Excellent fights that are underrated because of external factors

[Fox McCloud]

I'm watching the Countdown to Pacquiao-Morales III, because I think it's really well done and I'm obviously a Morales fanboy. ←←←←←← ↓↓↓↓↓

Anyway, they showed highlights of the second fight with Barrera, which happens to be my favorite of the trilogy, because I love extremely technical fights, and Morales giving his best performance of the trilogy probably makes me like it a little more too.

But, in the eyes of most, the second fight was a dud. Now... if you hadn't ever seen the first or third, I can't imagine anyone seeing it and thinking, *yawn*, well that was a waste of time. That made me think this topic might be a good idea. The goal is to list fights that are really good, and give the reason why they are not considered as good as they should be. So, to start us off:

Mayweather-Castillo I - Even though all we ever hear about is "Castillo was robbed!" and "Nah bro, it was easy work, Mayweather easily won 9 rounds to 3"... but in reality, the back and forth action in this fight was excellent, and this easily clocks in as Mayweather's most entertaining fight I think.

Barrera-Morales II - The pure violence of the first fight makes it most people's favorite of the trilogy, and the third fight had good back and forth action with Morales going out in the last few rounds to make it a very violent, very entertaining fight, but the second fight is definitely back and forth as well, providing pretty good action throughout. It just gets overlooked, because it was more technical than the other two.

Margarito-Cotto - Now it is just a big debate about whether there was plaster involved, and people's favorite avenue to piss off the PR brigade, bringing up Cotto taking a knee, but that fight was pure violence throughout, with the ultimate example of will overcoming skill (except maybe Chavez vs. Taylor, which somehow does get its due, regardless of the controversy surrounding it).

Maidana-Ortiz - So many people love(d... we'll see if it changes because of this Berto fight) to talk about how Ortiz had no heart, pointing to this fight, but people never seemed to talk about how this was the second coming of Cotto-Torres, which can never be a bad thing.

Lopez-Mtagwa - People love(d... they have a new fight to point to now) talk about how chinless little Lopez was going to be a knockout victim. In reality, watching the middle to last rounds, after Lopez stopped totally dominating was extremely entertaining.

I'll stop for now. What ones can you all come up with?

[B.U.R.N.E.R]

I have the PERFECT Fight:

Abraham-Dirrell.

Dirrell and AA fought their butts off. They both dropped each other it was an amazing fight but the late hit drama takes away from it on this forum.

[V.WEBB]

Quality post by a quality poster. Thumbs up D.Weins.

[Fox McCloud]

I have the PERFECT Fight:

Abraham-Dirrell.

Dirrell and AA fought their butts off. They both dropped each other it was an amazing fight but the late hit drama takes away from it on this forum.

I thought about that one, but I think it's one of those fights where the great fight that Dirrell fought gets forgotten, rather than the excitement of the fight. Not a lot of offense came from the dethroned "King" Arthur Abraham. That's a good separate topic that I think I'm going to make though, because a couple of things went through my head that would describe that topic too.

[Jack Napier]

Jermain vs Winky
people just think about "aw, Jermain is overrated, got exposed again"
"aw, Winky blew it by not attacking in round 12"
draw outcome distracts people from giving props to a great fight
more action than there was supposed to be in this

Terrible vs Jesus Chavez
Chavez just not that big of a star
Terrible was favored to beat him
because of those things, this fight gets overlooked
Chavez gave Terrible hell with only his left hand working
Terrible was hurt a few times, fight was dramatic
Chavez comes back from 2 early knockdowns

[savorduhflavor]

Not so much an external issue but....

I think Cotto/Mosley gets underrated because no one went down and no one got hurt. With the amount of clean punches that two good punchers landed on each other neither guy at any point was in any sort of trouble, and I think because of that some people feel it lacked some drama.

It's my personal favorite fight so I might be biased, but I thought it was high drama with vicious exchanges and there was consistent action at a high skill level.

[Fox McCloud]

Jermain vs Winky
people just think about "aw, Jermain is overrated, got exposed again"
"aw, Winky blew it by not attacking in round 12"
draw outcome distracts people from giving props to a great fight
more action than there was supposed to be in this

Terrible vs Jesus Chavez
Chavez just not that big of a star
Terrible was favored to beat him
because of those things, this fight gets overlooked
Chavez gave Terrible hell with only his left hand working
Terrible was hurt a few times, fight was dramatic
Chavez comes back from 2 early knockdowns

Oooooo, very good answers. I completely agree with both of those.

Taylor-Wright was extremely entertaining to me. Wright didn't sit on a jab the whole fight like he did against Trinidad, he came to fight. Taylor made the fight entertaining by using his physicality to get through Wright's shell that was showing its very early signs of age/wear and tear, plus he went back to the ropes so many times, which made for some good exchanges.

