he passed with flying colours. It may not have had the same 'wow factor' as his aforementioned victories over the likes of Rose and Rudkin, but throughout his extraordinary career the brilliant little Mexican had fewer finer nights than this.
# 4 - Orlando Canizales W PTS 12 Billy Hardy, IBF title, 1990
The skinny: In 1990, a dream came true for Billy Hardy, as he was given the opportunity to fight the Mexican-American Orlando Canizales for the IBF Bantamweight title. What's more, he was given the opportunity to do this in front of his adoring Sunderland following in his home town. The volatile Tyne and Wear atmosphere must have been a new experience for the champion, but nevertheless he had little to worry about from the outset - he was already considered one of the better pound for pound fighters in the world, and Hardy, while a good performer at European level, had nothing on his record to suggest that he could pull the upset, regardless of where the fight was being held.
The champion had the better of the very early going. Hardy, happy to let Canizales dictate the pace and look for big counters, had his moments but the champion's sharp jab followed by a clean right to the jaw in the opening seconds, as well as some classy uppercuts in the second round, were the highlights. However, the spirited challenger was standing up to these attacks surprisingly well, and even landed a clean right cross to the point of Canizales' chin at the end of the round.
Hardy started to show that he had more than just grit and determination going for him in the third, producing a tight round of clinical boxing and movement which he punctuated with a pair of cracking right hands, but he was clearly hurt by a right hand himself in the fourth, being forced to hold and cover up throughout as Canizales pushed for the finish. But once more, Hardy must have left many people surprised at how cool he remained while under siege, and when he again roared back well in the fifth, getting off first consistently with the jab and showing some superb defence to parry many of the champion's best efforts, the Sunderland faithful must have felt that the shock result was on.
Canizales upped his tempo in the sixth and seventh, forcing Hardy to throw a hell of a lot of shots just to keep him off and dazing him with a strong left hook, but if Hardy's lack of punching power was a concern then his fitness and composure wasn't as he spent the eight using the ring space brilliantly and coming up with eye-catching flurries before smartly nipping out of range to avoid the champion's counters.
When Canizales banged in a wonderful left hook to the body in the ninth which forced the challenger to go to his knees and take a count, you could have been forgiven for thinking that the end was nigh. Instead, however, Hardy came back stronger once more during a final three rounds which were all fought at an exceptional pace. Canizales continued marching forward, but his wide, looping hooks thrown with little of his usual fluidity were a stark contrast to the more clinical attacks of Hardy, all of which were stemming from his accurate jab and which also earned him an appreciation tap on the shoulder from the champion at the end of the eleventh round.
Canizales, who had been plagued with rumours of weight-making troubles coming in to the fight, did indeed look the more tired of the pair as the twelfth was fought out at a frantic pace, but despite Hardy's fine finish, which was capped by a huge right hand to the chin of the champion in the final thirty seconds, any impartial observer must have known that the call of the judges was going to be wafer-thin once the final bell sounded, and it was; 115-113 Canizales, 116-113 Hardy, 115-114 Canizales. Despite Hardy's magnificent, heroic effort, Canizales was heading back to Texas with his title after a sensational fight.
Why it's here: Divisional gatekeepers such as Hardy aren't meant to give outstanding fighters like Canizales such a stern argument, but occasionally they do - it's part of boxing's mystique and appeal. Depending on how you view it, this could be seen as either a fantastic night in the life of Billy Hardy, or conversely a tragic, painful kind of 'so near, yet so far' tale in which he deserved better, particularly if you're one of the people whose own personal scorecard for this fight made the Sunderland red head the winner. Whatever your take is, however, it was a truly superb bout, a real classic of the British ring.
# 3 - Carlos Zarate W TKO 4 Alfonso Zamora, Lineal title, 1977
The skinny: Nobody was sure who'd win when Carlos Zarate, the WBC Bantamweight champion and undefeated in his professional career, squared off against fellow Mexican Alfonso Zamora, who held the WBA version of the crown and likewise had never tasted defeat in the pro ranks, in Los Angeles in the summer of 1978. But one thing was pretty much for certain - it wasn't going the distance. Zarate's 55 wins included a staggering 54 inside the distance, and while Zamora's own 26 wins seemed little in comparison, not a single soul who'd so far shared the ring with him had heard the final bell.
Boxing politics meant that neither the WBC or WBA belts were on the line, incredibly enough, but there was little doubt that whoever won this one would be, beyond any shadow of a doubt, the king of the Bantamweight division from a lineal point of view.
The fight was a mix of memorable and bizarre right from the very off, as a madcap protester of some sort managed to breach security and present himself in the ring after a mere 30 seconds of the opener, but once that interruption had been remedied it was the WBA champion Zamora who started the better in a fight which was fought at a truly testing pace throughout, beating Zarate to the punch and chipping away at the body whenever the chance presented itself. Zarate went to the head well with a right before banging in a wicked left hook to the ribs, but Zamora's composed, clean work had edged the early going.
Zarate forced Zamora to the ropes for the first time in the second, but was made to back off when Zamora came up with a high-quality left-right combination. That seemed to give Zarate a wake up call as he then looked to box a little more scientifically, firing off his superior jab, rolling well underneath the return fire from Zamora and scoring with a beautiful right hand counter in close, too. Another blistering two shot combination from Zamora made the WBC champion's eyes widen in apprehension, but Zarate ended the round well, with two nice head shots as Zamora looked to rush him.
The second had been a hell of a round, but it was in the third that the fight really began to swing decisively in one man's favour. Zamora made a good start to it, getting his own jab going for the first time and rocking Zarate's head back three times with it, and even seemed to be holding his own in the inside exchanges, all of which were played out with stunning ferociousness and deadly intent. However, it was then that Zarate found a perfect right hook to the head, which landed as cleanly as could be and forced Zamora to retreat to the ropes once more. Two left hooks, followed by a short right, put the WBA titlist on the deck, but he showed that he wasn't finished yet when he rose and demonstrated superb will to gamely stand toe to toe for the remainder of the round and survive until the bell.
However, that typical Mexican fighting heart, rather than help, surely hindered him in the fourth as he looked to slug it out with Zarate again, his legs still unsteady and his head surely still unclear. Zarate floored him once more with another devastating right hand, and this time, though Zamora beat the count again, it was evident that the end was night. Upon resumption, a series of looping left hands put the hitherto unbeaten Zamora over again, and this time his corner took the compassionate route, throwing in the towel as the referee counted. In four short, action-packed and dramatic rounds, Carlos Zarate had shown that he was indeed the greatest Bantamweight in the world.
Why it's here: By all known measurements, this really should have been a super fight; two compatriots, both incredibly big punchers, both undefeated and a fight which cleared up once and for all who the real champion of the division was. It was exactly the kind of fight we wish we saw more of today, and the kind of fight which not enough fighters have been willing to make over the years. For Zarate, one of the very greatest Bantamweights, this was his crowning glory and undoubtedly the finest moment of his career - and once more, anyone who loves those 'fastest gun in the west' style slugfests will find their need for carnage satisfied here.
# 2 - Mashiko 'Fighting' Harada W PTS 15 Eder Jofre, World title, 1965
The skinny: Every now and then, a fighter comes along who seems to wear a cloak of invincibility, and in the eyes of many observers Eder Jofre, the brilliant Brazilian from Sao Paulo, was one such fighter come 1965. Unbeaten in more than fifty professional contests, he'd held the NBA Bantamweight crown since 1960, and from 1962 onwards, having beating Britain and Europe's representative in the shape of Johnny Caldwell, his claim to 118 lb supremacy had been undisputed. Travelling to Japan to fight 'Mashiko' Fighting Harada, Jofre knew he'd be up against it; Harada himself, despite being just twenty-one years of age, had already been a world champion before down at Flyweight, and fighting in front of his adoring home fans would doubtless inspire him in his quest to make history and hand a defeat to the seemingly invincible 'Golden Bantam'. Nevertheless, despite his own fine credentials, the Japanese was given, at best, only a moderate chance of upsetting the script.
