I’m not going to lie - the three matches between tough Mexicans Rafael Marquez and Israel Vazquez are my favourite boxing matches ever. The two boxers exchange crushing blows, the fights are fought at a blistering pace and tremendous heart is shown by both men in all of them. In my opinion, a fourth bout is absolutely necessary..
There are several reasons for this. Firstly, despite the fact the two have fought three times, we still don’t definitively know who the better boxer is. After all, in the first fight, Vazquez’s nose was broken and his breathing capacity through his nose was reduced to ten percent. However, up until this injury, Vazquez was more than holding his own and had even knocked Marquez down, so who knows how that first fight could have gone without the breakage. The second fight also had talking points - the most important one being the arguably premature stoppage. In my opinion, while Vazquez was really dishing out a beating to Marquez at this point, the stoppage was maybe fifteen seconds too early, and in a fight of this magnitude, Marquez should have been given a bit longer. After this, there was the inevitable rubber match - the only one that went the distance, but nevertheless, controversy still surrounded the fighters. One debateable topic was whether Marquez actually deserved being given the standing eight count in the twelfth round. Personally, I would tend to say that he did deserve it because of the way he floundered on the ropes, but it is easy to see why people would argue otherwise. In addition, did Marquez win the fight anyway? Marquez certainly thought he did, I thought he scraped a 114-113 decision and the judges were split over the verdict. This was a far from conclusive result. As a result of this, we need a fourth that doesn’t contain controversy and one where we can safely say X or Y won.
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Why A Fourth Rafael Marquez vs. Israel Vazquez Must Be On The Cards
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