I dont give rounds to the champ because hes the champ. You either score a fight by the system or you use that you have to beat the champ mentality. You cant have it both ways. People always say you have to beat the champ. Well if the challenger won 7 close rounds to the champs 5 then the challenger wins. There cant be hey it was close and even though the challenger mightve won 7 rounds you have to beat the champ. It doesnt work like that. You either score the fight or go by that beat the champ mentality. Got Em!!
Right, the "you gotta do more to take the belt away from the champion" argument doesn't work in boxing, since there are 12 individual rounds that must be scored and handed in after each round. It's real simple.
My issue with the judges scores how they all have round ten to Kovalev, which in my mind was a clear Kovalev round. If they score that for Kovalev, he wins the fight. Here is the breakdown:
All three judges gave Round 1 and Round 2 to Kovalev, with a 10-8 score in the second round reflecting the knockdown Kovalev scored on Ward.
Two judges (McKaie and Clements) gave Round 3 to Kovalev. One (Trowbridge) gave it to Ward.
All three judges gave Round 4 to Kovalev.
Two judges (McKaie and Clements) gave
Round 5 to Ward. One (Trowbridge) gave it to Kovalev.
Two judges (McKaie and Trowbridge) gave
Round 6 to Kovalev. One (Clements) gave it to Ward.
By that halfway point, McKaie and Trowbridge had Kovalev ahead 59-54, or five rounds to one. Clements had Kovalev ahead 58-55, or four rounds to two.
In the second half, the judges almost wholly favored Ward in very close rounds. All three judges gave Round 7, Round 8 and Round 9 to Ward.
All three judges also gave Round 10 to Ward. That scoring in particular raised the eyebrows of respected BoxingScene.com scribe Cliff Rold. “There simply isn’t a good case to have Ward winning the 10th,” Rold said on Twitter, soon after the bout ended. He rewatched the fight on Sunday and still had Kovalev winning the 10th. “Ward had moments, but in a relatively high output round, Kovalev landed more and blunted with the jab in the second half,” he said.
- See more at:
Fighting Words - Kovalev-Ward: The Fight is Over, The Fighting Isn’t - Boxing News
All three judges also gave Round 11 to Ward. By that point, going into the final round, McKaie and Trowbridge had the fight even at 104-104, while Clements had Ward ahead 105-103.
Clements gave the 12th to Kovalev. McKaie and Trowbridge gave the 12th to Ward.