When a classical, measured and pure boxer such as Jofre comes up against a relentless buzzsaw such as Harada, it's often the latter who gets the better of the opening exchanges, and that was certainly the case here - Harada, as he would for pretty much every round of the fight, literally ran across the ring towards the champion once the opening bell sounded, perhaps catching the Brazilian off guard with some whipping hooks and uppercuts in close. Jofre, naturally, remained patient and probed expertly for openings as Harada looked to establish his own jab in the second, doubling and tripling it up to good effect, and when the champion seemed to have hit the groove in the third, starting and finishing it with nice right hands to the head and digging in a beautiful right to the body, left to the head combination in between, you may have been forgiven for thinking that it was business as usual.
You'd have been wrong, though. Harada, having the fight of his life, was in command in the fourth, banging a thunderous right uppercut off the champion's chin which forced Jofre to totter back to the ropes and cover up as the challenger let rip with every shot in his arsenal, again stunning the Brazilian with another uppercut towards the end of the round. Jofre, rolling with and parrying shots as best he could, held on until the bell, but was clearly in a world of trouble now. However, he produced a magnificent champion's effort to win the fifth, catching Harada with a sneaky, short left as the challenger strode after him and then dazing him with some accurate left hooks in the closing stages.
Jofre looked to work the jab over the next two rounds, but Harada proved a difficult target to land cleanly on, surprisingly light on his feet and deceptively elusive, while also outworking the champion, said to be struggling to make the Bantamweight limit and plagued by management issues. Harada continued to score with his right hand over the top, but then in the tenth there seemed to be a renewed spring in Jofre's step and, for the first time, he anticipated Harada's sprint across the ring, countering it with a perfect right hand and dominating the round from that point onwards.
The eleventh and twelfth were mightily close affairs, but it was Harada who made the next big statement in the thirteenth, which was his best round for a while as he more or less totally negated any attacking threat the champion posed, overwhelming him with his own hurricane of shots and looking as if he had more energy in reserve of the pair. Knowing that his title was very much in jeopardy, however, Jofre upped his game in the final two rounds, again catching his onrushing opponents with neat left hand counters and then rocking him with a sharp one-two in the penultimate stanza, before taking control of the fifteenth and final round by making Harada's knees dip with a looping right hook.
The last time I scored this fight, I couldn't split them, having it 143 apiece using the ten point must system (7-7-1 in rounds). However, the judges on the night just about managed to find a winner - and to many people's surprise, it was Harada, who had dethroned perhaps the greatest Bantamweight of them all in a huge upset.
Why it's here: It says a lot about how highly regarded a champion Eder Jofre was that, despite facing a challenger with a record as good as Harada's, almost nobody thought he would lose this fight. But upsets are part of the fabric of the sport, and at the time this was seen as the Braddock-Baer of the Bantamweight class. What's more, if you wanted a fight which demonstrates the difficulty of scoring and the subjective nature of it, you'd be hard pressed to find a better one than this. What do you favour, the cool, calculated boxing of Jofre, or the pressure attack of Harada? Did the man from Japan do enough, or was it home town cooking? Moreover, even in defeat, Jofre showed the ingredients which made him such an outstandingly fine fighter in this contest, as did his conqueror. An unmissable slice of boxing history.
# 1 - Paulie Ayala W PTS 12 Johnny Tapia, WBA title, 1999
The skinny: Before this fight, the ever-aggressive WBA Bantamweight champion Johnny Tapia (whose already temperamental personality was being strained by promotional issues, meaning that, win or lose, this was to be his final fight under the Top Rank banner) aimed a hard shove in to the chest of Paulie Ayala, looking to win a version of the 118 lb crown after being turned back by Joichiro Tatsuyoshi in a WBC title tilt two years previously. It was typical of the fiery Tapia, undefeated until this point in 48 professional outings and a previously unified Super-Flyweight champion, but also a sign of what was to come in the coming twelve rounds.
Both champion and challenger showed real intent from the off, with the champion's body work standing out in particular, but some beautiful southpaw jabbing and left hand leads - as well as some superb hooks in close to the ribs which were to be a defining characteristic of the battle - allowed Ayala to get a foothold in the second, and he continued his good work in the next round too, being arguably unlucky not to have a knockdown called in his favour as the fiery Tapia, fighting with an almost sadistic half-smile on his face throughout, went over from a cuffing shot and then walked on to a perfect left hand as he bounced off the ropes.
The pattern continued in the fourth, with Ayala producing some Duran-like rolling up close as the pair continued to rip away at each other at an alarming pace, and Tapia's frustrations boiled over as he lashed out after hearing the bell to end the round. But the champion hadn't remained unbeaten for so long without good reason, and a tightened defence, as well as some huge double and triple left hooks inside to the body, saw him come back strongly in the fifth.
Tensions again almost boiled over in the next four rounds, which were largely dominated by Ayala's quicker hands and tremendous jab, but Tapia started throwing his jab with bad intentions in the ninth having previously ignored it for large periods, and in the tenth a head clash opened a cut on the challenger's forehead. The sight of blood seemed to spur Tapia on to have his best round in a while in the eleventh, as he finally showed the good sense to box at range, get off first and then nullify any return attacks from Ayala with his quick feet, and the stage was set for an amazing, grandstand finish in the twelfth.
The two combatants didn't disappoint as they produced a truly outstanding and utterly ferocious three minutes of fighting. Sticking together as if bound by glue, both were hit and hurt several times over as they pressed for a finish, but Ayala, who'd accumulated a lead in those middle rounds when Tapia seemed to be fighting too much with his heart and too little with his head, was still standing at the end to claim a unanimous decision, and with it Tapia's WBA belt, signalling the end of his outstanding unbeaten run.
Why it's here: It says much about the quality, ferocity and relentlessness of this fight that, in a day and age when even the most outstanding performers below the Lightweight class are often denied the limelight and coverage their talents merit, it still managed to be named Ring Magazine's 'Fight of the Year' for 1999. As well as being the kind of upset which always breathes new life in to the sport, it was also a microcosm of the troubled and ultimately ill-fated Tapia, who must surely rank as one of boxing's most remarkable characters; flawed, impulsive and always with a tendency to switch between the sublime and the ridiculous - but never anything less than hugely entertaining and an unmissable value for money fighter.
Part six of eight for this series now - the finishing line is just about starting to creep in to sight! Perhaps surprisingly, compiling a worthwhile countdown for the Bantamweights has proven to be by far the most difficult article in the series so far, much more so than the Flyweights, even. Frustratingly, the Bantamweight division has a long list of classics which aren't available in full on YouTube (one thing which I always try to make sure of when writing these articles) and, of all the 118 lb title fights which are available to view from start to finish, it takes a fair bit more trawling through to find ten worthy of inclusion. But nevertheless, I've managed to get it done, just about!
Anyway, you all know the drill by now; the fights are available to watch online for anyone who hasn't seen them but is interested, and I've included 'the skinny' (a run through of the fight) and my reasoning not only for why I've picked it, but also why I've decided to rank it as high / low as I have. Again, forgive me for any daft spelling errors you might come across!
It's all below if anyone is interested, anyway. Cheers fellas.
