Greeting boxing fans;
I had intended to Tweet round-by-round the Floyd Mayweather vs. Marcos Maidana welterweight title fight Saturday night. I really did. But I only managed one Tweet.
It was after the fourth round concluded and I wrote “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but Mayweather is losing. 3-1 for Chino.”
What I saw, watching the fight with friends at Shoeless Joe’s in St. Catharines, had me completely baffled. I had figured, like many boxing analysts, Mayweather would have an easy night. He would move, box smartly, and easily out point the slower, less gifted Maidana. Sure, Maidana is a relentless power puncher, but as Mayweather often says “skills pay the bills” and he has schooled better fighters than “El Chino.”
What happened was something that, I think, shocked many boxing watchers. Maidana swarmed all over Mayweather, throwing 100 punches in the first around alone. That non-stop volume of punches, combined with Maidana’s rough (and sometimes dirty) tactics, shut down a lot of Mayweather’s magic. At the half way point, I had Mayweather losing, something that totally shocked me.
I was unable to Tweet for the shock.
Even more bizarre, Maidana landed nearly as many punches on Mayweather as Mayweather landed on him – something that never happens. True, Mayweather’s connect percentage was much higher, but that doesn’t matter when scoring a fight. Maidana not only matched Mayweather in punches landed, and outlanded Mayweather in terms of power punches, he also hit Mayweather more, according to Compubox, than any other previous fighter.
Now, Mayweather did what he always does. He made mid fight adjustments to win rounds and ended up winning the fight. The official scores were 117-111, 114-114, and 116-112.
I scored it 115-113 for Mayweather – on the strength of his performance during the middle rounds – on par with many fight observers who gave Maidana’s raw and rough aggression more rounds than the judges did.
Maidana’s success was shocking in part because we have not seen, maybe ever, Mayweather have to work that hard to win a fight, to work that hard to keep an opponent off of him, to see him obvious lose rounds and potentially lose a fight. The look on Mayweather’s face at the end of the fight was the same look that Manny Pacquiao had after his third fight with rival Juan Marquez. It was a look that said “I hope I won, but I am not sure I did.”
Maidana’s success, which brought him within inches of handing Mayweather his first loss in 46 professional fights, demonstrated what a lot of people have thought about how a fighter might, maybe, be able to beat boxing’s pound-for-pound king. High octane aggression combined with relentless volume punching is probably the only way to get pasted Mayweather’s defensive genius and counter punching.
No one had really tried to do it since Ricky Hatton, who had a few rounds of success before Mayweather took over and Hatton began to fumble around the ring until he was stopped. The over rated Canelo Alvarez was regarded by many of having the power to disrupt Mayweather’s style, but Alvarez tried to play a tactical game in their fight. Which is like trying to out-think Bobby Fischer in a chess match. It just won’t happen.
Maidana, unlike Hatton, did not stop. He forced Mayweather to fight in the trenches and didn’t worry about getting caught with Mayweather’s sharp counter punches. Maidana and his trainers must have understood there was no way to avoid getting caught with counter shots by Mayweather, so don’t worry about it so much. It is going to happen no matter what you do, so accept that and keep moving forward.
Unlike everyone Mayweather has fought in recent years, Maidana did not freeze in place, worried about throwing punches because of the inevitable counter shots. He just plowed ahead. Most guys, when Mayweather cracks them with a counter punch, step back and try to reset their attack. But all that does is play into Mayweather’s hands. Maidana just took the punches, blocked and slipped when he could — his head movement was particular sharp — and kept attacking.
Seeing Mayweather that vulnerable, combined with Pacquiao’s sensational decision win over the then undefeated Tim Bradley a few months ago, immediately renewed talk of the long dreamed of super fight between Pacquiao and Mayweather.
A lot of people thought that Pacquiao would be unable to get past Mayweather’s great defense to land his lightning fast combos and do the kind of damage that he’d have to in order to win the fight. But to my thinking, if Maidana can get to Mayweather, Pacman certainly can. Pacquiao is much faster in terms of footwork and handspeed than Maidana is, he puts pressure on fighters better than Maidana can, and he has a more versatile arsenal of punches. Pacquaio attacks from weird angles, has the best footwork in boxing, and throws fast, hard combos better than just about anyone else.
The Maidana and Bradley fights proved, to me at least, that far from being a mismatch, a possible Mayweather vs. Pacman fight remains the best match that can be made in boxing – if only the two sides stopped acting like children and made the fight happen.
Look, I think Mayweather still would have to be the betting favorite if he did ever fight Pacquiao. Not because Mayweather is undefeated to date, but because Pacquiao always has the hardest time with highly defensive opponents. Mayweather is the best defensive fighter of this generation, hands down. And lets not forget Mayweather’s uncanny adaptability in the ring — his ability to make adjustments mid fights has won Mayweather many bouts, including Saturday’s brawl with Maidana.
But, the success Maidana had against boxing’s pound-for-pound king, should show any educated boxing observer that a potential Mayweather-Pacquiao isn’t the blow out some think it would be. To my eye, it would be highly competitive.
But for now the onlyest thing we can do is wonder and imagine.