Two fights ago, Junto Nakatani faced fellow bantamweight
champ Ryosuke Nishida. For that matchup, Nakatani and his trainer Rudy
Hernandez employed a daring strategy: take Nishida out early. Nakatani went
full throttle from the opening bell, attacking relentlessly and at times,
even recklessly. The combat was ferocious, yet Nakatani's game plan
worked. Nishida didn't make it to the second half of the fight.
Flash forward a year later. Now Nakatani was fighting the
great Naoya Inoue for undisputed status one division up at junior
featherweight. And instead of attacking Inoue in the early rounds, Nakatani
went the opposite route; he would attempt to neutralize the action. Using his
long right arm, he would extend it, either to jab or to occupy the space
between the two fighters. That simple maneuver was enough to keep Inoue on the
outside. From that perspective, Nakatani did achieve a tactical victory.
Although Nakatani was successful in turning down the
temperature of the fight, he neglected a vital element of professional boxing:
winning rounds. It's all good to reduce the number of landed blows from a noted
knockout artist, but Nakatani offered so little in the early rounds besides his
jab. While Inoue didn't dominate the first half of the fight, he would land two
or three impressive power punches a round, usually right hands, which would be
enough to take 10-9s on the scorecards.
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Inoue (left) and Nakatani (right) during and exchange
Photo courtesy of Lemino Boxing |
After the sixth, Hernandez told Nakatani that he needed to
let his hands go more. But Hernandez used more of a conversational tone instead
of issuing a desperate plea. The one change that Nakatani made was to stop jabbing. Consequently, Inoue
welcomed the additional room to operate and proceeded to win the seventh and
eighth.
Only in the ninth round did Nakatani start to show the
offensive firepower that had excited so many about this matchup. During the next two rounds he blasted Inoue
with straight lefts, right hooks and uppercuts. There were moments during these
rounds where Inoue voluntarily backed up and disengaged. For a brief spell The
Monster had been defanged.
A clash of heads toward the end of the 10th did play a role
in changing the trajectory of the fight; Nakatani received a sizeable cut from
the headbutt near his right eye and it clearly bothered him throughout the rest
of the bout.
However, let's also acknowledge what separates the truly
best from the merely excellent. Inoue found another gear. Similar to Usyk in
the Joshua fights or Crawford after dropping a number of rounds against Shawn
Porter. The elites essentially said, no more. They drew a line in the sand.
They refused to give into the opponent's momentum.
Right after having his worst round of the fight, the 10th,
Inoue started the 11th in attack mode and went after Nakatani. He proceeded to
have the best round that either fighter would have in the entire match. He
crushed Nakatani with power punches, including blistering uppercuts with each
hand. Now Nakatani was the one who was in retreat.
Inoue's stand in the 11th carried over to the 12th and that
was enough for him to take the fight. He won the bout with scores of 116-112 x
2 and 115-113 (I also had him winning 116-112). The final two rounds sealed the
win for Inoue.
Ultimately, the fight had two phases, a technical boxing
display (the first six rounds) and a more open power punching period (the final
six rounds). In each phase of the fight, I thought that Inoue had won four
rounds of the six. Inoue, even at 33, showed that he had more
to offer than his younger, undefeated opponent.
Now it must be said that Inoue didn't dominate the action.
He was a little bit better through most of the first half of the fight and his
final stand won him the back half, but he also needed that stand because things
were going poorly for him in rounds nine and ten. However, the great ones find
a way. They have an extra level.
I wonder if Hernandez and Nakatani will regret the overly
cautious start. Clearly, they didn't want a firefight to break out too early in
the fight, but what if Hernandez went to Nakatani after the third or fourth
round instead? What if Hernandez showed a
little more urgency in the corner? Before the seventh was too late to flip the switch in
my opinion. Nakatani would have needed to take five of the final six rounds of
the fight to ensure that he'd win it on the cards, and that's too tall of an
order against a fighter of Inoue's talent.
For the second Nakatani fight in a row, I believe that Rudy
Hernandez, who is often a spectacular cornerman, got outmaneuvered. In his last
fight, Nakatani and Hernadez couldn't stop Sebastian Hernandez's relentless
pressure and inside fighting in the second half of their bout. Nakatani
ultimately escaped with a win in one of his least convincing performances. And
on Saturday, I don't think that Hernandez had a good sense of how the fight was
going vis-a-vis the judges' scorecards. He left Nakatani with too little margin
for error.
The truly best cornermen have an ability to understand the scoring of a fight in real time, with dispassion. Trading in their trainer's hat for a judge's one, they realize when their fighter
is down (or could be down) and recalibrate
accordingly. If Hernandez truly understood the optics of Saturday's fight, he
would have junked Game Plan #1 sooner and been far more assertive in the
corner. But like the previous Nakatani fight, the adjustments weren't there
fast enough.
Shingo Inoue, Naoya's father and trainer, won almost
everyone's trainer of the year award in 2025. His other fighting son, Takuma,
also retained his bantamweight title on Saturday's undercard. Against Nakatani, Shingo had a very good night. He made
sure that Naoya wouldn't fall into traps or force the action. When the fight
was slow, Naoya didn't get reckless, a major change from a few years ago. In addition,
Naoya was switched on all fight and was able to deliver what was required during each phase of the
fight.
