Cotto-Margarito: Will Miguel’s scar tissue hold up under the pounding?

By Boxing News - 10/20/2011 - Comments

By Dan Ambrose: WBA junior middleweight champion Miguel Cotto’s face has been ripped and torn apart so badly in a number of his fights in recent years that it’s left him with extensive scar tissue around both of his eyes.

This same scar tissue has left Cotto vulnerable to sustaining cuts and he’s been lucky in his last two fights because his promoter Bob Arum has matched him softly against the weak punching Yuri Foreman and an aging 38-year-old Ricardo Mayorga.

On December 3rd, Cotto meets up with Antonio Margarito in a rematch at Madison Square Garden in New York. On the surface, you can say this is more soft matchmaking by Arum because Margarito is in the minds of many boxing fans a totally shot fighter at this point in his career.

That’s a debatable point, because Margarito does still possess power when he’s coming forward looking to engage. But it’s also true that Margarito has looked absolutely 100% horrible in his last three fights against Shane Mosley, Roberto Garcia and Manny Pacquiao. He’s definitely not the same fighter he once was that much is obvious.

You can see that in the way that Margarito was forced to run from Garcia, a fighter that he likely would have destroyed a couple of years earlier. However, Margarito has already beaten Cotto by an 11th round knockout in 2008, and he knows how to beat him. Margarito literally chopped Cotto to pieces in only two rounds – the 10th and 11th. That’s all it took to get Cotto bleeding like a stuck pig.

In rounds one through nine, Cotto was on the run and really didn’t get hit all that often. But now in the rematch he’s going to get hit and with all the scar tissue that litters both of Cotto’s eyes, we could see him bleeding badly after only a couple of rounds. If Cotto opts not to run from Margarito, he’ll get cut early. No way will Cotto hurt or stop Margarito in the early part of the fight. Margarito’s chin is too good and Cotto will be thinking defense all the way.

He’s taken so many beatings that he no longer is the daring fighter he once was, and he especially won’t be looking to exchange with a guy that destroyed him like Margarito. Cotto will try and box, but he’ll still wind up getting cut. Cotto is a much different fighter once he’s got blood dripping into his eyes than he is without a cut. He’ll get on his bicycle and try to run from Margarito, and that will leave him vulnerable to running out of gas.

Cotto doesn’t have the build or the stamina to run for 12 rounds. In truth, Cotto is more of a six round fighter than a twelve rounder. He does well if the fight is in the first half, but struggles in the 2nd half unless it’s a soft opponent like Mayorga. If Margarito can put pressure on Cotto like he did in their first fight, get him bleeding then we could see another knockout for Margarito.



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