SIGNING OFF IN STYLE

It really doesn't get much better than this. After two wars and one win each, Arturo Gatti and Irish Micky Ward went at it one more time at Boardwalk Hall, Atlantic City, on 7 June and provided another memorable encounter. 

And although Gatti was the unanimous decision winner after 10 punishing rounds, the 37-year-old Ward scored a moral victory by ending his 18-year career with a courageous, fiercely competitive performance.
Some fighters at the tail-end of their careers are a little bit lacking in the give-it-everything department. Not Ward. 

The proud veteran from the Boston suburb of Lowell, Massachusetts, resolutely withstood some wicked wallops to the body and head and, nose bloody and cut over the left eye, still managed to floor Gatti in the sixth - the only knockdown of the fight - and hurt him several times, including in the final round.

There was no doubt that Gatti won, the judges scoring it 96-93, 96-93 again and 97-92, but he paid a price. He broke his right hand in the fourth when an uppercut bounced off Ward's hip and he suffered a cut over the left eye and bruising and swelling around both eyes. 

Ward hurt his right hand, too, and each had blood showing inside the mouth as they went toe-to-toe in the frenzied final three minutes, fighting through the pain and the exhaustion to give and take punches.
The packed crowd of 12,643 and viewers watching on the Home Box Office television network in America saw a fight that not only lived up to expectations but probably surpassed them.

It was nearly as good as the first, amazing fight in the series at the Mohegan Sun casino resort in Connecticut in May of last year, when Ward won a narrow decision after dropping Gatti with a hook to the body in the unforgettable ninth round.

The rematch, last November at Boardwalk Hall, was dominated by Gatti after he dropped Ward with a right-hander in the third that damaged his rival's eardrum. Ward was unable to recover his equilibrium for the remainder of the fight - but Gatti broke his right hand in that fight, too.

So, with one win apiece, there was a feeling that the issue had not been completely settled, with Ward believing that in the rematch a freak punch took him out of the fight before he really had a chance to get into it.

The rubber match decided things to everyone's satisfaction. Ward, who had promised he would retire no matter what the result, had no complaints and was glad to have gone out fighting and with the respect of Gatti and the boxing fraternity in general.

He said that Gatti hurt him early in fight with body punches and with a shot to the head that left him a little dizzy. But the body blows, he admitted, were what slowed him down.

Gatti said that anyone else would have quit from the sort of punches that Ward took. No title was at stake in the meeting of light-welterweights who each came in at 142lbs (10st 2lbs), although MC Michael Buffer wasn't far out when he introduced the bout as: "Ten rounds for the unofficial but undisputed Blood and Guts championship of the world."

Gatti, 30, from Jersey City and who although Montreal born considers himself more New Jerseyan than Quebecois, was, of course, the crowd favourite, but Ward had plenty of support, too. At first it looked like being a runaway win for Gatti, who boxed beautifully in the first three rounds, in and out, scoring and getting away as he followed perfectly the blueprint laid down by his trainer, Buddy McGirt.

Gatti was punching fast and hard and Ward looked a little bewildered. Ward had talked beforehand of doing more boxing this time, trying to be a bit smarter, but he was in with a younger, quicker and more gifted fighter and it soon became clear that his only chance was to summon up all his heart and toughness and fortitude and somehow try to walk through Gatti's punches and hammer him. But it wasn't going to be easy. Watching on TV, I made the note in the opening round that "even when W. takes shots on gloves, G's power is evident".

By the second Ward's nose was bloody and in the third it was obvious that the body punches were having an effect on him. Gatti was really ripping in the hooks and right-handers underneath and Ward was taking deep breaths. Ward swung and missed, even touching down on his gloves when a big left hook went wide of the target and he lost his balance.

But in the fourth Gatti grimaced and turned away after throwing a right hand that caught Ward on the hip. Gatti's right hand dangled by his side and it was clear that he was injured. Ward said he realised it too, that he could see it in Gatti's face. Ward, energised by the turn of the events, came on strong, hooking to the body, and now we had a two-sided fight.

Gatti surged back in the fifth, letting both hands go even though it must have been agonising to throw the right. But throw it he did, although Ward said afterwards that Gatti's right hands were not as hard as they had been before the hand gave out. But, still, Gatti was piling up points and all Ward could do was march in, gloves held up in front of his face, and try to get shots off when he could. Ward was cut over the left eye now and seemed to be slowing down. At the end of the round his trainer and brother, Dick Eklund, told him: "Don't let a one-handed fighter beat you."

And in the sixth Ward had his big moment of the fight when, after being outboxed all through the round, he suddenly hurt Gatti with a left hook and then dropped him with a right hand that landed high up on the head. Gatti quickly pulled himself up on the ropes, nodding to his corner that he was all right as referee Earl Morton's eight count continued after the bell. Ward was to say ruefully that whenever he hurt Gatti it seemed to be at the end of a round. This was to be the only fight in the trilogy where the boxer who scored the knockdown didn't go on to win the fight.

The seventh was one of the great rounds of the year, each hurting the other. A short left hook counter had Ward briefly looking as if he might go down but he kept battling and it was a give-and-take round, with Gatti cut now over the left eye and the crowd going wild. HBO commentator Jim Lampley was moved to remark: "The most overused word in sports commentary is 'incredible' - this is another incredible fight."

Each man seemed to ease off a little in the eighth and ninth, with Gatti winning the rounds on two of the three judges' cards with boxing and jabbing, but they each let go with all that they had in the last round. Ward hurt his man one last time, with a left hook, and Gatti's legs seemed to give briefly as he went to the ropes. Ward tried to follow up but most of the punches missed. Gatti momentarily sat on the ropes, more due to Ward's physical pressure than being hit, and referee Morton correctly did not rule it a knockdown. 

Then Gatti came back again, slamming away with both hands to win the round on all cards and set the seal on a stirring display. He was to say afterwards that he threw the right so many times after breaking it that he "killed" the hand. Ward's legs didn't look too steady in the closing moments, but then the round ended, and with it one of the great rubber-match series in boxing history as the battered, bloody, weary warriors fell into an embrace.

Commentator Jim Lampley summed it up: "What Micky Ward and Arturo Gatti share together, only they know. Only they can touch it, only they can feel it." Great trainer Emanuel Steward, ringside with HBO's commentary team, agreed that what Gatti and Ward share is indeed a special bond. He said: "When you hit a person with the best punch you've got - everything - and they just come right back to you, first of all you respect them, and after a certain time you actually have to say: 'Man, I love this person.'" 

Gatti received a purse of $1.7 million, Ward got $700,000. They earned it with, as Michael Buffer put it, their blood and their guts.
Every so often a fight comes along that elevates us, lifts us above the everyday cares of the world and takes us to a special place. This was one such fight.