Morales vs. Chavez was a great fight, and even more so when you realize Chavez threw like 1200 left handed punches.

To be honest, a ton of Morales fights just get forgotten with how badass they are... Zaragoza, McCullough, Chi, Ayala and Chavez come to mind for starters. All of them were extremely violent with lots of offense coming back from the opposition.

Not so much an external issue but....

I think Cotto/Mosley gets underrated because no one went down and no one got hurt. With the amount of clean punches that two good punchers landed on each other neither guy at any point was in any sort of trouble, and I think because of that some people feel it lacked some drama.

It's my personal favorite fight so I might be biased, but I thought it was high drama with vicious exchanges and there was consistent action at a high skill level.

I really didn't enjoy that fight very much, and I totally recognize that it was very violent and a very good fight... it just didn't do it for me. I think the reason it didn't is because neither guy looked like they were hurt at all during any part of the fight, which is unfortunate, because I know those punches were hard, and it was a testament to the chins of those two that made it not as aesthetically pleasing. It's a fight I feel guilty for not liking as much as I should have.

[edgarg]

I'm watching the Countdown to Pacquiao-Morales III, because I think it's really well done and I'm obviously a Morales fanboy. ←←←←←← ↓↓↓↓↓

Anyway, they showed highlights of the second fight with Barrera, which happens to be my favorite of the trilogy, because I love extremely technical fights, and Morales giving his best performance of the trilogy probably makes me like it a little more too.

But, in the eyes of most, the second fight was a dud. Now... if you hadn't ever seen the first or third, I can't imagine anyone seeing it and thinking, *yawn*, well that was a waste of time. That made me think this topic might be a good idea. The goal is to list fights that are really good, and give the reason why they are not considered as good as they should be. So, to start us off:

Mayweather-Castillo I - Even though all we ever hear about is "Castillo was robbed!" and "Nah bro, it was easy work, Mayweather easily won 9 rounds to 3"... but in reality, the back and forth action in this fight was excellent, and this easily clocks in as Mayweather's most entertaining fight I think.

Barrera-Morales II - The pure violence of the first fight makes it most people's favorite of the trilogy, and the third fight had good back and forth action with Morales going out in the last few rounds to make it a very violent, very entertaining fight, but the second fight is definitely back and forth as well, providing pretty good action throughout. It just gets overlooked, because it was more technical than the other two.

Margarito-Cotto - Now it is just a big debate about whether there was plaster involved, and people's favorite avenue to piss off the PR brigade, bringing up Cotto taking a knee, but that fight was pure violence throughout, with the ultimate example of will overcoming skill (except maybe Chavez vs. Taylor, which somehow does get its due, regardless of the controversy surrounding it).

Maidana-Ortiz - So many people love(d... we'll see if it changes because of this Berto fight) to talk about how Ortiz had no heart, pointing to this fight, but people never seemed to talk about how this was the second coming of Cotto-Torres, which can never be a bad thing.

Lopez-Mtagwa - People love(d... they have a new fight to point to now) talk about how chinless little Lopez was going to be a knockout victim. In reality, watching the middle to last rounds, after Lopez stopped totally dominating was extremely entertaining.

I'll stop for now. What ones can you all come up with?

Just a little note-Castillo is supposed to have scored double the amount of punches that Mayweather did. I believe Castillo won that fight.

Mayweather's most entertaining fight (and for Mayweather to have an entertaining fight was unexpected anyway, since he was noted for "stinking out the house")

Was his very underrated fight with Emmanuel Augustus, where they both went hammer and tongs with each other for 9 rds. He expected his usual easy, overmatched opponent, as Augustus had about 17-20 losses then, and got much more than he expected.

[warp1432]

Midget fight 1: Arce vs Hussein often gets overlooked because people think of Arce more for his losses now I think. Also, this was on the undercard of Morales Pacquiao 1. Pacquiao Morales 1 was a great fight in itself so this fight gets often overlooked. Amazing fight though.

Midget fight 2: Like Arce Hussein, Segura vs Canchilla 1 was on the undercard of another great fight causing it to get overlooked (Margarito-Cotto). Fists went flying in this one and Canchilla ended up upsetting Segura with having better overall stamina and boxing skills. Segura wrecked him in a rematch, but the first fight was great.

And this is fight is not "underrated because of external factors" but Matthew Saad Muhhamad vs Marvin Johnson is the next best fight I've ever seen next to Corrales-Castillo 1. That fight is awesome

[Jack Napier]

Lennox vs Vit
all anybody talks about is the cut stoppage
"Lennox got lucky/Vit got robbed"
"Vit got owned!" :laugh:
that fight was a war, both poured their hearts out
just fodder for Klit lovers/haters to whine about
fight deserves more praise than that