04.09.06 – By Jeffrey Cabauatan – Saturday night, we saw a classic fight between a heavy hitter Samuel Peter vs. the master boxer James Toney. The buzz going into this fight was like no other. The trash talking from both camps was well covered and broadcasted in the internet and viewed around the world. What made this fight so interesting in my opinion is the unpredictability factor. There were many questions on James Toney’s condition and his age as boxing experts split on whether father time had finally caught up with Toney. Then, there were questions whether Peter learned a few tricks after his heart breaking loss to Wladimir Klitschko. As both fighters entered the ring, people in attendance eagerly awaited in what soon to be a great fight with a controversial ending.
Toney started the fight by working behind his jab. He was met by an aggressive Peter who thought he can land his punches at will. Well, he was dead wrong for ever thinking that James Toney is that easy to hit. James Toney slipped through his punches and smiled as if he was telling Peter that you aint seen nothing like this before. Toney’s jab was so accurate that it would appear by the second round that he might have broken Peter’s nose.
The master boxer, James Toney, continued this cycle with the exception of few occasions where Peter would try to steal round by throwing multiple combinations at the end of each round. However, those punches were not landing. It gave the fans the chance of something to cheer for but if closely examined, Toney was able to ducked and slipped from those punches and landed a countered hook of his own as well. The persistence of Samuel Peter would soon paid off in round 3 and 5 were he seemed to stunned Toney with his right hand. But Toney shook those punches off and stick to what he does best which is boxing.
James Toney would proceed to make Samuel Peter look very amateurish at times with his movement and counter punching. A frustrated Peter would then resort to his best punch which was the rabbit punch. In round 9, a gassed out Peter would be deducted a pointt for hitting Toney while the referee said break. Peter would then take the next round with his aggression. But it did not last long as Toney soon resumed to boxing and his jab in round 11 and 12.
When it was announced that it was Split decision, I just knew that Toney did not have a chance of winning. I’ve seen it many times last year and this year were ineffective aggressiveness was rewarded with a decision. Sure enough, Peter took home a Split decision victory with two judges scoring it 116-111 in his favor while one judge had it 115-113 in Toney’s favor. I do not see how those two judges could score the fight with 5 points differential given that Peter was deducted by a point. The only reasoning I can give is that they were blinded by the missed punches that Peter threw. The majority of the media in the fight and I believe that James Toney did more than enough to take a decision. This decision left a bitter taste in my mouth in what was supposed to be a great heavyweight action.