By Jay McIntyre: Editor’s Note: The following analysis is an abbreviated version It is also the second installment of a two part series. The full analysis of Timothy Bradley can be found at: http://a-neutral-corner.blogspot.ca/2014/04/my-two-cents-part-two-desert-storm.html
Timothy “Desert Storm” Bradley (31-0-0-1, 12 KO’s) seems to genuinely struggle in generating widespread appeal and marketability. His capacity to always find a way to win his fights is offset by a style that does not always do enough to make him look decisive. Indeed some fans have argued that had the ‘slip’ in his fight against Provodnikov instead been ruled a knockdown, then he could have potentially lost by a narrow margin of points. But, in his next fight, he did give his best performance to date against Juan Manuel Marquez in October of 2013. As close as the Marquez fight was to some, it was the least closest of his last three fights – for what that’s worth. The trouble with all of this is that Bradley – for all his boxing ability – leaves many fans wanting more. It’s a shame because on paper, the heart, endurance and willingness to engage punchers in a firefight should be a sure recipe for acclaim. However, the people want a champion that is decisive when his hand is raised, and narrow victories leave some degree of uncertainty surrounding that man as he sits on the throne. So, what does Bradley do well, and why is he near the top of the heap in the rankings? Let’s have a look at what Timothy Bradley brings to the ring in this second installment of a two part edition of “My Two Cents”.
At a Glance
Praise: good hand and foot speed, sound technical ability, durable chin, great endurance, high work rate
Concern: lack of knockout power, on occasion he looks busy without inflicting a lot of damage, doesn’t move had when combination punching.
The Tao of Timothy Bradley
Movement
One thing that Bradley does quite well is move and try to keep his opponent on his line of attack. A fighter’s line of attack is right in front of them when they are in their boxing stance. If a boxer has their opponent in their sights then the straights, hooks and uppercuts all have an opportunity to land. In a skillful boxing match, both fighters seek to keep their line of attack on their opponent while simultaneously trying to get away from their opponent’s line. Bradley can move in and out with reasonable effectiveness and is always pivoting to try and keep an angle to hit his opponent. In fact, if his opponent moves to find an angle and pivots, you can be quite sure that Bradley’s counter pivot isn’t far behind. When his opponent advances he can melt away, staying just out of range, and when their advance ends, he will flow back in to be ready to attack. It’s almost as though it’s recited (of course it can’t be) as his movements can sometimes closely shadow that of his opponent’s.
Take, for example, Bradley’s aforementioned pivoting. Bradley is always keen to try and maintain his line of attack, or to try and get away from his opponent’s line. Ducking (or slipping) an opponent’s attack usually gives the defender an opportunity to pivot away and stay safe, and Bradley can often be seen ducking when an opponent throws a punch. The advantage of pivoting lies in how quickly you can get away from the opponent’s line of attack (their placement to you at which they can deliver the most damage), while saving energy and still staying close enough to them for your own counters or clinching.
One thing we saw some of in his fight against Pacquiao, and a lot of in his Marquez fight, is his ability to ‘stick and move’ (hit and then move, so as to not get hit back). Standing just out of range, Bradley will dart in, usually behind a jab, and then spring back out before the inevitable counter would appear. He did this fairly consistently in the Pacquiao fight – even though the jab didn’t always land cleanly – and this helped keep the round going in his favour. In the Marquez fight, however, he was far more effective with this in-and-out movement. Marquez is a terrific counter-puncher, but if there is one thing we learned from his fight against Mayweather, it’s that his counters are based on his timing, not his speed. Bradley was the faster man for much of the fight and could edge Marquez with his pot shots. It is also worth noting that Bradley was able to have a good amount of success negating Marquez’s counter-punching because Marquez counters with combinations. Given Bradley’s aforementioned proclivity for darting in and out, the full combination of Marquez’s counter was largely voided because Bradley wasn’t always there to hit.
Work Rate
The Compubox statistics which I quoted near the end of my (http://a-neutral-corner.blogspot.ca/2014/03/my-two-cents-part-one-meditations-on.html) first installment in this series demonstrated some telling evidence. At first glance it is clear that Bradley’s pace is taxing, and his punch output is impressive. Prospecting for a second or two longer to get more data, however, will readily yield that he did not land a significant amount of those strikes. So when it comes time for the judges to score a round, Bradley usually dominates the criteria for ‘effective aggression’, and ‘ring generalship’.
Another aspect of the Bradley’s fights where he can accumulate punches in in the clinch. It is here that Bradley will look to sandpaper his opponent, not to necessarily deal any real damage, but to irritate him and rack up some points. This is all a part of his ability and willingness to get in his opponent’s personal space and slowly grind away at them. Unfortunately, it is also at this range where Bradley has repeatedly headbutted his opponents and this has also marred his reputation, being cast by a good portion of viewers as a ‘dirty fighter’.