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# 10 - Nana Konadu W TKO 2 Veerophol Sahaprom, WBA title, 1996
The skinny: It seems absurd that a fighter, even in the era of multiple sanctioning bodies, could hold a recognized world title after just four professional fights, but that's exactly what Veerophol Sahaprom had achieved by 1996. In the wake of outstanding champions such as Khaosai Galaxy and Sot Chitalada having already retired, Thai boxing was looking for a new hero, and Saraphrom appeared to be it. Nana Konadu's record suggested a solid professional, but also one who was unlikely to ruin Saraphrom's planned route to world domination at 118 lb.
Sahaprom started off looking sensational. A sharp and compact boxer blessed with a healthy dose of speed, he initiated proceedings with a neat left hook and followed it up with a textbook one-two. And later in to the round, when he lured Konadu in to making a mistake, cleverly ducked under the African's hook and fired off a superb counter left to deck the challenger, it looked as if things couldn't have been going any better for the WBA titlist and home favourite. However, if Konadu hadn't shown anything else so far, he was at least showing that he was tough - he sprung up almost instantly, although the champion continued to take advantage of the gaps in his defence, boxing away the rest of the round without any trouble and scoring regularly.
There were more worrying signs for Konadu as the second round got underway, too. Being beaten to the punch time and again - and being countered on the few occasions that this wasn't the case - a big straight right down the pipe seemed to have him wobbled, and the following left hook from Sahaprom had the challenger's knees dipping.
But if, as Harold Wilson once said, "a week is a long time in politics", then a second can be a long time in boxing, as the unfortunate Sahaphrom and his legion of fanatic supporters were about to find out. Growing in confidence and, understandably you could argue, feeling as if he had the time, space and freedom to do as he wished in the fight, the champion looked to open up and push for the finish as the round neared it's end, but out of nowhere Konadu came up with the perfect reply - a compact right hand counter on the inside, which exploded perfectly on to Sahaprom's jaw.
In a flash, the frenzied cheering of the audience switched to a worried hush as their champion wobbled back towards the ropes from the impact of the shot. Inexperienced in the art of survival, having never encountered such a situation before, Sahaprom opted to try and brawl his way out of danger, which proved a huge error as Konadu, dogged and determined, continued to club away at his man, eventually sending him to the canvas with a left uppercut followed up by a right. Sahaprom, whose world had fallen apart in a matter of mere seconds, did beat the count - but he was clearly still badly disorientated and, much to the shock, amazement and despair of the crowd, the referee waved the fight off.
Why it's here: Long, drawn out battles can be superb, but so too can short, bloody and brutal shootouts such as this one. Despite lasting only two rounds, the fight also represented a huge turnaround, the sort which us viewers love to see every now and then, and it also reinforced the dictum that it's dangerous and foolhardy to overlook any opponent. Sure, there may be no footage of them and their record might be padded with journeyman - but as Saraprom found out here, they can turn out to be very, very good on occasion!
# 9 - Mashiko 'Fighting' Harada W PTS 15 Alan Rudkin, World title, 1965
The skinny: Having upset probably the greatest Bantamweight of them all - Eder Jofre - to win the world 118 lb crown, Japan's Mashiko 'Fighting' Harada could have been forgiven for opting for a 'safe' first defence of his title. But as first defences go, this one promised to be a tough one. Alan Rudkin, the challenger from Liverpool, had already won the British and Commonwealth titles, and had shown his world-class credentials by scoring an upset stoppage victory over Johnny Caldwell, formerly Europe's world title claimant. His sole professional defeat, a cuts stoppage, had been avenged, and despite not being a big puncher, he was known for setting a pace almost as scorching as the one the indefatigable Japanese champion was famed for.
Perhaps sensing the danger the challenger posed, the remarkable focussed Harada made a blistering start, replying to Rudkin's nice left hook to the jaw by firing off a quick double-right hand, one upstairs and one down, to put the challenger down for a count in an admittedly untidy manner. Finding the swarming, ever-jolting Harada a difficult target to pin down, it wasn't until the third that Rudkin found any real momentum, meeting Harada's customary charge with a series of stiff jabs and banging in an emphatic right cross as he grew in confidence. When Rudkin continued to flurry and intelligently slide out of harm's way throughout the fourth, he must have been confident that he could bring the belt back home to Merseyside with him.
However, the champion always had the knack of forcing his opponents to fight his kind of fight, and so it proved to be the case in the fifth as Rudkin curiously stopped using his accurate jab and instead traded in close with Harada, coming off second best as both men attacked the other's body at a searing pace. The champion's constant attacking and prodigious work rate looked to have swung the fight firmly in his favour for the next two stanzas, but Rudkin was back on song in the eighth, getting back to his superior pure boxing and probing for openings patiently as his movement finally managed to keep the champion more or less in check.
Rounds in which either man looked truly dominant or clearly superior were becoming increasingly rare by this stage, with Rudkin starting the ninth, tenth and elevenths ones well before Harada came roaring back in the final stages of them, but once the champion seemed to be getting the better of the action again in the twelfth and thirteenth with his withering body attack, British hopes seemed to be fading fast.
Rudkin, though, had no desire to go away quietly, and he produced his best round in a while in the fourteenth, a three-minute stanza which was fought with great intensity and at a phenomenal pace considering how far in to the bout both men were. In something of a role reversal, it was Harada scoring with the neat, straight punches while Rudkin connected with wild, swinging hooks which had all of his might behind them, but it was the Liverpudlian showing the better and cuter defence and, despite shipping a big right hand in the final seconds, he'd done enough to give himself a slither of hope going in to the fifteenth and final round.
However, it had taken a super-human effort by the Englishman to even keep pace with the Japanese world champion, and it showed in the fifteenth as Harada made the first real statement, reeling off a trio of hard left hooks in succession which rocked the challenger. Gamely and, inevitably, at a frantic pace, Rudkin battled gamely, but Harada knew he was closing in on the victory line and proved just too resilient for Rudkin to make a dent in him. After the final bell sounded, the verdict was announced - unanimously in favour of the champion - and if some felt that Harada had merely stumbled across the title in the short term, his reign was well and truly underway now.
Why it's here: Despite being a defeat, this fight proved to be the announcement of Alan Rudkin as a truly world class fighter back in 1965. For a man of such (relatively) small experience to jump in there with a champion as accomplished as Harada and hold his own so admirably is impressive indeed, and this effort deserves to be remembered as one of the better unsuccessful world title attempts by any fighter from these shores. Harada's career opponents read like a who's who of lower weight boxing throughout the whole decade, but nevertheless Rudkin remains one of the most impressive names on his ledger and, once more, he showed in this fight what being a great champion is all about - taking them all on, and finding a way to win when you do, no matter what. An all-round excellent fight.
# 8 - Lionel Rose W PTS 15 Mashiko 'Fighting' Harada, World title, 1968
The skinny: Getting so close to the summit of Bantamweight boxing hadn't been easy for Australia's Lionel Rose, whose tendency to be spotted smoking a pipe was no gimmick, but rather a regular indulgence. He'd learned his boxing in the Down Under outback in a ring crafted from the remains of a picket fence and some string which acted as ropes, and had been forced to take up the sport professionally at a very young age and with no amateur experience after his father died suddenly of a heart attack, leaving his family with precious little income. Rose had vowed that he would become a world champion in his old man's honour, and now he had his chance. Mashiko 'Fighting' Harada had achieved one objective in becoming champion by usurping the legendary Eder Jofre, and his three successful title defences in the meantime had ticked another box - namely, convincing he boxing world that his win over the Brazilian had been no fluke, and that he was a worthy champion in his own right.
The betting odds said that the Japanese whirlwind would defeat Rose, but clearly this had no ill bearing on the challenger, who boxed exquisitely from the off with precision, great movement and effortless grace. As ever, Harada pressed at every opportunity and darted across the ring at the beginning of every round, but he was stung by a stream of jabs in the first, staggered by a perfect counter left in the second and out sped throughout the third.
