Tarver vs Johnson

[darthpb]

Oh, come on, I thought Tarver won 7-5....

[mh2365]

Originally Posted by darthpb

Oh, come on, I thought Tarver won 7-5....

Not sure how anyone can think Johnson won that fight.

Edit ... wait I'm sure someone on this board (we all know who) will claim he knew Johnson would win and scored it exactley 115-113 in favor of Johnson. Because he had some inside info or some other BS.

[mking55]

I too thought Tarver had a slight advantage and won. However, it wasn't absurd that Johnson got the decision as we've all seen decisions a lot worse.

And, can anyone feel bad that Johnson won? You have to like the guy. And the way he keeps coming. When he said after the fight that Tarver didn't hurt him, you almost had to believe him because he just kept on coming.

It was a real pleasure to watch a boxing MATCH. The fighters were evenly matched. After that disgusting piece of crap (Klitschko vs. Fatboy Williams), it was good to be reminded of how enjoyable and exciting a fight can be.

[erickdamac]

I though johnson Won the fight.

Tarver Gave away the 10th lost the 11 and started the 12 good but finish flopping all over the ring!

115-113 for Johnson Guys come on stop making every fight "controversial"!

[almo]

I had it 6-6 a draw! Its not out of the question that someone gave a round that the commentators saw as a Tarver round to Johnson. Johnson came forward all night and kept punching. Tarver counterpuched well. I dont see controversey with this fight.

Remember how tarver thought he won the 1st jones fight??? Well there was no controversy there either...they just fought again.

You want controversey, look at:

Sturm Vs De La Hoya

or

Coutney Burton vs Emmanuel Agustus

[IceTea]

I had it 6-5-1 for Johnson. Strum is fighting Tito next year.

[PittPanther]

I didn't think it was that bad of a decision, however, I also felt that Tarver won the fight.

I'll agree with Martin and say it's easy to feel good for Johnson.

[Cap]

I had Johnson winning 115-113. Tarvet threw a lot of pitty-pat punches in some rounds that did nothing. Johnson took many of the early rounds, Tarver came on in the middle and Johnson took the later rounds. It was very close and I can see other judges giving it to Tarver, but I scored it for Johnson.

Cap

P.S. I only saw the first two rounds of the Golota-Ruiz fight due to technical error on my part. Hope they replay. The tape ran out on Johnson-Tarver seconds after the final card was read out! If Klitschko fights Ruiz he should insist on Jay Nady as ref.

[wildhawke11]

At least a nice guy won the fight.
In his time Johnson has been on the end of some bad decisions so just for once Lady Luck smiled on the old timer. Good Luck To Him.

[BrocktonBlockBuster]

I didn't see the fight. But,from what I read Johnson was the aggressor most of the fight? Alot of fight fans and judges don't give enough credit for aggression-IMOP.

[jaylosch]

Exactly, it was tough to score, im sure even tougher at ringside, as a judge...FOTY candidate, this was awesome.

[Garagiste]

Has anyone seen the scorecards? I'm curious how the final round was scored, and whether that was the margin of victory for Johnson.

With so little left in the tank, Tarver should have been smarter than to go all out at the start of 12. Still, I scored the round for Tarver. He did more in the first 90 seconds than Johnson did in the second half of the round.

Can anyone think of other fighters who, like Johnson, revived their careers so convincingly—back-to-back wins over arguably the two best in their weight class—after years of scuffling against lesser opponents?

[Tosti]

Our own Dennis Andries did something similar, he spent years in the doldrums before having a late career rally. Although technically limited he never knew when he was beat.

[maxx]

As I often do, I originally watched the fight with no sound & the next day watched it with sound. No sound I had Johnson winning 7-4-1. Sound I had Tarver ahead 7-5.

One of the big differences: with no sound you don't have Roy Jones constantly telling you that Tarver is just playing possum. Watch it without that commentary it looks as if Johnson has Tarver in trouble a number of times. Watch it with that commentary and you end up discounting some of Johnson's work even if Tarver may not have always been playing possum.

Another big difference with watching the fight without commentary was noticing how pitty-pat many of Tarver's punches looked. The commentators glossed over it, but many of those punches just looked a lot more like slaps (although, certainly, Tarver threw his share of solids shots as well).

All told, I'd say this one was far from a robbery. In my opinion, a point or two in either fighter's favor (or a draw) would have been reasonable.

