Even father time can’t slow down Hopkins
[BoxingGlove Notes]
Dressed in a black boxing outfit laced with bright lime green and wearing a typical, “War of the Worlds”, lime green alien mask, Bernard “The Executioner”, no-no-wrong name — he’s now “The Alien” Hopkins, again made boxing history by successfully defending his I.B.F. Light Heavyweight Title at age 48.
His “selected” but mandatory opponent was Karo Murat, 25-1-1, 15 knockouts. The “Star Trek” type fight event, occurred on Saturday, October 26, 2013, at the Boardwalk Hall Convention Center in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
Who would’ve thought that in this modern day we would be mixing, galaxy, space, and alien talk with the sweet science? It had to be a modern day mongoose like Bernard Hopkins to initiate this genre.
It seems that he was told by his medical doctor that he was so strong, young and viral, that he did not “appear” human, so he had to be an “alien”. So “viola”, from now on you will see, Bernard “The Alien” Hopkins as he continues to fight until he retires from the squared circle, and flies away on his space ship to his “real” planet.
In defending his title, Hopkins, 53-6-2, 32 knockouts in typical standard fashion boxed cautiously keeping slow footed clumsy Murat at bay by counter-punching him at will although Murat came forward punching and hitting Hopkins sporadically on the head and body.
They were not hurting punches but scored some points as the fight progressed much to the delight of the mainly Hopkins fans.
Hopkins surprised many, myself, included, when he threw many combination punches, staggering Murat and sometimes not only hurting him but surprising him as to how this 48 year old could punch so sharply and not get tired.
It was Murat who as the fight progressed was getting tired and he is only 30 years of age. Maybe he should’ve had some of Hopkins’ blood injected into him.
As the fight progressed Murat would score a combination of unanswered punches exciting the pro Murat audience and giving them the hope that he could win and score the biggest boxing upset of the century.
After seeing Hopkins retaliate I got the impression that he was only playing possum to trap Murat and excite the crowd. Hopkins was more active in his offense than in several of his previous fights and he was also very defensive, bobbing and weaving, using the shoulder roll, and elbow defense like Floyd Mayweather, as he got out of harm’s way round by round until the 12th.
A tiring Murat suffered 2 severe cuts on his left eye which he claimed were caused by Hopkins’ constant head butts but they were really clean punches with right hands. The fight at times did turn fouled filled as both clinched a total of 35 times throughout the fight by my count. Referee Steve Smoger, had to take a point away from Murat for repeatedly hitting on the break. At one time Hopkins spun Murat around and while he hit him in the back, he actually kissed him on his neck much to the delight of the close to 8,000 fans in attendance.
The decision as perhaps expected, was unanimous. Judges, Julie Lederman and Joseph Pasquale voted the same, 119/108 and the other Judge, Benoit Russell, voted, 117/110 all for Hopkins. I gave the fight Hopkins, 118/110. I actually called round 6 even.
With this victory Hopkins indicated in the post- fight ring interview that he will continue to fight to build on his own legacy since he was not following anybody. “Chess player that I am I’ll just continue to fight until I walk away in to the sunset”, he stated.
Obviously, for Murat a first time visitor to America, this was a disappointment, but I am very sure a lucrative one since he was well paid for his fistic visit with the alien, and it will be back to the drawing board to figure out went wrong and perhaps challenge for a future world title.
The W.B.O. Middleweight Championship fight between defending champ, Peter “Kid Chocolate” Quillin and “King” Gabriel Rosado was a very good hard fought battle with Kid Chocolate knocking Rosado down in the 2nd round with a powerful left hook.
I began to get the impression that a ring upset was going to occur when challenger Rosado hurt a weakening Quillin with a very hard right hand punch and appeared to be winning round after round to the delight of his Philadelphia fans who bought over $20,000 worth of tickets to see their home town hero take the 160 pound title back home to “Philly”.
Tragically, in an exchange of hard punches Rosado suffered a severe cut on his left eyebrow in the 9th round which bled profusely and the fight was stopped in favor of Quillin in the 10th.
At stoppage, judges Waleska Roldan, Ron McNair and Kason Cheeks, respectively, had it for Quillin: 89-81, 87-83 and 90-80.
No matter how much Rosado pleaded with the Doctors and the referee not to stop the fight it had to be stopped. It was a long deep wound on his eye. “I could see, I am not blind, please let me continue, I am not hurt, and this is the championship rounds,” begged Rosado, to no avail.
The fight had to be stopped in my opinion because the cut was a deep and grotesque wound. Rosado did demand a rematch.
In the 3rd title fight, knockout sensation, Deontay Wilder, Continental Americas Heavyweight Champion lived up to his reputation and knocked out a gutsy but outclassed Nicolai Fertha in the 4th round in a fight where the brave Fertha “attacked” Wilder from the very first round, hitting him at will but at the same time absorbing a horrific beating.
By the 2nd round Fertha was bleeding profusely from his nose as he was knocked down twice by Wilder’s powerful punches. Perhaps mercifully when he was knocked down in the 4th, round, the referee stopped the slaughter. So Deontay now owns a frightening fighting record of 30 fights and 30 knockouts.
After the fight he again repeated that he wanted to fight the Klitschko’s, “So that I could bring the heavyweight crowns back to America where they belong”.
Meantime to open up the fight card, the “little” guys gave us some excitements. Undefeated super middleweight, Dominic Wade, 11-0, 9 knockouts, scored a first round k.o. over veteran, Roberto Ventura, and Braulio Santos, 10-1, 9 knockouts, also k.o.’d David Clark in 1:39 seconds also of the first round.
Both, Santos and Wade are young future super-stars tabbed by Golden Boy Promotions to be future world champs. In the 3rd. preliminary, undefeated, Zachary Ochoa, 4-0 won a unanimous decision over Michael Doyle.
Over all it was a pretty good fight card which actually attracted the curiosity seekers due to the ageless wonder Hopkins. He proved he can still be competitive in a young man’s sport.
Not Baseball, not Football, not Basketball, not Soccer, but the most brutal of all, Boxing.