But the champion finally managed to make it his kind of fight in the fourth, driving his head in to the challenger's chest and dragging him in to an inside brawl as the pair of them showed that they could take a shot just as well as they could administer one to an opponent. Things turned a little ugly, from just about every possible angle, in the sixth, as Harada at first somehow managed to throw himself to the floor, so wayward and wild was one of his swinging hooks, and as Rose was then docked a point for consistent use of the elbows as he attempted to fend Harada off when it came to the inside exchanges. Harada, who could rough it up with the best of them, answered with four cynical (and illegal) kidney punches in the next clinch, but if that was the worst of him, then he showed the best of him in the seventh, stunning Rose with a big right hand over the top and driving his man back to the ropes.
The ebb and flow continued as Rose once more got back in to his rhythm, throwing series of piston-like jabs, all of which scored cleanly, and in the ninth he left Harada swinging at thin air as his speed, movement and stinging right hand - which earned him a flash knockdown at the end of the round - took control. As the fight moved in to the late stages, Rose looked as if he might completely run away with it, repeatedly getting off first with his jab (which looked as if it simply couldn't miss by now) and almost always being just that little bit out of range for the champion to launch a worthwhile counter-attack thanks to his deft footwork.
Harada, knowing that his title was slipping away, came back well in the thirteenth, a string of impressive body attacks helping to release the aggression and pent up frustration which had seen him beginning the round by angrily banging his gloves together. When Harada again managed to get in close to go to work on Rose's body in the fourteenth, it seemed that there might yet be some hope for the champion. However, as he was forced to back away ever so slightly, it was Rose who had the final say, sending Harada's legs in to spasm with a heavy right cross and then having the confidence to fight on the inside once more with the Japanese star for the rest of the round, more than holding his own.
True to form, Harada took nothing even close to representing a backwards step in the final round, but Rose wasn't to be denied - a stunningly fast triple jab combination set the tone, and once more the classy counters and clever pivots which had characterised his exceptional showing throughout the fight were there for all to see. At the final bell, there was no doubting Rose's superiority - he was indeed the brand new Bantamweight champion of the world.
Why it's here: Quite simply, Lionel Rose's showing in this fight ranks as one of the most outstanding and complete exhibitions of boxing you could ever wish to see, for my money. Harada was seldom beaten in his championship career across three weights in any case, and even when he was he was never even close to being outclassed when at his peak - apart from this one night. Styles make fights, so they say, but if you're looking for the perfect blue print of how a textbook boxer should handle a world class, unorthodox and relentless stalker, then look no further. Outstanding stuff and a performance which would be nigh-on impossible to improve upon.
# 7 - Rafael Herrea W PTS 15 Venice Borkhorsor, WBC title, 1973
The skinny: Going in to this 1973 bout, Rafael Herrera had been on the Bantamweight scene for a long time and had mixed it with some truly outstanding company; he'd had the wood over the legendary Ruben Olivares, a fellow Mexican who enjoyed an almost God-like status amongst Latin American fight fans, had gone 1-1 with Chucho Castillo, the man who'd battled out an outstanding trilogy against the aforementioned Olivares, and also boasted a pair of wins over Rodolfo Martinez, who'd already spent a good few years ranked highly in the division and would go on to win a world title there the following year. By contrast, Herrera's opponent for this Inglewood, California (where Herrera had garnered a massive following) fight, Venice Borkhorsor, was little more than a new kid on the block in Bantamweight terms. His one real win of note, against the highly-respected Betulio Gonzalez, had given him a world title, but that had been down at Flyweight. Stepping up to 118 lb, there weren't a great deal of people willing to give him a chance of adding a second title against a man as experienced and grizzled as Herrera.
However, while the Thai Borkhorsor had a reputation as being a bit of a brawler, he was a handy boxer, too, and showed that from the off, controlling Herrera with his neat left hand counters in the first round and visibly stunning the champion with a gorgeous hook upstairs. Herrera, like almost all Mexican warriors, continued to press and work the body, and had his success, but the Thai southpaw was growing in confidence all the time, to the point where, by the fifth round, he felt he could start throwing his left hard and straight without even setting it up through the jab. Even more worryingly for Herrera, these punches were landing on the button time and time again.
The sixth, an absolutely fantastic round of non-stop action, finally saw Herrera moving the neat-boxing Thai in to the position he'd wanted all along - right against the ropes, where he was twice able to force the younger challenger to cover up and try to roll with shots. By the eighth, Borkhorsor's followers must have been worrying that the pace was proving too much, as he was again forced to suck up some evil body punches and appeared to be on unsteady legs at the end of the round as he was easily bundled to the floor, and when Herrera recovered quickly from two nice counters to dominate the remainder of the tenth, most indications seemed to point towards a steady defence of the Mexican's crown.
However, Borkhorsor managed to find an extra spring in his step in the eleventh, upping the pace of his own attacks and once more showing that he was the purer boxer of the pair, and in the thirteenth he stunned the pro-Herrera crowd in to something approaching silence, reeling off four hard left hands in a row to close the champion's right eye and brilliantly make him miss over and over again, while all the time being close enough to take full advantage and counter sharply. Suddenly, the Thai was producing his best form of the fight, and he was sublime once more in the fourteenth; Herrera made his statement first, digging in some nice body hooks, but then a crisp right hand from Borkhorsor quickly turned in to a blistering four-punch combination, all of which were on the money, and he spent the rest of the round controlling the champion behind his jab before putting the seal on a fantastic round with a sharp left hand which sent Herrera tottering to the ropes.
The champion, admittedly, produced an admirable effort to nick the fifteenth round on pressure, but to most observers it made little difference - to them, Borkhorsor had won, building up an unassailable lead with his dominance for much of the final third of the bout. Judge at ringside Chuck Hassett returned a score of 145-141 in the Thai's favour, which seemed just about right. However, incredibly, the two other judges, Larry Rozadilla and Ruby Jordan, scored the fight in Herrera's favour, 143-141 and 144-142 respectively. The Mexican had retained his crown - but only thanks to one of the most controversial and disputed points verdicts of the era.
Why it's here: It could be argued that the decision rendered by the judges - which was and continues to be widely condemned - takes the shine off of what was a superb fight. However, when looking back on a series of great fights, it never hurts to throw in a little bit of controversy now and then, does it? It always makes for good debate and, regardless of how you score the fight, it can't be denied that, between them, Herrera and Borkhorsor served up one hell of a treat for anyone who has an interest in the Bantamweight division. A classic, pure and simple.
# 6 - Lionel Rose W PTS 15 Alan Rudkin, World title, 1969
The skinny: By the time he boxed Lionel Rose in 1969, Alan Rudkin had already won the Bantamweight British and Commonwealth titles, but it was the world title he really wanted. This was to be his second attempt, having lost on points two years previously to the man who Rose, the handsome Australian of Aborigine heritage, had dethroned, Mashiko 'Fighting' Harada.
Rudkin was prone to slipping between being a boxer and a brawler at times, but there was no doubting which category the champion fell in to; Rose was a stylist through and through, and it was his smooth work which got the better of the early rounds. Countering nicely and winning the battle of the jabs, Rose swept the first two rounds before, in the third, Rudkin realised he was going to have a seriously hard time trying to out jab the champion and upped the tempo, getting his first real foothold in the fight as he scored repeatedly with his right hand, thrown in multiples as he applied constant pressure going forwards. However, this round was only a hiccup for Rose, it seemed, as the champion opened a cut over the challenger's left eye in the fourth and then lured him in with his cross-arm defence in the fifth, compounding Rudkin's error by scoring with a perfectly-executed right hand counter.
