Under the category of ‘Good Fights That End Badly’ is
Tuesday’s boxing FS1 Toe-to-Toe-Tuesday matchup between Miguel Flores and Chris
Avalos. Both boxers acquitted themselves
superbly although I would have given Flores the win if they’d gone to the
scorecards. Instead, the referee ruled
Avalos the winner by RTD.
At first I didn’t get what was going on when ref Bruce
McDaniel stopped the fight at a break in the action. RTD means retired by technical decision. If you’re wondering how RTD differs from TKO,
the latter (TKO) means you were stopped in the ring by the punches of the
opponent. In that case, the ref jumps in
and stops one fighter from taking further punishment.
Those punches you take when you’re out on your feet are the ones that
can kill you. But that wasn’t the case
here.
An RTD occurs when a fighter refuses to continue or his
corner won’t let him continue. In Flores’ case, he was bleeding from a cut
opened up by an unintentional head butt and a combination of punches. McDaniel says the cut opened up first from a punch. But even if that were so, a head-butt occurred and made it impossible to continue. If strict rules of interpretation (as in criminal law) were applied, then the head-butt would have been the reason for the stoppage and Flores would have been declared the winner.
I don’t think anyone
knows which caused the greater damage but everyone (including Avalos)
acknowledges the head butt. If the fight
were stopped at that point, and for that reason, I would have gone to the
scorecards. The referee, believing that
the cut was opened in an earlier round, went for the RTD.
By the way, all three judges had Flores winning when the
fight was halted.