[meade95]

Originally Posted by Tosti

Our own Dennis Andries did something similar, he spent years in the doldrums before having a late career rally. Although technically limited he never knew when he was beat.

I enjoyed watching Andries fight (and you are exactly right...he had a great span late in his career) - His brawls with Harding were fantastic -

Now has for the Johnson / Tarver outcome -

I think it was a fine call - A draw was conceivable but if the nod had to go one way or the other....I think Johnson earned it over Tarver -

[sabotai]

I thought Tarver won, but don't see anything wrong with Johnson winning. There were a couple of close rounds (but then again, everyone seems to preach about always giving the close ones to the title holder and Tarver came in as the title holder (IBO). I guess that only applies to the champions they like ). I think what it came down to really was Tarver took a round off here and there, Johnson didn't. Tarver, I think, has too much confidence. He always thinks he's winning. And that's fine and good, but when you allow that to convince yourself that no matter waht, you are comfortably ahead and can take a round off, then it's a big problem.

I thought it was still a great fight. Definately a good one to end out the year.

[mrchallenge]

Originally Posted by Garagiste

Has anyone seen the scorecards? I'm curious how the final round was scored, and whether that was the margin of victory for Johnson.

With so little left in the tank, Tarver should have been smarter than to go all out at the start of 12. Still, I scored the round for Tarver. He did more in the first 90 seconds than Johnson did in the second half of the round.

Can anyone think of other fighters who, like Johnson, revived their careers so convincingly—back-to-back wins over arguably the two best in their weight class—after years of scuffling against lesser opponents?

George Costner was just a struggling contender, he was knocked out in the first round twice by Sugar Ray Robinson, and than he beat Ike Williams and Kid Gavilan in back to back fights. Suddenly he was the hottest fighter in boxing but than he was forced to retire and did not really get to cash in on his new found success.

As for the fight, I picked Johnson to win, but I scored the fight for Tarver, he had the better defense, he made Johnson miss alot. Despite Johnson's aggression it was Tarver who was busier in terms of punches thrown. Though I may have been influenced by the HBO announcers, who seemed biased in favour of Tarver. If anybody deserved a close decision, it was Johnson so lets all pat him on the back. Tarver messed it up by not showing the same intensity as Johnson.

[mh2365]

Originally Posted by mh2365

Not sure how anyone can think Johnson won that fight.

Edit ... wait I'm sure someone on this board (we all know who) will claim he knew Johnson would win and scored it exactley 115-113 in favor of Johnson. Because he had some inside info or some other BS.

Let me amend this a little .... Johnson was the agressor and seemed to throw harder punches but that doesn't overcome the nearly 100 punches landed advantage that Tarver had.

Johnson's fight is to come forward ... Tarver's fight is to get enough space to use his reach and look to land the heavy left hand. Both fighter's accomplished their goal.

Everyone is saying that Tarver's punches were pitty-pat .... but they were landing. The goal in boxing is to land punches and when a fighter lands 100 more usually they win the fight. If it mattered how hard the punch was then Howard Davis would've never won a fight.

With that said, Buddy McGirt (IMO the best trainer in boxing) told Tarver before the 10th he needed all 3 rounds, Tarver ignored him. McGirt told him before the 12th that he needed a KO but Tarver was too worn out.

Johnson is a classy guy and I understand he's been robbed on some decisions, Karma can back around and helped him in this fight because he didn't win the fight. He was close but he didn't win it.

[dempsonny]

Tarver won! The punch stats show him landing more punches and even more power punches. Neither fighter was hurt. But throughout the fight it always looked like Johnson was fighting from behind. Johnson was very likable though after the fight humbly saying he's not the best and that he's still looking for Mr. Best. Tarver felt he was robbed rightly so but he too didn't act like a jerk about it. He was well spoken.

[marc420]

OK, I'm new here, and I'm obviously not the big-time boxing fan that some others here are.

But, as I understand it, doesn't the impact of the punches indeed count for part of the scoring in a professional fight? In amateur boxing, I believe it is indeed just the number of times you land punches with the painted part of the glove, and "pitty-pat" punches count the same as thundering blows. But in professional boxing, I thought the judges did indeed assess the impact of the punch.

If I'm correct, then going just by the punch total isn't exactly right, and if the impression was that Tarver was throwing a lot of "pitty-pat" punches, then the judges would take that into account.