And that brings up another great separator between the
greats and the very good. They understand what tools, techniques and strategies
can work in a given context during the fight. You didn't see Inoue throw any
uppercuts in the technical portion of the bout, because those opportunities weren't available,
and he saw no reason to force it. But after Nakatani was softened up some, suddenly the shot could be deployed. And despite hardly throwing it
for the first ten rounds of the fight, when Inoue went to his uppercuts, he was
able to land them with maximum ferocity and devastating impact.
With over a decade of championship-level
experience spanning four weight classes, Inoue is no
longer at his physical prime. His power isn't the same at 122 lbs. that it was
at the smaller weights, and Saturday was the first time that he looked labored
at points during a 12-round fight. Yet, he was still the one with his hand
raised at the end of the fight, and doing so against a fellow pound-for-pound
entrant.
Despite his Monster moniker, it's worth remembering
that even as the knockouts have stopped (and power is not the last thing to go
in boxing; it goes), Inoue has still found a way. In his last three fights he
has decisioned three top-ten contenders at 122 lbs., with his last one, Nakatani, an
undefeated multi-divisional champ who had youth and size advantages. The clock
may be ticking on Inoue's undefeated record, but let's not forget what a career
it's been. On Saturday, Inoue didn't just beat Nakatani, but he beat back
Father Time too. To both, he said, not yet.
***
Gilberto "Zurdo" Ramirez's initial strategy
against David Benavidez was understandable. After all, it was Ramirez who was
the cruiserweight champion and Benavidez was the fighter coming up more than 20
pounds to challenge for his title. Ramirez thought that he could impose himself
on Benevidez, that his physicality and body shots would wear the supposedly
smaller man down. But by the end of the second round, it was clear that
Benavidez had the clear edge in hand speed and, surprisingly, power.
The pay per view broadcast was in Ramirez's corner after
every round. And during each look-in, Ramirez's trainer, Julian
Chua, emphasized that Ramirez needed to stay behind his jab, use angles and not
engage in a mano-a-mano war.
But Ramirez was determined to win an attritional battle on
the inside. And to be fair to him, there were moments where he did
well, landing right hooks up top, jabs and straight lefts downstairs, and three- and four-punch combinations. However, there were points in every round except the
fifth, where he was getting lit up by Benavidez's own combinations. And these
weren't four- or five-punch shoeshines; these combos included menacing
power hooks thrown with maximum force. They dazzled the crowd and also blew up
both of Ramirez's eyes.
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Benavidez (left) catching Ramirez with a left hook
Photo courtesy of Cris Esquada/Golden Boy |
Ramirez and Benavidez had been frequent sparring partners
over the years and perhaps that familiarity led Zurdo to believe that he could
take Benavidez's best shots. But it's worth remembering that fighters spar with
much larger gloves, which can do a lot to take the sting out of punches.
Benavidez dropped Ramirez twice in the fight, in the fourth
and the sixth. In both cases Ramirez took a knee after being badly hurt by
multi-punch combinations. He couldn't handle the onslaught of punches. In the
sixth, after dropping to the canvas for the second time, he spit out his
mouthpiece and indicated to the referee that he didn't want to continue.
Benavidez's victory was a comprehensive beatdown and a
display of his mastery at mid-range and in close quarters. There are few
fighters who can match Benavidez in a pocket war, which Zurdo found out the
hard way.
Throughout most of his career, Benavidez has been
masquerading as a smaller-weight fighter. I have no idea how he made 168 as
many times as he did. And in truth, he lost a belt by missing weight. Even at
light heavyweight I didn't think that his stamina looked great over 12 rounds
against Gvozdyk and Morrell, despite winning comfortably on the
scorecards.
But at cruiserweight I think that we finally saw Benavidez
in full flow, without worrying about gassing or punching himself out.
He was throwing seven- or eight-punch combinations not just once or twice in
the fight, but several times each round. This was a fighter who now fully
believed in his conditioning.
Picking the correct weight class in boxing is often more of
an art than a science. And sometimes the answer can be more political than you
think. A promoter might have better potential opponents or a path to a title at
a given weight class, but not at a neighboring one. A fighter also may not
understand his body or how to train properly. Maybe his team is also finding
out by trial and error as it goes.
If I were handling Benavidez's career. I'd never have him
drop below cruiserweight again. Why would I want to see a fighter who looked
like one of the absolute best talents in boxing lose 20 pounds or more at this
phase of his career? Benavidez has two cruiserweight belts, the PBC's full
support, and a legitimate fan base. Why not demand that Beterbiev, who has been making 175 since Calvin Coolidge was President, fight him
at cruiserweight? Why not do the same for Bivol? Why should Bivol's belts mean
more than Benavidez's?
Benevidez is now at the point of his career where he can be
a shot-caller. If people want money fights, now they may look to him where in the past there were just enough convenient reasons to avoid him.
Benavidez is a star and supremely talented. It's now his time in boxing, where he can become one of the faces of the sport. Let's see who will challenge him at 200 lbs. Who wants to cement a legacy? Will it be Opetaia? Bivol? Beterbiev? Who will be brave? Let's see who will stand up and be
counted.
He's a member of the Ring Magazine Ratings Panel, the Transnational Boxing Rankings Board, and the Boxing Writers Association of America.
