Woods Retires – News

By Jim Dower: With sadness Boxing News 24 has learned that former IBF light heavyweight champion Clinton Woods (42-5-1, 24 KO’s) has decided to hang up his gloves for good and retire from boxing as of today. Woods, 37, is officially ending his 15-year pro career, which includes an IBF light heavyweight world title and wins over the likes of Glen Johnson, Rico Hoye, Julio Cesar Gonzalez and Elvir Muriqi.

However, Woods hasn’t been fighting all that good of late, losing his IBF title in a 12 round decision loss to Antonio Tarver last year in April and then a lackluster 12 round decision loss to Tavoris Cloud last month on August 28th. Woods still has the talent to compete at a high level in the light heavyweight division, but would have to be directed against the weaker champions, such as WBA light heavyweight champion Gabriel Campillo and WBO champion Zsolt Erdei.

But it looks as if Woods wasn’t interested in seeking out the weaker of the champions and wanted to focus on fighting the best. Woods looked good in beating Muriqi by a one-sided 12 round decision in February of this year, showing a good work rate and excellent form in beating Muriqi.

However, in Woods’ fight against Cloud, Clinton clearly fought the wrong kind of fight against the shorter fighter, electing to stand in close and trade shots against the big power puncher.

As such, Woods ended up getting dominated by Cloud and staggered in the 8th and 10th rounds by big right hands from the American. More of a problem for Woods was his habit of lying on the ropes. Woods fought much of the second half of the fight lying against the ropes and trading shots with Cloud.

This was a near suicidal move to do against a big puncher like Cloud, yet Woods stuck with this bad strategy for the remainder of the fight and essentially handed the victory to Cloud. I saw this as a winnable fight for Woods if he had just had been astute enough to stay off the ropes, use his reach and stay in the center of the ring.

Cloud’s reach was limited and his boxing skills even more so. Boxing a fighter like Cloud should have been Woods’ game plan from day one in training, which is why it seems so odd that Woods opted to slug with Cloud. In hindsight, it was an insane move on Woods’ part in doing this and it was like handing the victory to Cloud on a silver platter.

At any rate, I wish Woods all the best in his next career.

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