Despite this, Rudkin (known for his superb stamina, an attribute he put down to the fact that he made weight so much easier than many of his opponents) showed no intentions of simply going away. He completely abandoned his jab in the seventh and eighth rounds, but won both of them, loading up in twos, threes and fours (often to the body) and somewhat negating Rose's smooth jab with his sheer pressure. Rose stopped the rot in the ninth, rocking Rudkin's head back with a stiff right hand and getting the jab flowing once more, but in the tenth there were perhaps signs that the pace of the fight was beginning to tell on the champion, as he faded after a good start and allowed the Liverpudlian challenger to outwork him.
It almost seemed as if Rose was now taking a one round off, one round on approach as he bounced back brilliantly to boss the eleventh before looking in a spot of bother in the twelfth, as Rudkin bounced a booming right hand off his jaw, almost certainly his best punch of the fight until that point. The thirteenth could have been fought in the ol' phone booth, as both men slugged away viciously on the inside, but it was all Rudkin in the fourteenth as he once more abandoned his jab and any other refined techniques, instead opting to simply work Rose over with his outstanding pressure.
Going in to the fifteenth, the fight was clearly still in the balance, but as suggested earlier it was Rudkin who looked the fresher and more energetic, outworking and outpunching the champion, albeit without ever really having him in any real trouble. Rudkin's wait for the verdict must surely have been agonizing - but not as agonizing as the moment in which he learned that, in the eyes of the judges, he hadn't quite done enough to grapple the belt away from the Australian. His big finish hadn't been enough, and Lionel Rose had successfully defended his Bantamweight title on a split decision after a wonderful contest.
Why it's here: Traditionally, the sixties has been viewed as one of the poorer decades in the history of British boxing, with no fighter from these shores managing to defend a world title, and fewer managing to win one to begin with in any case. I, on the other hand, see that decade of 'failure' more as a case of British fighters regularly being the contemporaries of some truly outstanding champions, and that was certainly the case for the unfortunate Alan Rudkin. Despite losing this fight by an extremely narrow margin - and I agree that his big finish was just about too little, too late - anyone wondering just how good a fighter Rudkin was could do much worse than have a look at this fight. As one of Britain's most underrated historical fighters, Rudkin deserves his moment in the sun - and besides, it's not as if the fight itself was lacking in great action, either.
# 5 - Ruben Olivares W PTS 15 Chucho Castillo, World title, 1970
The skinny: By 1970, the fearsome-punching Ruben Olivares looked totally untouchable. Boasting a 57-0-1 record, which included 55 knockouts, many boxing fans and scribes were wondering when a challenger to his world title would come from who could even give him a decent argument. Lionel Rose and Alan Rudkin, for instance, had been two of the outstanding performers in that classic era for the Bantamweight division in the sixties, their battle against each other for the title as well as their respective fights against the likes of Mashiko 'Fighting' Harada all being closely-contested and totally absorbing contests. And yet Olivares had taken just five rounds to batter the classy Rose to defeat to win the world title in 1969, and a mere two rounds to annihilate the normally durable and resilient Rudkin. On that form line, no Bantamweight should have stood a chance against the Mexican, and certainly not his compatriot Castillo, whose record by 1970 suggested that, while he was a capable and solid performer, he was some way short of the elite bracket of which Olivares was a part.
Suffice to say, then, that when the champion was decked at the end of the third round having been largely in control for the action which had gone before, there was a sense of shock amongst the California crowd who had gathered to watch Olivares, whose famed punching power had made him perhaps Mexico's most revered champion up until that stage. It was a hard left hand that did the job, and though the champion bounced straight back up (taking another two flush shots amidst the confusion of whether he was to be given a count or not), it was now clear that the fight was not going to be the cakewalk many had predicted.
Castillo's classier jabbing and movement took the fourth and fifth, as Olivares, not used to being made to work so hard for openings, lagged behind, stuck on the outside and unable to utilise his incredible punching power. A strong left hook finally gave the onlooking crowd a glimpse of that power in the sixth as Castillo was forced to hold on just a little for the first time, but after a minute-long break the challenger's confidence seemed as high as ever in the seventh, to the point where he felt he could even take the champion on in a vicious inside exchange on the ropes. Incredibly, he was more that holding his own, too.
Olivares made his short body hooks count in the eighth, ninth and tenth, outworking the more mechanical challenger, but in a frantic eleventh round, in which jabs were almost totally abandoned, it was Castillo who had the bigger say, starting the round with a classy double hook to the body and then trading hard right hands upstairs as the round drew to a close. That effort seemed to take something out of Castillo, however, and he seemed oddly subdued in the next two rounds as he threw nowhere near enough to prevent Olivares stalking him and ultimately walking him down with his power, but he produced a fine effort in the fourteenth, jolting Olivares' head back many times with some great uppercuts on the inside.
The fifteenth belonged to Olivares, however, who kept a cool head to string together some beautiful high-low attacks, and although Castillo had given him much more of a scare and run for his money than anyone would have predicted beforehand, it wasn't enough - Olivares, going the distance for just the third time in his remarkable career, had run out a unanimous decision winner.
Why it's here: For both men, this was the beginning of one of the best and most entertaining rivalries / series in the history of the 118 lb weight class; they would go on to contest two more world title fight, Castillo gaining revenge with a shock cuts stoppage win in the second before Olivares again peeled himself off the canvas to make the saga 2-1 in his favour. More than that, however, it was a further confirmation of Olivares' greatness. When a champion has been running through opponents, a question always remains - will they be able to cope when they're finally forced to think, suck it up and win 'ugly'? Well, Olivares was asked that question here, and he passed with flying colours. It may not have had the same 'wow factor' as his aforementioned victories over the likes of Rose and Rudkin, but throughout his extraordinary career the brilliant little Mexican had fewer finer nights than this.
# 4 - Orlando Canizales W PTS 12 Billy Hardy, IBF title, 1990
The skinny: In 1990, a dream came true for Billy Hardy, as he was given the opportunity to fight the Mexican-American Orlando Canizales for the IBF Bantamweight title. What's more, he was given the opportunity to do this in front of his adoring Sunderland following in his home town. The volatile Tyne and Wear atmosphere must have been a new experience for the champion, but nevertheless he had little to worry about from the outset - he was already considered one of the better pound for pound fighters in the world, and Hardy, while a good performer at European level, had nothing on his record to suggest that he could pull the upset, regardless of where the fight was being held.
The champion had the better of the very early going. Hardy, happy to let Canizales dictate the pace and look for big counters, had his moments but the champion's sharp jab followed by a clean right to the jaw in the opening seconds, as well as some classy uppercuts in the second round, were the highlights. However, the spirited challenger was standing up to these attacks surprisingly well, and even landed a clean right cross to the point of Canizales' chin at the end of the round.
Hardy started to show that he had more than just grit and determination going for him in the third, producing a tight round of clinical boxing and movement which he punctuated with a pair of cracking right hands, but he was clearly hurt by a right hand himself in the fourth, being forced to hold and cover up throughout as Canizales pushed for the finish. But once more, Hardy must have left many people surprised at how cool he remained while under siege, and when he again roared back well in the fifth, getting off first consistently with the jab and showing some superb defence to parry many of the champion's best efforts, the Sunderland faithful must have felt that the shock result was on.
Canizales upped his tempo in the sixth and seventh, forcing Hardy to throw a hell of a lot of shots just to keep him off and dazing him with a strong left hook, but if Hardy's lack of punching power was a concern then his fitness and composure wasn't as he spent the eight using the ring space brilliantly and coming up with eye-catching flurries before smartly nipping out of range to avoid the champion's counters.
