By Gerardo Granados: It has been twenty three years since boxing fans got the chance to witness one of the best fights of all times. Maybe for some fans this fight wont be ranked as number one but for sure it must rank among the personal top ten list. Back in march 17 of 1990 Julio Cesar Chavez won by TKO 12 with only two seconds left elevating himself as a world boxing star.
Richard Steele was highly criticized for stopping the fight although it was evident that Taylor made the count but was knocked out on his feet. Do the young boxing fans have ever seen this fight? If you don´t then you must watch it and decide if Lou Duva had a valid reason to be so angry after the referee stopped the fight.
Taylor was ahead on points but was taking terrible punishment and on the last round Duva told him that he needed to win the last round instead of instruct him to box and avoid Chavez. Taylor spent the night at the hospital with a broken facial orbital bone, bruised ribs, blood in his urine and also lost a pin of blood during the fight; meanwhile Chavez went on to celebrate his victory.
It was a fight to study and learn from it, it was a fight to watch again at least once a couple of years, it was the Ring Magazine fight of the year 1990, and it was amazing to watch two prime World Champions fight each other.
Meldrick´s blazing speed and accuracy on one corner, on the other corner Chavez´s clean power shots and relentless pressure; “lightning vs. thunder”. As a boxing analyst said “it was a work of art”; it was a genuine title fight and at the end one had to loose. Sadly on that night something was beaten out of Taylor who was never the same he was after that fight.
Cheers for both mean sons of boxing, and I personally thank you for giving us boxing fans such memorable fight.
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