i wonder if professional boxing will return to minnesota after tonight.But you know what? Iwouldn't care if it never returned to minnesota. that was one of the worst decisions i have ever seen. there is no way no how, not a single possible reason that vanda should have won that fight. he won 2 rounds at most, and that is being generous.
the worst part about this decision is that it hurts Matt Vanda, who is a helluva nice guy, and he had absolutely nothing to do with it. He simply went out and did what his job was to do and that was to fight Sam Garr. Now the judges come along and take away the impressive showing by Sam Garr and spit in the face of it. I would totally understand if Sugar Ray Leonard came back to promote in minnesota. If your guy gets beaten the way his did tonight and he still gets a decision, why the hell not come back time and again?
Now onto the judging situation. All 3 of those judges should never judge again, even the one who ruled for Garr. He ruled 97-95 for Garr, which is rediculous because Garr won at least 8 rounds. I personally know one of the judges and despite that I would still be a happy man if he never judged a professional fight again. The way his scores read were like he was watching a different fight. I also don't think his connections to certain people in the fight helped the situation.
Overall it is a giant blackeye to the sport, hurts Vanda when he didn't really do anything to deserve whats coming, and hopefully 2 of those judges
SC - You say you know one of the judges personally. Have you made your displeasure over last night's events known to this person? If so, what was his response? How serious are they about boxing in MN to begin with?
i haven't spoken to him yet, i expect to see him within the next month or so at one of my amateur fights. i'm most likely going to talk to him and ask what was going through his head. im friends with him but not good enough friends to not mind if i offend him or not.
as for how serious they are, i honestly don't know but it doesn't seem they are too serious. this was the highest profile fight in MN in a long long long time, most likely the biggest fight since my coach, Duane Bobick, last fought here. however, i think it says something about how serious they are when the botch the decision of the biggest fight in MN in 20-30 years.