When Canizales banged in a wonderful left hook to the body in the ninth which forced the challenger to go to his knees and take a count, you could have been forgiven for thinking that the end was nigh. Instead, however, Hardy came back stronger once more during a final three rounds which were all fought at an exceptional pace. Canizales continued marching forward, but his wide, looping hooks thrown with little of his usual fluidity were a stark contrast to the more clinical attacks of Hardy, all of which were stemming from his accurate jab and which also earned him an appreciation tap on the shoulder from the champion at the end of the eleventh round.
Canizales, who had been plagued with rumours of weight-making troubles coming in to the fight, did indeed look the more tired of the pair as the twelfth was fought out at a frantic pace, but despite Hardy's fine finish, which was capped by a huge right hand to the chin of the champion in the final thirty seconds, any impartial observer must have known that the call of the judges was going to be wafer-thin once the final bell sounded, and it was; 115-113 Canizales, 116-113 Hardy, 115-114 Canizales. Despite Hardy's magnificent, heroic effort, Canizales was heading back to Texas with his title after a sensational fight.
Why it's here: Divisional gatekeepers such as Hardy aren't meant to give outstanding fighters like Canizales such a stern argument, but occasionally they do - it's part of boxing's mystique and appeal. Depending on how you view it, this could be seen as either a fantastic night in the life of Billy Hardy, or conversely a tragic, painful kind of 'so near, yet so far' tale in which he deserved better, particularly if you're one of the people whose own personal scorecard for this fight made the Sunderland red head the winner. Whatever your take is, however, it was a truly superb bout, a real classic of the British ring.
# 3 - Carlos Zarate W TKO 4 Alfonso Zamora, Lineal title, 1977
The skinny: Nobody was sure who'd win when Carlos Zarate, the WBC Bantamweight champion and undefeated in his professional career, squared off against fellow Mexican Alfonso Zamora, who held the WBA version of the crown and likewise had never tasted defeat in the pro ranks, in Los Angeles in the summer of 1978. But one thing was pretty much for certain - it wasn't going the distance. Zarate's 55 wins included a staggering 54 inside the distance, and while Zamora's own 26 wins seemed little in comparison, not a single soul who'd so far shared the ring with him had heard the final bell.
Boxing politics meant that neither the WBC or WBA belts were on the line, incredibly enough, but there was little doubt that whoever won this one would be, beyond any shadow of a doubt, the king of the Bantamweight division from a lineal point of view.
The fight was a mix of memorable and bizarre right from the very off, as a madcap protester of some sort managed to breach security and present himself in the ring after a mere 30 seconds of the opener, but once that interruption had been remedied it was the WBA champion Zamora who started the better in a fight which was fought at a truly testing pace throughout, beating Zarate to the punch and chipping away at the body whenever the chance presented itself. Zarate went to the head well with a right before banging in a wicked left hook to the ribs, but Zamora's composed, clean work had edged the early going.
Zarate forced Zamora to the ropes for the first time in the second, but was made to back off when Zamora came up with a high-quality left-right combination. That seemed to give Zarate a wake up call as he then looked to box a little more scientifically, firing off his superior jab, rolling well underneath the return fire from Zamora and scoring with a beautiful right hand counter in close, too. Another blistering two shot combination from Zamora made the WBC champion's eyes widen in apprehension, but Zarate ended the round well, with two nice head shots as Zamora looked to rush him.
The second had been a hell of a round, but it was in the third that the fight really began to swing decisively in one man's favour. Zamora made a good start to it, getting his own jab going for the first time and rocking Zarate's head back three times with it, and even seemed to be holding his own in the inside exchanges, all of which were played out with stunning ferociousness and deadly intent. However, it was then that Zarate found a perfect right hook to the head, which landed as cleanly as could be and forced Zamora to retreat to the ropes once more. Two left hooks, followed by a short right, put the WBA titlist on the deck, but he showed that he wasn't finished yet when he rose and demonstrated superb will to gamely stand toe to toe for the remainder of the round and survive until the bell.
However, that typical Mexican fighting heart, rather than help, surely hindered him in the fourth as he looked to slug it out with Zarate again, his legs still unsteady and his head surely still unclear. Zarate floored him once more with another devastating right hand, and this time, though Zamora beat the count again, it was evident that the end was night. Upon resumption, a series of looping left hands put the hitherto unbeaten Zamora over again, and this time his corner took the compassionate route, throwing in the towel as the referee counted. In four short, action-packed and dramatic rounds, Carlos Zarate had shown that he was indeed the greatest Bantamweight in the world.
Why it's here: By all known measurements, this really should have been a super fight; two compatriots, both incredibly big punchers, both undefeated and a fight which cleared up once and for all who the real champion of the division was. It was exactly the kind of fight we wish we saw more of today, and the kind of fight which not enough fighters have been willing to make over the years. For Zarate, one of the very greatest Bantamweights, this was his crowning glory and undoubtedly the finest moment of his career - and once more, anyone who loves those 'fastest gun in the west' style slugfests will find their need for carnage satisfied here.
# 2 - Mashiko 'Fighting' Harada W PTS 15 Eder Jofre, World title, 1965
The skinny: Every now and then, a fighter comes along who seems to wear a cloak of invincibility, and in the eyes of many observers Eder Jofre, the brilliant Brazilian from Sao Paulo, was one such fighter come 1965. Unbeaten in more than fifty professional contests, he'd held the NBA Bantamweight crown since 1960, and from 1962 onwards, having beating Britain and Europe's representative in the shape of Johnny Caldwell, his claim to 118 lb supremacy had been undisputed. Travelling to Japan to fight 'Mashiko' Fighting Harada, Jofre knew he'd be up against it; Harada himself, despite being just twenty-one years of age, had already been a world champion before down at Flyweight, and fighting in front of his adoring home fans would doubtless inspire him in his quest to make history and hand a defeat to the seemingly invincible 'Golden Bantam'. Nevertheless, despite his own fine credentials, the Japanese was given, at best, only a moderate chance of upsetting the script.
When a classical, measured and pure boxer such as Jofre comes up against a relentless buzzsaw such as Harada, it's often the latter who gets the better of the opening exchanges, and that was certainly the case here - Harada, as he would for pretty much every round of the fight, literally ran across the ring towards the champion once the opening bell sounded, perhaps catching the Brazilian off guard with some whipping hooks and uppercuts in close. Jofre, naturally, remained patient and probed expertly for openings as Harada looked to establish his own jab in the second, doubling and tripling it up to good effect, and when the champion seemed to have hit the groove in the third, starting and finishing it with nice right hands to the head and digging in a beautiful right to the body, left to the head combination in between, you may have been forgiven for thinking that it was business as usual.
You'd have been wrong, though. Harada, having the fight of his life, was in command in the fourth, banging a thunderous right uppercut off the champion's chin which forced Jofre to totter back to the ropes and cover up as the challenger let rip with every shot in his arsenal, again stunning the Brazilian with another uppercut towards the end of the round. Jofre, rolling with and parrying shots as best he could, held on until the bell, but was clearly in a world of trouble now. However, he produced a magnificent champion's effort to win the fifth, catching Harada with a sneaky, short left as the challenger strode after him and then dazing him with some accurate left hooks in the closing stages.
Jofre looked to work the jab over the next two rounds, but Harada proved a difficult target to land cleanly on, surprisingly light on his feet and deceptively elusive, while also outworking the champion, said to be struggling to make the Bantamweight limit and plagued by management issues. Harada continued to score with his right hand over the top, but then in the tenth there seemed to be a renewed spring in Jofre's step and, for the first time, he anticipated Harada's sprint across the ring, countering it with a perfect right hand and dominating the round from that point onwards.
The eleventh and twelfth were mightily close affairs, but it was Harada who made the next big statement in the thirteenth, which was his best round for a while as he more or less totally negated any attacking threat the champion posed, overwhelming him with his own hurricane of shots and looking as if he had more energy in reserve of the pair. Knowing that his title was very much in jeopardy, however, Jofre upped his game in the final two rounds, again catching his onrushing opponents with neat left hand counters and then rocking him with a sharp one-two in the penultimate stanza, before taking control of the fifteenth and final round by making Harada's knees dip with a looping right hook.
