3/21/2005
115-113
It couldn’t get any closer than that. It was anybody’s ballgame. The match could have gone either way with the manner Manny Pacquiao and Erik Morales were trading punches.
At the middle of the bout, Pacquiao suffered a devastating cut above his right eye, which came from an accidental headbutt. It might have slowed him down a bit but it didn’t deter him nor it crimped his style.
Personally, I scored it 155-113 also, but in favour of our hometown hero. Two things. One, I was giving Manny sympathy points by handing him rounds too close to call. Two, I was trying to deny the floating news that Pacquiao lost when the broadcast barely started on TV.
With these factors taken into consideration, I may not be the perfect boxing judge as I am also to partial to aggressive fighters who hit hard and hit a lot. But then in reality, some judges work with that mindset. So, in essence, what I’m doing is emulate them and ‘predict’ what their probable final score would be. And yes, I do also get swayed sometimes by the commentary.
But I still need a lot of work to get there. In this fight alone, I was off by four rounds as I gave two rounds to Pacquiao, which should have been Morales’ instead. But I’ll justify why I give the bout to Manny.
Counting out the fact that he is Filipino and just basing it on aggressiveness, Manny was throwing more punches (thus being the aggressor) although Morales was hitting the cleaner blows. Erik also concentrated on evading Pacquiao’s attacks usually by sidestepping. He would connect here and there with a counterpunch, and yes, I agree that most of them were solid or Manny would not be reeling back and retreating every now and then.
Basically, it was a case of who landed more punches or who hit the cleaner blows.
This style of ‘scoring’ I picked up in the Felix Trinidad-Oscar dela Hoya match. Trinidad did a tirade of punches although not all of them landed squarely while dela Hoya was getting the cleaner looks although his hits were few and far between. In the end, Trinidad won by unanimous decision.
In my opinion though, this practice of scoring (and its other derivatives, eg, some judges just focus on who had better defense or who was more technical without considering the other facets) should cease.
At the middle of the bout, Pacquiao suffered a devastating cut above his right eye, which came from an accidental headbutt. It might have slowed him down a bit but it didn’t deter him nor it crimped his style.
Personally, I scored it 155-113 also, but in favour of our hometown hero. Two things. One, I was giving Manny sympathy points by handing him rounds too close to call. Two, I was trying to deny the floating news that Pacquiao lost when the broadcast barely started on TV.
With these factors taken into consideration, I may not be the perfect boxing judge as I am also to partial to aggressive fighters who hit hard and hit a lot. But then in reality, some judges work with that mindset. So, in essence, what I’m doing is emulate them and ‘predict’ what their probable final score would be. And yes, I do also get swayed sometimes by the commentary.
But I still need a lot of work to get there. In this fight alone, I was off by four rounds as I gave two rounds to Pacquiao, which should have been Morales’ instead. But I’ll justify why I give the bout to Manny.
Counting out the fact that he is Filipino and just basing it on aggressiveness, Manny was throwing more punches (thus being the aggressor) although Morales was hitting the cleaner blows. Erik also concentrated on evading Pacquiao’s attacks usually by sidestepping. He would connect here and there with a counterpunch, and yes, I agree that most of them were solid or Manny would not be reeling back and retreating every now and then.
Basically, it was a case of who landed more punches or who hit the cleaner blows.
This style of ‘scoring’ I picked up in the Felix Trinidad-Oscar dela Hoya match. Trinidad did a tirade of punches although not all of them landed squarely while dela Hoya was getting the cleaner looks although his hits were few and far between. In the end, Trinidad won by unanimous decision.
In my opinion though, this practice of scoring (and its other derivatives, eg, some judges just focus on who had better defense or who was more technical without considering the other facets) should cease.
// posted by Unknown @ 12:08 
