Haney vs Lomachenko
I don't know here to begin. Well it was a great fight and pretty much went exactly how I thought it would. Loma showed everyone that he should not have been such a big underdog. Everyone has been looking past him the last few years. Haney fought well. He showed he is a good. He has toughness and composure. Max Kellerman always talks about who won the "story" of the fight. In these terms, there is no question to me Loma won.
Controversial Judging
I am such a huge fan I don't trust myself to try to score this fight. I wasn't even really trying to score it last night. I knew it was going to be a close fight and it was. Loma won the championship rounds clearly in my opinion but so many rounds were close that could have gone either way. I haven't gone back and rewatched it yet. Maybe later today. The pain is too fresh. But watching it with 2 members of my family last night - one of them thought Loma was robbed. The other thought Haney edged it. I thought Loma landed the more clear shots, more volume but I worried the judges might give several of those rounds to Haney because of the body shots he was landing. If you see how lots of boxing experts scored each round, with the exception of a couple rounds, the scoring is all over the place.
When Loma went into matrix mode in the 10th I thought he's got to go for it. With a fight this close there is no guarantee he will win the decision. Now the day after it seems like the majority of people saying Loma actually did win. I’m not surprised. The commentary team seemed really somber after the decision too. They all picked Haney to win and as the fight started I thought their bias was more towards Haney but Loma's work was winning everyone over as the fight went on.
But to be honest when they were reading the scores I did not know what they were gonna say. As a fan I was hoping that they were going to call out Lomachenko‘s name and I thought he won the championship rounds. Now I see most people think Haney won the 12th. But I thought it was another one of those really close rounds that could have gone either way. To Haney's credit he dug down and came out strong in the 12th knowing he had just lost the last 2 rounds and I think that was enough to make it a really close round that could have gone either way and stem the onslaught by Loma.
I've become jaded.
I have become jaded watching boxing and MMA over the last several years. I take it as a given that the judges make bad decisions almost every week. It's like part of the game. There have been several times over the years where I thought the judges must be either corrupt or really really incompetent. But this was one of those fights where I think if I was to go back and really try to score the fight, there are several rounds where you can argue either way. I would give them to Loma, but I could see someone arguing the other way. How does someone judge if a fewer number of body shots cause more damage or are worth more than much more volume combinations to the head? In this case it really is subjective because neither was clearly out damaging the other. So, if it was a robbery, I have seen worse.
Maybe that is a really jaded view. There was that one judge that gave Haney the 10th round which was the most clear cut round of the fight. How can that not be either corruption or complete incompetence? But looking at the fight as a whole there were many really close rounds. In hindsight I can go back and rewatch it and count each point and decide who landed the harder clearer shots but in actuality judges are just there watching in that moment and, if you pretend they are not corrupt, they are human and making their best judgement in that moment. But if that judge is corrupt, then why not give more of the less clear rounds to Haney? Why give him round 10? So it makes me think it is more incompetence? I heard that Lomachenko‘s team is going to try to appeal that decision. I don’t know. Does that ever happen? I’ve never seen it happen. I've never heard of a judge being punished for blatantly wrong scores. Does that happen?
Is being undisputed really that important?
Loma won even if he didn't get the decision and didn't get the belts. He proved what he needed to prove. What are these belts anyway? It is kind of an arbitrary goal when you think about it. I understand getting all those belts was a goal he set for himself when he started his pro career but when you think about it the belts in this case represent some momentary decision in some judge's mind about shots that may or may not have been slightly more significant in very close rounds. And the judges we are talking about may or may not be incompetent or corrupt or both. Maybe I'm just trying to make myself feel better saying the belts don't matter - even when I wanted so badly to see him win them back and I know what they meant to him.
"See you next time"
So anyway I’m feeling bummed out but you know how it is when that first time that you get your heart broken? It feels really bad and then the next time you still feel bad but you know you can get through it and it’s not quite as a devastating feeling. Well that’s how I feel this morning because I am sad that Lomachenko didn’t get the win but nowhere near as sad as when he lost to Teofimo. I was I was very bummed out for about a week at least. Here at least he put on a great performance. I think both guys did their best and it was a good fight. But I just feel like Loma is an artist. His boxing is beautiful. He is so good even against an opponent where he gave up so many advantages. So I have to be happy that it was a good performance. He didn't seem to have any injuries and there will be more fights according to Loma. He said "See you next time."
The Reads:
I can pat myself on the back a little bit because my read on the fight was pretty good. I thought it would go to decision but if there was a KO it would be Loma finishing Haney in the 10-12 rounds. And That's when there was a glimpse of that possibility. But Haney kept it together and was able to push back.
Boxing Bets:
I lost all the Loma bets, - 4.65 UNITS, but you know what I'm kicking myself for this morning is that during the fight I was watching the live odds just to see how people thought Loma was doing. In the last round I think his odds were -2000 or something. I could tell it was going to go the distance, so why did it never occur to me to put a little on Haney when the odds were so good and knew the decision could go either way? I could have made a profit whichever way the decision went. I was so worked up in the fight that it didn't even occur to me until the next morning that that's what I should have done.
UFC Results:
The other thing that I’m doing this morning to make myself feel better is counting up the results from UFC last night. +5.78 UNIT 30% ROI I shouldn't say that I’m starting to get the hang of UFC betting because every time I say or even think that I have a losing week the next week.
Some notes on UFC:
Dern looked so good. I had lost hope in her. I thought she is just floundering in the wrestling and striking. But her striking improved a lot. She completely dominated Angela Hill who is considered a good striker. She completely dominated her in the striking. I think to note is Hill who isn't known to be a good grappler was able to fend off the submissions. There were times when she really looked close to either being knocked out or submitted. But I think she is well rounded and tough and she was able to survive. So something to remember in the future is that Dern isn't necessarily going to finish anyone on the ground if they are relatively well-rounded.
Bad read on the Ducote and Lupita fight. I shouldn't have thought Ducote might be better. I think I thought maybe because I don't like Godinez. She is frustrating, but she was just slightly better than Ducote. It was close and the split decision could possibly have been good but ultimately no. In the future I would not count on either of them to be very great unless there was some significant advantage.
Buckley round 2 was very good. For such a volatile fight where either guy could have been Ko'd at any instant it went surprisingly how people were predicting it..
That Michael Johnson fight was another that I could say the same about. Johnson was looking really good and suddenly it was over.
Overall lots of favorites come through.
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