BoxRec

ESPN Classic showed the Emile Griffith-Jorge Fernandez welterweight title fight last night.

There were some interesting things about this.

First, they introduced several former and current champions before the fight, like they used to do. This included Joe Louis,Carlos, Ortiz, Davey Moore, and few others. What surprised me was that the guy who seemed to get the biggest applause from the audience was Sonny Liston. This was after Liston had beaten Patterson for the first time and before the rematch. Maybe Liston wasn't so unpopular after all. The fight was in Las Vegas; maybe he was just popular there. Even that seems a little odd since Liston had never fought there up to that point.

Anyway, the fight was pretty interesting. Fernandez maybe one of those guys that just wasn't in the right place at the right time. He seemed to have decent speed, good boxing skills and good power. He had previously given Griffith two very close fights before Griffith was the champion. The fight ended kind of strange; Fernandez couldn't continue after a low blow in the 9th round. They went to the scorecards and Griffith was ahead so he won. In this fight, Griffith seemed to be the better fighter, but I was still impressed with Fernandez.

You get the feeling that had he came a long at a different time he could have been a pretty good world champion.
I just wanted to know what other people thought about him. He isn't a guy you hear much about.

Ambling Alp wrote:ESPN Classic showed the Emile Griffith-Jorge Fernandez welterweight tiel fight last night.

There were some interesting things about this.

I was still impressed with Fernandez.

You get the feeling that had he came a long at a different time he could have been a pretty good world champion.
I just wanted to know what other people thought about him. He isn't a guy you hear much about.

Thanks, Ambling Alp!
Please, see this:

http://www.cyberboxingzone.com/boxing/w ... meron.html (brief boxing biography of Jorge Fernandez)
http://albordedelring.com.ar/benatar/martinsosa1.htm (another biography, in Spanish)





Thanks, Granberry!





msc

I've heard that Carlos Monzon was actually unpopular for a long time in his native Argentina, because he unseated Fernandez as the country's middleweight champ, and Fernandez was very popular at the time. Supposedly, it wasn't until Monzon beat Benvenuti for the title that the country genuinely took a liking to him.

It's amazing that Fernandez (who is supposedly only about 5'5" or 5'6" tall, and a blown up welterweight) could hang with Monzon, but he went the distance with him in two 12-round fights, and that was fairly late in Fernandez's career. According to boxrec, his overall record is 114-10-3, with 81 KO wins, and he was only stopped three times.

The fight with Griffith was his only world title fight, I believe. It came to a lousy ending. The officials didn't seem to know what to do, so they just said, "Griffith is ahead on points... so we make him the winner on a TKO". Um, WTF?? It's like they just made up a new rule. Before that, the fight looked like it was shaping up to be another close fight, like their other two meetings. Griffith never gave Fernandez a rematch. Griff was known to win a lot of fights under controversial/bizarre circumstances.

Ambling Alp wrote:First, they introduced several former and current champions before the fight, like they used to do. This included Joe Louis,Carlos, Ortiz, Davey Moore, and few others. What surprised me was that the guy who seemed to get the biggest applause from the audience was Sonny Liston. This was after Liston had beaten Patterson for the first time and before the rematch. Maybe Liston wasn't so unpopular after all. The fight was in Las Vegas; maybe he was just popular there. Even that seems a little odd since Liston had never fought there up to that point.

I don't know the answer to this, but maybe the fact that Liston had never fought in Vegas is the very reason he was still popular there? Maybe it's when people saw him fight, they were turned off by him?

I've seen Liston make a few appearances in Vegas during his reign. He was also introduced when Harold Johnson fought Willie Pastrano. At that time, Johnson was being considered as an opponent for Liston (although that went out the window once Johnson lost to Pastrano, and Liston went on to lose his title to Ali anyway). Unfortunately, I can't remember for sure whether Liston was booed or cheered when he was announced, but for some reason I don't think he got quite so hearty a reception that time. I remember he was introduced alongside Joe Louis, with the idea being that we were seeing "the great champ of yesterday and the great champ of today". Liston and Louis also sat right next to each other watching the fight.

My2Sense wrote:
I don't know the answer to this, but maybe the fact that Liston had never fought in Vegas is the very reason he was still popular there? Maybe it's when people saw him fight, they were turned off by him?

WEIRD.

Liston lived in Las Vegas.

Why would people be turned off when they saw Liston fight?

He knocked out Floyd Patterson twice in the first round, knocked out Cleveland Williams twice, Mike Dejohn, Roy Harris, Zora Folley, Wayne Bethea, Nino Valdez, etc etc etc.

Joe Louis and Liston were good friends.

Louis considered Liston a great fighter.

Louis said the Liston-Ali fakes were fakes.

Martin Sosa Cameron wrote:

Ambling Alp wrote:ESPN Classic showed the Emile Griffith-Jorge Fernandez welterweight tiel fight last night.

There were some interesting things about this.

I was still impressed with Fernandez.

You get the feeling that had he came a long at a different time he could have been a pretty good world champion.
I just wanted to know what other people thought about him. He isn't a guy you hear much about.