The last time I scored this fight, I couldn't split them, having it 143 apiece using the ten point must system (7-7-1 in rounds). However, the judges on the night just about managed to find a winner - and to many people's surprise, it was Harada, who had dethroned perhaps the greatest Bantamweight of them all in a huge upset.
Why it's here: It says a lot about how highly regarded a champion Eder Jofre was that, despite facing a challenger with a record as good as Harada's, almost nobody thought he would lose this fight. But upsets are part of the fabric of the sport, and at the time this was seen as the Braddock-Baer of the Bantamweight class. What's more, if you wanted a fight which demonstrates the difficulty of scoring and the subjective nature of it, you'd be hard pressed to find a better one than this. What do you favour, the cool, calculated boxing of Jofre, or the pressure attack of Harada? Did the man from Japan do enough, or was it home town cooking? Moreover, even in defeat, Jofre showed the ingredients which made him such an outstandingly fine fighter in this contest, as did his conqueror. An unmissable slice of boxing history.
# 1 - Paulie Ayala W PTS 12 Johnny Tapia, WBA title, 1999
The skinny: Before this fight, the ever-aggressive WBA Bantamweight champion Johnny Tapia (whose already temperamental personality was being strained by promotional issues, meaning that, win or lose, this was to be his final fight under the Top Rank banner) aimed a hard shove in to the chest of Paulie Ayala, looking to win a version of the 118 lb crown after being turned back by Joichiro Tatsuyoshi in a WBC title tilt two years previously. It was typical of the fiery Tapia, undefeated until this point in 48 professional outings and a previously unified Super-Flyweight champion, but also a sign of what was to come in the coming twelve rounds.
Both champion and challenger showed real intent from the off, with the champion's body work standing out in particular, but some beautiful southpaw jabbing and left hand leads - as well as some superb hooks in close to the ribs which were to be a defining characteristic of the battle - allowed Ayala to get a foothold in the second, and he continued his good work in the next round too, being arguably unlucky not to have a knockdown called in his favour as the fiery Tapia, fighting with an almost sadistic half-smile on his face throughout, went over from a cuffing shot and then walked on to a perfect left hand as he bounced off the ropes.
The pattern continued in the fourth, with Ayala producing some Duran-like rolling up close as the pair continued to rip away at each other at an alarming pace, and Tapia's frustrations boiled over as he lashed out after hearing the bell to end the round. But the champion hadn't remained unbeaten for so long without good reason, and a tightened defence, as well as some huge double and triple left hooks inside to the body, saw him come back strongly in the fifth.
Tensions again almost boiled over in the next four rounds, which were largely dominated by Ayala's quicker hands and tremendous jab, but Tapia started throwing his jab with bad intentions in the ninth having previously ignored it for large periods, and in the tenth a head clash opened a cut on the challenger's forehead. The sight of blood seemed to spur Tapia on to have his best round in a while in the eleventh, as he finally showed the good sense to box at range, get off first and then nullify any return attacks from Ayala with his quick feet, and the stage was set for an amazing, grandstand finish in the twelfth.
The two combatants didn't disappoint as they produced a truly outstanding and utterly ferocious three minutes of fighting. Sticking together as if bound by glue, both were hit and hurt several times over as they pressed for a finish, but Ayala, who'd accumulated a lead in those middle rounds when Tapia seemed to be fighting too much with his heart and too little with his head, was still standing at the end to claim a unanimous decision, and with it Tapia's WBA belt, signalling the end of his outstanding unbeaten run.
Why it's here: It says much about the quality, ferocity and relentlessness of this fight that, in a day and age when even the most outstanding performers below the Lightweight class are often denied the limelight and coverage their talents merit, it still managed to be named Ring Magazine's 'Fight of the Year' for 1999. As well as being the kind of upset which always breathes new life in to the sport, it was also a microcosm of the troubled and ultimately ill-fated Tapia, who must surely rank as one of boxing's most remarkable characters; flawed, impulsive and always with a tendency to switch between the sublime and the ridiculous - but never anything less than hugely entertaining and an unmissable value for money fighter.
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Re: The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by TRUSSMAN66 Mon 22 Jul 2013, 5:23 pm
This isn't meant to be tasteless but you not think
Lupe Pintor vs Johnny Owen deserves to be on there...........A rank skinny outsider outboxes a great fighter in his hometown.......Gets caught and put down heavily and then gallantly tries to carry on paying the ultimate price!!...When titles were something to give your all for!!!....All that is great about Boxing and all that is bad encapsulated in one fight!!
Certainly replace the Hardy fight with this one...........
There seems to be a hoodoo in Boxing about fights that produce fatalities being hidden and hushed up..
Sure Owen died but he died gloriously........and his performance should be celebrated not hidden!!
Great work Chris..
Lupe Pintor vs Johnny Owen deserves to be on there...........A rank skinny outsider outboxes a great fighter in his hometown.......Gets caught and put down heavily and then gallantly tries to carry on paying the ultimate price!!...When titles were something to give your all for!!!....All that is great about Boxing and all that is bad encapsulated in one fight!!
Certainly replace the Hardy fight with this one...........
There seems to be a hoodoo in Boxing about fights that produce fatalities being hidden and hushed up..
Sure Owen died but he died gloriously........and his performance should be celebrated not hidden!!
Great work Chris..
Last edited by TRUSSMAN66 on Mon 22 Jul 2013, 5:24 pm; edited 1 time in total (Reason for editing : ..)
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Re: The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by 88Chris05 Mon 22 Jul 2013, 5:35 pm
Good shout on Pintor-Owen, Truss, and you can chalk that one down to a simple oversight on my part; I have no issue including tragic fights if they were genuinely brilliant ones (I included the tragic final meeting between Emile Griffith and Benny Paret in the Welterweight article of this series, for instance).
An excellent fight in its own right and would have been well worthy of inclusion here, you're right. I guess sometimes certain fights just slip through the old memory net!
An excellent fight in its own right and would have been well worthy of inclusion here, you're right. I guess sometimes certain fights just slip through the old memory net!
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Re: The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by TRUSSMAN66 Mon 22 Jul 2013, 5:36 pm
Wait till you reach my age..
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Re: The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by Rowley Mon 22 Jul 2013, 5:39 pm
Sterling work again Chris. Cannot find any fault with your winner either. As you have alluded to in your summary a fight that showed us very much the best and worst of the tragic Tapia. Guts and heart to burn but that streak of machismo and desire to have a tear up probably cost him. Cracker of a fight that stands up to repeated watching.
Still waiting with baited breath for the cruisers to make their appearance in the series.
Still waiting with baited breath for the cruisers to make their appearance in the series.
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Re: The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by 88Chris05 Mon 22 Jul 2013, 5:49 pm
Rowley wrote:Still waiting with baited breath for the cruisers to make their appearance in the series.
Unless by 'Cruiser' you mean the likes of the HMS Exeter and the SMS Schwelswig-Holstein, I think you might end up disappointed, Jeff.
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Re: The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by Rowley Mon 22 Jul 2013, 5:51 pm
Come on Chris, faitn heart ne'er won fair maid. Am sure if you try hard enough you can find 500 words of prose for Enzo Mac vs Bobby Gunn
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Re: The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by TRUSSMAN66 Mon 22 Jul 2013, 7:25 pm
The one cruiserweight fight you must see in your lifetime..........
Holy v Qawi..
Holy v Qawi..
