Antonio Margarito

Antonio Margarito Montiel (born on March 18, 1978 in Torrance, California) is a Mexican professional boxer. He is a former WBA, WBO, & IBF welterweight champion.^[1] Nicknamed El Tornado de Tijuana, he is known for his aggressive fighting style and his iron chin. Margarito was in an incident in which his corner was caught tampering with his hand wraps prior to his bout with Shane Mosley, the hand wraps were found by the CSAC to contain sulfur and calcium which, when combined with oxygen, forms Plaster of Paris.^[2] He is currently trained by former IBF super featherweight champion Roberto García.^[3] Antonio also manages IBF lightweight champion Miguel Vázquez.^[4]

Personal life

He resides in Tijuana, Baja California with his wife Michelle Margarito and is the brother-in-law of undefeated prospect Hanzel Martinez.^[5]

Amateur career

Margarito compiled a record of 18–3 in his relatively brief amateur career, indicating that he may have turned pro quickly due to financial concerns.^[6]

Professional career

Welterweight

Margarito made his debut at the age of 15, beating Jose Trujillo in Tijuana by decision. On April 25, he achieved his first knockout, defeating Victor Angulo in the second round. On October 17 he suffered his first defeat, a six round decision to Victor Lozoya. Over the next six bouts he went 4–2. Following that he went 28–2–1, with notable wins over Alfred Ankamah, Juan Soberanes, future world Middleweight Champion Sergio Gabriel Martinez, Buck Smith, David Kamau and Frankie Randall, a former World Jr. welterweight champion who became the first man to beat Julio César Chávez in 91 fights.

WBO Welterweight Championship

On July 21, 2001, he got his first world title try against southpaw Daniel Santos for the WBO welterweight title, at Bayamón, Puerto Rico's Rubén Rodríguez Coliseum. The fight had to be stopped in the first round as a consequence of a clash of heads that opened deep gashes on both fighters and sent them both to a nearby hospital. Because the fight had not gone four rounds or more for a technical decision to be awarded, it was declared a no contest, and Santos retained the belt.

Capturing the title

Santos then vacated the WBO title to go up in weight and pursue the WBO's light middleweight championship, and Margarito was assigned to fight Antonio Díaz for the vacant title, in front of an HBO Boxing audience. On March 16, 2002, Margarito crowned himself world champion, beating Diaz by knockout in round ten. He defended that crown with a decision in twelve over Danny Perez Ramírez and a knockout in two over former WBA title holder Andrew Lewis. Lewis was a southpaw and a hard puncher, but had been exposed as having a weak chin. Margarito proved that he has a world class chin. He publicly asked for a unification bout with then WBC and WBA champion Ricardo Mayorga.

At this point Margarito considered going up in weight, to try to lure Fernando Vargas, Oscar De La Hoya or Shane Mosley into a lucrative fight, or Santos into a rematch at the Jr. Middleweight division. On October 17, 2003, Margarito made his light middleweight division debut with a two round knockout win over Maurice Brantley in Phoenix, Arizona.

On January 31, 2004, and back in the welterweight division, he retained his title with a second round knockout of Canada's previously undefeated Hercules Kyvelos.

Margarito did face Daniel Santos in a rematch on September 11 of the same year, at the José Miguel Agrelot Coliseum in San Juan, for Santos' WBO light middleweight title. The rematch also ended because of a headbutt, but this time, as the fight had already reached the four rounds mark needed for fights like these to be decided by judges, Margarito lost by a split ten round technical decision. He was down on two scorecards when the fight was stopped.

On April 23, 2005, Margarito retained his WBO welterweight title against another Puerto Rican, undefeated world class puncher Kermit Cintron, dropping him four times on his way to a fifth round knockout. This was regarded as one of his best wins.

After almost a ten month layoff, Margarito returned to the boxing ring on February 18, 2006, retaining his title with a first round knockout of Jaime Manuel Gomez, who had lasted eleven rounds with Mosley for the IBF lightweight title eight and a half years before.

On December 2, 2006, Margarito defeated future champion Joshua Clottey by a twelve round unanimous decision. Margarito set a Compubox all-time record of 1675 total punches thrown in a twelve round bout.^[7]

Losing the title and regaining it

On July 14, 2007, Margarito lost a unanimous 12 round decision to undefeated challenger Paul Williams, losing his WBO belt. After the bout Margarito heavily disputed the decision, claiming that he had landed the most meaningful punches. Williams, however, landed the most punches (outhitting Margarito by almost a 2–1 ratio, and throwing an average of over 100 punches per round) according to compubox.^[8]

On April 12, 2008, Margarito engaged in a rematch with Cintron, who had won the IBF welterweight title belt following his loss to Margarito in 2005. In the early rounds, Cintron struck Margarito with several flush power shots to the head, but Margarito remained unhurt and continued to execute a game plan of continuously moving forward and pressuring Cintron. In the sixth round, Margarito landed a liver shot, knocking Cintron out and taking the IBF title. As the referee counted Cintron out, HBO cameras captured Margarito, from a neutral corner, gesturing upward with his arms and urging Cintron to get up so that the two men could continue fighting for a longer period of time.^[9]

Margarito vs. Cotto

Following his successful rematch with Cintron, the IBF ordered him to fight a mandatory defense against the organization's number-one contender, Joshua Clottey, whom Margarito had previously defeated in 2006. Rather than agreeing to a rematch with Clottey, Margarito vacated the IBF title and agreed to a fight with undefeated WBA titlist Miguel Cotto of Puerto Rico. The Cotto-Margarito match took place on July 26, 2008, in Las Vegas, Nevada

Margarito won in the 11th round via TKO. Margarito had lost almost all the early rounds, but he came back with relentless pace, eventually winning in the 11th round in which was one of the fights of the year.^[10] At the time of the TKO Margarito was ahead by two rounds on two judges' scorecards, with one judge having it even. Prior to his fight with Shane Mosley, Margarito had a record of 37 wins, 5 losses and 1 no contest, with 27 wins by knockout.

