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January 2001
Each month we bring you a selection of articles from the current and past issues of BOXING MONTHLY. To buy the magazine, see our subscription or back issues pages, or use our world distribution map to find a news-stand copy. Why not use our Interactive Forum to express your own boxing comments and opinions!
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MAGNIFICO The year ends on a high note as Tito and Vargas give their all for boxing. GRAHAM HOUSTON reports from ringside in Vegas |
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VARGAS TOOK some big hits but just kept coming against the outstanding champion Trinidad
- Get Big Pic Sometimes, though rarely, a big event in boxing lives up to all its promise. A crowd of 10,627 at the Mandalay Bay casino resort in Las Vegas and a worldwide TV viewing audience saw such a fight on 2 December as Felix "Tito" Trinidad hammered "Ferocious" Fernando Vargas into defeat in the 12th and final round. The clash of undefeated light-middleweight champions had everything. There were knockdowns and shifts of fortune. There was accomplished boxing and powerful punching. Courage was displayed on either side, as was an indomitable will to win. But Trinidad, 27, the WBA champion and the older and more experienced man, had a little too much firepower and pressure for the 22-year-old Vargas, who rallied from two first-round knockdowns to wage a truly heroic fight before being bombed out of the contest with three knockdowns in the final round. When Vargas, the International Boxing Federation champion, went down for the third time in the 12th - and fifth time in the fight - Las Vegas referee Jay Nady waved the finish, without bothering to count, after one minute, 33 seconds of the round. But Trinidad, an idol in his Puerto Rican homeland, had to survive a fourth-round knockdown and was penalised two points for low blows. Vargas, the Mexican-American from Oxnard, California, who had most on the big crowd on his side, also had a point taken away for a low delivery. But although both men showed the bruises of battle it was Trinidad who was doing most of the damage, as shown on the scorecards of the three judges, who all had the Puerto Rican in front. Judge Duane Ford of Las Vegas had it 103-100, Stanley Christodoulou of South Africa saw it 104-100 while Glenn Hamada of Washington state made Trinidad in front by 104-99.,/p.
But scoring, of course, became academic when Trinidad landed his tremendous punches in the final round. He had dropped the younger man twice in the first round but failed to finish the job. But this time there was no escape for Vargas as Trinidad came on like an express train down the tracks. Tito is known for his strong finishes, such as the last three rounds of relentless pursuit against a fleeing Oscar De La Hoya in a superfight that fizzled instead of sizzled. But in the last round against Vargas he was a devastating, unstoppable machine - and this after Vargas had boldly come back to win the 11th on the cards of all three judges. Some media members felt that Trinidad should have been in front by a wider margin than the judges had it. "Where do they get these judges from?" asked Bernard Fernandez of the Philadelphia Daily News. But although Vargas was rocked often, he did some effective scoring of his own in between getting caught by the heavier hits of the Puerto Rican. I did not keep a running score, but when I went back over my notes I found I had it 103-100 in favour of Trinidad, making me the "Duane Ford" judge. The story, though, is not about points margins: this was Trinidad's greatest night, although Vargas must have won a special place in the hearts of fight fans all over the world for his exemplary show of heart and his zest for combat. Vargas had pledged that he would not run, and he was true to his word. "He promised the only way he would lose was on his back," said Vargas's manager, Rolando Arellano, afterwards, "and unfortunately for us that's what happened." (Actually he was on all fours when the fight was waved over.) Vargas's assistant trainer, Roger Bloodworth, said - rightly - that there was no shame in his man's defeat. "I'm not [feeling] down," Bloodworth said. "Tito is a great, great fighter." Indeed he is, and one felt tempted to go along with the opinion of the Vargas camp - and, needless to say, Trinidad's promoter, Don King - that the Puerto Rican is now pound for pound the best in the world. This was Trinidad's 39th consecutive victory, of which 32 have come inside the distance with his opponents either on the floor or so badly hurt that the referee has had to rescue them. Vargas, the 1996 U.S. Olympic representative, had won 20 consecutive fights, with 18 opponents stopped. He had looked masterful and boxed like a seasoned veteran in his impressive wins over world champs Yory Boy Campas and Ike Quartey. But he had never faced anyone like Trinidad. Afterwards, Vargas was taken to hospital as a precautionary measure but released after tests, including an MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) brain scan, revealed no serious injury. Trinidad made only a brief appearance at the post-fight conference. Dark glasses hid the worst of the damage to his battered features but his right eye seemed to be swollen nearly shut - from an accidental thumb, he said - and his lips were puffed. His body language was of a man totally spent, one who had poured out all his strength and passion in the remarkable display we had witnessed earlier. He seemed drained. At one point, Trinidad hung his head and wept, shaking his head to indicate he was too overcome to carry on speaking. His father and trainer, Felix Trinidad Sr., said through an interpreter: "We had a tremendous battle and that's why we're sentimental right now." But then Tito gathered himself to speak, though an interpreter, of his love for boxing, which although "a hard sport of great sacrifices", has given him so much. He spoke of Vargas with an admiration that was touching in its sincerity. "I want to tell Fernando Vargas, wherever he is now, that he is a great champion," Trinidad said. Vargas, he said, was very strong and had everything