recap :de la hoya vrs hopkins

in the past i have not agreed with boxing commentator bert sugar and i have as yet not seen the recent hopkins / de la hoya bout , but it seems that if sugar's commentary is any indication , hopkins at age 39 ,will finally get the recognition he deserves .

hopefully , bernard will successfully defend his title one last time in january , set the all time record at 20 for the most successful middleweight title defenses and then retire from the game with a big payday, financially set for life and his place in the historybooks as one of the greatest middleweights of all time , firmly secure .

as a "senior citizen " myself , i love those rare occasions when the "oldtimers" of sports manage to pull the rabbit out of the hat and best the "kids" ,even though at age 31 , de la hoya is not yet over the proverbial hill , but still is no longer in the spring chicken category either.

by age 33 to 35 most athletes have done what they are going to do in sports and need to be actively completing their detailed preparations for a successful retirement.

so many great champions , either for lack of money, or love of that addictive victory-thrill that fighters grow to crave , have been unable to leave the ring and stay retired .

hopkins cites the great "marvelous marvin hagler" , the "blue collar champion" as his role model in this fight against "olympic golden boy" oscar de la hoya.

back in the 80s, after winning the fight , but being robbed by the judges and losing what must have been an emotionally crushing decision to boxing's then "golden boy" sugar ray leonard , marvelous marvin hagler stuck to his pre-announced game plan and without shame , retired from the "square jungle" a wealthy man , who will for a long time to come , be recognized as one of the very best middleweights to ever have put on a pair of gloves .

we hope that benard hopkins after scoring a dramatic KO over his "golden boy" opponent, follows marvin hagler's footsteps .


*addendum on hopkins' knock out of de la hoya by a "liver punch":

the fact that the highly paid "ring magazine" writer bert sugar , in his recap of hopkins' 9th round KO of de la hoya , had to call on the durable and very likable kickboxer-turned boxer and actor , randall "tex" cobb ,for a description of the liver punch's effects on a fighter and then derisively referred to cobb as a "human punching bag" , is evidence for WHY i have NOT in the past, often agreed with , or even liked bert sugar...

a liver punch is not uncommon in boxing ,or martial arts... back in my college days during a training session , i once took to the liver area , just a light tap of a roundhouse kick from one of my early martial arts instructors .

if delivered properly , a shot there is terribly effective and is one reason why most fighters are taught to fight with their left side forward .

it felt as if all of the power to the legs was completely cut off...you are momentarily paralyzed , your mouth and throat taste bitter like bile , or hot vomit and your whole body hurts like an excruciating hell ... you cannot move.

i did not drop --it was just a quick light tap -to exactly the right place-but it was all i could do to keep from falling down...it felt similar in intensity to the time years later when a "seasoned veteran" sekou was sparring without a protective cup and got nailed full force, below the belt by a front kick --dead in the "groan" as the once popular "archie bunker" tv character used to humorously refer to that rather "sensitive" area on a man.

...your legs give out , they cannot work no matter how hard you try , you are rolling helplessly on the floor , screaming in extreme agony from literally blinding pain , combined with the strong urge to vomit ... arms and legs shaking involuntarily while from the waist down and back up to your face and neck again, you also feel ice-cold as hell...yet you sweat profusely at the same time... it was scored as a TKO because i could not continue...

...the first time i saw something like this was when the great roberto duran while in the twilight of his days as a 130 pound lightweight ,fought a quick ,tough ,pesky , but light-punching villomar fernandez who for 13 rounds ,despite a lack of punching power, gave duran all the trouble that he could handle .

fernandez took the best that duran had to offer and was giving the champ a boxing lesson ...slipping punches without "running" from duran... using skill to make duran miss and then answering with combinations of his own , fernandez was ahead on all cards.

he wasn't just a clever boxer though , several times during the fight , fernandez's chin withstood the best shots that duran's vaunted "manos de piedra/hands of stone" were able to deliver and after almost 13 rounds , he was still in front of duran , taking the fight to him , beating the champ to the punch , but unable to seriously hurt the legendary duran .

villomar had the heart of a hungry lion and was pumped up for victory...

if he could go the 15 round distance ,it looked as if an upset decision would surely be in the making , when suddenly ,during one of their many very lively exchanges , duran caught fernandez along the ropes and landed with a heavy left hand to the liver .

fernandez's legs dropped out from under him as if he had been shot with an elephant gun ...his legs had a complete power blackout and he hit the canvas like a brick .

