Nine hours before featherweights Nick Ball and Brandon Figueroa entered the ring last night in Liverpool, the fight’s promoter Queensberry Promotions posted on social media an AI-generated image which featured the two boxers squaring off inside a Colosseum. It came with the caption “ARE YOU READY TO BE ENTERTAINED?” and the only thing capable of softening the disappointment of AI slop being used to sell a legitimate fight was the fact that (a) it was a legitimate fight and (b) entertainment was almost guaranteed.
With these two, you see, there was never any danger of us being let down, nor the need for anything “artificial”. In Ball, you had a WBA champion whose nickname “Wrecking Ball” amounts to more than just an obvious pun, while Figueroa, the former champion from Texas, threw over 1,000 punches in his previous bout, a 12-round decision win over Joet Gonzalez. Together, they were only ever likely to produce one kind of fight. It would be a battle – yes, of the gladiatorial sort – but it would also be real, with nothing either forced or fake about it. A “proper fight,” they would call it in the UK, and a proper fight it proved to be. Not only that, after 11 rounds of compelling back-and-forth action, we received a proper finish, too, when Figueroa, the underdog, landed a left hand on Ball which made three judges’ scorecards irrelevant and delivered the Texan his third world title (two full titles, one interim).
The finishing shot, a stunner, arrived just 10 seconds into the final round. By that stage the fight was perceived to be in the balance, with Ball starting well, Figueroa coming into his own during the middle rounds, and Ball responding in kind. Nobody knew going into the championship rounds how the judges would have it. They only knew that nothing could be left to chance or taken for granted.
Figueroa, known as the “Heartbreaker”, was perhaps more conscious of this than anyone. He was neither the champion nor the home fighter, so suspected he would have to do that little bit more to win rounds and ultimately win the fight. After round five he was implored by his cornerman Manny Robles, “You’ve got to be first and you’ve got to be last,” and received the instruction as a reminder. A reminder to get going. A reminder to not expect any favours. “You’ve got to start taking over,” Robles added.
Up to that point the fight had been competitive, but Figueroa had yet to make any sort of dent in the champion from Liverpool. He came forward, as is his custom, and he always showed a willingness to exchange, only every time he did so he found Ball more than happy to oblige and give some back. In fact, Ball would often use Figueroa’s aggression against him by stepping off to the side and then popping out fast jabs, counter left hooks or lead rights as Figueroa marched forward. The jab in particular was a key shot for Ball throughout the fight. It was an impressive shot, too, given the physical disadvantages with which he had to contend (Ball, at 5 '2, was seven inches shorter than the 5' 9 Figueroa). Despite his shorter arms, Ball was able to utilise superior timing and speed to round after round out-jab Figueroa and prevent him from setting his feet. He would then accompany this shot with either a stiff right cross or a slashing left hook, both of which were shots Ball relied on time and time again whenever Figueroa opened up.
But Figueroa was not without success of his own, of course. By virtue of him constantly throwing and trundling forward there were always going to be periods of success and periods in the fight when he would grab the momentum and force Ball to fight his kind of fight. This was especially true in the middle rounds when Figueroa found his rhythm and started to reap the rewards of his early investment in body shots. The eighth and ninth were particularly good rounds for the visitor, with a lead right hook catching Ball clean in the eighth, and a left cross forcing Ball to the ropes in the ninth. In the ninth, too, Figueroa, a southpaw, appeared comfortable switching stance and was becoming increasingly physical with Ball; pushing him back, grappling with him, and whacking away at whatever bits of flesh were available on an admittedly small target.
The assumption at that stage was that Figueora, accustomed to flourishing late, was turning the fight around. However, Ball, who had boxed so well in rounds five, six and seven, sharpened up again in the 10th and 11th rounds, just when he needed to. He spotted more openings for the jab in the 10th, as well as a clever straight right, and in the 11th, he sensed for maybe the first time that Figueroa’s work was starting to become sloppy and that his attacks were being launched without much thought. This meant Ball could not only navigate his way around them, but also search for openings, then exploit them whenever presented with one.
Yet still Figueroa came forward and still he punched. Sloppy though it was at times, he was still showing a fierce determination to engage and win rounds and he believed, too, that at some point one of the many shots he was throwing would be the one to land clean and make a difference. If it took a thousand shots to land the one he needed, so be it.
That is the game of chance Brandon Figueroa is and has long been content to play and last night in Liverpool it again paid off – and how. In round 12, with both men now exhausted, Figueroa acted as he had done in the 11 previous rounds – moving forward and throwing – only this time one of the numerous left hands he threw landed flush on Ball’s chin and almost spun the British fighter’s head around on his neck. The result was that Ball collapsed to the canvas, where he looked to be out and where he was immediately counted by the referee, Steve Gray.
Somehow, despite the severity of the knockdown, Ball managed to pull himself upright and show enough “life” for Gray to let him continue. He was given ample time to recover too, it should be noted, not that it mattered. In fact, most who saw the knockdown punch land, and saw the impact it had, would have known that Figueroa going on to finish Ball was now an inevitability. We also knew that if there is one fighter you don’t want smelling blood it is someone like Figueroa, a man whose every attack is relentless and whose stamina is endless. Sure enough, in just a matter of seconds Figueroa was not only on Ball, he was swarming him and hurting him against the ropes. He then bundled him through the ropes and out of the ring.
It was at that point – 32 seconds into round 12 – the referee intervened, having presumably realised what we all realised: the only way to stop Brandon Figueroa punching was to end the fight. That permitted Figueroa, now 27-2-1 (20 KOs), to at last lower his hands and celebrate as various members of Ball’s team tried to lift the stricken former champion back into the ring and check he was okay.
Some members of Ball’s team were less interested in the health of their fighter, however. For reasons only they know, they appeared far more interested in targeting Figueroa and his team, seemingly irked by them celebrating a tremendous knockout win. We even saw Andrew Cain, who boxed earlier in the night, aim a kick at one member of Figueroa's team, which in turn motivated a few of the Liverpool fans to then throw bottles into the ring and cause Figueroa, the victor, to duck for cover at a time when he should have been standing tall.
The natives were now restless, it seemed; the ring had indeed become a Colosseum, as advertised, but this was not the “entertainment” the locals had in mind, nor an image doctored by lazy promoters. Instead, this was real. As real as it gets.
