February saved the best for last, as Juan Manuel Marquez and Juan Diaz turned in a Fight of the Year caliber performance in Houston, with Marquez winning with a ninth round knockout.

The fight got off to an extremely fast pace from the opening bell, with Diaz smothering Marquez and unloading punches in large quantities. The first two rounds were old fashioned toe-to-toe brawls, with Diaz seemingly getting the better of the older fighter.

In the third round, Marquez seemed to be able to avoid getting stuck on the ropes, where Diaz was doing most of his damage, and Marquez started to control the middle of the ring.

As the rounds went on, Marquez did a better job of boxing than he was doing early in the fight, but Diaz was still controlling the bulk of the action.

With each passing round, Marquez became a little more accurate, but also was getting more and more tired.

As Marquez seemed to be slowing down in the eighth round, he landed a series of left hands that both opened a vicious gash over Diaz’s left eye, and later wobbled him. Diaz was able to land a left hand of his own to keep Marquez from trying to finish him off and survive the round.

In the ninth, Diaz came out with his legs back under him and proceeded to pick up where he was in the seventh round, but a perfect right hand to the temple from Marquez wobbled Diaz, and this time he could not help but go to the canvas after a few more Marquez punches found their target.

Diaz beat the count, but with his legs gone and no ability to clinch, Marquez peppered him with combinations, hitting the body and the head, until a perfect uppercut sent Diaz straight down to the floor. The fight was waived off at 2:40 of the ninth round with no count from the referee needed.

No doubt this is the leader in the clubhouse for Fight of the Year, and as HBO’s Jim Lampley said, “good luck to the rest of boxing topping that.”

After the fight, Marquez chose to call out the retired former pound-for-pound king Floyd Mayweather, saying that Manny Pacquiao isn’t interested in a third fight and Marquez wants to fight the best.

On the undercard, Chris John seemingly outboxed Rocky Juarez for the majority of their bout, but all three referees saw the fight as a 114-114 draw. John outclassed Juarez all night, but Juarez was more aggressive and threw far more power punches. Coupled with the Houston crowd roaring at everything Juarez did, John got the short end of the stick in a fight that he probably won.

Article reposted from BoxingInformer.com.

Share this story...

Discussion

No comments for “Marquez Knocks Out Diaz in Lightweight Epic”

Post a comment

You must be logged in to post a comment.