YEAR OF THE UNDERDOG: There were surprises galore in 2011

Upsets were the norm in 2011 but often only seemed shocking because the sportsbooks now offer such wide odds on boxers who are generally expected to win.
 
Odds of -1000 (10-1 on) once indicated a prohibitive favourite. Now, however,  we are seeing boxers listed at -1400, -1800 and higher in fights that have a competitive look to them (such as Lamont Peterson on home ground in DC against Amir Khan).
 
It might seem unbelievable that the great Joe Louis was a mere 6-1 on favourite to defeat overmatched Nathan Mann in a heavyweight title fight in 1938. Louis was only 2-1 on to beat Max Schmeling in their rematch. Sporting types who felt sure that Louis was a class above Tony Galento could have wagered on the heavyweight champion at 6-1 on — but they would have had a scare when Two-Ton Tony dropped the Brown Bomber with a left hook.
 
Today, Louis would be something like -3500 over Galento.
 
I think that players will be increasingly looking for good-value underdogs in the year ahead, because even placing favourites in parlays is now of questionable value.
 
Here’s a look at some of the surprises of 2011:
 
Nobuhiro Ishida TKO1 James Kirkland: Kirkland was a massive favourite over the former junior middleweight champion from Japan. Ishida had been beaten by the strong but ordinary Rigoberto Alvarez in his last fight. I heard that Peter Quillin had been beating up Ishida in sparring in Los Angeles. When I interviewed Quillin for Boxing Monthly he didn’t wish to discuss the sparring sessions — it seemed to me that he didn’t want to say anything uncomplimentary about a boxer who had sparred with him — but he did say he was “surprised” that Ishida beat Kirkland.

Although Kirkland had been inactive for two years due to a prison term for parole violation, he had stopped two opponents since his return to boxing and he looked like being much too powerful for Ishida. If there was a clue to the upset it might have been that Kirkland was wobbled in his two-round win over trial horse Jhon Berrio. Also, Kirkland was training in Las Vegas, away from the iron disciple imposed by trainer Ann Wolfe back home in Austin, TX. Still, it was astonishing to see Kirkland down three times against an opponent with just seven stoppage wins in 30 fights.
 
Ermano Fegatilli W12 Stephen Foster Jr.: Fegatilli’s win over Foster on the British boxer’s home turf in northwest England was a huge surprise. Foster had just stopped the heavy-handed Levan Kirakosyan in three rounds to win the European junior lightweight title; the Belgian Fegatilli was on a winning run but had stopped only five opponents in 26 bouts. It looked, on paper, as if Foster would be much too strong for him. A clue to a potential upset was Fegatilli’s confident bearing after arriving in the U.K. He had clearly come to win and obviously felt very good about his chances. Foster, meanwhile, looked a little drained at the weigh-in, although this is not so unusual in this age when fighters weigh in a day before a fight and have more than 30 hours in which to put liquids and nourishment into their system after making weight.

Foster started as a -1400 favourite but it was clear very early that the British boxer wasn’t relishing Fegatilli’s body blows. Fegatilli had stopped just one opponent in his last 14 fights, but he had Foster down five times. Indeed, Foster looked in such a bad way that his trainer was poised to pull him out at the end of the 11^th round. Foster dug down and fought well in the 12^th, but he had been soundly defeated. Afterwards, Foster revealed that he had been struggling with a virus the week before the fight.
 
Orlando Salido TKO8 Juan Manuel Lopez: Mexico’s Salido was a big outsider in the betting against the colourful JuanMa, an unbeaten power puncher who was defending his featherweight title on home soil in Puerto Rico. In his last fight, Salido had been well beaten by Yuriorkis Gamboa, the undefeated Cuban, and it seemed that Lopez’s promoter, Top Rank, had made the match with Salido to see if JuanMa could go one better than Gamboa and become the sixth boxer to stop Salido. However, Salido had his own ideas.

There were clues to the upset for those smart enough to spot them (full disclosure: I wasn’t one of them). For one thing, Salido had changed his training set-up, reverting to his original trainers after working with ex-champ Daniel Zaragoza for the Gamboa fight, which he felt was an unsuccessful experiment. This suggested that, with a happier training camp behind him, Salido would likely fight better against Lopez than he did against Gamboa. Additionally, Lopez had been looking extremely heavy when spotted ringside at a boxing show just weeks before the Salido fight, and he had been having well-publicised marital problems.

