By Gerardo Granados: There will never be any excuses or justifications for a bad performance, the new WBC middleweight champion Sergio Martinez won the fight dominating an inexperienced young lion, period. But still a friend of mine asked me “what if it had been a fifteen rounder instead of twelve? The reason he asked was as the reader already knows the twelve round knock down of Martinez.
Pro boxing is a way of life, there are innate natural fighters and there are athletes who are skilled enough to beat any natural fighter due their discipline and work ethic.
As for the fight, I score the bout 118-109 for Martinez who clearly outclassed and dominated Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. Sergio fought at the distance and tempo that he wanted to, and punched at will a clueless Julio Cesar who simply did not throw combinations and was very predictable, and on times simply did not throw any punches. From round one to the eleven the story was practically the same but on the twelve round Chavez Jr. badly hurt Martinez who managed to survive due his experiences and great preparation for the fight.
I responded to my friend “what if Freddie Roach had ORDERED Chavez Jr. to go for the KO since the eight round instead of urge him to go for it on the eleventh round?” If your trainer orders then you must obey, aint that what is supposed to happen when you are disciplined? Maybe the game plan was wrong, maybe Julio Cesar was unable to execute the plan but why didn´t he adjusted? It won’t matter if the fight was a 15 rounder because for a title bout you have to prepare like a professional and you can´t skip any practice session due personal whims. There is no use to find someone to blame when you are the only one responsible.
Although Chavez Jr. never quit and came close to upset the odds, and for sure he will learn a lot from this fight and cannot be criticized for losing against a top pound for pound fighter who has been avoided the last couple of years.
As for Martinez, he won the fight but he might have lost at the same time because his performance might award him to be avoided a little more. Perhaps Chavez Jr. is the only middleweight contender who can guarantee a big purse and the rest of the organization champions as IBF – WBA Super World champion Daniel Geale, WBO champion Dmitry Pirog, WBA World champion – IBO Gennady Golovkin and also former champion Felix Sturm would be more interested to fight against Julio Cesar instead of taking a high risk low profit fight against Sergio. Maybe even Sergio Martinez should seriously consider a rematch against a fighter who may not refuse to fight him and who also can bring him a good payday.
The 15 round title bouts are long gone for safety reasons, but on those last three rounds you could separate the true champions from the rest.
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