Thanks, Ambling Alp!
Please, see this:

http://www.cyberboxingzone.com/boxing/w ... meron.html (brief boxing biography of Jorge Fernandez)
http://albordedelring.com.ar/benatar/martinsosa1.htm (another biography, in Spanish)





Thanks, Granberry!





msc

Thanks for those links, Martin.
It seems that Fernandez had three strikes against him.
He never won the world title.
He was from outside of the United States.
He wasn't a heavyweight.

If a fighter has all those things against him it's unlikely that he will be remembered very much even if he was really good.

Maybe a rebroadcast of a fight against a well known fighter (like Griffith) is a start.

My2Sense wrote:I've heard that Carlos Monzon was actually unpopular for a long time in his native Argentina, because he unseated Fernandez as the country's middleweight champ, and Fernandez was very popular at the time. Supposedly, it wasn't until Monzon beat Benvenuti for the title that the country genuinely took a liking to him.

It's amazing that Fernandez (who is supposedly only about 5'5" or 5'6" tall, and a blown up welterweight) could hang with Monzon, but he went the distance with him in two 12-round fights, and that was fairly late in Fernandez's career. According to boxrec, his overall record is 114-10-3, with 81 KO wins, and he was only stopped three times.

The fight with Griffith was his only world title fight, I believe. It came to a lousy ending. The officials didn't seem to know what to do, so they just said, "Griffith is ahead on points... so we make him the winner on a TKO". Um, WTF?? It's like they just made up a new rule. Before that, the fight looked like it was shaping up to be another close fight, like their other two meetings. Griffith never gave Fernandez a rematch. Griff was known to win a lot of fights under controversial/bizarre circumstances.

Hi, My2Sense!

I'm admire: is exactly your affirmation of the cause of the unpopularity of Monzon. Jorge Fernandez was the first Argentinian who was #1 of the world in three different weights: Welter, Jr. Middle and Middle. Here is a short biography of him:

JORGE FERNÁNDEZ — Born on September 28, 1935, in Buenos Aires, Argentina. As a welterweight, he was number one challenger for the world title (1962), as a junior middleweight, Argentinean champion (1966-67); as a middleweight, champion of Argentina (1964-66) and South America (1966-67). One of the most complete Argentinian boxers, with all the resources of the stylist and the power of the most precise and decisive kayoer. As amateur, fought 42 bouts, winning all. In the beginnings of his extended professional career (1953-73), he was unbeaten in 47 fights, with 46 triumphs (31 by KO), until his first defeat, facing the extraordinary puncher Martiniano Pereyra (Points 15), and taking revenge less than a year after. With other important victories against Alfonso Moreno (KO 1), Adalberto Ochoa (KO 4) and Joe Miceli (TKO 7), in 1960 he went to the United States, where he obtained brilliant triumphs over difficult top rivals like Teddy Wright, Isaac Logart, Charley Scott and Denny Moyer (twice). Like with Luis Manuel Rodríguez, Emile Griffith had serious difficulties in his bouts with Jorge, winning in very controversial decisions in the first two fights. In the third, which was for the world welterweight title of Griffith on December 1962, in Las Vegas, Fernández was doing very well, when Emile commited a severe infraction, connecting with a very potent low hit, and when Fernández waited for a technical victory by foul, the referee declared him the loser by TKO: in Nevada, rules didn’t exist for disqualification. Returned to his country, won roundly over fighters like Manuel Álvarez (by KO in 6; Álvarez was winner of Curtis Cokes, in 1962, and with victories over L. C. Morgan, Vicente Derado, Al Urbina and a draw with Nicolino Locche), the European champion Fortunato Manca (Points 10), Billy Collins (Points 10), the Argentinian champion Héctor Mora (Points 10 and TKO in eight), the South American champion Fernando Barreto (TKO 6 and KO 7); his fans and rivals considered him invincible; and his first defeat against Monzón was regarded as an error by the judges and an injustice. The second defeat before Monzón was less controversial than the first, demoralized Jorge, who resolved to retire, though he returned to the ring, fighting in Europe, where he crowned his brilliant career by obtaining the Spanish middleweight championship with a brief victory over Pablo Sánchez (TKO 2, in Zaragoza, in 1973). In total, between 1953 and 1973, Jorge Fernández fought 127 times as professional, won 114 (KO’s: 81), drew 3 and lost only 10.

Five most important fights:

W PTS 10 Martiniano Pereyra (July 12, 1958)

W TKO 7 Joe Miceli (July 25, 1959)

W PTS 10 Denny Moyer (April 18, 1961)

L TKO 9 Emile Griffith (December 8, 1962)

L PTS 12 Carlos Monzón (September 3, 1966)





msc

Ambling Alp wrote:

Thanks for those links, Martin.
It seems that Fernandez had three strikes against him.
He never won the world title.
He was from outside of the United States.
He wasn't a heavyweight.

If a fighter has all those things against him it's unlikely that he will be remembered very much even if he was really good.

Maybe a rebroadcast of a fight against a well known fighter (like Griffith) is a start.

Thanks, Ambling Alp! O.K.! Today, Jorge Fernández is a very good man, in a good economic situation, with an excellent family and their sons are graduates in the University. During a time, he was Interventor (Special President) of the F.A.B. (Federacion Argentina de Boxeo, Argentinian Boxing Federation)





msc