SPECIALIST SAYS LEONARD EYE INJURY WAS WORSE THAN MARGARITO?S
By Ronnie Nathanielsz
PhilBoxing.com
Wed, 17 Nov 2010
Well known eye specialist Dr. Arnold Salud says the fractured eye socket injury suffered by Antonio Margarito as a result of the battering he received at the hands of pound-for-pound king Manny Pacquiao is not as bad as the eye injury suffered by Sugar Ray Leonard in 1982.
Dr. Salud was speaking to the Inquirer after Top Rank promoter Bob Arum who promotes both Pacquiao and Margarito announced that the Mexican would undergo surgery to repair a fractured right eye socket at the Dallas Methodist Hospital on Wednesday, Manila Time, after the swelling on his eye is reduced.
The eye specialist from the American Eye Center recalled that Leonard was diagnosed with a detached retina while training for a May 1982 fight with Roger Stafford in Buffalo, New York after which he announced his retirement. However, Leonard ignored his doctors advice and came out of retirement to score a 9th round TKO over Kevin Howard on May 14, 1984. In 1987 Leonard won the middleweight title beating southpaw Marvin Hagler in a controversial decision in one of the greatest fights of that era.
Dr. Salud said referee Laurence Cole should have stopped the fight because of the obvious damage to Margarito?s right eye and the fact that it was clear he had no chance of winning.
Dr. Salud pointed out that injuries to the eyes are ?not always visible by counting fingers. When you can see the fingers of the referee it doesn?t mean the boxer is okay. It's not only injuring the eye you can also injure the socket or orbit of the eye.?
He said there are four walls that surround the eyeball and in boxing ?it's like pushing the eyeball into the skull. You can actually break the walls of the orbit and when that happens you are also causing injury to the eye maybe not at that moment but later on and that?s what happened to Margarito.?
Salud said that when referee Cole asked Margarito whether he could still see his fingers ?at that particular time the wall or walls may have been broken already.?
Dr. Salud said that to his mind the injury of Sugar Ray Leonard was ?worse because in the retina detachment it?s the eye itself that is injured while in orbital fracture it?s the housing that is injured not the eye and if you can repair it well, all the more you can go back.?
When one or more bones surrounding the eye are broken the condition is called orbital fracture. The orbit is the bony structure around the eye and depending on where the fracture is located it can be associated with severe eye injury and damage.
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