Shane Mosley

Margarito fought Shane Mosley on January 24, 2009 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, California,^[11][12] for the WBA title and the vacant Lineal Welterweight championships of Lineal Champs and Cyber Boxing Zone (CBZ).^[13][14] The Ring did not recognize this bout for its vacant Welterweight championship despite the fact it pitted The Ring #1 ranked welterweight, Antonio Margarito vs. The Ring #3 ranked welterweight, Shane Mosley. Coming in the bout, Margarito had just TKO'd the previous The Ring #1 ranked welterweight and current The Ring #2 ranked welterweight, Miguel Cotto.^[15] In the fight Margarito was battered and outclassed by Mosley, he lost the fight and his WBA title by 9th round TKO.

Tampered handwraps controversy

Controversy erupted before the fight when Mosley's trainer, Naazim Richardson, observed that Margarito had a pasty white substance in his handwraps.^[16] One doctor described this material as plaster hidden in the wrapped hands of Margarito, leading to accusations that he may have been trying to cheat. At Richardson's insistence, California State Inspector Dean Lohuis called for Margarito's hands to be rewrapped. According to Judd Burstein, the attorney for Mosley, Margarito had wet pads in the wrapping. Mosley's doctor, Robert Olvera, likened the material to the type of plaster used to make casts. Burstein said he seized the pad removed from the wrapping and another pad found in Margarito's dressing room. Both were placed in a sealed box that was given to Lohuis for further study.^[17] The California Department of Justice laboratory later confirmed the substance to be similar in nature to plaster of Paris.^[18]

In late January, the California State Athletic Commission suspended Margarito and his trainer, Javier Capetillo, pending investigation.^[19] At the hearing, Margarito claimed he did not know what was in the wraps, while Capetillo admitted to making "a big mistake" by placing the wrong inserts into Margarito's hand wraps. The commission voted unanimously to revoke Margarito and Capetillo's licenses for at least one year. While it found Margarito did not know about the gloves, it took the line that as head of the team, he was responsible for Capetillo's actions. Since state boxing commissions generally honor suspensions imposed in other states, this action effectively banned Margarito from boxing in the United States.^[20]

In November 2009, it emerged that red stains on the hand wraps Margarito used in the Cotto fight were similar to the stains on the inserts seized before the Mosley fight. This has raised suspicions that Margarito's gloves were loaded for that fight, and possibly others as well.^[21]

Latin Fury 14

Margarito was scheduled to return to the ring on March 13, 2010 against Carson Jones, pending his relicensing, on the Pacquiao-Clottey undercard. But for reasons unspecified, promoter Top Rank announced he would not return.^[22] Margarito expressed interest in fighting Filipino boxer Manny Pacquiao if the latter's bout with Floyd Mayweather did not materialize.

His comeback fight was postponed until May 8 and was held at Aguascalientes, Mexico, where he faced light middleweight contender Roberto García (21–2).^[23] Margarito won a ten round unanimous decision over Garcia to capture the vacant WBC International Light Middleweight title.^[24][25] The judges’ score cards were 99–89, 100–88 and 99–90, all in favor of Margarito.^[26]

Pacquiao vs. Margarito

On July 23, 2010, Bob Arum announced that Margarito would face Manny Pacquiao for the WBC light middleweight title that was vacated by current undisputed middleweight champion Sergio Gabriel Martinez.^[27][28] The fight took place on Saturday, November 13, 2010 in Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Texas as Margarito got a license in Texas, United States.^[29][30] In his Camp for this fight, Margarito had four southpaw sparring partners who are the undefeated; Karim Martínez, Cleotis Pendarvis,^[31] number one mandatory for the WBA light middleweight title, Austin Trout, and U.S. Olympic Silver Medalist Ricardo Williams.^[32][33] Despite having a 17 pound weight advantage, a 4.5 inch height advantage, and a six inch reach advantage, Margarito was dominated by Pacquiao and took a savage, brutal beating.^[34] The fight wound up being a unanimous decision loss for Margarito, with the judges' scorecards being 120–108, 119–109, and 118–108.^[34][35] Margarito was taken to the hospital directly after the fight where it was discovered that his right orbital bone had been fractured. Surgery had to be postponed to three days later as his face was too swollen to operate on.^[36]

Five weeks before the fight Margarito and boxer Brandon Rios were interviewed by Elie Seckbach and the video taken showed the group mocking Manny Pacquiao's trainer Freddie Roach who has Parkinson's disease.^[37][38] On the Thursday before the fight, Margarito publicly apologized to Roach and to everyone suffering from Parkinson's.^[37]

Margarito vs. Cotto II

On December 3, 2011, Margarito was defeated by Miguel Cotto via TKO in the 10th round. The fight was stopped at the start of the 10th round because of the condition of Margarito's right eye which was swelled shut. This was the same eye that was badly damaged in his fight with Manny Paquiao and the one that almost kept the New York State Athletic Commision from granting him his boxing license because of the special procedure that was performed on it in 2010.

Professional boxing record

See also

• Notable boxing families
• List of Welterweight World boxing champions
• List of IBF World Champions
• List of WBO World Champions
• List of WBA World Champions
• The Battle (Margarito's battle against WBA Welterweight champion Miguel Cotto)

References

External links

• Antonio Margarito Fight-by-Fight Career Record
• Manny Pacquiao vs Antonio Margarito
• Personal Website
• Official Clothing Line
• Professional boxing record for Antonio Margarito from BoxRec