"The message was clear: Naz was here to put on a show, Barrera was all business. And business was good...."
God Save the Queen, Because He Sure Couldn't Save the Prince
15 Rounds by Steve Kim
So this is what Ron Borges must have felt like.
You remember when the veteran boxing scribe of the Boston Globe was the lone voice in the wilderness when he picked Evander Holyfield to upset the heavily favored Mike Tyson.
But I hesitate to use the word 'upset'. In both instances, the better fighters won. These were no
upsets. What this was though, was fundamentals over flash.
Barrera threw a book of boxing at Hamed, and Hamed was obviously illiterate. Hamed was made to look like a rank amateur, devoid of any real game plan and sorely lacking in any solid technical skill. His footwork made it seem as if he was boxing in quicksand, his right jab starts from too far away to make a difference and Hamed only throws combinations when someone is clearly dazed.
In other words, without his power, he's Junior Witter. Well, maybe that's overstating it, but you get my drift.
This fight reminded me a bit of Holyfield-Tyson in certain respects. Barrera had an answer for all the mental and physical ploys of Hamed.
When Hamed delayed his entrance into the ring, Barrera waited patiently and smiled. Every time Hamed tried to wrestle with Barrera, it was Barrera who ended up doing the roughhousing. When Hamed took a punch at Barrera on the break, Barrera would come back with this own punch in retaliation — only his were even harder.
>From the time Barrera was kneeing Hamed when they wrestled to the canvas to the final round when Barrera put Hamed into an LAPD Rampart Division-like headlock and rammed Hamed into the ring corner. Barrera, bullied the bully.
That was crystallized when Hamed tried to touch gloves with Barrera, only to have Barrera disdainfully ignore the gesture. The crowd which became more and more 'Mexican' as Barrera's dominance grew, cheered at their fighters non-compliance.
The message was clear: Naz was here to put on a show, Barrera was all business. And business was good.
With his dominance of the highly regarded Hamed, now maybe Barrera can garner the respect he truly deserves as one of the game's pound-for-pound best. Take away one monster right hand from Junior Jones, and Barrera is one of the game's elite.
Yet for some reason he was talked about like a club fighter coming in to this fight. It was also Barrera's whiskers which were questioned because of that one dose of 'Poison' from the hard punching Jones. Funny, but I seem to remember Hamed hitting the canvas a few times myself. Barrera was never in a fight he didn't like. But, it was Hamed who stunk out the joint against the likes of Cesar Soto and Wayne McCullough among others.
Hamed, has never been dominant against elite featherweights in their prime. In fact looking at his ledger, he has never faced a great fighter in his prime at all. Barrera was battle-tested in every way from his wars with Jones (twice), Kennedy McKinney and Erik Morales.
Now, who was the guy with 'the heart of a lion'?
Is Barrera back? Who said he went anywhere?
BARRERA'S BLUEPRINT
Somewhere Brendan Ingle is smiling (or laughing out loud). While the S.S. Naz was a rudderless ship, Barrera was sailing smoothly without really hitting the rough waters he was expected to.
Give Barrera's staff led by Rudy Perez and Oscar Maldonado credit. They implemented a great strategy and Barrera executed it to perfection.
They went with the old "KISS" philosophy: Keep It Simple Stupid. Not implying that Barrera is anything but highly intelligent in or out of the squared circle, but the plan of attack was very basic.
* Circle to the left: All night Barrera would slide to his left, away from the left of Hamed. Hamed never
made the adjustment and tried to cut off the ring.
* Work off the jab: The signature punch of Barrera with his left is usually the left hook. But on this night, he worked mostly off the jab and despite facing a southpaw he was able to land a fairly decent amount of jabs to Hamed (according to CompuBox: 101 out of 274, 37 percent). Barrera kept Hamed at bay even when
not
landing his 'stick', staying away from the lead left hook, therefore not creating counter-punching
opportunities for Hamed.
* Lay traps: Barrera counter-punched the counter-puncher. He did just as much damage stepping back as he did coming forward. Hamed simply isn't comfortable initiating the action. It was evident in visiting Barrera at his Big Bear training camp a few weeks ago that that little things like head movement, balanced footwork and feinting were being worked on.
* Work the body: Barrera didn't do the usual amount of banging downstairs as we're used to seeing from him, but he did more to Hamed's midsection with good hard punches than any of his previous opponents combined. As the night went on, Hamed felt things he had never
felt before.
Like the Lombardi Power Sweep, simple, yet perfectly executed to perfection.
CHEESE-STEAK MAKES A POINT
Calvin 'Cheese-Steak' Davis an aspiring lightweight from Philadelphia (what else do you expect a fighter from Philly to be nicknamed?) who was in Las Vegas working out in the Bernard Hopkins camp was one of the few who tabbed Barrera to topple the Prince.
"If you look at all the fighters who have really hit Barrera," explained Davis a couple of day before the fight at Johnny Tocco's gym. "They were all right-handed guys with good fundamentals who threw straight punches. Now, where does Hamed fit into any of this?"
Great point 'Steak'.
HAMED BOX OFFICE
Humpy Hamed fell off the wall...
And all of Time Warner's men...
May not be able to put him together again...
Sorry, for the bad nursery rhyme, but the point has to be made that HBO/Time Warner was largely responsible for creating the myth of Hamed.
Look at who he had faced Pre-Barrera on HBO: Kevin Kelley, Wilfredo Vasquez, Vuyani Bungu, Wayne McCullough, Paul Ingle and Augie Sanchez.
All this while ducking Juan Manual Marquez (with the help of the WBO and Paco Valcarcel).
That's a lot of guys who are either past their prime, blown up bantamweights or guys who simply didn't deserve the fight (but got it anyway, because they were deemed safe enough for Hamed). When Cesar Soto is the best 126 pounder you've faced, it says more than you need to know.
The Barrera battle was largely made because of Hamed's flagging ratings. In this business, there is simply a time you have to fight the fights you don't want. Oscar De La Hoya learned this, and now so will Hamed.
Hamed can no longer face the likes of Istan 'Ko Ko' Kovacs and expect HBO to comply with there wishes. It seems that the only way that Hamed can redeem himself is to fight Barrera in a rematch.
And Barrera-Hamed II is something that he may not want. Barrera did nothing but stick to basics, and he can do it again. But Hamed in addition to making some technical adjustments (if he can, at this point, he is, what he is) may have some psychological scars he may never overcome. No fighter in the game today was as cocksure and confident as he was. His arrogance seemed to be his shield, that shield has now been punctured.
The first loss for a fighter is usually the toughest to overcome. For Hamed, it may be his toughest battle. Tougher than the what he faced this past Saturday night.
ANOTHER WAY OF SAYING?
I kept hearing how Barrera was 'a classic Mexican fighter', now, at times this is a great compliment. But the way they ('they' being mostly the East Coast media) seemed to use it as a euphemism for — "he's a stupid fighter, one who gets hit with everything, and has no skill".
Much like inner-city high school basketball teams have 'great athletes', and suburban schools have players who 'play within the system and are disciplined'. Sometimes things are said without really saying it.
Barrera proved he has plenty of brains along with his brawn.
I WASN'T ALONE
I wasn't exactly the lone voice in the wilderness, Bernard Fernandez (Philadelphia Daily News), Robert Morales (San Gabriel Valley Daily News) and Eric Bottjer (CKP matchmaker) also picked Barrera to beat Hamed.
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