11.12.06 – By Geoffrey Ciani: Jermain Taylor successfully defended his middleweight championship against Kasim Ouma this past Saturday. It was a good win for Taylor whose punching power was the difference maker. Ordinarily, Ouma has an extremely high punch output, but against an elite fighter like Taylor, Ouma was forced to think twice before throwing caution into the wind. Although Ouma was a game challenger, he essentially lost every round against Taylor in what amounted to be a one-sided unanimous decision.
One interesting aspect of this bout was the open scoring experiment. Ordinarily, scorecards aren’t revealed until the conclusion of the fight. In the Taylor-Ouma middleweight championship bout, however, they were revealed in regular intervals, after the 4th, 8th, and final rounds.
Boxing is one of the few professional sports where the “score” is unknown until the end. In most sports, both fans and participants know exactly what the score is at any given moment of a contest. Many boxing enthusiasts have long advocated an “open scoring” system similar to what we saw in the Taylor-Ouma bout. Those who advocate open scoring in boxing usually predicate their argument on the fact that knowing the score will encourage a fighter who’s losing to know he has to score a knockout for a win. On the flip-side, those against open scoring might argue that a fighter who knows he’s well ahead on the scorecards might coast to victory, rather than fighting his hardest.
Both sides make good points. Then, too, is the fact that revealing the score in regular intervals will prevent something that often plagues the sport – bad or controversial decisions. On this front, I’m not so sure that there’s much merit to the argument. After all, if someone is going to make some questionable decisions when awarding rounds to fighter A or fighter B, I’m not sure that open-scoring really changes anything. Furthermore, that boxing is a sport long known for its corruption (or perceived corruption) plays a similar tune. Will open-scoring really make the sport any less corrupt? Will it lessen the perception of corruption? Frankly, I’m not so sure it would.
As it turns out, the open scoring experiment this past weekend seemed to reveal very little. After four rounds, all three judges had Taylor up 40-36 (and rightfully so). After eight rounds, two judges had Taylor up 80-72 and the third judge had Taylor up 78-74. Essentially, Taylor knew that the only way he could lose was by being knocked out, or at least, knocked down several times. To his credit, Ouma tried to press the action, but he was unable to do anything to reverse the trend of the earlier rounds. Likewise, to Taylor’s credit, he didn’t stop fighting and merely coast; he continued fighting much like he had earlier in the fight, and in my view, he won all twelve rounds in the fight.
That being said, my instincts oppose open scoring. I think boxing is one of those sports where having an unknown score makes things more interesting for the fans and combatants alike. Regardless, I’d be interested in possibly seeing more open scoring experiments to see if my mind can be swayed, and I’d not be adverse to open scoring experiments which differ from that on Saturday night.
Are you for or against open scoring in boxing? Send me an e-mail and let me know, as I intend to include my survey results in a follow-up article.
Send your comments to: geoff@eatthemushroom.com with the subject “Open Scoring”.