Another way that Bradley tries to outwork his opponent’s is when reacting to their success. Not content to let them get points without having truly earned them, he seeks to take away from his opponent’s success by trying to flurry back so that they look less dominant and to give him some clout in the round as well. It is a wise stratagem in that – like I said before – it makes the rounds look close, but it also is an attempt to try and catch them if they get sloppy in their form when they are punching at him. If you watch Bradley’s fight against Marquez and Provodnikov there more than a few instances of this. Bradley had a hard time doing this with Pacquiao, however, because Pacquiao never keeps his head in one place for too long. Bradley had to adjust by backing Pacquiao up and getting him to the ropes – but this backfired in round four when he loses the exchange and is wobbled on his feet.
Jab
The king of punches – the jab – is a punch that Bradley used extensively throughout his fight with Pacquiao. Although I disagreed with the judges on their final verdict for the fight, I can still appreciate how Bradley was able to use his jab to demonstrate his aggression and back up the Filipino. He could double it, triple it, and use it as an indicator of how far away his opponent was from him. It also contributed to his effective aggression.
Left Hook
I would make a strong case that alongside Bradley’s jab, his left hook is arguably his best punch. Although Bradley is not one known for his power, his left hooks are rather precise and sharp. The left hook can starch an opponent as it lands quickly due to its closeness to the opponent, but also with power because of the body torsion involved when thrown correctly.
Unfortunately, we just did not see very much of them in his fight against Pacquiao. Part of the reason was Pacquiao’s speed, the other part was due to Pacquiao often getting his lead foot on the outside of his opponent’s.
Bradley’s damaging punches often come almost exclusively once he is in an exchange, or when he gets an opportunity to counter his foe. In particular, his left hook deserves some respect, and, if he is given a target or an opportuntiy during an exchange on the inside, his right hook can be pretty humbling as well. In reviewing his fights against Provodnikov and Marquez he was able to use his left hook to great effect because both men throw looping shots and Bradley could get his hook inside of theirs. It worked wonderfully.
Durability
There’s not much to say here, other than the fact that Bradley doesn’t often get phased when he gets clobbered. In his last three fights, he ate his fair share of punches, most of which were hooks from Ruslan Provodnikov and Juan Manuel Marquez, and left hands from Pacquiao. Unfortunately for Bradley, we are so keenly aware of his toughness because of his lack of head movement. A moving target is harder to hit, and while Bradley’s feet are quick, his head doesn’t always move during combinations or when advancing on his opponent’s line of attack.
Bradley’s tendency to attack on a straight line has led to him being caught by all of his three most recent opponents – Manny Pacquiao, Ruslan Provodnikov, and Juan Manuel Marquez. While I expected Bradley to win the decision against Marquez as I awaited the judges’ verdicts upon my first viewing, a closer look at the fight showed some clean punching from Marquez that I initially missed. This could be attributed to Bradley giving him still target during certain sequences in their fight.
What did we learn from their first fight?
Timothy Bradley has an unshakable will to win, but he also has trouble shaking the doubt surrounding those victories. What was clear from his first fight against Pacquiao, however, was that he struggled with a couple of things. Emmanuel Stewart described it best when he said that the one punch which Bradley could not figure out was the left hand of Pacquiao. Time and again Pacquiao used his jab to set up his range and was consistently able to land his left on Bradley. If Bradley ducked, he would chase him down with a heat-seeking left, and if Bradley ducked, Pacquiao’s left still managed to catch him.
For his own part, Bradley was able to keep a high work rate that forced Pacquiao to fight with more regularity. When Pacquiao’s pace did not match that of Bradley’s, he risked losing rounds, and ultimately, that proved to be his undoing in their first fight.
Considerations going into the rematch
Two things come to mind when I think of Timothy Bradley trying to get the win that he wants going into this second fight. The first is the the importance for Bradley to incorporate slight lateral movements into his game. One way to avoid getting hit with such regularity is for Bradley to come in at an angle that is not a straight beeline at his opponent (which means he stays in his opponent’s sights). For example, stepping to the side and then coming forward creates a new angle from which he can attack and be relatively safe. To illustrate my point, consider two boxers standing on a clock at 6 and 12. The line of the minute hand at 12 and hour hand at 6 represent their lines of attack. In this case, the boxers at 6 and 12 are both on a straight line to one another and thus are equally exposed to danger as they move toward one another. If however, the boxer standing at 6 steps laterally to 5 or 7 and turns slightly to face his opponent, then he no longer is on the line of attack of his opponent standing at 12, but he does have an angle of his own. Masterful boxing is mastering subtleties, which is why slipping punches involves ‘grazing the ear’, and why slight footsteps can decisively change things in a boxer’s favour (Floyd Mayweather’s dominance over Robert Guerrero underscores this point nicely). If Bradley can get his lead foot outside of Pacquiao’s, he may open up an opportunity for that beautiful left hook he has without getting smacked with the southpaw’s left.
Secondly, Bradley also needs to throw his right hand. When throwing his right hand, he needs to step in and close the distance if he intends to land it with any conviction. Pacquiao employs a high guard and usually catches his opponent’s straight punches as he backs up, nullifying their effects. With this in mind, he should also consider throwing the right hand to the body as that is an open space not covered by Pacquiao’s arms. Bradley won’t want to get into a situation where both he and Pacquiao are unloading punches on one another – he simply doesn’t have the power or the evasion to wins those encounters.
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