At the weigh-in, Salido looked in rock-hard condition whereas Lopez had a slightly soft look. The signs were there that Salido had done everything possible to give himself the best chance of victory whereas Lopez, in contrast, had been having distractions outside the ring while Lopez’s conditioning had to be considered questionable. Lopez started well enough, sweeping the first three rounds on all three judges’ cards, but Salido weathered the early onslaught and by the fourth the fight was turning in the Mexican veteran’s favour as Lopez started to run out of steam.
 
Jorge Arce TKO12 Wilfredo Vazquez Jr.: Arce’s last-round win over Vazquez was a major surprise to many. There was a perception that Arce had seen better days while the undefeated Vazquez, son of one of Puerto Rico’s great champions, had stopped his last five opponents, the last three victories having come in championship fights. Vazquez had youth on his side and looked the naturally bigger man in the junior featherweight title bout, with Arce having turned professional as a 105-pounder. Form pointed to Vazquez because he had knocked out Cecilio Santos in two rounds whereas Arce struggled in winning on a seventh-round TKO against the trial horse Santos.
 
I was on site for the fight in Las Vegas and Arce looked tremendously confident and very relaxed at the weigh-in. I was expecting a Vazquez win inside the distance and it is difficult to let go of a pre-fight opinion, even when doubts intrude, because no one likes to change horses. Yet I was having real doubts about my original view of the fight — Arce seemed to be treating Vazquez like a green kid going in over his head against proven veteran. There was nothing mean-spirited in Arce’s manner, more a matter of him exuding self-belief.
 
Vazquez opened as a -1200 favourite, and on the evening of the fight the Puerto Rican boxer was -250 to win by KO, TKO or DQ. By the fourth round it looked as if the odds might be justified — Vazquez seemed to be settling down after a shaky start, and he floored the Mexican veteran with a left hook just before the end of the fourth round, and Arce was cut on the bridge of the nose. Yet Arce, as ever, was resilient and big-hearted, and his relentless pressure was something that Vazquez had never previously encountered. In the 11^th Vazquez seemed suddenly to succumb to fatigue and Arce was all over him in the 12^th to pull off a dramatic victory.
 
LAMONT PETERSON W12 AMIR KHAN: In hindsight, Khan should never have been an -1800 favourite over Lamont Peterson, especially not in Peterson’s hometown of Washington DC. Peterson is courageous and tough, and he can fight. Khan, though, had the amateur pedigree that included an Olympic silver medal, and in his last fight the British junior welter had blown through Zab Judah in what had looked, on paper, like a serious test. Also, it was difficult to overlook Peterson’s one-sided points defeat against Timothy Bradley, gritty though Peterson had been in that fight.
 
Most boxing observers saw Khan winning, some even predicting he would halt Peterson inside six rounds. However, it is never a good idea to dismiss the chances of a capable, motivated fighter who is boxing in front of a home crowd. Peterson fought the fight of his life, and my sneaking feeling is that Khan was already looking ahead towards a megafight with Floyd Mayweather Jr. — and when one of the contestants is looking past his opponent it opens the door to an upset possibility.
 
It helps if the local fighter has virtually all the close rounds scored in his favour — as was the case when Jonathan Barros got the controversial win over Celestino Caballero in Argentina (another 2011 upset) — and Peterson, it must be said, got the breaks on the scorecards against Khan. In two very close, either-way rounds, the 10^th and 11^th, it was Peterson who received the benefit of the doubt on two scorecards.
 
Most people feel that the local referee was harsh in docking Khan two points for shoving Peterson off him, with the second deduction, in the final round, seeming particularly harsh. Still, Peterson fought so well that he put himself within reach of winning a close decision, and Khan, having lost a point for pushing, was asking for trouble by repeating the offence.
 
Many fighters won on the road in 2011 but the Peterson-Khan fight was a reminder that fighting at home has to be taken into consideration when one ponders the possibility of an upset.