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HBO Boxing After Dark Recap

October 4, 2008

Pechanga Resort and Casino-Temecula, California

Featherweight (126 pounds) 10-Round Match:

Yuriorkis Gamboa (11-0, 9 KO's, 126 pounds) vs. Marcos Ramirez (25-0, 1 ND, 16 KO's, 126.5 pounds)

Gamboa had a stellar amateur boxing career. Competing for Cuba, Gamboa won numerous championships. His amateur career washighlighted by taking home a gold medal for the island nation at 112 pounds at the 2004 Athens Summer Olympiad. Following the Olympics, without the opportunity to turn professional, Gamboa began winning world amateur boxing championships at 126 pounds and had he not defected would have been the gold medal favorite at 126 pounds in the 2008 Beijing Olympics. (The 126- pound division ended up being 1 of the 3 weight classes that Cuba did not medal at in the Olympics this year, and the only weight class under 178 pounds where Cuba did not take home a medal.)

It took 2 different doctor visits and EKG's to clear Gamboa for this match. The first doctor became alarmed when he checked Gamboa and found out the boxer had an extremely low resting heart beat. After a second doctor's visit on Friday it was determined that Gamboa is in fact a phenomenal athlete who has trained so much that his body functions on a very low resting heart beat. If a normal person showed up with that heart rate, they would be hospitalized and found to have severe heart problems. Normal people cannot live on that few heart palpitations. Unfortunately for Gamboa's opponents, that condition means the boxer is essentially a hummingbird and nearly impossible to fatigue during a match.

Gamboa captured the vacant WBO NABO championship at 126 pounds in his last match. On July 18, 2008, Gamboa defeated Al Seeger via technical knockout at 2:30 of round 1 at Buffalo Bill's Star Arena. That title is not on the line in this match.

Gamboa is unranked by The Ring, and the number 7 ranked boxer in the world at 126 pounds by boxrec.com.

Ramirez has built his record facing very soft opposition. The Midwestern United States is known for being bereft of quality boxing competition. The Kansas City, Kansas resident's last 6 matches and 15 of his last 17 matches have been in Kansas City, Missouri. (Kansas City, Missouri and Kansas are connected with the state line artificially dividing what is in reality a larger city.) That friendly geography has allowed Ramirez to build an undefeatedrecord competing in 26 matches, while only facing 2 opponents with a winning record of at least 7 wins, and who were not coming off a loss.

The Kansas City resident's last match was a 12-round unanimous decision victory over Adailton De Jesus to capture the vacant IBF Latino Championship at 126 pounds on May 30, 2007 at Barney Allis Plaza in Kansas City, Missouri. (De Jesus was knocked out by Gamboa at 35 seconds of round 6 on October 30, 2007 at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel Casino in Hollywood, Florida.)

Ramirez is unranked by The Ring, and unranked by boxrec.com, because he has not boxed in official competition in over a year. The long absence from the ring is due to a string of personal tragedies.

At 26-years-old, Gamboa is 1 year younger then the 27-year-old Ramirez. Ramirez has the height advantage standing 5' 7" tall, while Gamboa stands 5' 5" tall. The Kansas City resident has the reach advantage with a 23.5" arm length compared to the 22" arm length of Gamboa. Ramirez will be the larger boxer in the ring having unofficially rehydrated to 139 pounds. Gamboa has unofficially rehydrated to 137 pounds approaching match time. Both boxers will employ the orthodox stance.

All of the official judges keeping score of this match from ringside are from California. The referee is Jerry Cantu.