it took to win this fight. "But I was in great condition," he said. "I never gave up." In the end, he said, the better fighter won. There can be no argument about that. Trinidad said that after his right eye was injured (he started to blink and dab at the eye with his glove in the third round, after a Vargas jab) he had trouble seeing. "It's very difficult to fight with one eye," he said, "but I said I will not stop." Nor did he. Meanwhile, Vargas's left eye was swelling and closing from on top by the 10th but he never stopped fighting back. "The fight fulfilled its prophecy," Don King told us afterwards. "This was a gruelling fight on both sides. I think Vargas was tremendous. I really respect his intestinal fortitude. Steven Spielberg couldn't have written a better script for the 12th round. It was the best fight of the year, certainly - I would say the best fight of the decade, and most probably the fight of the millennium. "Our plan doesn't call for a rematch, but we can always be talked into it." But before any talk of an encore, Vargas needs a long rest. "He'll be back," said his promoter Gary Shaw, of Main Events. But not for a while. Trinidad, meanwhile, also needs time for recuperation, after which he is expected to move up to middleweight to challenge William Joppy, who retained his WBA title in a mismatch on the undercard. And, if he beats Joppy, Trinidad will target Roy Jones Jr., the light-heavyweight champion, who has talked about boxing at super middleweight (168lbs, or 12st). "At this point we want to enjoy the night," King said, "but we're on the path to Roy Jones. We've got some stumbling blocks on the way, and one of them is William Joppy - he's guarding the doorway. But the mission is Roy Jones." But with Jones's over-inflated opinion of what he is worth financially, it is by no means certain such a match can be made. This is in the future, though. For now, we can savour the memory of a fight that, everyone agreed, was just what boxing needed after the Mike Tyson-Andrew Golota fiasco and the undramatic Lennox Lewis-David Tua bout (not to mention Roy Jones's lacklustre pay-per-view performance against Eric Harding). Trinidad versus Vargas showed what boxing can be, at its best. It is this sort of epic encounter that keeps the fans coming back for more, suffering through the disappointments in the hope of seeing the sort of fights that are genuinely memorable. Yet the fight looked perilously close to being all over in the opening round. Within the first half-minute, a huge left hook cracked Vargas on the chin and sent him tottering back, listing to one side, before a six-punch barrage, most of which missed, scrambled him to the floor on the seat of his white satin trunks as his legs suddenly gave way. Vargas jumped right up but still looked unsteady as referee Nady completed the eight count. Almost immediately he was down again from another Trinidad left hook. Again he got up, more slowly this time, and, after taking the eight count, pulled himself together sufficiently to stave off Trinidad for the remainder of the round - and even grinned at Tito as the bell sounded. The war was on. Trinidad was the implacable aggressor but Vargas remainedsurprisingly poised under siege. He used head movement and angles to have the older man missing, and got in shots of his own. But Trinidad was not the easiest target to hit cleanly, keeping his hands high, as always, but also showing more side-to-side movement of the head than he has ever revealed before. There were roars from the rival factions as each man had his moments, but mostly it was Trinidad controlling the fight, and his left jabs sent Vargas's head jolting back. It looked in the fourth as if Vargas, amazingly, might be turning the tide as a left hook counter dumped Trinidad on the seat of his green trunks for the compulsory eight count. But Vargas's charge was checked by a low left hook, and referee Nady told the judges to take a point from Trinidad's score, while giving Vargas time to recuperate. Vargas boxed beautifully in the fifth and Trinidad lifted his right glove to him in a show of respect as the round ended. But then Trinidad took command again, only to have another point deducted, in the seventh, for a left hook that strayed below the belt. But with each passing round Trinidad seemed slowly to be wearing down the younger man, who was under intense mental as well as physical pressure, because every lapse was punished with power. It reminded of what Chris Finnegan told me after his knockout loss in 14 rounds to Bob Foster, the great, extremely hard hitting light-heavyweight champion, in London in 1972, that it was like fighting with a shotgun pressed up against your head. In the 10th, it was Vargas's turn to have a point taken away for a low left hook, but the two were trading punches at the bell. And Vargas showed he was still very much in the fight by outsmarting Trinidad in the 11th, scoring points while his opponent looked to land the one big punch. But Vargas needed a knockout to win - and instead got knocked out himself. Trinidad's big left hook sent Vargas down for the first time in the last round, after he had absorbed a heavy right and tried to come back with a countering hook. Then the left hook had him down again for another mandatory eight count. I thought the fight should have been stopped at this point, because Vargas looked out on his feet. But referee Nady let it continue, and an unsteady and disorientated Vargas tried to hang on. He was too far gone, though, and Trinidad landed, inevitably, with another clear shot to the head, this one a right hand that sent Vargas flopping to his hands and knees. It was the fifth and final knockdown that Vargas was to suffer. The referee signalled the fight was over, without bothering to start a count. But if ever a fighter gave all he had in a valiant losing effort, that fighter is Vargas. It was his misfortune to be up against one of the outstanding fighters of the last 20 years. Winner and loser were magnificent. Of all the fights I have seen in Las Vegas going back to 1981, this might have been the greatest. I felt privileged to be at ringside to witness it. |
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