Huck complains of cracked rib that he suffered in 4th round against Lebedev

By Boxing News - 12/19/2010 - Comments

Image: Huck complains of cracked rib that he suffered in 4th round against LebedevBy Jim Dower: WBO cruiserweight champion Marco Huck (31-1, 23 KO’s) was quick to make excuses for his poor performance against previously unbeaten challenger Denis Lebedev (21-1, 16 KO’s) last Saturday night at the Max Schmeling Halle, Prenzlauer Berg, Berlin, Germany. Huck won the fight by a controversial 12 round split decision, but from many people’s perspective, Huck appeared to get easily beaten. I had Lebedev winning 9 rounds to 3.

After the fight, Huck said “I cracked my rib in the 4th round and whenever I threw a punch in the following [rounds] it hurt like being stuck with a knife. But I hung in there and showed my big heart. I did not give up and kept fighting. That is what being a champion is all about.”

The judges scored the fight 115-113 and 115-113 for Huck and 116-112 for Lebedev. The fight looked very similar to the Carl Froch vs. Arthur Abraham Super Six bout with Huck fighting exactly like Abraham. But in this case, the Abraham-like Huck won on two of the judges’ score cards. it was shocking how badly the fight was scored because Huck looked so awful throughout, rarely throwing punches and when he did, he badly missed. The referee seemed off his job as well, warning Lebedev twice for landing shots on the black part of Huck’s belt line, which wasn’t low.

Huck winced in pain each time he was hit in that location but he was wilting from the body shots by Lebedev and clearly couldn’t take it. Lebedev stopped throwing to the body after the 2nd warning by the referee, which saved Huck from a possible stoppage loss. All in all, it was a badly scored fight and the referee didn’t make things better by warning Lebedev needlessly for what appeared to be perfectly legal shots.

Huck landed some big right hand shots in the 2nd, 5th and 10th round. Those were the rounds I thought he did enough to win. As for the rest of the fight, Huck held back from throwing punches and looked like a carbon copy of Abraham, a fighter known for not throwing punches. Lebedev stalked and tagged Huck many times in rounds 1, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 11 and 12. Those rounds were beyond question as Lebedev out-punched and out-landed Huck by a significant margin. In the 12th, Huck ran around the ring like he had the fight in the bag. It was totally bizarre because I had him losing by lopsided scores and all I could think of was that he had totally lost his senses and was just giving up.

In terms of the worst decisions I’ve seen in my years of watching boxing, this fight ranks up there among the top. It was just pitiful. One has to feel sorry for Lebedev, who came into the hostile arena, dominated Huck for 12 rounds and then had to leave a loser. I don’t know how this is being played out in Germany, but more than a few people saw Huck as the loser in this fight. This fight deserves a rematch, because I don’t know how Huck and his promoters can be happy with this decision. However, if they do fight again they need to have it take place in a neutral country because I fear that Lebedev will end up a loser again unless he knocks Huck out in Germany.



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