Although Tito Trinidad came in as the favorite, Bernard Hopkins was supremely confident of the outcome. As impressive as the Puerto Ricans’ run was, “The Executioner” knew that the buck stops with him.
Thirsty and longing for recognition that so long eluded him, Hopkins was determined to make this donnybrook his ticket to superstardom.
I recall that leading up this fight, this Last Rounder was a lonely voice in the wild as I predicted Hopkins to emerge victorious. And we were both right.
SIZE. Moving up through 2 weight divisions, Trinidad was like a buzzsaw who powered through his opponents featuring his signature seek- and- destroy style.
But Hopkins was the bigger man in there. He was taller and was a true middleweight, having held the belt for more than seven years.
The first few rounds were close, but Hopkins eventually wore down his more popular opponent.
Prior to the fight, Hopkins predicted exactly how he would beat Trinidad, and he saw it through exactly as he envisioned it.
He timed Trinidad’s forays and counter-punched beautifully. In the 12th round, Tito’s corner mercifully called for the denouement of the fight, and the rest as they say, is history for Bernard Hopkins.
After that fight, Tito was never the same again. He would win two more fights, but lost his last two to Ronald Wright and Roy Jones Jr.
BUD. Can Terence Crawford take a page out of Tito’s journey, learn from it and somehow pull off a victory against a much bigger, accomplished champion in Canelo Alvarez?
I think he can, but he has to fight the perfect fight.
“Bud” was a lightweight champion not too long ago and he moved up to the junior welterweight division in 2015. He became a welterweight champion in 2018 and just last year, moved up to the junior middleweight division.
As you can see, his journey through weight classes has been gradual and ideal. However, the fight against Alvarez will be at the 168 lb and this will be his first foray at the supermiddleweight division.
There’s an adage in boxing that a good big man will beat a good little man nine times out of ten, and this could hold true for Alvarez-Crawford. But we have considered how “good” Canelo still is at this stage in his career and whether Crawford is really that “small”
Check out our three possible scenarios for this superfight in next week’s column
LAST ROUND. It’s on my idol, my one and only bro, Atty Ramsey Quijano who celebrates his birthday this week. Cheers!