Farewell to a Fighter

I try to follow boxing as much as I can- which isn't a whole lot, since I recently stopped getting HBO. So, since I couldn't see it on TV, I just watched the Joe Calzaghe-Mikkel Kessler fight on YouTube. Calzaghe was my favorite active fighter: I liked the fact that he steadfastly insisted on fighting in Wales, I liked the fact that he was an undefeated champion in the days of champs with 25-12 records, I liked the fact that he fought up-and-comers like Peter Manfredo (whom he annihilated) and Kessler. I liked the guy. But I had only seen bits and pieces of his fights. After seeing this fight, I thought three things:

1. You would have sworn that Kessler was the older man. The big Dane fought like an aged George Foreman. He waited very carefully until he could deliver right hands with precision, not daring to leave his very orthodox stance and let fly. He was careful, he was guarded. Calzaghe was 35 at the time of the fight, Kessler, 28. This was a role reversal. Calzaghe let his hands go. He was fast, he was bouncing on his feet. He often did not sit down between rounds. He danced and stuck, winging punches at Kessler, who was moving leadenly. Even the comparative heights added to the effect: Kessler has at least three or four inches on Calzaghe- it made the whole fight look like a particularly annoying younger brother attacking the firstborn.

2. This was clearly a mainland European fighting against someone from west of the continent. Ever since Drago-Balboa on Christmas Day, there has been a clear contrast between the mainlanders and Britons and New Worlders. Non-English Brits especially, plus Americans and Latin Americans, tend to fight with some fire (well, not so much for Americans anymore, but still). Those guys come at you. They wade into punches. They fight dumb, they fight hard. They impose their wills. It's like fighting an ox: it's stupid, it's taking punches, but it's still coming at you. You cannot drive it back. That's the way the best west-of-continent boxers are. The continental Europeans are much different: ponderous, calculating, picking their spots, clinching and blocking and waiting. That was Kessler. I think one of the announcers inadvertently summed it up: "There's a big right from the Dane, and the Welshman keeps coming." The Dane throws hard punches at opportune times. He looks to derail you, to make you pay for a mistake. The Welshman wants to make that mistake, because that way he can get close and unload whatever guns he carries. Mainlanders are heavy on the "science," light on the "sweet," vice versa for the others.

3. Watching Mikkel Kessler fight Joe Calzaghe was like watching a man fight an angry animal. Kessler was steady, he counter-punched, he played defense. Calzaghe barely did any of those things: he was erratic, he was unpredictable, he came in flurries, he feinted and twirled and got mean. He smelled blood: in one of the later rounds, he had very clearly hurt Kessler. The referee chose that time to pull them apart and warn Calzaghe about holding the head. I truly believe this would otherwise have been a knockout or a stoppage. Calzaghe fought, Kessler just boxed.

If anything, watching this made me even less okay with Calzaghe retiring. He's gone, Pacquiao has few legitimate challengers, Mayweather is gone (or going) and was passionless in any case, ditto for De La Hoya, Roy Jones is dead on his feet, Holyfield is an embarrassment at this age, and Nikolay Valuev will not stop ducking Wladimir Klitschko. Who am I going to cheer for now?