In my time of training, fighting, and covering combat sports, there are few fighters that really intrigue me like the ones whose mental stability and toughness is called into question. I'm not just talking about the simple claim of the ones who are anti-social, the ones who get involved with drug addiction, or the womanizers who have no end to their appetites. No, I have always been more moved by people who seem to shut down or excel at certain periods during the fight, and clearly none are more polarizing over the last ten years than Victor Ortiz.
This past weekend, the world watched as Victor, who was leading on my card by three rounds heading into the tenth, outboxed Josesito Lopez for the majority of the bout before stopping the fight on the stool due to a broken jaw. In fact, outside of one round, I would even say that Ortiz won a good portion of the dog fight, like the exchanges that made the crowd love Josesito so much. Jose landed the sexier shots when he did land, but the steady work went to the title-fight veteran and favorite Victor Ortiz.
Here is where the story becomes too easy. On June 27th, 2009m Ortiz attempted to run over one Marcos Maidana, knocking him down early in the first before Marcos got up and knocked him down in return. Then, Ortiz knocked Maidana down two more times, but each time, Maidana got up and continued his attack. Several big shots and a few rounds later, Ortiz stops the fight in the corner and says to the Mexican crowd, "I don't need to be getting hit like this." If you add that event with this one, 1+1=quitter. You aren't allowed to quit at all in the fight sport, let alone if you are a world champion, and even less so if you are Mexican. You know Marquez or Bam Bam Rios are finishing that fight. I would even guess that both men would have thrown their broken jaw at Josesito in the tenth, as that's how bad they want it. Ortiz, who would not have been able to fight Canelo Alverez anyway, gave a fight away that he was winning, prompting everyone to praise the natural 140-pound Lopez for his grit and toughness, forgetting that he was being beaten for large portions of the fight by Ortiz. Reporters are trying their best, but this weekend was not about the warrior effort of Josesito, who I am predicting to fight the winner of Khan/Garcia next, if not Marquez in Cowboys Stadium October 6th, with a rematch with Ortiz being my third option. No, this weekend is about the anomaly that is Victor Ortiz, who showed the ring IQ that got him disqualified early in his career, got him a sucker punch from Mayweather, and a near point deduction in this one. Adding to this, after the fight, he seemed to be Birthday happy, smiling the best he could and laughing through the interview like he did after the Mayweather loss, as if nothing critical had happened at all. Ortiz, once again, is on the outs with the public.
Here is where the story becomes more interesting. After the fight, when they interviewed Ortiz, he mumbled that he broke his jaw. They then asked him if it was on the last big left hook he took in the ninth, but then he stated, "No, it was early, in the first or something." That changes things drastically. If it were to break in the first or second round, or even in the fifth round as he manager is reporting, that means he went the majority of the fight, biting down on his mouth piece as best he could, and winning the fight despite it. That means he didn't stop because he got his jaw broke; it means he stopped because he could no longer fight with a broken jaw. Lets look at the fight that saved Ortiz's career. In the Berto fight, Ortiz had the look of a man on a mission. Most boxing writers were picking Berto because they figured if the fight hit a wall, Berto would go through it and Ortiz would quit. Ortiz came out and dropped Berto in the first round, then was dropped himself in the second. Then after taking a brutal counter right in the opening minute of the 6th round, he bounced back to score a knockdown of his own later in that round. He would go on to take the majority of the rest of the rounds and win a Unanimous Decision. He hit the wall, and pushed through it. He had erased what is impossible to erase. He earned his Mexican back.
So the intriguing question is, why would he quit this time? He has been able to push through adversity before, and every time he was in a dog fight, he was ready to throw back, not seeking to box out a decision. He fought the way the masses wanted and did it with a broken jaw, yet it was not enough, because he didn't do it for nine more minutes. He failed us by not finishing the fight with a broken jaw, when he could have opted out earlier for his own sake.
I can feel already that most people do not believe that Ortiz had his jaw broke early, but in the ninth, as Showtime showed the big left hand land over and over. It's strange how boxing fans and writers respond sometimes. Pacman loses to Bradley and on second look, everyone says it was a closer fight than the HBO broadcast made it seem. Yet Ortiz says he got his jaw broke early and no one believes it, because Showtime clearly showed his jaw turn on the big left. Yet Josesito hit him with a lot of shots that caused his head to turn like that, and between rounds, Danny Garcia asked him over and over if he was okay. He was rushed to the hospital afterwards, and unlike the Bradley fight, where I thought there was some media dodging involved (not taking a shot at Bradley, just when it was announced that he was rushed to the hospital after the fight, it seemed like they were sparing him from questions about the controversial decision), he was genuinely injured from the damage he suffered in the ring.
It's strange what we ask of combatants. As Teddy Atlas says, "I respect everyone who gets into that ring." Even if they are an opponent, or they are showing up for a paycheck, or they go down without receiving significant damage, they are respected for climbing into that ring and being available for sporting violence. Yet once one has the ability to be a champion, was champion, or is attempting to remain champion, they are placed in a very unnatural position in the world of public opinion. A security guard says he will die to protect Walmart and we call him an idiot; a police officer is respected if he falls in the line of duty, but no one expects him to. In combat sports, one is expected to lay it all on the line, despite what they are feeling physically. It is the trainer's or ref's job to save them from the battle; they must hand themselves over to the realities of the fight, never responding to the damages occurred in the battle with anything other than a offensive combative rebuttal. They are only allowed to fight back when something happens to them in the ring, or else cowardice is the label they wear for a lifetime. I think people had just cause to be critical of the performance of Ortiz after Maidana. This time, however, I am giving him a pass. I think he attempted to fight despite an injury and just found he could't finish. If you are injured to the point that fending off further damage is the game plan for the rest of the fight, then its time to stop. Showtime followed him back to the locker room, which was awesome by the way Showtime, and he looked at himself in the mirror for a moment, searching the swelling around the jaw, then he fell to his knees and put his head on the sink in disappointment. I think Ortiz endured all he could, and fought till he could endure no more, the big left hook bringing about the decision to stop fighting. But that seems to be his crime...he realized the pain instead of the desire to win so bad, he couldn't.