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 In this staff artist's oil paint version of a wire photo, Shane Mosley, right, wallops Ricardo Mayorga on his way to one of boxing's all-time most dramatic finishes. |
Over the hill prizefighters?
Guess again, sportswriters!
of TheColumnists.com
If you read any of the advance hype for last Saturday night's junior middleweight battle between ex-champs "Sugar" Shane Mosley and Ricardo "El Matador" Mayorga, you might have reached the conclusion this was a sort of "Boxing Night of the Living Dead."
Mosley, one of the most stylish boxer-punchers of his era, is now 37-years-old and that's senior citizenville for most prizefighters. The former lightweight champ (135 pounds) had moved up to 147 pounds to become a welterweight champ, then 154 pounds to annex a junior middleweight crown. But when he entered the ring Saturday night, he wasn't champion of anything and was, in fact, at that stage of his career when he needed to find other famous "senior citizens" to fight.
His opponent, Mayorga, also a former welterweight and junior middleweight champ, is a 35-year-old brawler from Nicaragua. Brawlers usually don't age well, especially if they train on beer and smoke two and a half packs of cigarettes a day, as Mayorga has been known to do. Always a tough guy, Mayorga now is mostly known for the fighters who have knocked him out in recent years. He obviously had to dehydrate him in order to make weight for the Mosley fight because, after drinking a few gallons of water, he came into the ring Saturday night weighing 170 pounds, 10 more than Mosley, who also had re-hydrated a good deal after the weigh-in the day before.
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Nicaraguan slugger Ricardo Mayorga. At right, the poised boxer-puncher "Sugar" Shane Mosley, still a great fighter. |
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Wise fight people assumed Mayorga might make it lively for the first few rounds, but that the smarter, more proficient boxer Mosley would take him out somewhere between the sixth and eighth rounds of their 12-round fight in Southern California. Both men have always given a good account of themselves, so nobody expected it to be a flop in the excitement department.
What most viewers expected, though, was for the career of at least one of these guys to reach its inglorious end Saturday night.
And that's where the big surprise comes in.
Though overweight, Mayorga didn't look it--nor act it. He came at Mosley like a bull, setting the pace and making Mosley fight his brawler-style of fight for the first three rounds. Though Mosley was able to land the cleaner, sharper punches all through the fight, Mayorga walked right through them. I soon lost count of how many times Mosley landed solid right hand shots flush on Mayorga's chin--and didn't even faze the marauding Nicaraguan.
In the next three rounds, Mosley outboxed Mayorga and avoided the pummeling Mayorga had been giving him thorugh the first three. But by the seventh round, ;the men were fighting a lot more evenly than one ever imagined they would. Though the HBO broadcast team didn't give Mayorga much credit for effectiveness from then on, I did on my card. I had him winning both the eighth and ninth rounds and the eleventh. When the two finally reached the final round, I had Mayorga ahead, mostly because he'd been able to keep backing Mosley up with his furious barrages, even though Mosley kept landing the cleaner, more accurate punches.
I believe Mosley and his corner knew the outcome might be in doubt when they went into the last round, so Mosley seriously stepped up the pace and finally floored Mayorga. I knew that knockdown had at least brought Mosley even in points--and one of the three judges agreed with me, it turns out. I figured Mosley had to knock Mayorga out if he wanted to be sure he wasn't going to lose on points or wind up with a draw.
And, miracle of miracles, that's what he did! But how he did it was spectacular, for sure. Throwing combinations of lefts and rights the way his two historic namesakes --"Sugar" Ray Robinson and "Sugar" Ray Leonard--might have done, Mosley finally caught the struggling Mayorga with a picture perfect left hook and put him down for the count to 10. And here's the beauty of it: When the ref stopped counting, there was only one second left on the clock!
As far as I'm concerned, that's high drama. Better yet, the amazing finish just put the capper on what was one heck of a rip-roaring fight betweenn two willing warriors. If Mosley had landed any of his earlier shots flush on the chin of any normal welterweight or junior middlweight contender, he would have gone home a lot earlier. Mayorga was as tough as always--and kept slugging right until the very end.
Likewise, Mayorga was in much better condition than it looked and surely would have pulverized anybody with skills any less plentiful than those of the great Sugar Shane Mosley. Are they both washed up? No way, Jose. They both have lots of fight left in them--and I'm hoping we'll get a chance to see them both go on with their careers after a little rest and recreation.
©2008 by Ron Miller. The photo of Ricardo Mayorga is courtesy of HBO. The photo of Shane Mosley is courtesy of Mosley. This column first posted Sept. 29, 2008.
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