Clutch City Boxing

Punch-stats and fighter’s faces tell a different story than the judges decision

Whether in the “good old days” of boxing or the current “social media” era of boxing, one thing has been consistent, money and making money is the ultimate objective. And last night’s main event was a perfect example of that.

On one side you had Valdez, who despite failing pre-fight drug testing, was allowed to follow through with his homecoming “showcase” against a former amateur rival, who despite his amateur pedigree, hadn’t done anything in the pro ranks to give any indication that he might upset Valdez’s hometown love-fest.

On the other side you had Conceicao, an Olympian and gold medal winner, who had largely under-achieved up until last night, and had struggled with B level competition fairly recently.

The actors were all in place and the table was set for “Valdez’s Homecoming”. The sanctioning body of the night (WBC), the referee, the judges, and DAZN broadcast commentators, all knew the script for the night. Conceicao was brought in to provide some resistance but ultimately play his part in making Valdez look strong and set up a future fight between Valdez and the winner of the upcoming Herring vs Stevenson bout.

And although Andre Ward and Timothy Bradley spoke out against Valdez apparently using a banned performance enhancement drug and testing positive for it, they still played along with the narrative as soon as the bout started, largely ignoring Conceicao’s work in controlling Valdez from the start, peppering him with jabs to the head and body, and following through with laser like straight right hands, while making sure to mention anything Valdez was able to do, which wasn’t much.

Conceicao’s dominance was Valdez was soo evident through the first six or seven rounds, that all the on air commentators could do was to criticize Conceicao’s “clowning” of Valdez, stating that he was not endearing himself to the crowd, or judges.

And just to be clear, Valdez did try to turn it up in the last half of the bout, but he still wasn’t very effective, and Conceicao still controlled the ring, and landed punches in return whenever he did get touched.

The on-air narrative that Conceicao gave up the match because he didn’t dominate as thoroughly as he did in the first seven rounds, in the last five, was a weak attempt to salvage the reputation and record of Valdez in order to set up the big money unification with the winner of Herring vs Stevenson.

Also little to no mention was made of the fact that the referee unjustly took a point away from Conceicao for tapping the back of Valdez’s head during a clinch, while Valdez landed legitimate, full power, shots to the back of Conceicao’s head during the bout, not to mention several low blows.

The WBC, DAZN, and boxing in general know that Valdez is part of the most powerful team in boxing at the moment, The Reynoso Team, of whom the biggest money maker in boxing, Canelo Alvarez is a member of, and they did everything they could to make sure the money train keeps rolling.

The punch-stats along with the faces of Valdez and Conceicao told the story much better than the biased commentary and judges decision did. And even the punch-stats were favorable to Valdez because I know my eyes weren’t lying to me when I saw Conceicao land more body shots than he was given credit for.

As is always the case in the stage of life, fact is always more powerful than fiction, and the fact of the matter of the Valdez vs Conceicao bout is/was, that an underdog came into a known PED drug cheat’s hometown, and still out-performed, out-boxed, and out-fought him, regardless of what the biased judges decision and on-air commentators said.