RAHMAN?TONEY FIGHT ENDS IN A CONTROVERSIAL TKO
By Ed de la Vega, DDS
PhilBoxing.com
Thu, 17 Jul 2008
Temecula, CA: - Tonight at the glitzy Pechanga Casino Resort east of Los Angeles, two former world champions met on the center of the ring for the North American Boxing Organization Heavyweight title.
But, the much anticipated fight that could have determined who between the two ex-champs will call it a career if he loses, ended in a controversial TKO win for Toney.
Hasim Rahman (45-6-2 ,36 KO 1NC) came out as he promised. He peppered James Toney ( 70-6-3, 43 KO 1NC) with numerous jabs which Toney only occasionally answered with a strong right hook.
Round one:- Rahman
In round two, the process reversed. Toney found his range and started landing more telling blows.
Round 2:- Toney
In round three, during an exchange in the middle of the ring, the two bumped heads. As soon as that happened, Rahman knew he was cut and he complained to the referee. The referee acknowledged that his cut was due to an accidental head butt.
Round 3: -Toney
Between rounds, the ring physician inspected the cut of Rahman. After a few seconds talking to Rahman and checking the cut, he called the referee and asked him to stop the fight.
Initially, it was a ?no-contest? because by California rules, if an accidental injury occurs to boxer by a head butt, before the end of round 4, the fight is a ?no contest?. If the fight goes over round 4, the winner will be determined by the judge?s scores. But after discussions, they finally decided it was a TKO win for Toney.
Tonight?s fight is actually a rematch between the two. In March 2006, they fought for the WBC title at Atlantic City to a hard fought draw.
A quick rematch was however put on hold because Rahman had a mandatory title defense against Oleg Maskaev in August of the same year. Rahman lost to Maskaev via a 12 round TKO thus throwing off the proposed re-match with Toney.
With Rahman losing to Maskaev and the rematch squandered, he and Toney went on different ways. Rahman fought four times and defeated relatively unknown opponents. Toney in the meantime lost consecutive bouts to Samuel Peters and beat Danny Batchhelder by a split decision.
A four time champion, Toney had been having problems with weight since the middle of 1994 when he lost to Roy Jones in a super middleweight fight. He also was said to have drug problems and got suspended twice for steroid use. After his fight with Batchelder, he tested positive for steroids and was suspended by the California Athletic Commission for a year. The suspension was subsequently cut to 6 months. Thus he was allowed to fight again.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Ed de la Vega, DDS.
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