by James Slater – Although this writer would never profess to being a huge fan of referee Jay Nady, I do feel the flack he is getting right now with regards to his officiating of Saturday Night’s wild, wild affair between Kendal Holt and Ricardo Torres is unjustified. Let’s be honest here; the incredible amount of furious action that transpired in just over one minute of boxing was chock full of incident. As such, no referee, whoever he may be, could have possibly done a better job than the third man who chooses (or used to choose) to give a salute when it comes to his onscreen gimmick..
In short, Nady, though he is fully deserving of the criticism that has come his way in the past, was not at fault on Saturday night in Planet Hollywood. A number of fans, and some experts, have claimed Nady should have put his foot down with regards to two infringements that occurred during Holt-Torres II. Firstly, Torres should have been severely penalised when he hit Holt just as Kendall was in the middle of getting back up from his second trip to the floor.
If you recall, Torres belted Holt with a swift left hand as “Rated R” was almost, but not quite, upright from his second knockdown. Sure, this was a blatant foul, but Nady had his back turned at the moment the shot landed. Therefore the ref is absolved of any negligence with regards to this incident. Indeed, not only was Nady turned away at the time, but the shot came so fast it was very easy to miss ( this writer is guilty of neglecting to put this occurrence in his original fight report).
But what about the head-butt Holt hit Torres with, and Nady’s handling of this infraction? The butt was almost certainly accidental, yet some say Nady should have dived in and either warned Holt for it or given Torres time to recover. The simple fact, however, is Jay Nady is not capable of moving at the speed of light! The time between Holt’s head-butt and the fight ending right hand he landed on Torres just after it was no more than a second or two. How on earth, then, was Nady expected to get to the advancing fighter in time to do anything?
No, in this case Jay Nady performed as well as any other referee could have. And in understanding that Saturday’s WBO light-welterweight title fight was one of the most furiously paced, incident-laden and untamed fights ever seen – it must be accepted that Jay Nady did as good a job as could possibly have been expected. In the final analysis, though a third fight between Holt and Torres is a must, referee Jay Nady was NOT at fault.