- Published:November 22nd, 2008
- Comments:No Comment
- Category:Graham Houston`s Prediction/Reports, Uncategorized
I knew Steve Molitor was in the toughest, most dangerous fight of his life against Celestino Caballero in their junior featherweight title unification match on Friday night but I never thought he would get blown away in a mismatch.
As ShoBox commentator Nick Charles noted, the Canadian southpaw “didn’t land one sharp, accurate punch” in the four-round meltdown.
Caballero, freakishly tall and long-reaching, effortlessly walked Molitor down and whacked him out. I wrote “Fight’s over” in my notebook in the first round. The end didn’t come until 52 seconds of the fourth, but in the first three minutes it was abundantly clear that Molitor was overmatched physically and didn’t have a clue how to deal with the monster marching across the ring at him.
When trainer Stephane Larouche told Molitor after three rounds: “It’s not Steve Molitor here tonight, it’s not you, man,” defeat had been admitted. Within a minute Molitor had been dropped by a right uppercut, and he was basically out of the fight after the eight count. Referee Luis Pabon could have stopped the fight there and then, but when Molitor’s legs buckled from follow-up punches it was all too clear that the Canadian boxer had nothing left. I was relieved when referee Pabon waved the finish, the towel coming in simultaneously from trainer Larouche.
This reminded me of a couple of other devastating defeats suffered by Canadian fighters, welterweight Shawn O’Sullivan getting destroyed in three rounds by Simon Brown and another Olympic silver medallist, heavyweight, Willie de Wit, crashing out in two rounds against Smokin’ Bert Cooper in the 1980s.
It wasn’t so much that they lost but the manner of their defeats that was so stunning. Neither man stood a chance, and neither did Molitor.
I had never picked against Molitor and I couldn’t go against him this time. I thought he had the speed, conditioning, talent and mental toughness to fight a winning fight. After all, Jorge Lacierva had been competitive against Caballero, and so had the former flyweight champion Lorenzo Parra, who was moving up three weight divisions. Even Ricardo Castillo, who had been well beaten by Molitor, went nine rounds with Caballero. One of my knowledgeable Panamanian readers emailed me shortly before the fight to say that he was rooting for Caballero but that he feared Molitor would outbox him. A lot of people got this completely wrong, me included.
Maybe Molitor was mentally tired after a busy schedule. This was his seventh title fight in two years, almost unheard-of by today’s standards. Commentator Charles wondered if Molitor was overtrained. The cruel reality, though, is that Molitor at his very best probably could not staved off such a formidable champion as Caballero. It was a sad night indeed for the Molitor team, truly a night of broken dreams, because this wasn’t just a defeat, it was a massacre. Perhaps Molitor, 27, can come back from this and enjoy success. After all, he lost to an exceptional fighter. Things will never be the same, though.
I was wrong about the winner but at least I had the right guy favourite in “Graham’s Odds”. Although I tipped Molitor I actually made him the underdog, and I would have considered it an upset had he beaten Caballero. From the first minute of the first round, though, it was obvious to me that Molitor would need a miracle to win, and there weren’t any miracles to be had on a cold night in Canada.
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