By Hector Gonzalez: I’m hearing fighters being referred to as ‘brawlers’ much too often and thought that I’d write this response article. I think it’s important that fans be reminded that styles make fights and understand what there is to appreciate about different styles and how they match up against other fighters. I also think that Floyd Mayweather Jr., who we could all agree is one of the best fighters today if not the best fighter today, has set the standard so high that good fighters with good styles are being referred to as ‘brawlers’ by fans. That needs to stop, it’s condescending and it makes it sound as if some of these World Champion fighters lack skills because they don’t fight like Mayweather.
I think that I could count the number of actual ‘brawlers’ in recent memory with my hands. Let’s see, Ricky Hatton, Brandon Rios, Michael Katsidis, Marcos Maidana, Ricardo Mayorga, Antonio Margarito, Lamont Peterson, of course Andre Ward and Arturo Gotti and maybe Lucas Matthysse and maybe even Manny Pacquiao. Having said that, the same goes for pure actual technicians fighting right now; Mayweather, Nonito Donaire, Guillermo Rigondeaux, Mikey Garcia, Juan Manuel Marquez, Mickey Ward, Bernard Hopkins and the Klitschko’s……. The rest of the fighters out right now will fall under the category of ‘boxer punchers’ and a couple of them as ‘unorthodox’ such as Carlos Molina and Miguel Vasquez. NOT brawlers. It’s about styles.
Here is an example take for instance Orlando Salido who is a high rate pressure fighter. He was clearly defeated by Mikey Garcia who is a superior technician, but what if Garcia did not have a strong punch and a strong chin, and Salido no matter how much Garcia was able to counter, Salido kept walking right through all of Garcia’s best punches? The reason I bring it up is because that’s an actual scenario that could play out between Salido vs his next opponent Vasyl Lomachenko. Garcia and Lomachenko may have similar styles, but what good will it be for Lomachenko if he physically and mentally is not able to handle Salido’s pressure.
Another reason why I bring up Orlando Salido is because fans sometimes refer to ‘pressure fighters’ as brawlers without paying attention to their technical qualities. For example, Salido’s over hand right is damn near perfect, he cuts off the ring with devastating body punches, he also has good timing sometimes landing punches from different angles. So my question is this is, how could a fighter like Salido be broken down to a simple ‘brawler’.
Here’s another example, take for example John Molina vs Mickey Bey. Mickey Bey is technical superior to John Molina in almost every way, but Molina KO’d Bey during the 10th round. I could think of a long list of fighters who could give Bey a lot of problems even though they are technically inferior to Bey simply because of the pressure style that Molina gave him. And by the way, there is no such thing as a lucky punch in boxing.
There are also examples of fighters who have styles that do not work for them. For example, Amir Khan who fights too offensively but has a weak chin or Antonio De Marco or Victor Ortiz who I think would be exceptional fighters if they learned to stop walking forward so much.
My point is that the word ‘brawler’ is being over used when describing ‘boxer punchers’. I would encourage fans to pay more attention to styles and the qualities of some of these guys fighting right now. For example, inside fighting is not the same as ‘brawling’…
Also remember that in boxing 101 you fight the technician by applying pressure, and you fight the pressure fighter by being technical.
The fighters that could do it all like Roy Jones Jr. or Muhammad Ali come only a couple of times in every generation, too infrequently to be considered mainstream styles. I could put El Finito Lopez in that category and I’m betting that Mikey Garcia is heading in that direction.
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