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Re: The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by captain carrantuohil Mon 22 Jul 2013, 10:41 pm
Splendid, Chris, as usual. Delighted to see two of the late Alan rudkin's fight on here. Personally believe that while he lost clearly enough to Harada, he was the victim of one of the worst hometown decisions ever against Rose. He certainly got the worst scorecard of all time from Australian judge Ray Mitchell who, quite incredibly, scored the contest (on the five point must system that was still around back then) 75-60 to Rose, or 15 rounds to nil!
Might have to disagree with you that Olivares' win over Castillo confirmed his greatness, though. To me, it was the first indication of his fallibility, something confirmed by his subsequent performance in title fights at both bantam and feather. Ruben was always value for money, but to me, he has always received a touch more credit than should really be his due, certainly by comparison with a man like Harada.
Postscript to the Ray Mitchell scorecard by the way: it seems that the Australian actually gave Rudkin a share of the 13th, but had awarded Rose a 5-3 round in the 11th.
Might have to disagree with you that Olivares' win over Castillo confirmed his greatness, though. To me, it was the first indication of his fallibility, something confirmed by his subsequent performance in title fights at both bantam and feather. Ruben was always value for money, but to me, he has always received a touch more credit than should really be his due, certainly by comparison with a man like Harada.
Postscript to the Ray Mitchell scorecard by the way: it seems that the Australian actually gave Rudkin a share of the 13th, but had awarded Rose a 5-3 round in the 11th.
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Re: The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by 88Chris05 Mon 22 Jul 2013, 11:10 pm
Thanks, captain. Good to see you back and I'm pleased you made it in time for this as I know the Bantams are one of your strong suits.
Taking a more in-depth look at Rudkin's career has been a really enjoyable exercise for me and has confirmed, in my eyes at least, that he's one of the most underrated fighters the UK has ever produced. I agree that the shutout card he was on the wrong end of against Rose was an absolute disgrace, of course, but I didn't think that Rose winning the fight outright was. To me, it was simply an extremely tight one where either man could have edged it by a point, perhaps two. I favoured Rose's more precise boxing over Alan's higher workrate by the absolute slimmest of margins, and just felt that Rudkin cost himself a couple of key rounds when he was trying to box Rose at range when he should really have been looking to drag him in to the inside exchanges as much as possible. Rudkin was a strong all-rounder, but Rose was a silky-smooth stylist and a very difficult man to outbox.
Anyway, superb fight and I can fully understand why anyone might score it in Rudkin's favour.
As for Olivares-Castillo I, it's all about perspective, for me. It wasn't Olivares' finest performance, but nevertheless we've seen plenty of fighters who looked a million dollars blowing all comers away, and then look totally lost when faced with an adversary who can extend and really threaten them. Some can't deal with it, but Olivares did and overcame the first panic moments (or something close to them!) of his career, which arguably said more about him as a fighter than anyone of his straightforward, devastating knockout wins beforehand did.
As I said though, everyone has a different take on things like that.
Taking a more in-depth look at Rudkin's career has been a really enjoyable exercise for me and has confirmed, in my eyes at least, that he's one of the most underrated fighters the UK has ever produced. I agree that the shutout card he was on the wrong end of against Rose was an absolute disgrace, of course, but I didn't think that Rose winning the fight outright was. To me, it was simply an extremely tight one where either man could have edged it by a point, perhaps two. I favoured Rose's more precise boxing over Alan's higher workrate by the absolute slimmest of margins, and just felt that Rudkin cost himself a couple of key rounds when he was trying to box Rose at range when he should really have been looking to drag him in to the inside exchanges as much as possible. Rudkin was a strong all-rounder, but Rose was a silky-smooth stylist and a very difficult man to outbox.
Anyway, superb fight and I can fully understand why anyone might score it in Rudkin's favour.
As for Olivares-Castillo I, it's all about perspective, for me. It wasn't Olivares' finest performance, but nevertheless we've seen plenty of fighters who looked a million dollars blowing all comers away, and then look totally lost when faced with an adversary who can extend and really threaten them. Some can't deal with it, but Olivares did and overcame the first panic moments (or something close to them!) of his career, which arguably said more about him as a fighter than anyone of his straightforward, devastating knockout wins beforehand did.
As I said though, everyone has a different take on things like that.
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Re: The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by TRUSSMAN66 Wed 24 Jul 2013, 11:08 am
Going to give a shout to Richie Sandoval ko 15 Jeff chandler
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Not suggesting it makes your list.....But remember that Chandler was champion for four years and was being talked of as a future Hofer.......Sandoval was a punchy little warrior and basically out-hustled Jeff and took his title.....Surprise to many at the time..
Good fight too.............
Also Sandoval went on to lose to somebody Chandler beat in Gaby Canizales..nearly died too..Fight is on the Mugabi-Hagler card !!!
He was dangerously dehydrated making the weight and was bitter about it afterward..
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Not suggesting it makes your list.....But remember that Chandler was champion for four years and was being talked of as a future Hofer.......Sandoval was a punchy little warrior and basically out-hustled Jeff and took his title.....Surprise to many at the time..
Good fight too.............
Also Sandoval went on to lose to somebody Chandler beat in Gaby Canizales..nearly died too..Fight is on the Mugabi-Hagler card !!!
He was dangerously dehydrated making the weight and was bitter about it afterward..
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Re: The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by 88Chris05 Wed 24 Jul 2013, 11:51 am
Thanks for the suggestion, Truss. I watched Sandoval-Chandler but never got around to doing a small write up for the fight in the end, and once I'd written up ten of them which I was reasonably happy with I just wanted to get the article done and out there, because it took a pretty long time to finish! You're right though, it was an enjoyable fight. Have never seen Chandler-Canizales, though, although as you say I know that he got the beating of a lifetime in it.
The Bantams were just so tricky as there are a load of title fights from that weight class that were reported as classics (and look like them from what bits I've seen) but which were never recorded in full for some reason, or have the filming rights caught up in some legal battle. I wanted to at least have the choice of considering fights like Arnold Taylor versus Romea Anaya, Rafael Herrera versus Rodolfo Martinez II and Joe Becerra versus Alphonse Halimi II, but they were non-starters because of those kind of issues.
The Bantams were just so tricky as there are a load of title fights from that weight class that were reported as classics (and look like them from what bits I've seen) but which were never recorded in full for some reason, or have the filming rights caught up in some legal battle. I wanted to at least have the choice of considering fights like Arnold Taylor versus Romea Anaya, Rafael Herrera versus Rodolfo Martinez II and Joe Becerra versus Alphonse Halimi II, but they were non-starters because of those kind of issues.
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Re: The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by AlFrancis Thu 25 Jul 2013, 6:44 pm
Hello all, first post on here. Just come across the site and just wanted to say how much I enjoyed the thread. I've seen 8 of the 10 fights mentioned, just have to watch the Tapia-Ayala and Konadu Veraphol fights.
The bantam division is very close to my heart, I'm Alan Rudkin's son, lovely to see him remembered on here.
The bantam division is very close to my heart, I'm Alan Rudkin's son, lovely to see him remembered on here.
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Re: The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by 88Chris05 Thu 25 Jul 2013, 6:52 pm
Hi AlFrancis, thanks a lot for dropping in and it's great to have the son of Alan Rudkin himself commenting. I hope you'll stick around - glad you enjoyed the article.
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Re: The ten Bantamweight title fights you must see in your lifetime
by AlFrancis Thu 25 Jul 2013, 7:00 pm
88Chris05 wrote:Hi AlFrancis, thanks a lot for dropping in and it's great to have the son of Alan Rudkin himself commenting. I hope you'll stick around - glad you enjoyed the article.
Thanks Chris, I will. A couple of my favourites apart from the above would be Olivares-Castillo 2 and Lupe Pintor-Alberto Davila 2.
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Join date : 2013-07-25
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