Writhing in agony , still conscious , but simply unable to rise , fernandez was counted out by the referee .

roberto duran had saved his title and won one of the best match ups that i have ever witnessed between an underdog kid with nothing but tenacity, speed and sharp boxing skills, vrs a great champion in his prime, still possessing legendary boxing skills , tremendous experience and for his 130 pound size , an awesome amount of pure raw punching power .

shortly afterwards duran would move up from lightweight division to win titles in the welterweight , junior middleweight, and middleweight divisions...but would , unfortunately end up financially broke and forced to fight years past his 40th birthday ...always sad to see a great champion go out like that...,

Undisputed: De La Hoya vs. HopkinsRecap by Bert Sugar

Despite all the pre-fight hype by an array of writers wearing their pencils down to the nub comparing Hopkins-De La Hoya with Hagler-Leonard, Hagler-Leonard it wasn't.

For reasons that couldn't stand up to the vaguest examination De La Hoya, acting almost as if some highwayman of the long ago had ordered him to "Stand and Deliver," chose to stand directly in front of Hopkins instead of moving in and out throwing flurries as Leonard had. Maybe it was a psychological holdover from his fight with Felix Trinadad when his machismo had been called into question after he ran the last four rounds and now driven by a fear of being something less than a warrior he elected to take a stand. Or maybe he thought his strategy would throw Hopkins off his gameplan. But whatever it was that made him make his stand, it was as successful as Custer's last one.

There was no tortoise-and-hare story here, just Oscar standing in front of Bernard trading blow-for-blow and jab-for-jab and playing cat-and-cat with the stronger champion throughout the early going. And winning a majority of the opening rounds on the judges' scorecards.

But by the fourth Hopkins, who had looked somewhat tentative and a little offput by Oscar's strategy, unsheathed his jab and began closing the distance between the two--and every now and then throwing a left shoulder into the mix just to remind Oscar that he had made a mistake trying to match him on the inside.

As the fight entered the fateful ninth, Hopkins was ahead on two of the judges' scorecards (79-73 and 78-74), with the third judge having Oscar ahead (77-75). But truth be told, the real number for Oscar was "911."

In boxing, there are certain danger signs to be as strictly observed as railroad crossings. One of them is never-ever be backed into the ropes by Bernard Hopkins. But somehow, someway, Oscar found himself in the ropes with one minute gone in the ninth. And Bernard, following him like a tail to a comet, came forward behind a needle-to-the-lodestone left jab followed by a pluperfect left hook to the body which found Oscar's liver with a divining-rod accuracy.

The effect was not evident immediately. But after a momentary pause, Oscar, in a delayed reaction, succumbed to the law of gravity, his face contorted in pain, his powers barely those of respiration, his mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water. As referee Kenny Bayliss tolled the count over him, Oscar tried mightily to rise, but his legs failed to uphold the functions they had sworn to uphold and by the count of "Ten" was on all fours pounding the canvas in frustration.

(To assess the effect of a liver punch, we called on that "Human Punching Bag," Randall "Tex" Cobb who said that a liver punch thrown in a sparring session with Greg Page was the only punch that had ever hurt him. According to Cobb, "Page hit me in the liver and I just stood there, frozen, mouth open. (Trainer) Georgie Benton called out "Time' and asked if I was 'okay.' All I could say was 'aaaaargh' and he called 'Time In.' ")

The "Liver Punch"--which will now go down with the "Solar Plexus Punch" thrown by Bob Fitzsimmons to win the heavyweight crown from Jim Corbett back in 1897 as one of the most devastating punches in history--may be debated for years to come. But what is not debatable is Bernard Hopkins'greatness. And as the discussion went on far into the night like a smokey party no one seemed to have the energy to leave the question was: where does Bernard Hopkins, that credentialed courier of old age at 39-going-on-Social Security with that old gray fist, stand in the pantheon of middleweight greats?

For, pruned of potential escape clauses, there is no doubt that Hopkins, a man who assaults both ears and opponents, deserve to be considered one of the all-time all-timers in the middleweight class. How else to assess the greatness of a man who has now successfully defended his middleweight title a record 19 times, made both Oscar De La Hoya and Felix Trinadad one with the canvas and laid waste to the middleweight landscape and the record books at the same time?

If you want to get in on the discussion about both the "Liver Punch" and the "Greatness"--with a cap "G"--of Bernard Hopkins, just tune in to the exclusive delayed broadcast of the fight Saturday, September 25th on HBO. Maybe then you'll come away with an appreciation of both the punch and the man who delivered it, Bernard Hopkins.

Bert Randolph Sugar is the former editor of Ring, Boxing Illustrated and Fight Game magazines and the author of the recently-released book, "Bert Sugar On Boxing."