A right hand from Ramirez sends Gamboa following onto his knees and into the ropes with 1:34 to go in round 1. Gamboa springs up and wants to continue without the referee counting. However, the referee stops Gamboa from chasing Ramirez to the neutral corner and forces the gold medalist to take the mandatory 8-count. With 1:23 to go in the round, Gamboa is allowed to go charging back into action. Ramirez easily wins round 1 on Lederman and my scorecard, 10-8.The knockdown Ramirez scored was not a flash knockdown as Gamboa tried to sell. It was the result of the Cuban taking a hard left hand with about 1:46 to go in round 1 that hurt Gamboa. Ramirez then followed that up with a combination capped by that right hand that sent Gamboa to the mat. Correction, on replay it was not the right hand that finished the combination that knocked Gamboa down. Ramirez' right hand missed completely, but Ramirez followed through with the punch and delivered an elbow smash to the jaw of Gamboa. The illegal elbow was what knocked Gamboa down. It does not appear to have been an intentional elbow. With 2:05 to go in round 2, Gamboa lands a combination that drops Ramirez to a knee on the canvas. Ramirez takes the full 8-count and is breathing heavy when the referee asks the boxer to walk towards him. Ramirez never saw the combination that put him down and is in bad shape. The referee properly allows Ramirez to continue with 1:51 to go in the round. However, Gamboa will likely put an end to this match in the next 30 seconds. Rather then hold on to recover, both boxers began trading power shots in the center of the ring when the action resumed. Ramirez had never been knocked down in his career as a pro or amateur prior to taking that combination from Gamboa. However, a right hand from Gamboa sends Ramirez to the ground for the second time in his competitive boxing career with 1:33 to go in the round. Ramirez started to stand up at 9 and the referee fast-counted from 9 to 10, while Ramirez was beginning to stand. It was a good stoppage by the referee. Ramirez is protesting, but not that vigorously.The boxer should know that if he stays down too long, the referee may stop it. The HBO commentators are a little upset by the fast-count. However, knowing the skill disparity between the 2 boxers and having seen the last 2 matches, the stoppage cannot be argued. Gamboa was going to knock Ramirez down in another 20 seconds.

The official outcome from Jake Gutierrez is that: at 1:41 of round 2, the referee has reached a count of 10 making the winner by knockout and still undefeated, Yuriorkis "El Cicion de Guantanamo" Gamboa. The win moves Gamboa to 12-0 with 10 of those wins coming by way of knockout.

The final punchstat numbers have Gamboa landing 28 of the 104 total punches he threw, for a 27% total connect percentage. The victor landed 27 of the 89 power punches he threw, for a 30% power connect percentage. Ramirez landed 20 of the 82 total punches he threw for a 24% total connect percentage. The vanquished Ramirez landed 17 of the 51 power punches he threw, for a 33% power connect percentage.

Gamboa said in his post match interview that he knew he was hit by an elbow but it did not hurt him much. He said the knockdown made him be more aggressive. Gamboa was asked if he was going to continue to box as aggressively, since he keeps getting knocked down. He said he was, because he always scores the knockout in the end.

The Cuban Olympian came into this match with a lot of hype, against an opponent designed to be knocked out quickly, and knocked that opponent out quickly. However, Gamboa looked horrifically flawed for someone who is being billed as elite. His defense was awful at times and he boxed in a reckless manner that will get him quickly knocked out against decent opposition. Gamboa has amazing physical tools and athleticism. His amateur track record shows he knows how to box. However, the fact he became so much better then everyone else on the amateur level allowed him to become a technical nightmare. It will take years of work in the gym to turn him into the professional boxer people want him to be. He definitely has the potential to be great. However, it will probably be several years before he unlearns the bad habits he picked up from too many years of dominating amateur boxing and approaches being the elite boxer people want him to be. Additionally, in his interview Gamboa did not express the desire to become the type of boxer he needs to become to be elite. He is now living in Miami, Florida, which has been arguably the worst place for young Cuban boxers to live and progress as professional boxers after they defect. The perception is that in Miami star Cuban defectors are allowed to live in excess, while they lived in near prison conditions training in Cuba. The people behind Gamboa seem to know the right things to do, the question is if they can get the boxer to accept them.

The Gamboa match featured a competitor who came in with a lot of hype and under performed.