Miguel Cotto defeated Yuri Foreman to win the WBA junior middleweight title, but the fight came second to the event itself.
The fight took place at Yankees Stadium, in the Bronx, New York, it pitted, Foreman, a recent world champion, who in 2014, went on to be an Orthodox rabbi, against one of the biggest Puerto Rican boxing stars of the modern era, Miguel Cotto.
Despite being undefeated, Foreman came in as a slight betting underdog. In terms of pay, Cotto was making two million dollars, were as Foreman was making $750,000, for the event promoted by Top Rank Inc, as they fought in front of 20,272 people.
One of the major stories of the fight was a theme of Cotto’s career - reinvention. We saw it late when he went to train with Freddie Roach, but for this bout, Cotto trained with Emanuel Stewart, the pioneer of the Kronk Gym style of boxing. The bout served as the first boxing in Yankee Stadium in over 53 years, as the last one was Muhammad Ali versus Ken Norton, in 1976.
The bout was shown on HBO Championship Boxing and was forever defined by Yuri Foreman falling down in round seven when his right knee buckled. This became the story of the fight. Foreman’s trainer, Joe Grier, tried to throw the towel in, but referee Arthur Mercante Jr., allowed the fight to continue on various occasions.
Cotto would stop Foreman in the ninth round with a signature left hook.
Cotto, The Great Puerto Rican Fighter
After Felix Trinidad, we had Miguel Cotto, a legend, who emerged from the island of Puerto Rico and navigated us through the new waters of the internet, social media, and various other entities.
Cotto had lost to the now-shamed Antonio Margarito, as well as had a rough outing with Joshua Clottey prior to being stopped late by Manny Pacquiao. Cotto was abandoning the welterweight division and moving up - and won a title against Foreman.
Cotto’s career was confusing not unlike a lot of great fighters as after this win, he would land a marquee fight against Floyd Mayweather which he lost, and then lose to Austin Trout in a true shocker in Madison Square Garden.
Cotto would end his career with Freddie Roach, in the middleweight division, beating Sergio Martinez, the man of the division at the time, but staying astutely away from the biggest threat Gennadiy Golovkin.
His final big act was facing Canelo Alvarez on pay-per-view in a fight he’d lose.
Cotto wasn’t just a fighter, but someone who brought out the big names, and made the big fights.
Foreman’s aftermath
Despite holding a win over Daniel Santos to win his world title, Foreman never got the respect he truly deserved as a fighter. The knee issue would plague him, and in his next fight he would lose to Pawel Wolak, who just walked through his punches.
Foreman tried to revive his career, but the magic and a bit of intrigue were gone. Foreman's rise in the sport was exciting as we hadn’t had at to my memory, a boxing rabbi, and his footwork as well as speed was elite. It was always a question of; whether it could work at the highest level.
Against Cotto, on this night it didn’t, and that seemingly dimmed enthusiasm around his career.
